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Since the end of August, there have been reports that BMI is in advanced talks to sell itself to the private equity firm New Mountain Capital. A deal has yet to be signed but the possibility has raised concerns among songwriters about what it will mean for the collective management sector if one of its largest organizations becomes a business owned by private equity.
Such a move would take BMI in a new direction, away from the traditional model – based on non-profit and transparent operations—of the CISAC community. For CISAC and our global network of 227 Collective Management Organisations (CMOs, or societies), however, it also highlights the strength and value to creators of the global collective rights management system. The collective management model has been successful for over a century, remaining faithful to its core principles, while transforming and adapting to keep pace with the rapidly changing business environment.
BMI will stay connected to this community. In anticipation of the new direction it has taken in the last year, it has moved from being a full CISAC member to a CISAC “client,” a new category that was established in 2020 to accommodate the new types of rights management entities — including SESAC, Soundreef and Nextone – which have emerged.
Clients make up a very small group of “for-profit” entities that differ from the overwhelming majority of CISAC members, which operate on a non-profit basis. Clients are not subject to all of the traditional transparency and business rules that full CISAC members abide by, but still have access to CISAC’s systems and data exchanges that help the global music market function
By accepting for-profit entities as clients, CISAC maintains its inclusiveness and diversity, while not compromising on the core conditions of membership.
It is those core membership conditions which provide the unique value of the global network. Full members, such as ASCAP in the US, PRS for Music in the UK or GEMA in Germany, are required to meet key fundamental rules:
to operate on a non-profit basis or be controlled by their affiliates
to respect CISAC’s global standards of governance and professional rules
to be fully transparent in their financial reporting and share information with the rest of the CISAC members
As a global confederation, CISAC respects individual creators’ decisions on whom they entrust their rights to. It equally respects members and clients’ decisions on how they manage creators’ rights. The global song rights market is changing rapidly, with growing competition between different types of royalty collection bodies at a time when the cost pressures of managing digital collections and distributions has never been greater.
These changes are inevitable and they are good, if they have the end of result of better serving the creators who are at the center of our business.
In this transforming landscape, the vast majority of CISAC’s member societies remain non-profit entities which abide by all CISAC rules. Full CISAC members work only for creators and rightsholders, not shareholders. Their transparency obligations ensure high levels of integrity and best practice across the network. Creators and rightsholders, not financiers and investors, are assured a controlling role in their decision-making. Creators sit on our societies’ Boards of Directors. You’d be hard pressed to find other entities in the music industry which have music creators as their Board members.
The global collective management system gives creators a strong, united voice to lobby for creator-friendly legislation, develop modern systems for data exchange, adopt best practices and maximize collections and distributions. From turning around failing markets such as Greece, Turkey and India, this community continues to play an indispensable role for creators and publishers worldwide.
Our sector remains the only part of the music industry that puts the creator front and centre of everything it does. While more commercial ventures may be tested in our fast-evolving market, the fact remains that the collective management system is the most robust, reliable and fit-for-purpose model in serving creators.
Gadi Oron is the director general of the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC), a Paris-based rights organization.
September marks the 20th anniversary of the RIAA launching litigation against consumers in a bid to extinguish — or at least dampen — the flames of peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing. The consumer litigation was part of a multi-pronged effort that targeted internet service providers, the P2P providers like Napster and Limewire and music fans. In early 2003, nearly 40% of internet users in the United States had used a P2P service to download music, or an estimated 54 million individuals. Upon the RIAA’s announcement of consumer suits, parents began asking their children what they were doing with those stacks of blank CDs; coverage of the pending litigation stifled file sharing before the first notice was filed.
Much has been written about the P2P era, but one thing is for sure: The vast majority of downloaders knew it was illegal. If there was any uncertainty in consumer’s minds, the RIAA litigation helped to clear it up. Perhaps that is the greatest legacy of the consumer litigation, which ended in 2008. The actual law was contested for some time, with arguments about technological innovation and the promotion of that technology for purposes of copyright infringement.
By the 10th anniversary of the consumer litigation in 2013, the record labels had largely won the battle against P2P file sharing. After settlement of the Limewire copyright infringement case in May 2011, the number of people using the remaining services rapidly fell in the United States, and by 2013 had dropped 60% from the peak in 2003. Litigation was one of many contributing factors. The P2P file sharing experience was awful for users, fraught with spoofed files, pop-ups, malware, incomplete and incorrect files, and other maladies. iTunes downloads revived the singles era by offering $.99 tracks. Pandora had been at the top of app store charts for several years, and Spotify was gaining momentum. By 2013, half the U.S. internet using population was streaming, and a handful were beginning to pay for subscriptions. The RIAA moved on to other battles, notably the YouTube “Value Gap.”
As the 20th anniversary of the consumer suits approaches, there has been a stunning reversal in progress in the war to limit consumer access to unlicensed music. An estimated 55 million people in the U.S. acquired or accessed “free” music files in the past year, according to MusicWatch research — the same amount as in 2003. What went wrong? There is an abundance of apps and sites that permit consumers to obtain unlicensed music. Apps that permit YouTube stream-ripping are widely available. Mobile apps available with “free downloads” frequently contain unlicensed content. The very social platforms that the industry relies on to promote artists also harbor unlicensed content. Unlike in the P2P era, the law is clear when it comes to these forms of copyright infringement and licensing requirements, though the DMCA still provides a shield to services that rely on content uploaded by fans.
The problem is the consumer. The teenager who knew that they were committing piracy while downloading In Utero from Limewire is now an adult. Today, they can be easily confused. Their Google music searches may include content that infringes on copyright. Same for the app store on their phone. The recent spate of Taylor Swift Eras tour livestreams on TikTok, while technically the same as a stream-rip of “Cruel Summer,” does not register the same in fans eyes. On top of the unlicensed content, MusicWatch studies indicate 20 million streamers are sharing logins to music streaming services.
The industry has not been silent. The RIAA has litigated against stream-rippers. Mixtape app Spinrilla was successfully sued for infringement and shut down in May. Sony and Universal just sued the Internet Archive for copyright infringement. And as an alternative, streaming companies offer family plans, which raise ARPU and blunt the impact of unauthorized account sharing.
Unlike 2003, however, the industry isn’t paying much attention to the infringing consumer. And why should it? There hasn’t been a collapse in revenues as was experienced during the aughts. Most infringing consumers are active streamers and many pay for a subscription — and a vinyl record or two. There’s not much reason to target music fans. But that doesn’t mean that more shouldn’t be done to educate consumers and further protect the rights of artists and copyright holders.
Russ Crupnick is the principal at market research firm MusicWatch.
The music industry has progressed rapidly over the last decade. TikTok is launching music careers, sites like YouTube are creating new distribution channels and artists like Grimes are open-sourcing their vocals for generative AI creation. But for all of that progress, the opaque systems that control the industry are not in favor of artists driving culture. As listeners, we’ve seen the tip of the iceberg with Taylor Swift’s highly publicized re-recording of her masters and Megan Thee Stallion’s legal dispute with her record label over unpaid royalties.
Music is the most consumed category of art on the planet, and it’s time to evolve the system so that all artists — from top recording stars to indie creators to those who are just getting their careers started — are set up to succeed. But to really grasp what’s needed to shift the power dynamic in the direction of artists, it’s important to peel back the complexities of music revenue.
Changing the narrative on music revenue
There’s a false narrative that is pervasive in the media that says music doesn’t generate any money, driven in large part by the litany of really bad record deals that draw public attention (like the aforementioned Megan Thee Stallion example). But in reality, music makes money — it’s the artists who don’t get paid what they deserve.
The streaming revolution of the 21st century has transformed the way people consume music. But despite streams making up 80-90% of the industry’s revenue, artists see few of those dollars after industry players take their inevitable cuts. Though record labels serve a valuable role in the music ecosystem (from marketing and developing an artist to licensing and distribution), artists can be haunted for decades by bad deals signed early in their careers that unknowingly give away creative control and a significant portion of their future earnings. Artists who have signed contracts with unfavorable terms typically don’t earn negotiating power until they’ve amassed a large following and a fruitful career.
Why the bad deals?
Most artists simply don’t know what they’re signing — it’s not necessarily that they’re making a bad decision. As an artist myself, I experienced this firsthand early in my career. It would take years for me to get paid for my songs — and as someone who’s proficient in accounting from my time studying business in college, my inability to see how much I made from my music was mind-boggling.
The reason that deals are so opaque is that music revenue is growing and coming from more sources than ever before, which creates a complex web of intermediaries within the ecosystem. Every different distributor has a different deal with every different streaming service, and every label has a different deal with every streaming service. And the streaming services are not transparent about how their rates differ across these various deals. Beyond that, there are numerous types of royalties — from performance royalties to mechanical royalties to in-app streaming royalties. Therefore, when it comes to signing on the dotted line, artists must blindly place their trust in a network of counterparties, lacking any real visibility into their actual earnings once every entity has taken their cut. All of this is perpetuated because record labels are incentivized to control information so they can make more competitive deals with artists.
As a result, artists gravitate to what comes naturally — the music. They don’t want to worry about the business side of things because the system isn’t set up in a way that empowers them to ask questions or negotiate favorable deals, and it distracts them from doing what they love.
Finding the opportunity in technology
To rewrite the way music institutions approach music revenue and income, we need to make it as transparent as possible. It seems like a lofty goal for an industry that has long been set in its ways, but technology is making it possible. My company Royal recently launched a free tool that allows any artist to estimate the streaming revenue for their songs. The hope is that artists become more empowered to make deals that uplift their careers.
I’ve also been bullish on crypto since its earliest days, for a variety of reasons, including its ability to transform the music industry with transparency. Blockchain is inherently transparent — in fact, the one thing you can’t do on a blockchain is hide information. It’s all there, at all times. It’s also time-stamped which establishes a clear provenance (traceability of ownership over time). This is especially useful in the music business, where copyright infringement plagues artists and record labels alike. Perhaps most importantly, leveraging tokens that represent rights enables artists to see the value of their songs and create tangible benchmarks upon which to negotiate better deals. With more information always comes more power.
Artists don’t know how much money they’re missing out on, but they could. And it doesn’t have to be a public battle when they do find out. If we embrace technological progress to improve outdated systems, we can create an open data ecosystem that gives artists not only more transparency into their earnings and fan bases but more control over their artistic careers. Better deals alongside more creative freedoms is a winning combination that can define the next 30 years of music — we just have to be willing to change.
Why should artists even care?
As much as streaming has changed the music industry for the better, there are still unanswered questions about how value accrues in this system. Do we equate the value of passively listening to a sleep playlist in the background to actively listening to your favorite album with friends?
This talk of numbers and questions of value may seem like a distraction for artists who just want to spend their time making music — but ignoring this topic completely opens the door to predatory industry practices that threaten musicians’ longevity and entire legacies.
More industry transparency should improve all the variables that play into an artist’s career and result in musicians keeping more ownership of the art they create. Having the humility to acknowledge what music is actually worth is the first step in unlocking more value in this new era of the industry.
Justin Blau is CEO of Royal and a world-renowned musician and producer, known as 3LAU. An early crypto adopter, Justin has been advocating for building the investable layer of music on blockchains since 2017. In 2021, he founded Royal to empower artists to share their music with fans and give people the opportunity to invest in music.
Ask a lawyer: “Do you have too many clients?” The answer will only ever be, “I’d like more.” But not all lawyer-client relationships are created equal. Entertainment lawyers are not like lawyers who handle class action lawsuits and represent thousands of clients with little contact, or personal injury lawyers where you hope that you never have to help the particular client again. We are in a high touch, fast-paced, relationship-based, paper-intensive business.
Billboard raised some great questions and points last month in its widely-discussed report, “Music Lawyers Have a Problem: Too Many Clients, Too Many Deals & Too Much Paperwork.” It’s true: the digital era has removed substantial barriers of entry to recording and distribution of music. Now combine that with the ease and speed of music to market, songs written and recorded, sometimes by as many as ten or more credited writers and producers, and deals that are as varied and creative as the music they’re meant to protect. You’re left with ever-growing piles of music business paperwork.
This “Lawyer Problem” can and will be fixed by a combination of music industry education and training and the deployment of deal-making platforms and tools, aided by AI, that modernize and improve the whole dealmaking process. These are the fundamental beliefs that led me — and co-founder Steven Ship — to build Creative Intell, an education and deal-drafting platform now in private beta.
This doesn’t mean that every artist and their team members need to go to law school. But let’s face it: if you bring your car to a mechanic and can’t describe the problem, you aren’t setting yourself – or the mechanic – up for success. Attorneys spend an enormous amount of time on education, walking clients through basic deal points and nuances. In an age when deals are getting more and more bespoke, it behooves artists and their camps to master the broad dynamics and key terms of basic dealmaking. A striking number of industry professionals in positions where they should know better still don’t understand basic royalty accountings or recoupment; each one of these cases costs the client billable hours and/or a law firm a lot of time.
Administrative process may not sound like the sexiest topic. But given the high volume of deals being done, an enormous amount of time is wasted on tasks as simple as downloading documents, saving the file to the correct folder and naming the document, redlining, checking precedent from prior deals, and looking for variations to include in a revised draft. If you’re a lawyer or a manager, how many emails do you send or receive asking “Where are we with this?” Talk to any working attorney in the music business, and they will acknowledge that these are substantial, contributing factors to the drag on deals.
And you’d be amazed what happens once a deal is signed. How much time is spent on taking contracting metadata and having it entered into royalty systems? Why are producer agreements sent to record labels as PDFs that need to be manually entered into royalty systems? The same goes for song split data for publishers and PROs. Minutes that add up to hours and days can be saved throughout the entire contracting process. Notably, none of the tools utilized by music industry attorneys are actually built for making contracts or their other needs. As platforms where all of the above can be executed, organized and archived in one place emerge and become industry standard, transformative speed and efficiency will result.
And of course, it wouldn’t be a “future of work” piece if we didn’t touch on the potential of AI. Generative tech offers enormous promise in the dealmaking and contracting spaces. Google “legal tech” and “AI” and you’ll see waves of funding and new, still-experimental utility–and yes, plenty of missteps in these early days. But given the right focus and experienced oversight, well-trained engines are capable of generating bespoke language for some of the most common deals in the music business where clients can ask questions, and be provided with immediate, accurate contextual education. These sorts of next-generation platforms should lower the barrier to entry for all music industry stakeholders including artists, songwriters, producers, managers, etc. in a whole different way: creating much greater access to credible, needed legal direction and knowledge to handle the world of music industry deals.
None of this will put lawyers out of business. Rather, as the various elements laid out in this piece begin to come to market, attorneys will be freed to fix higher level issues such as song splits disputes that hold up income for years which require relationships to fix and stamina to resolve. They’ll have more time to develop relationships with more “buyers” and “sellers” to provide added value. And they’ll finally get ahead of paperwork to plan for their clients’ futures. In this world, lawyers may still be unable to help themselves from always wanting more clients. But those clients will receive better, faster service.
David Fritz is partner, Boyarski Fritz LLP, and co-founder, along with Steven Ship, of Creative Intell, a deal-making platform currently in private beta.
Hip-Hop is turning 50 this year, and so am I.
I grew up fully immersed in the world of Hip-Hop and, like many other people, I don’t know anything else. Fifty years on, our culture rightly reminisces about and celebrates the iconic songs, performers, and cultural moments from over the years – but for me, and so many others, Hip-Hop is about more than just the music.
For me, it is the lens through which I view the world. I am a student of KRS-One. “Rap is something you do. Hip-Hop is something you live,” KRS famously said. That expansive view of the word, the sound, the dance, the visual art, the fashion, the business politics, philosophy, technology is what defines me.
Hip-Hop to me is, of course, the foundational “Four Elements” that we all recognize: MCing, B-Boy/B-B-Girling aka Breakdancing, Graffiti and DJing. But beyond these core tenants of the genre, it’s about so much more. Hip-Hop is about the energy and will of the people that cannot be stopped or controlled by any external system – and how we define and create the Culture on our own terms.
It is also how A.I. (Allen Iverson) played basketball. How he arrived at the games, with his hair braided by his mother. How the league changed the dress code to control his expression only to birth an even more powerful expression of fashion and expression we see today.
Hip-Hop was how Barack Obama moved on stage with Michelle and the family. The syncopation of his voice and the pregnant pauses caused the world to hang on his every word with the way he delivered a speech – it felt like rhyming. If he wanted to, Barack would have been an ill MC. Just as I imagine if Hov wanted to run for office he could be Mayor. It is this energy – that multifaceted, multidisciplinary power of Hip-Hop that BRIC looks to celebrate this year and for years to come.
2023 marks the 50th anniversary of Hip-Hop, a huge moment for the Culture. But what happens after the big weekend of celebrations planned for the summer? At BRIC, we’ve been having thoughtful conversations about our own contributions to this moment, particularly with my background as the founder of the Brooklyn Hip-Hop festival and BRIC’s rich history as a place for artistic exploration, incubation, and presentation. As a leading Brooklyn arts and media institution whose work spans contemporary visual and performing arts, media, and civic action, BRIC is uniquely positioned to plug into this moment across the spectrum of arts and culture. For over 40 years, our institution has shaped Brooklyn’s cultural and media landscape by presenting and incubating artists, creators, students, and media makers. As a creative catalyst for our community, we ignite learning in people of all ages and centralize diverse voices that take risks and drive culture forward.
I’m excited to share that, this fall, BRIC is launching a new curatorial lens called BRIC Hip-Hop. Across the organization, we’ve united around an ethos and a mission of creating an evergreen home for the education, expression, and evolution of Hip-Hop. Our programmatic focus will join others in the space by giving Hip-Hop a home for incubation, debate, and development not just during anniversary years, but for many years to come.
In many ways, Hip-Hop culture is built into the DNA of BRIC. For decades, it’s been central to how we operate, how we coordinate, how we curate. On the surface, we may not be here B-Boying or bombing trains, but we operate under the same tenets and philosophies that have fueled Hip-Hop culture for half a century. The fundamental idea is that we use arts, culture and education to communicate and build with our community. It is how we show up for the people—of all races and spaces, of all ages and means—every year, not just this year. Hip-Hop is how we grow, why we adapt, and what we hope to embody in the future. We institutionalize the spirit, diversity and beating heart of Hip-Hop into BRIC’s programming and through BRIC’s team.
We do this because it matters. Hip-Hop is innate to us, but it is also a choice. It is a choice to be multidisciplinary, to embrace art and creation in its many forms. It is a choice to be anti-racist, to embrace people from all walks of life who have found comfort and possibility in the enduring strength of community. It is a choice to be feminist, not to be ageist or transphobic or limit access because of a disability, but to view and operate with a goal of equality and equity of power, purpose and possibility.
By institutionalizing Hip-Hop, by ingraining it into everything we do, we’re seeking to build on its legacy and protect it for generations to come. We are celebrating the past by making entry points for creation in the present to better our collective futures. Maybe you’re a teenager. Maybe you’re a toddler. Maybe you’re grandparents. Maybe you’re from Flatbush or Park Slope or Bed-Stuy. It doesn’t matter. All are welcome.
New York is the birthplace of the Culture and we want to make sure people don’t forget about Brooklyn’s contributions to the story of Hip-Hop, both past and present. Many people walked up and down Fulton Street, from Masta Ace and Big Daddy Kane to Yasiin Bey to HOV himself for clothes, fame, and inspiration. And like those that came before us, we want to come together, cut through the madness of the world and do something real.
We’re beyond excited to share this new vision for BRIC’s contributions to the Hip-Hop space with our communities this fall and in the years to come. BRIC Hip-Hop will be a waystation for scholars, tourists, and artists this year and well into the future. Come join us at the Lena Horne Bandshell or at BRIC House, come down to the stoop, and find your place, whether it be something familiar or new. We can’t wait to have you be a part of the BRIC Hip-Hop conversation.
Wes Jackson has over 25 years of experience as a leader and innovator in entertainment and academia, previously working at Emerson College, The City University of New York, and consulting for Jazz At Lincoln Center. He is a Trustee of the Brooklyn Public Library and Board Chair of the Brooklyn Crescents, and has been leading BRIC — a multi-disciplinary arts and media institution anchored in Downtown Brooklyn — as its President since July 2022. On August 11 & 12, BRIC will commemorate Hip-Hop’s 50th Anniversary with free music performances, screenings, and more in Brooklyn at Prospect Park. Visit here for details.
From ChatGPT writing code for software engineers to Bing’s search engine sliding in place of your bi-weekly Hinge binge, we’ve become obsessed with the capacity for artificial intelligence to replace us.
Within creative industries, this fixation manifests in generative AI. With models like DALL-E generating images from text prompts, the popularity of generative AI challenges how we understand the integrity of the creative process: When generative models are capable of materializing ideas, if not generating their own, where does that leave artists?
Google’s new text-based music generative AI, MusicLM, offers an interesting answer to this viral terminator-meets-ex-machina narrative. As a model that produces “high-fidelity music from text descriptions,” MusicLM embraces moments lost in translation that encourages creative exploration. It sets itself apart from other music generation models like Jukedeck and MuseNet by inviting users to verbalize their original ideas rather than toggle with existing music samples.
Describing how you feel is hard
AI in music is not new. But between recommending songs for Spotify’s Discover Weekly playlists to composing royalty free music with Jukedeck, applications of AI in music have evaded the long-standing challenge of directly mapping words to music.
This is because, as a form of expression on its own, music resonates differently to each listener. The same way that different languages struggle to perfectly communicate nuances of respective cultures, it is difficult (if not impossible) to exhaustively capture all dimensions of music in words.
MusicLM takes on this challenge by generating audio clips from descriptions like “a calming violin melody backed by a distorted guitar riff,” even accounting for less tangible inputs like “hypnotic and trance-like.” It approaches this thorny question of music categorization with a refreshing sense of self awareness. Rather than focusing on lofty notions of style, MusicLM grounds itself in more tangible attributes of music with tags such as “snappy”, or “amateurish.” It broadly considers where an audio clip may come from (eg. “Youtube Tutorial”), the general emotional responses it may conjure (eg. “madly in love”), while integrating more widely accepted concepts of genre and compositional technique.
What you expect is (not) what you get
Piling onto this theoretical question of music classification is the more practical shortage of training data. Unlike its creative counterparts (e.g. DALL-E), there isn’t an abundance of text-to-audio captions readily available.
MusicLM was trained by a library of 5,521 music samples captioned by musicians called ‘MusicCaps.’ Bound by the very human limitation of capacity and the almost-philosophical matter of style, MusicCaps offers finite granularity in its semantic interpretation of musical characteristics. The result is occasional gaps between user inputs and generated outputs: the “happy, energetic” tune you asked for may not turn out as you expect.
However, when asked about this discrepancy, MusicLM researcher Chris Donahue and research software engineer Andrea Agostinelli celebrate the human element of the model. They describe primary applications such as “[exploring] ideas more efficiently [or overcoming] writer’s block,” quick to note that MusicLM does offer multiple interpretations of the same prompt — so if one generated track fails to meet your expectations, another might.
“This [disconnect] is a big research direction for us, there isn’t a single answer,” Andrea admits. Chris attributes this disconnect to the “abstract relationship between music and text” insisting that “how we react to music is [even more] loosely defined.”
In a way — by fostering an exchange that welcomes moments lost in translation — MusicLM’s language-based structure positions the model as a sounding board: as you prompt the model with a vague idea, the generation of approximates help you figure out what you actually want to make.
Beauty is in breaking things
With their experience producing Chain Tripping (2019) — a Grammy-nominated album entirely made with MusicVAE (another music generative AI developed by Google) — the band YACHT chimes in on MusicLM’s future in music production. “As long as it can be broken apart a little bit and tinkered with, I think there’s great potential,” says frontwoman Claire L. Evans.
To YACHT, generative AI exists as a means to an end, rather than the end in itself. “You never make exactly what you set out to make,” says founding member Jona Bechtolt, describing the mechanics of a studio session. “It’s because there’s this imperfect conduit that is you” Claire adds, attributing the alluring and evocative process of producing music to the serendipitous disconnect that occurs when artists put pen to paper.
The band describes how the misalignment of user inputs and generated work inspires creativity through iteration. “There is a discursive quality to [MusicLM]… it’s giving you feedback… I think it’s the surreal feeling of seeing something in the mirror, like a funhouse mirror,” says Claire. “A computer accent,” band member Rob Kieswetter jokes, referencing a documentary about the band’s experience making Chain Tripping.
However, in discussing the implications of this move to text-to-audio generation, Claire cautions the rise of taxonomization in music: “imperfect semantic elements are great, it’s the precise ones that we should worry about… [labels] create boundaries to discovery and creation that don’t need to exist… everyone’s conditioned to think about music as this salad of hyper-specific genre references [that can be used] to conjure a new song.”
Nonetheless, both YACHT and the MusicLM team agrees that MusicLM — as it currently is — holds promise. “Either way there’s going to be a whole new slew of artists fine-tuning this tool to their needs,” Rob contends.
Engineer Andrea recalls instances where creative tools weren’t popularized for its intended purpose: “the synthesizer eventually opened up a huge wave of new genres and ways of expression. [It unlocked] new ways to express music, even for people who are not ‘musicians.’” “Historically, it has been pretty difficult to predict how each piece of music technology will play out,” researcher Chris concludes.
Happy accidents, reinvention, and self-discovery
Back to the stubborn, unforgiving question: Will generative AI replace musicians? Perhaps not.
The relationship between artists and AI is not a linear one. While it’s appealing to prescribe an intricate and carefully intentional system of collaboration between artists and AI, as of right now, the process of using AI in producing art resembles more of a friendly game of trial and error.
In music, AI gives room for us to explore the latent spaces between what we describe and what we really mean. It materializes ideas in a way that helps shape creative direction. By outlining these acute moments lost in translation, tools like MusicLM sets us up to produce what actually ends up making it to the stage… or your Discover Weekly.
Tiffany Ng is an art & tech writer based in NYC. Her work has been published in i-D Vice, Vogue, South China Morning Post, and Highsnobiety.
When introducing myself as the vp of marketing and wellness at Guin Records, a title that doesn’t conform to the usual melody of the music industry, I’m often met with raised eyebrows and intrigued inquiries. This blending of roles — pairing the vibrant, creative world of marketing with the crucial, human aspect of wellness — might seem unconventional to most in our industry. Yet, this combination isn’t just possible. It’s essential and, I would argue, long overdue.
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The responsibilities of my role involve walking the line between two worlds. I champion and promote the music our artists create, steering the narrative to connect deeply with new audiences and core fans. Simultaneously, I cultivate an environment that nurtures the mental and emotional well-being of our artists and staff.
At Guin Records, we embed wellness into the very fabric of our ethos and values. We recognize that the creative process, while exhilarating, can also be emotionally taxing. We acknowledge the highs and lows, the euphoria and the vulnerability that come with artistic expression. Therefore, we prioritize the well-being of our artists, empowering them to create and share their music in a sustainable and healthy way.
Why is this important? Because music is profoundly human. The music that touches our souls, the lyrics that resonate with our experiences and the performances that captivate our senses — all are born from the hearts and minds of individuals. Artists, like all of us, require support, care and an environment conducive to their growth and well-being.
How do we accomplish this? By acknowledging that an artist’s well-being is not a peripheral concern but a core element that directly impacts their art as well as our bottom line. As a concrete step, we offer non-recoupable wellness stipends to our artists. This financial support allows them the freedom to invest in their mental and physical health without burden.
Moreover, we maintain a strong alliance with non-profit entities like Backline, ensuring our artists and team members have readily available mental health resources. We’ve proudly signed the “Breaking The Barriers” pledge, committed to helping knock down long-standing roadblocks that often keep BIPOC communities from getting the mental health care they need. To further our investment in our team’s well-being, we’ve instituted a “Mental Health Day Policy.” This grants our employees the liberty to take much-needed breaks for personal rejuvenation; fostering a culture of prevention against burnout. After all, in nurturing our people, we nurture the music.
So I call on my industry peers to turn the volume up on this crucial conversation. Let’s recognize that a healthy artist creates better music, and a team that feels supported performs better. Let’s shift our industry narrative to one that doesn’t just produce beautiful music but also upholds the well-being of the beautiful minds behind it.
By prioritizing wellness, we’re setting the stage for a more sustainable, empathetic and human-centered music industry. By championing the music we love while investing in the well-being of those who create it, we pave the way for a sustainable industry that supports everyone involved. It’s not just about the end product but about the process, the people and the passion that fuel it all.
Brandon Holman is vp of marketing & wellness at Guin Records, whose artist roster includes Asha Imuno. Holman is also co-founder of The Lazuli Collective, an experiential wellness agency that delivers wellness and mental health programming to audiences around the world through events, music and consultancies including the Coachella Arts and Music Festival.
Twenty-something years ago, after failed major label record deals, I started my journey as an independent artist. I would get in front of small crowds and sing songs no one in the room knew. Some shows were better than others, but each one ended the same way. I would thank everyone for coming out, and challenge them; that if they felt something, support it. I would then run off stage to the merch table. You didn’t have to shake my hand, buy my CD or sign my mailing list. But you had to walk past me.
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We now have seven people on our staff. The band and I have traveled the world several times over. My songs are known and have graced this magazine many times. It wasn’t easy, but I’m fortunate for every lesson learned. Here are five points to consider:
1. Completion
Talent is important. But completion defines who wins and who loses in this business. We all know countless songwriters, producers and musicians working in a studio, with world-changing ideas they will never complete. At the same time, you may scratch your head, wondering how the person you feel isn’t that talented is winning so much. There’s one main difference between these two people: that person is giving his or her work a chance to win.
I have absolutely no idea what will and will not work. I’ve had songs I thought would pay off my house. But they were released to a choir of crickets. Sometimes an idea is one second from the trash can — but ends up being the song that keeps me on tour for a year. My friend, comedian Tommy Davidson, told me, “The only one who knows what works is God.” I’d add that the only one who shows you what works is the crowd. I’ve been fortunate to chase my dreams and make a living doing the music I love. I have an amazing team I believe in and who believe in me.
Next year will mark the 30th anniversary of my song “The Moon” appearing in Billboard. Just last year, I enjoyed my most successful song to date, “Lessons.” We didn’t get here because we did everything right. We got here because we completed everything we tried. Why have an idea if you’re not going to write it? Why write it if you’re not going to record it? Why record it if you’re not going to release it? Why release it if you’re not going to market it? Completion is an attitude.
2. Hire Yourself
I was a struggling songwriter for several years. A big year would be followed by a quiet one. Even when working with a major artist, I was unemployed as soon as i walked out of that studio. No matter what my bank account said, I financially operated broke. The main reason is because I was waiting to be selected. I was writing songs, hoping for a label or artist to select them. Month to month, check to check, walking a tightrope hoping someone would rescue me before everything fell apart.
A drastic shift came when I released my first album independently. I found myself more in control of my destiny. Sure, I still had to be selected. But this time I had more control over who was selecting me. If no one is booking you, book your own show. Rent a small venue; go to all the barbershops and hair salons to sell tickets. Show your heart and passion; challenge anyone who felt something from you to support it. When someone supports you, remember them. If done right, that small venue will become a bigger venue.
3. Believe
No matter what your beliefs may be, what we do takes faith. Faith that we are doing the right thing, even when it’s not coming together like you planned. Faith that it is going to work. Faith that what you are doing has purpose. As an independent artist, you are pushing your dreams to the forefront without any stamp of approval. Rejection hurts. Nobody likes having the melody of their exposed heart responded to with silence. But something has to keep you going. Work till something takes your breath away. Then show the world what takes your breath away in hopes that it will take theirs away too. Don’t take it personal when someone doesn’t believe in it. They’re simply moving themselves out the way for the people that do believe.
4. Perception
Life is a stage. Whether you’re a musician or not, you have a tender instrument that deserves a level of tuning and care. Every professional guitar player will tune their guitar before taking the stage. Professional vocalists and horn players will go through hours of exercises to warm up their instruments. They do this to have a better connection to the musical sounds that will surround them. Skipping this process can have catastrophic consequences, not only to your perception of your instrument, but also to your audience’s perception of your instrument. Perception holds the key to how much enjoyment and fulfillment you will receive during the journey. When out of tune, we may forget that the reward is not what our gifts produce, but the gift itself.
This road may not be easy, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be beautiful. Tune out negative talk and discouragement. Warm up your instrument daily to handle the ups and downs that await you. Hold on to your hunger and drive. Allow your challenges to be seen as opportunities.
Someone is reading this and wishing to be on a chart. Someone is on that chart, wishing to be higher. Someone has the highest chart position but wishes for some peace and quiet. Perception helps you appreciate where you are. Some days will be hard, and this business takes sacrifice. But if you’re fighting to do what you love, it’s worth fighting for to find happiness.
5. Failure
I underwent vocal cord surgery nine years ago. The doctor told me about the blood hemorrhage I had, the surgery risks and the strenuous recovery process ahead. When he walked out of the office, I cried like a newborn. A tour was canceled; I spent weeks in silence and months relearning how to do the things I loved. Eventually, I found my way back onstage and in the studio. I lost a bit of my range and gained a nice rasp that I personally feel adds character. Most important, I gained a vocal health I never had before. I learned about the acid reflux that was causing constant hoarseness. Now I can come home after multiple shows, talk to my wife and kids or go into the studio and sing as much as I like.
Not everything is going to work. But you will learn more from the failures than the successes. We usually walk away discouraged and weighed down with pity. We are human, so a moment of that is more than fine. After that though, ask yourself what was the purpose of the failure? More times than not, it wasn’t so you could stop. It was probably strengthening you so you could keep going.
I hope a younger version of me is reading this and the words are ricocheting through his or her body. I do hope you felt something. If you did, I challenge you to support it — especially if what you end up supporting is you.
Eric Roberson, a Grammy-nominated singer/songwriter/producer, is celebrating his 21st year as an independent R&B/soul artist. Through his Blue Erro Soul label, Roberson released his 17th studio album Lessons in 2022. He’s also a professor at the Berklee College of Music.
In 1994, at the dawn of the internet era, Rolling Stone asked Steve Jobs if he still had faith in technology. “It’s not a faith in technology,” he responded. “It’s faith in people.”
Today, at the dawn of the artificial intelligence era, we put our faith in people too.
It’s hard to think of an issue that has exploded onto the public scene with the furor of the debate over AI, which went from obscure technology journals to national morning shows practically overnight. This week, Congress is convening the first two of what will surely be many hearings on the issue, including one with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and another with musician, voice actor and SAG-AFTRA National Board member Dan Navarro.
As members of the global Human Artistry Campaign, made up of more than 100 organizations that represent a united, worldwide coalition of the creative arts, we welcome this open and active debate. It’s gratifying to see policymakers, industry, and our own creative community asking tough questions up front. It’s a lot easier to chart a course in advance than to play catch up from afterward.
We don’t have long to get this right, either. The internet is already awash in unlicensed and unethical “style” and “soundalike” tools that rip off the writing, voice, likeness and style of professional artists and songwriters without authorization or permission. Powerful new engines like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Jukebox, Google’s MusicLM and Microsoft’s AI-powered Bing have been trained on vast troves of musical compositions, lyrics, and sound recordings — as well as every other type of data and information available on the internet — without even the most basic transparency or disclosure, let alone consent from the creators whose work is being used. Songwriters, recording artists, and musicians today are literally being forced to compete against AI programs trained on copies of their own compositions and recordings.
RIAA Chairman/CEO Mitch Glazier
Othello Banaci
We strongly support AI that can be used to enhance art and stretch the potential of human creativity even further. Technology has always pushed art forward, and AI will be no different.
At the same time, however, human artistry must and will always remain at the core of genuine creation. The basis of creative expression is the sharing of lived experiences — an artist-to-audience/audience-to-artist connection that forms our culture and identity.
Without a rich supply of human-created works, there would be nothing on which to train AI in the first place. And if we don’t lay down a policy foundation now that respects, values and compensates the unique genius of human creators, we will end up in a cultural cul-de-sac, feeding AI-generated works back into the engines that produced them in a costly and ultimately empty race to the artistic bottom.
That policy foundation must start with the core value of consent. Use of copyrighted works to train or develop AI must be subject to free-market licensing and authorization from all rights holders. Creators and copyright owners must retain exclusive control over the ways their work is used. The moral invasion of AI engines that steal the core of a professional performer’s identity — the product of a lifetime’s hard work and dedication — without permission or pay cannot be tolerated.
David Israelite
Courtesy of NMPA
This will require AI developers to ensure copyrighted training inputs are approved and licensed, including those used by pre-trained AIs they employ. It means they need to keep thorough and transparent records of the creative works and likenesses used to train AI systems and how they were exploited. These obligations are nothing new, though — anyone who uses another creator’s work or a professional’s voice, image or likeness must already ensure they have the necessary rights and maintain the records to prove it.
Congress is right to bring in AI developers like Sam Altman to hear the technology community’s vision for the future of AI and explore the safeguards and guardrails the industry is relying on today. The issues around the rapid deployment of novel AI capabilities are numerous and profound: data privacy, deepfakes, bias and misinformation in training sets, job displacement and national security.
Creators will be watching and listening closely for concrete, meaningful commitments to the core principles of permission and fair market licensing that are necessary to sustain songwriters and recording artists and drive innovation.
We have already seen some of what AI can do. Now it falls to us to insist that it be done in ethical and lawful ways. Nothing short of our culture — and, over time, our very humanity — is at stake.
David Israelite is the President & CEO of the National Music Publishers’ Association. NMPA is the trade association representing American music publishers and their songwriting partners.
Mitch Glazier is chairman/CEO of the RIAA, the trade organization that supports and promotes the creative and financial vitality of the major recorded-music companies.
TOKYO — The traditional path to financial independence through music creation has been evolving for years. While there was once a clear-cut approach that included labels, publishers, touring, and CD sales, now the vast majority of artists need to find a different way to make it. The world is bigger now, and the borders and boundaries of music are being torn down piece by piece. Not only are more and more people listening to music from outside their markets, even in once more locally focused countries like Japan, Korea and India, but more and more people are watching how other music pros operate and taking notes.
This means that new markets are opening up to creators in the United States and that, simultaneously, Asian artists are rethinking their whole approach to the business. Together, these dynamics are leading to new career paths and new sounds.
In Japan, we’ve witnessed a huge change in the incentive structure. I’ve worked for years in the Japanese market as a producer and have watched things change firsthand. One of the biggest sources of change came not from our market, but from South Korea. BTS broke the world charts and now everyone’s looking outside of Japan. Korea opened their eyes.
BTS, BLACKPINK, and other K-pop groups set a precedent and demonstrated what’s possible. Before, everyone assumed you had to change for export, to sing in English, to adjust your look and feel. But these young Korean stars didn’t initially feel a need to sing in English; instead their fans learned Korean. Korean artists and producers were able to prove that an Asian person who doesn’t know English or even have perfect pronunciation can top charts and win a Grammy. The most important factor is entertainment. Are you entertained? If so, that’s all you care about as a fan.
Watching BTS take the world by storm, Japanese artists began to expand their ambitions, and the industry has had to respond. Music professionals used to be focused on monetizing this island and that alone, but now younger artists are looking outside and considering their options. The entire ecosystem of labels and publishers has come into question, as young artists are asking why they should sign to a label. Talented musicians who sign to a major are a huge deal now. Artists know they have to pull through all their fanbase themselves.
As young Japanese creators think globally, the market is starting to open up more and more to new global talent. Yet creating the relationships to make this openness work has proven a slow evolution, not a quick pivot. The first and foremost reason that there’s a disconnect is the language barrier, as not everyone in the Japanese industry feels comfortable conducting business in English. They can’t communicate the way they’d like.
This further enhances local skepticism about working with foreign producers. Instead of a set deal, things change as the project evolves, terms change, as, say, three more writers start asking for advances out of the blue, all problems that I’ve heard about from A&Rs I’ve talked to. Relationships with people in Japan make project management easy. Because of the way publishing works in Japan, local producers cost less and everyone knows the terms of a standard contract. No negotiation is required. It’s safe and administratively simple, by comparison.
Yet if a Japanese A&R exec turns to a producer who isn’t big in Japan, they can feel shocked by higher prices and more complex terms, with international publishers and other parties involved. They have to put out their neck personally and that’s a major risk. As things change at home, however, and Japanese creators rethink their strategies, this risk can feel worth taking, and more and more tools and services are working to enable better communication and collaboration.
This has implications for artists far from our corner of the world. Artists in the United States are fighting for attention for percentages of pennies—this is not new information to anyone. In Japan, however, one play of an artist’s track in a karaoke booth can generate a hundred times as much revenue as a Spotify stream. Write, produce, or perform a hit that gets played regularly in karaoke rooms across Tokyo, especially if it’s a song that works for weddings, birthdays, or graduation, and you could receive a comfortable check for life. Yet even as artists continue to search for new ways to stand out from their peers, opportunities in East Asia often get overlooked as viable options. I see this changing, as both Japanese and non-Japanese players understand one another better, and it’s thrilling.
We’ve entered a space without borders, where business practices as well as sounds cross and blend. We can look at each other, communicate and share information any time, even across languages. The quicker that moves, the quicker the trends flow. We don’t go through decades of rock; it’s a one-month period of rock, until someone comes up with a new crazy sound. This is often happening on platforms with global reach, key gateways to new music and to what kids are making right now. How the next steps unfold–how labels, publishers, and established players react to this new global exchange–are still being determined. But once distant markets are growing closer, and the entire business stands to benefit.
Kenneth Kobori, CEO of SURF Music, is a songwriter and producer in Japan as 2SOUL. He achieved early success with “Story” by AI in 2005, which charted in Oricon’s top 10 for 73 weeks. He’s worked with Earth, Wind & Fire and Little Glee Monster, among others, and is also a former executive and startup member of Breaker, Inc.