State Champ Radio Business
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When Bonnie Raitt‘s touching ballad “Just Like That” won the Grammy for song of the year, the singer-songwriter seemed just as shocked as the crowd. “I am just totally humbled,” she said while accepting the award.
Though she is a decorated and critically acclaimed musician, with 11 Grammys and five top 40 hits on the Hot 100 to her name, Raitt’s “Just Like That” was the least commercially successful song up for the category this year by a long shot. Despite not cracking the Hot 100 chart, “Just Like That” managed to beat out the nine other nominated songs, each of which ranked in the top 20 of the Hot 100 this year, including two No. 1 tracks (“As it Was” by Harry Styles and “About Damn Time” by Lizzo). Many see Raitt’s win as proof that the top Grammy awards do not necessarily always go to those with the most commercial or widespread success.
This particular award win is surprising for Raitt in more ways than one. Song of the year is one of four top awards given out each year by the Recording Academy, along with record of the year, album of the year and best new artist, and it is the only one of the big four that honors the craft of songwriting specifically. Raitt, as she admitted in her acceptance speech, “[doesn’t] write a lot of songs,” but she did write “Just Like That” singlehandedly.
So how much did “Just Like That” earn in publishing royalties for Raitt as its only songwriter, and how much did the Grammy win help the song commercially?
Billboard estimates that before the Grammys, “Just Like That” had earned Raitt over $6,000 in publishing royalties from its release date (April 22, 2022) to the week of the Grammys, which aired on Feb. 5, 2023, for her work as a songwriter from U.S. streaming, sales and airplay combined. In the two weeks following the show, those formats earned her another nearly $6,000. In other words, Raitt earned almost as much from the song in just two weeks as she did in the more than nine months prior to the broadcast.
Raitt owns her publishing, and she houses her songwriting catalog under two entities, Kokomo Music and Open Secret Music. In 2018, she entered an arrangement with indie publishing house Bluewater Music to administer her publishing catalog worldwide. Because she owns her publishing and wrote “Just Like That” by herself, the vast majority of the money she earns from the song will end up in Raitt’s pocket, with deductions likely only made to pay Bluewater Music administration fees and whatever cut her manager makes.
Overall, since the release of “Just Like That,” Billboard estimates that Raitt has earned a total of about $12,000 in publishing royalties from streams and sales of the song. The majority of that came from both physical sales of the album on which the song appears — also called Just Like That — and U.S. on-demand audio streams, according to Luminate. In the two-week period after the Grammys, song downloads and streaming were the biggest source of royalties by far.
In terms of streaming alone, Raitt earned only about $975 worth of publishing royalties from U.S. on-demand audio streams in the almost 10 months that elapsed between the song’s release and the week of the Grammys. But in just the two weeks since her song of the year win, she has earned a little over $2,000 in publishing royalties for U.S. on-demand audio streams.
The week before the Grammys, dated Jan. 27-Feb. 2, “Just Like That” was racked up 44,000 on-demand audio streams in the U.S. The week after the Grammys, dated Feb. 3-9, on-demand U.S. audio streams increased by 3,028% to 1.377 million, according to Luminate. The massive spike, however, did not hold steady in the following week, dated Feb. 10-16, when the number of U.S. on-demand audio streams fell to just over 410,000.
On the physical sales side, Raitt earned over $4,000 in publishing royalties from selling copies of her albums through to the night of the Grammys. In the two weeks after the awards show, Raitt earned about $700.
Along with increased consumption in the sales and streaming categories, “Just Like That” has also sparked interest at radio. The week before the Grammys, it was played just a handful of times, but in the two weeks after her win, she received a total of 144 radio spins, according to Luminate. While still not significant enough to push her to the top of any charts, airplay could contribute solidly toward her future publishing earnings if it continues to gain traction.
So far, the big Grammy win for “Just Like That” doesn’t appear to be boosting sales and streaming activity for Raitt’s overall catalog in the U.S. While weekly catalog album consumption activity jumped to over 9,000 copies on average in each of the two weeks after the show — up from the weekly average of over 3,000 copies before the show — all of that gain is coming from the Just Like That album.
Rising British singer PinkPantheress has been gaining recognition with a set of mixtapes and EPs that have caught the attention of fans, and the U.K. charts, over the past few years. And while she had been bubbling under in the United States, she had yet to crack the Hot 100 until this month, when her single with Ice Spice, “Boy’s a liar Pt. 2,” went viral and debuted at No. 14 on the Hot 100 before rocketing to No. 4 this week. The track is the first Hot 100 Top 10 for both artists, as well as the first duet by two acts who are each making their first Hot 100 Top 10 appearance to reach that mark in only two weeks since February 2021.
The story of “Boy’s a liar Pt. 2” started in November, when PinkPantheress’ original, solo version of the song was released and started gaining traction — where else? — on TikTok. A few months later, rising Bronx MC Ice Spice jumped on the remix and the two shot a video in New York City. Released Feb. 3, the “Pt. 2” remix exploded out of the gate, making waves not just in the United States but also globally; this week, it concurrently shot up to No. 4 on the Billboard Global 200. And that earns 300 Entertainment vp of marketing Lallie Jones the title of Billboard’s Executive of the Week.
Here, Jones discusses the viral spark that 300 — along with its U.K. and global partners at Warner Music Group — managed to turn into a Top 5 hit, the differences between the U.S. and global marketing campaigns and the impact of radio jumping on the song, which led U.S. spins to increase 258% week over week. “One can embark on a release with what you think will and should happen, but timing and cultural appetite will always dictate the impact of a record,” she says. “The collision of PinkPantheress’ underground notoriety and mystique, mixed with Ice Spice’s ubiquity and virality, led to a pop culture explosion.”
This week, PinkPantheress and Ice Spice’s “Boy’s a liar, Pt. 2” surged to No. 4 on both the Hot 100 and the Billboard Global 200 charts. What key decisions did you make to help make that happen?
So much about this project has been a collaborative effort amongst PinkPantheress, her management and the global team across WMG. Our goal at 300 was to utilize the remix to broaden her already growing profile and further develop her reach Stateside. PinkPantheress’ music transcends genre, but it was important in the U.S. market to establish her as a Black artist creating on her own terms. As such, we strategically secured support from social accounts that could help accelerate the cultural conversation. We also targeted influential livestreamers and enlisted creators whose reaction videos propelled the track’s consumption. The official video also played a key role in setting this release on fire as the No. 1 trending video on YouTube for 11 straight days. PinkPantheress really wanted to step into Ice Spice’s world and film in NYC with the rising directors George and Fred Buford. Zak Boumlaki, her incredible marketing lead at Warner Records U.K., and I ensured the cast reflected youth and diversity that truly resonated.
The original “Boy’s a liar” was released in November. Why did you guys want to put out this remix, and how did it come together?
The original “Boy’s a liar” sound started to go crazy on TikTok in November, and once released, the track continued its viral trajectory throughout the holidays. The U.S. and U.K. teams pushed for an additional version, believing that the song deserved a longer story. It was PinkPantheress’ decision to enlist Ice Spice for the remix. Coincidentally, Ice Spice had posted the song on her IG stories, and PinkPantheress responded to it by asking if she’d like to team up.
The song has been a smash out of the gate, becoming the first duet by two acts each making their first Top 10 appearance on the Hot 100 to reach that mark in only two weeks since February 2021. What was the marketing plan behind it?
Leading up to release, the main marketing anchor was releasing a vibrant visual that placed the two artists in the same world. Initially, we wanted to keep the collaboration a surprise, with the intention of slowly teasing the partnership on both artists’ TikTok accounts. [But] snippets of them shooting together fueled a frenzy, and, even before the partnership was revealed, there was a bubbling conversation amongst their fans fantasizing about what would happen if the two actually came together. One can embark on a release with what you think will and should happen, but timing and cultural appetite will always dictate the impact of a record. The collision of PinkPantheress’ underground notoriety and mystique, mixed with Ice Spice’s ubiquity and virality, led to a pop culture explosion.
The song is not just No. 4 in the U.S., but also globally. How did the worldwide rollout plan differ from the U.S. plan?
In [the U.S.] market, we face the common challenge of tying the artist themselves to their music, especially when they’re not from here. While other markets might have impacted radio at launch, our plan was to first focus on setting the table culturally before pursuing a commercial radio push. We had the fortune of PinkPantheress being Stateside on release weekend and were able to capture her moving around with different artists, including her linking with Ice Spice throughout the weekend. Seeing her outside in the States is all part of her establishing a true U.S. presence.
The song has grown significantly in streams (up 54%) and radio airplay (up 258%) in just its second week out. How do you plan to keep the momentum going?
There’s no ceiling for this song or PinkPantheress as a writer, producer and artist. Despite its online ascension, the radio story is only beginning and the track will see a multi-format impact in March. Radio airplay will take the song’s consumption and visibility to the next level, positioning the track as one of the most popular anthems of the year. Alongside radio, the track will sustain momentum through thoughtful digital strategy, out-of-home campaigns, and her upcoming appearances at U.S. festivals this year. Following her gut and internal compass has resulted in PinkPantheress developing into one of the most intriguing artists of this time. Our North Star is protecting her brand and supporting her vision by pursuing only the right opportunities that will take her to new heights.
What’s TikTok without music? That’s the central question at the heart of debates between major rights holders and the Bytedance-owned social media platform negotiating rates for their content, and a group of Australian users have been pulled into the middle to try to find out.
Earlier this month, it was revealed that that TikTok is running tests in Australia that limits the amount of licensed music some users can encounter on the platform. The test impacts fewer than half of Australia-based accounts, and it doesn’t affect everyone in the same way, according to a person familiar with the situation. The test puts people into multiple cohorts and provides them with different libraries of sounds to use in video creation. So, not everybody in the test will have the same catalog to choose from. Likewise, users in the test cohorts have different encounters with audio. Some people in test cohorts will encounter muted music on other users’ videos. This allows TikTok to compare and measure the different ways people interact with the app.
The results may inform TikTok’s licensing strategy, but evidence that some Australians are unhappy members of the test cohort can be seen on Twitter. “Tiktok really ruining its own app with all this ‘sound removed’ garbage,” one Australian user tweeted last week. Another echoed the sentiment: “wtf is up with tiktok removing like half the sounds??? like i swear ive seen SO many tiktoks where the sound has been removed.”
The risk of upsetting users and creators isn’t lost on TikTok. “We appreciate it’s disappointing if a certain track is unavailable or if a sound is muted on a previous video,” the company said in a statement. “This change will not be in place for long and not all music is affected.” The test will run from a month to a month and a half, according to a source familiar with the situation, meaning it should conclude by mid-March.
Why would TikTok degrade its user experience even in a relatively small market like Australia? A source familiar with the company’s thinking said TikTok is using the experiment to study what is trending, how users are accessing the platform through different entry points and how they are enjoying it. It is not a negotiating tactic, the person said. Nonetheless, the company is gathering the data during a year when most, if not all, of TikTok’s agreements with music rights owners come up for renewal. The source said it is predictable that TikTok would gather this information ahead of high-stakes negotiations, like those ongoing with major labels and other stakeholders.
Around the music industry, there are different interpretations for TikTok’s actions. One explanation is that TikTok is doing what tech companies do all the time: run tests, collect data and analyze the results. That narrative fits with what’s known. Australia, an important yet small and isolated English-speaking market, is a popular place for tech companies — Spotify, Facebook, Google, Tinder and others — to test new products. Much like these other companies, TikTok is an engineering-led company with engineers who want to take data-driven approaches to making decisions on how much time and resources should be invested in projects, building systems and, yes, even licensing rights. Sometimes, as history has shown with most of those other companies, too, a different mindset puts them at odds with creative industries.
“I don’t think they truly understand music at these tech companies,” says a record label executive. “It just doesn’t resonate with them.”
Negotiating tool?
TikTok, of course, has numerous people from the music world on staff: Ole Obermann, global head of music, and Tracy Gardner, head of licensing and partnerships, are former Warner Music Group executives. Jordan Lowy, head of music publishing licensing and partnerships, previously worked at Universal Music Group and Disney Music Group, and dozens if not hundreds of other music industry alums work at TikTok in editorial and artist partnerships. But the company looks and acts like a social media company, not a music company.
A less benign view of the test is that TikTok is looking for a rationale to argue music is not important to the platform – or not as important as labels believe. Annabelle Herd, the CEO of ARIA, the trade body for the Australian record industry, said TikTok “seeks to rationalize cutting artists’ compensation” and “downplay the significance of music on its platform.” Another industry executive believes the test is meant to lower expectations going into discussions with rights holders. “They’re looking to anchor their negotiating position near zero,” says a music industry source.
TikTok has spent years playing up music’s importance to creators, users and artists. “Music is at the heart of the TikTok experience,” Obermann stated in the opening words of the TikTok 2021 Music Report. That year, around 430 songs surpassed 1 billion views, up 200% from the previous year, and over 175 songs that trended that year charted on the Hot 100. In the company’s 2022 year-end report, Obermann reiterated TikTok’s value to artists, saying the platform “continues to unlock real-world opportunities for artists and labels, helping talent to secure record deals, brand collaborations, chart success, or be re-discovered decades later.”
And while the platform has certainly evolved beyond lip-syncing videos – book reviews and finance advice abound, for example – much of the recent news coming out of the company still involves music: StemDrop, an interactive, collaborative songwriting platform led by Max Martin, Syco Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Samsung; a Calvin Harris virtual reality concert; and welcomes to The Rolling Stones and Dolly Parton for joining the platform.
Anecdotally, exactly how important records labels’ music is to TikTok is debatable. Its top three trending songs of 2022 were independent releases, and the No. 1 song, “Sunroof” by Nicky Youre & Dazy, was originally released independently through SoundOn, TikTok’s music distribution business that’s been known to add promotion to music uploaded through its service. In all, only five of the top 10 of 2022 were signed to major labels. Major label music is arguably more important to on-demand streaming platforms and radio stations. By contrast, all the top 10 tracks of Billboard’s year-end Hot 100 and Radio Songs charts were released through major labels.
But major label music is everywhere on TikTok. Lizzo’s “About Damn Time” was the No. 4 trending song of 2022. Pharrell Williams’ “Just a Cloud Away” was No. 5. Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill” was No. 10. And TikTok’s ability to give unknown artists a large audience increases its need to license music from labels. “Sunroof” was so successful that Youre signed with Colombia Records and reached No. 4 on the Hot 100.
What’s past is prologue
TikTok has ample motivation to reduce what it pays music rights holders. Licensing costs eat up more than 70% of a music subscription service’s revenue with little left over after paying operating expenses. Social networks, on the other hand, generate huge sums of free cash flow. Facebook, for example, had an operating margin of 25% in 2022 and 40% in 2021.
Services that once butted heads with music rights holders decided it was wiser to build partnerships that enriched both sides. Like TikTok, YouTube began as an ad-supported platform built on user-generated content and characterized by minuscule royalties. Over time, YouTube attracted better advertisers, built a strong on-demand premium service and became a major source of revenue for labels and publishers. In the 12-month period ended June 30, 2022, YouTube paid music rights holders $6 billion through YouTube advertisements and fees from the YouTube Music subscription service.
Now, YouTube has “a phenomenal partnership” with rights owners after it “decided that music is important to us forever,” Warner Music Group CEO Robert Kyncl, YouTube’s former chief business officer, said during WMG’s Feb. 9 earnings call. It invested in music “holistically” by building a copyright management platform, Copyright ID, launching the YouTube Music subscription service and taking on TikTok with its short-form video platform, YouTube Shorts.
TikTok appears to share YouTube’s ambitions to offer a multitude of services that segment the market into ad-supported and paying customers. Parent company Bytedance already has an on-demand music service, Resso, operating in Brazil, Indonesia and India, and a separate on-demand service, Qishui Yinyue, in China. But in major markets like the U.S., TikTok users that want to listen to an entire track and explore an artist’s catalog end up going – in large numbers – to on-demand services like Spotify and Apple Music. Pairing its short-form video platform with an on-demand service would give TikTok a “significant opportunity” to leverage data and manage customers across multiple platforms, says one of the music industry sources. “Why would they not want to capture that demand themselves?”
“TikTok needs to do that [also],” Kyncl said during Warner’s earnings call. “It’s the right decision for them to evaluate.”
Additional reporting by Liz Dilts Marshall
Lawyers for Ed Sheeran’s copyright accusers are firing back at the star’s efforts to ban an infamous YouTube clip from an upcoming trial over “Thinking Out Loud,” calling the video “among the most important and critical evidence in this case.”
With a trial looming in April over whether Sheeran’s smash hit infringed Marvin Gaye‘s “Let’s Get It On,” a pre-game showdown is brewing over whether jurors will get to watch the YouTube video. In it, Sheeran draws cheers at a 2014 concert by seamlessly toggling between the two songs.
Earlier this month, the star’s lawyers argued that the clip will confuse jurors. While such a performance might appear to be evidence of illegal copying, Sheeran’s lawyers argued that it really only showed that both songs feature a common chord progression that’s “freely available to all songwriters.”
But in a response on Thursday (Feb. 23), lawyers for Sheeran’s accusers said the clip was obviously relevant to the core dispute in the case: whether “Thinking Out Loud” shares enough similarities with “Let’s Get It On” to constitute copyright infringement.
“The video of the medley at issue provides helpful guidance to highlight and/or illustrate those similarities and why they are significant,” attorney Patrick Frank wrote. “The medley which defendants belatedly seek to exclude from admission at trial … is among the most important and critical evidence in the case.”
The current case against Sheeran was filed way back in 2017 by heirs of Ed Townsend, who co-wrote “Let’s Get It On.” Gaye’s heirs, who once famously sued Robin Thicke over accusations that his “Blurred Lines” was stolen from the legendary singer, are not involved in the case.
Sheeran’s lawyers have long argued that the star did nothing wrong, since “Thinking Out Loud” and “Let’s Get It On” share only “unprotectable and commonplace elements” that are not covered by copyright law. But Judge Louis D. Stanton has repeatedly refused to decide the case in their favor, ruling that the dispute is close enough that it must be decided by a jury.
In the lead-up to the trial, attorneys for the Townsend heirs filed a formal notice that they planned to play the YouTube clip for jurors. In the video — a six-minute snippet of a November 2014 concert in Zurich, Switzerland that’s been viewed nearly 300,000 times — Sheeran abruptly switches from “Thinking” to “Let’s” and back again, drawing huge cheers from the crowd.
In Thursday’s new filing, those same lawyers pointed out that the judge overseeing the case previously singled out the YouTube clip as potential evidence that might resonate with jurors, saying they “may be impressed” by the footage. “Presumably, if the court believed that the video … would be improper for a jury to view at trial, the court would have been reticent to state a jury’s possible interest in the same,” the Townsend lawyers wrote this week.
In seeking to exclude the clip, Sheeran’s lawyers argued earlier this month that allowing such evidence could have a broader “chilling effect” on the music industry and on medleys, which they called an “important, enduring aspect of live concerts.” But in Thursday’s response, the lawyers for the Townsend heirs sharply disagreed.
“Defendants have provided nothing beyond mere speculation that the inclusion of directly relevant evidence … would have any collateral impact on any aspect of the concert industry.”
An attorney for Sheeran declined to comment on the new filing. But earlier on Thursday, the star’s lawyers filed a motion arguing that the deadline for such a response had already expired; they can file a formal reply brief in the weeks ahead.
Music publishing companies Reservoir Media Management and PopArabia are suing Anghami Technologies Limited and its parent, Nasdaq-listed Anghami Inc., the Middle East’s largest legal streaming company, for copyright infringement related to a dozen Western and Arabic songs from artists like Lil Jon, 50 Cent and Kelly Clarkson.
The suit was filed Dec. 22 at the Abu Dhabi Global Markets Court.
In the filing, a copy of which Billboard procured, the court says the claim by Reservoir and PopArabia involves “the exploitation of a small number of songs in one territory” but that “the Anghami service exploits a very large number of songs in numerous territories across the Middle East region and beyond.”
Anghami is primarily a freemium audio-streaming service that says it has more than 73 million users across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), Europe and the United States, and a library of over 57 million songs. The service, which was launched by co-founders Elie Habib and Eddy Maroun in Beirut in 2012, relocated its headquarters in 2021 from Lebanon to Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, where it’s part of the Abu Dhabi Global Market. (Anghami also operates a subscription service called “Anghami Plus” that allows users to download songs.)
PopArabia, which describes itself as the “leading music publisher” in the MENA region, is also based out of Abu Dhabi. In 2020, PopArabia entered into a joint venture with Reservoir to sign and develop Arab talent
The suit names 12 songs, including such international hits as “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” by John Denver; “Candy Shop,” written by Scott Storch and 50 Cent; “Yeah!” written by Lil Jon; “I Gotta Feeling,” co-written by Frédéric Riesterer; “Havana,” “Señorita” and “Break My Heart,” co-written by Ali Tamposi; and “Because Of You,” written by Kelly Clarkson, David Hodges and Ben Moody.
The Arabic tracks are “Laa,” written by Bassem Funky and Dok Dok; “Number 1,” written by Mohamed Saber, Fawzy Hassan, Islam Mohamed Ali and Abdel Hakim; and “LV COCO” and “Hallelujah” by Moroccan hip-hop star 7Liwa.
Reservoir and PopArabia are seeking an injunction to restrain Anghami from infringing its copyrights, as well as unspecified damages, interest and costs. The applicable law for the claim is U.K. Private International Law, the court says.
In an email response to Billboard, Saurabh Poddar, Anghami’s head of licensing, says the company intends to defend itself against the lawsuit. “Despite having this claim for a handful of songs, we assert that Anghami is more than willing to sign a license with publishers no matter how small or big they are, as long as such license is negotiated and implemented with a scientific method with regards to identification of actual market share, legal capacity and provided representation is confirmed especially in the case of a sub-publisher,” Poddar says.
A spokesperson for PopArabia says the company does not comment on ongoing litigation but notes that “we do take the protection of our rights and those of songwriters very seriously and believe it is essential to the development of a healthy ecosystem for music creators, which we have championed for in the UAE for over a decade.”
Anghami says on its website that it has licensing agreements in place with major international and Arabic music labels, as well as with “thousands of independent labels and distributors.”
In their suit, Reservoir and PopArabia counter that “while [Anghami] may indeed have licensed the copyright in certain sound recordings from record companies, it has not…obtained any license to use the underlying musical and lyrical works which are embodied in the sound recordings which it offers to consumers for streaming and downloading, or to reproduce the lyrics of those Songs.”
Two sources with knowledge of the case tell Billboard that in the past Anghami has questioned PopArabia about whether the company owns the rights it says it does. “In these court cases, one of the things that they will always challenge you on is the chain of title,” says a leading executive from a global publishing company who spoke to Billboard on background. “It’s much easier for PopArabia to instigate the case using [a handful of] works that they have directly signed to them.”
Licensing negotiations between PopArabia and Anghami were ongoing for at least three years before they reached a stalemate, says the source. “That’s when the question was raised, are they actually genuine in these attempts to license?”
Abu Dhabi-based media executive Michael Garin, who says he has seen the correspondence between the two companies, tells Billboard that Anghami has made licensing deals with the three major record companies, “who clearly protect their [own] intellectual property rights.” But in the case of Anghami, “it’s my understanding that for 10 years they’ve been using music from the region and from smaller publishers who they just felt were either too ignorant, too disorganized [or] too naive to ever sue for the collection of their rights,” says Garin, the former CEO of film and entertainment company Image Nation and media hub twofour54, of which PopArabia is “an investment and portfolio company.” (Anghami did not respond to Garin’s assertions.)
Garin, who until recently was also the director-general of the Abu Dhabi Creative Media Authority, a governmental organization, says he has been “working for the past decade to help protect the intellectual property rights of content creators.”
On the support section of its website, Anghami says it generates and pays out royalties after deducting 8% for publishing rights from revenues to be paid to music-collecting societies such as SACEM. However, SACEM no longer has a licensing deal with the platform.
“In 2018, we succeeded in getting a settlement with Anghami to cover the period of exploitation [from 2012] until 2018, but from 2019 we do not have any agreement,” says Julien Dumon, the director of development, phono and digital at SACEM. Significantly, the deal, which excluded the United States, covered usage in Europe and the Middle East. Talks for a renewal have been ongoing since 2019, says Dumon.
“We have been negotiating for close to five years now,” he says. “The fact that nothing has been signed whereas on the other side, SACEM has been able to close deals within a year with all the other actors in the industry clearly demonstrates that Anghami is not willing to properly engage and get an agreement in place.” (Anghami did not respond to a question about negotiations with SACEM.)
The Middle East and North Africa is the fastest-growing music market in the world, as per the IFPI’s Global Music Report for 2022, which said revenues from recorded music in the region grew by 35% in 2021 to $89.5 million. Streaming accounts for 95% of those revenues. A consumer research study conducted by the IFPI in April surveyed over 1,500 people aged 16 to 44 in the UAE and found that 54% of the respondents “typically listen to at least one Middle Eastern genre.”
With a claimed 58% share of the music streaming market in the region, Anghami is the dominant player; at least one report has said that Spotify was considering buying the streamer.
According to a source close to the matter, Anghami initially submitted a jurisdictional challenge to the case filed by Reservoir and PopArabia and subsequently withdrew it. The streamer now has about a month to file a response in the ADGM Court.
Beyond the copyright lawsuit, Anghami faces other challenges. The streaming service said in November that it was trimming its headcount by 22%, or roughly 39 employees, in order to maintain profitability. And on Jan. 9 the company received a notice from the Nasdaq indicating Anghami was not in compliance with the stock market’s listing rules due to its failure to file an interim balance sheet and income statement for its second quarter of 2022, according to a company filing. Nasdaq gave the company until Mar. 10 to submit a plan to regain compliance.
BRISBANE, Australia — Three-piece Australian pop outfit Blusher is the latest signing to Atlantic Records, Billboard can exclusively reveal.
Hailing from Melbourne and formed in 2021, Blusher made all the right noises with their debut, the independently-released “Softly Spoken.”
The 2022 tune, a slice of euphoric pop, got support from national youth network Triple J and its Unearthed sister station, and it’s edging towards one million plays on Spotify, where it landed on several playlists, including New Pop Picks and Fresh Finds.
Carrie West, Atlantic senior director of A&R, admits she was “blown away” when she caught the band live. “Blusher embodies the next generation of empowered female artists – a self-contained force of nature who write and produce all of their music,” she comments, lauding their “riveting” stagecraft.
“I look forward to standing alongside them as we continue to channel that irresistible creativity and energy into great records for a global audience.”
Atlantic Records chairman & CEO Craig Kallman welcomes the group into the “Atlantic family.”
They’re among “those rare artists that you know from day one are destined for the world stage, and we’re proud to give this amazing trio the platform to amplify their unique voices and bring their personal visions to life on a global scale,” Kallman notes in a statement.
“From their voracious appetite for creation to their fastidious work ethic, they’re everything we look for in an Atlantic artist.”
Blusher’s career is guided by Powerhouse Management’s Jamie-Rose Fowler (George Alice, Japanese Wallpaper, INXS, ex-YUNGBLUD) and Charlotte Ried (Polish Club, Gretta Ray, Matt Corby, ex-Vera Blue).
The new Atlantic signing is comprised of Miranda Ward, Lauren Coutts and Jade Ingvarson-Favretto, all solo artists before forming the act during the pandemic.
They produce and write together, share vocals on many of their songs and swap instruments during live outings, which have included showcases at the Bigsound conference in Brisbane.
“We’re happy to partner with (Warner Music Australasian president) Dan Rosen and the entire Warner Australia crew to give Blusher the launching pad for what we have no doubt will be a long and successful career,” adds Atlantic’s Kallman.
To celebrate their introduction to major label-world, the trio today (Feb. 24) releases “Dead End,” just their second single — and first with Atlantic.
It’s a crystal-clear pop experience with a chewy bassline and dreamy melodies.
Stream “Dead End” and watch the official music video below.
A woman who is suing Nick Carter over accusations that he raped her in 2001 now says the Backstreet Boys member is trying to “harass and intimidate” her with meritless counterclaims about a “conspiracy.”
A month after Shannon “Shay” Ruth filed her lawsuit in December, Carter countersued — claiming he’d been the victim of a “five-year conspiracy” that aimed to “to harass, defame and extort” him by exploiting the MeToo movement.
But in a filing Wednesday, Ruth’s lawyers said those counterclaims were brought with “no other purpose than to harass, intimate, and potentially silence plaintiff.”
“He seeks to use his wealth and celebrity status to outlast plaintiff,” Ruth’s lawyers wrote. “All while hiding behind being the ‘victim’ of the ‘#MeToo’ movement and the preposterous notion that plaintiff is only seeking attention and publicity.”
Ruth’s lawyers want the case dismissed under Nevada’s anti-SLAPP statute — a type of law enacted in states around the country that aims to make it easier to quickly dismiss cases that threaten free speech.
“Fortunately, Nevada is among approximately 31 states that have enacted a statutory scheme to prevent such suits or, at minimum, limit their nefarious intent by requiring a party to demonstrate there is a probability of success on the merits before their claim can progress,” Ruth’s lawyers wrote. “This is the very definition of a SLAPP lawsuit, and it should not be allowed to progress.”
A representative for Carter did not immediately return a request for comment on Friday.
Ruth sued Carter in December, claiming he raped her when she was 17 years old following a 2001 concert in Washington state. Now 39, Ruth says she waited more than 20 years to come forward because she was afraid of retaliation.
“He told plaintiff she would go to jail if she told anyone what happened between them,” Ruth’s lawyers wrote at the time. “He said that he was Nick Carter, and that he had the power to do that. Due to his various threats, plaintiff did not report Carter’s crimes for many years.”
Carter fired back in January, claiming Ruth had been manipulated into bringing the allegations by Melissa Schuman Henschel — a former member of the teen-pop group Dream who previously accused Carter of assaulting her in 2003. “Ruth was a vulnerable and highly impressionable individual, craving attention and desperate to fit in,” his lawyers wrote.
In legal terms, Carter’s countersuit accuses Ruth, Schuman and Schuman’s father of defamation and other forms of wrongdoing. But in Wednesday’s motion to dismiss the case, Ruth’s lawyers said Carter would not be able to prevail on those allegations because he is a “public figure” – a status that makes it hard to sue for defamation in American courts.
“By his own admission of being an ‘American icon,’ Carter is by definition a ‘general public figure’ in Nevada,” Ruth’s lawyers wrote. “As such, the burden he must meet to defeat an anti-SLAPP motion is significantly higher than would be for the average citizen, and he cannot meet that burden in this matter.”
Max Cutler, Spotify‘s head of audio talk shows and partnerships, is departing to “return to his entrepreneurial roots,” according to the company. His exit is part of a broader reorganization at the streaming company’s podcast division, where Julie McNamara has been appointed to lead licensed exclusives in addition to her oversight of Spotify’s global podcast studios. Additionally, Bryan Thoensen will continue overseeing content partnerships for third-party creators while expanding both those efforts and his team, while Bill Simmons will now report to podcasting head Sahar Elhabashi; in addition to continuing to lead The Ringer, Simmons will partner with vp/global head of ads business & platform Lee Brown on podcast monetization across the Spotify portfolio. No layoffs are connected to these shifts, according to the company.
Stacey Tang and Glyn Aikins were named co-presidents of RCA UK; both have worked at the label since 2018, with Tang most recently serving as executive vp while Aikins was co-president of Sony Music’s Since 93, a label partnership with RCA. Tang was named to Billboard‘s International Power Players list last year.
Robin Godfrey-Cass joined Primary Wave Music to focus on catalog acquisitions for the publishing giant. Godfrey Cass has over 40 years of experience in the music industry, including as managing director at Warner/Chappell Music UK and Round Hill Carlin UK; founder of Crosstown Songs; and co-founder of Perfect Storm, which eventually sold to Reservoir.
Cathy Bauer was appointed to the newly created role of head of physical sales & marketing at ADA Worldwide. In the role, she will manage ADA’s global physical sales and marketing division “with a focus on growing partners’ businesses and establishing efficient and standardized processes,” according to a press release. Bauer will additionally be tasked with identifying growth and innovation opportunities for ADA’s artists and partners, including through direct-to-consumer initiatives. She reports to ADA Worldwide president Cat Kreidich. Bauer joins ADA from ABKCO Music & Records, where she served as vp of sales & marketing for nearly five years.
Concord promoted 12 staff members to vp and senior vp roles across multiple business areas: Carol Boldish to vp of production, Concord Label Group (Nashville); Tom Frank to vp of sync marketing, Concord Label Group (London); David Geer to vp of music & publications, Concord Theatricals (New York); Shane Guitar to vp of operations, Fearless Records (Los Angeles); Randy Linsey to vp of international marketing & sales, Craft Recordings (Los Angeles); Clare Maxwell to vp of marketing, Concord Label Group (London); Elysha Miracle to senior vp of rights data management (Nashville); Meredith O’Leary to vp of sync marketing, Concord Label Group (New York); Gary Paczosa to senior vp of A&R, Rounder Records (Nashville); Stephen Phillips to vp of sync, Concord Music Publishing (London); Kelly Voigt to senior vp of corporate communications (Nashville); and Marty Willard to senior vp of business & legal affairs (remote).
Parlophone Records announced several key promotions and hires, chiefly Jack Melhuish, who has been named GM. He will continue to oversee and develop campaigns for Parlophone’s roster while also taking on wider responsibilities at the label. Additionally, Arina Logacheva, Molly McNulty and Seb Smith have been hired as senior A&R managers while Jason Ngimbi was hired as junior A&R manager. Logacheva joins from Universal Music, McNulty comes from Kobalt Music Publishing, Smith comes from Believe Music and Ngimbi joins from BMG. Lastly, Grace O’Neill was promoted to head of radio while Sam Palm was promoted to head of the newly created insight department, where he will extend the work he’s been doing as streaming head by incorporating more robust audience data.
Marcus Wise was appointed CEO for the European region at Wise Music Group. Previously global head of media, the London-based executive will lead the company’s music publishing and recorded music interests across the continent. Additionally, Dave Holley was named Wise Music Group COO, also based in London.
Alexander Brose, former executive director and CEO of The Tianjin Juilliard School in China, will succeed Dr. Peter Simon as president/CEO of The Royal Conservatory of Music upon Simon’s retirement on Aug. 31, 2024. The transition will begin on Sept. 1, 2023, when Brose will assume the role of president designate and work closely alongside Simon leading up to his departure.
Allison Smith was promoted to vp of promotion at Big Machine/John Varvatos Records; she was previously national director of promotion. In her new role, Smith will continue cultivating relationships between rock radio and the Varvatos imprint’s roster, which includes Badflower, Ayron Jones, Starcrawler, The Struts and Violet Saturn. She can be reached at allison.smith@bmlg.net.
Samantha Steel was named COO at Triple 8 Management, where she will oversee operations, promote a positive company culture and vision and develop solutions for internal communications as well as growth potential for employees and clients. Steel first joined Triple 8 in 2017, when Good Time Inc., where she served as GM, was acquired by the company. She can be reached at Sam@Triple8Mgmt.com.
JukeJoint Foundation, a nonprofit designed to empower women of color in the music business, was launched by Fresh ‘N Sassy Productions and ENCORE Music Tech Solutions founder Janishia Jones out of Los Angeles. Current board members include Live Out L!ve CEO Candace Newman, Exceleration Music head of data strategy Britnee Foreman, Jammcard operations manager Katrina Lee and Mass Appeal head of finance Daphnee Pierre. The Foundation will help women of color forge key professional connections by providing access to music industry events, scholarships to assist in repaying student loan debt and grants to aid the launch of their own music businesses. It plans to open additional chapters in New York, Atlanta and Nashville.
Gail Berger was named senior vp and GM of automotive partnerships at SiriusXM, succeeding Rodney Pickett, who will retire at the end of the month. Reporting to chief commercial officer Joe Verbrugge, Berger will oversee the company’s automotive partnerships, automotive remarketing and automotive field operations teams responsible for growing SiriusXM’s presence in new and used vehicles. Berger, who has been with SiriusXM since 2012, was most recently senior vp of automotive remarketing.
Bryce Sherlow was promoted to A&R manager at Warner Chappell Music in Nashville, while Benji Amaefule was hired in the same role. Amaefule joins from media platform Country Central, where he served as head of artist and label partnerships; he also interviews Nashville artists and writers and reviews new music via his brand TheBenjiChord.
Drive Agency president/CEO Jessy Tolkan was appointed as chairperson of the board of directors at HeadCount, the nonpartisan, nonprofit voter registration organization that harnesses music, culture and digital media to increase voter turnout. She succeeds Peter Shapiro, who recently finished out his four-year term as chair but will keep a seat on the board.
Mary Beth O’Toole launched The Conduit Collaborative, a boutique public relations firm with locations in Los Angeles and Sacramento, Calif. The firm specializes in finding non-traditional pitch angles for clients, ranging from music artists to Washington lobbying firms. It offers a range of PR services, including tour press and red carpet services, and has already worked with the Janis Joplin estate, Universal Music and L.A. Live, among other clients. O’Toole can be reached at info@conduitcollab.com.
Sound Future Foundation, which harnesses the influence of the live event industry to further climate innovation, announced its new board of directors, including board chair Terah Lyons, who previously served as policy advisor to U.S. chief technology officer Megan Smith in President Obama’s Office of Science and Technology Policy and founding executive director of the global nonprofit Partnership on AI. The remainder of the new board includes treasurer Kelci Zile (sustainability partner, Madrona Ventura Labs); secretary Adam Brunner (senior planner & counsel, Wildstar Partners); Brandy Schultz (co-founder/chief marketing officer, Sound Future and founder of Adventure Nannies); Ashley O’Winter (co-founder/COO, Sound Future); Wesley Schultz (songwriter-producer-lead singer of The Lumineers); Sara Full (tour manager); Joe Atamian (senior vp, Wasserman Music); and Alex Bruford (founder/CEO/agent, ATC Live).
ASM Global appointed Leonie Patrick of the San Francisco Travel Association as GM for its San Francisco convention center the Moscone Center. “Her focus will be to actively create an international destination while driving a great value for live meetings and events that drive action within their communities,” said ASM Global executive vp of convention centers Dan Hoffend in a statement.
TAIT — a global group of designers, fabricators, engineers and innovators for live and location-based experiences — promoted Gemma Hodgson to chief commercial officer. Additionally, Jess Chalifoux has joined the company as vp of global business development. Chalifoux reports to Hodgson, who can be reached at gemma.guy@taittowers.com.
Sander Shalinsky was named legal counsel at SRG/ILS Group. In music, Shalinsky is best known for his work with The Weeknd and producer Bob Ezrin, among many other record labels, artists, publishers, managers and music executives.
Singer-songwriter Jewel co-founded Innerworld, a mental health platform that aims to “build the largest community in the metaverse for mental health support,” according to a press release. Jewel will serve as chief strategy officer, while founder Noah Robinson will serve as CEO.
CrossBorderWorks founder/CEO Vickie Nauman joined the advisory board of Web3 company Pixelynx, which develops new formats of music and experiences for the metaverse.
Irving Azoff teed off on scalpers, Stubhub and the federal government in a no-holds-barred panel Wednesday during the Pollstar Live conference at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills. Azoff, along with artist Garth Brooks, MSG Entertainment chairman James Dolan and former top Department of Justice antitrust official Makan Delrahim, took the federal government to task for the way it handled last month’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on ticketing. Despite evidence that the problems linked to the ticket sale were the result of a massive bot attack, most senators at the hearing blamed Ticketmaster for service disruptions and tried to link customer dissatisfaction with the ticket sale to antitrust allegations that the company is operating as a monopoly.
Delrahim, who investigated Live Nation and Ticketmaster on behalf of the Department of Justice in 2019, told his fellow panelists that Congress was convoluting two separate issues and “were well intentioned, but didn’t understand the issues” facing the primary ticketing business. Azoff was more aggressive in his comments. He said most problems in ticketing were “likely perpetrated by scalpers” who “steal massive amounts of tickets” and pay lobbyists to “to demonize Ticketmaster, and actually make laws to support and protect scalpers instead of artists or fans.”
The panel was a call for unity within the music business after the senate hearing left many in live entertainment feeling rattled, including many of Live Nation’s own competitors.
The touring community has stayed silent through most of the sector’s controversies in the post-pandemic period – including consumer frustration over high prices for Adele, Bruce Springsteen and Blink-182 tickets – leaving Ticketmaster to take most of the incoming barrage. And the Senate Judiciary Committee revealed — to many people’s surprise — how angry and often misinformed politicians are with Ticketmaster, and by extension, the concert industry writ large.
The panel was held during an annual conference sponsored by Pollstar, a long-running trade publication now owned by Azoff, Tim Leiweke and the Oak View Group. Wednesday’s panel was the concert businesses’ first attempt to create a unified voice between buildings, artists, promoters and ticketing companies and to launch a new offensive targeting scalpers who, as Brooks pointed out, are becoming increasingly effective at using bots to “slow the system down so people get frustrated and immediately head to the secondary markets.” Dolan noted scalpers have made it very difficult to get tickets into the hands of people “who don’t have seven figure incomes.”
No artist “wants their fans to have to pay for a ticket that is exponentially higher than face value,” Azoff said. “I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that Washington isn’t focused on the real issue — screwing artists and their fans. Our government has a long history of screwing artists.” Add in the explosion of fraudulent and misleading ticketing sites and the scourge of speculative ticket listings, and it’s easy to see why Azoff, Dolan and the other panelists are alarmed about the growth of the secondary ticketing business.
They’re not wrong, but the situation may also not be as dire as Azoff and his compatriots want to make it seem. Unlike sports ticketing where nearly all non-season-ticket sales are handled by a small cadre of elite brokers, the concert business has been highly effective at delegitimizing the secondary ticketing industry and preventing sites like StubHub from gaining direct access to ticketing inventory. Brokers have further been stymied by initiatives like Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan and SafeTix, which have proven effective at reducing the number of tickets sold on the primary market. In fact, the primary ticketing business’ success at stopping the secondary industry less than a decade ago is why most scalpers are now resorting to such extreme measures to procure tickets.
This is mostly good news for Azoff. His worst fears about the growth of the secondary ticketing market have not materialized, and today the industry has been marginalized and to the point that some actors have resorted to illegal acts to procure tickets.
As Delrahim explained, there are already existing laws on the books and “all sorts of limits” the government can place on scalpers. Existing securities law regulating the short selling of stocks could be applied to speculative ticket listings, noting that prosecutors with the Southern District of New York have “already brought a number of prosecutions” for what he calls “naked short selling.” There are also Federal Trade Commission laws banning “deceptive and unfair practices” that could be better enforced.
“The FTC should open an investigation against speculative ticket sellers who go online and try to sell tickets way before they have been sold – that’s a clear violation of the artist rights,” he added.
Compelling the government to enforce its own laws is difficult, though, and Live Nation and Ticketmaster are not equipped to slow down the bad behavior of the secondary ticketing industry on its own. Instead, Azoff made a rare plea to the audience of touring business professionals for help.
“If you agree with us,” he said, “you all have work to do because there’s a lot of weird bills being proposed out there and the people in this room have a chance to go out and let fans be heard. Ultimately, this is going to be decided at the local and municipal level and that’s where all of us need to bring the fight.”
To afford living in Austin, Katie-Marie Marschner works two jobs in the music business: In addition to her gig as a tour manager, she earns $19 an hour working remotely 40 hours a week as a YouTube Music subject matter expert — poring over spreadsheets for errors in the company’s charts algorithm. To manage it all, she alternates between her YouTube Music “office computer” and her “fun computer.”
Marschner’s employment for YouTube Music is through Cognizant, an IT company that contracts with the Google-owned music streamer to supply staff. But after she and her coworkers petitioned the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to hold a union election that would effectively unionize them, Cognizant is now mandating that all 58 employees report to work in Austin — even though Marschner and her colleagues say the company hired them with the understanding they’d work remotely, often outside the city. This kind of flexibility has allowed Marschner to travel on off-days as a tour manager and book hotels during her lunch breaks, and she says, “Returning to the office is completely unfeasible.”
Marschner and her colleagues see the new in-office mandate as a union-busting move: Rather than allow the workers to unionize, Cognizant is demanding they return to the office, and, presumably, will fire the workers who can’t. The remote employees – some of whom work far from Austin and even Texas – say they accepted their jobs years ago with the understanding they’d be able to work from home and accuse Cognizant of changing the terms after their union activity. In response, on Jan. 23, the workers filed an Unfair Labor Practice complaint with the NLRB. Three weeks ago, the workers went on strike, marching last Tuesday to Google’s downtown Austin headquarters for a rally.
The division’s union movement caught the attention of Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas). They wrote a Feb. 21 joint letter to the CEO of YouTube’s parent companies, Google and Alphabet, complaining the return-to-work announcement was an “anti-union posture” and requested the workers be “able to freely exercise their right to join a union as guaranteed by federal law.”
“These workers are inspiring people across the country,” Casar tells Billboard. “When the United Auto Workers started organizing at General Motors, their first strike was 50 workers. Soon enough, hundreds of thousands of autoworkers decided to join. That helped make auto-worker jobs stop being poverty-wage, dangerous jobs and made them into middle-class-family-sustaining jobs.”
A Google rep did not respond to inquiries, but a spokesperson has told reporters the striking workers are employees of Cognizant, not Google. Jeff Demarrais, a Cognizant spokesperson, sent a statement saying the company “respects the right of our associates to disagree with our policies, and to protest them lawfully,” adding that it is “disappointing” the workers decided to strike over a return-to-office policy the company has “communicated to them repeatedly” since December 2021. In an email, Demarrais accused the protesters of issuing “death threats” against other Cognizant employees and “blocked the office driveways with downed trees.”
Neil Gossell, who works for the striking YouTube Music division, calls the downed-tree claim a “flat-out lie,” saying a recent Austin ice storm was responsible for the blocked walkways. “I don’t know of any threats we made to anybody who chose to return to work,” says Gossell, a music generalist with YouTube Music who oversees “missing content” taken down due to copyright issues or missing artist names. “Sure, we’re frustrated with them, but we hope we can convince them into joining and help themselves have a better and fairer workplace.”
Gossell and Marschner are upset that Google, whom they see as their employer, has deferred to Cognizant. “I’ve gone through Google training. I go through their security training. I go through their ethics training…. [But] if we want to negotiate over pay, they say, ‘Pay is based on the contract we have with Google, so we can’t bargain over that.’” Marschner says.
The employees, affiliated with the Alphabet Workers Union, which has never held a strike, are awaiting National Labor Relations Board decisions on their election petition and the two Unfair Labor Practice complaints.
“It’s going to be a long labor movement, because we’re not stopping until we have a union,” Gossell says. Referring to recent union activity at Amazon, Disney and Tesla, he adds: “I’m not saying we’re the tip of the spear, but we’re part of something bigger that’s going on in America. All you have to do is pick up a history book to see how this ends.”
