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On Sept. 27, indie labels and distributors around the world received a letter from Merlin, the coalition that negotiates their licenses with TikTok and other digital services. “With no warning, TikTok walked away before negotiations even began… they do not want to renew our deal, which expires on October 31st,” Merlin’s letter said.
Instead, Merlin explained, TikTok wanted to forge deals with most of the labels and distributors the coalition represented directly, a move that Merlin read as an attempt to “fragment” its membership and “minimize” payments for indie music. (TikTok says it walked away from negotiations with Merlin due to concerns about fraudulent content from certain Merlin members making its way onto the social media app. The company also says it wanted to form closer relationships with Merlin members.)
TikTok and Merlin both declined to comment for this story.
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Since then, 12 different labels and distributors among the thousands represented by Merlin have spoken to Billboard about what they would do when their licenses expire after Halloween. Will the indies walk away, attempting to take a stand against TikTok in solidarity with Merlin? Will they renew their licenses individually? And if they do, how will those deals compare to what Merlin negotiated previously? (Nearly all of the executives who spoke to Billboard for this story requested anonymity, given most of their respective companies have non-disclosure agreements with TikTok.)
At first, one distribution executive said their company was not yet negotiating its own license with TikTok — because this exec said they were still hopeful that Merlin and TikTok might come back to the negotiating table. “We want to make sure there is no possibility with Merlin first,” the executive said. John Carnell, CEO of Phoenix Music International (PMI), had a similar view. In an email to Merlin, obtained by Billboard, Carnell said that while TikTok has approached Phoenix individually, “There is no way we would undermine Merlin’s position.”
Unlike Universal Music Group (UMG), which pulled its entire label and publishing catalog from TikTok earlier this year when its license with the platform expired amid renewal negotiations, antitrust laws prevent Merlin from forcing its members to move off of TikTok. It can’t even ask its members to collectively strike against TikTok, leaving the coalition with little choice but to accept TikTok’s decision.
Carnell ultimately decided PMI would “not be entering a deal with TikTok,” according to his email, but the other executive holdout took a different tack. This week, in a second interview, the executive said their company had decided to sign a direct deal with TikTok after all. “If I still thought that not signing would help Merlin get a new deal, or could help the independent music community, I would try to not sign,” the distribution executive said. “But even when Universal didn’t sign [a licensing deal], [TikTok] didn’t care… We have no choice [but to sign a new licensing agreement] because our artists want to be on TikTok — perhaps too much — but for them, it is very important.”
This is a commonly held sentiment among Merlin members, many of whom say their artists want to be on TikTok, and they need to oblige — or risk losing talent to competitors. In the last week, both UnitedMasters and Ditto announced that they had signed new agreements with TikTok. Steve Stoute, founder and CEO of UnitedMasters, told Billboard, “I believe we struck a fair deal with TikTok for UnitedMasters and our artists, who understand how valuable promotion can be for their reach… Merlin has done a great job representing independent labels across the world, and I am a proud Merlin member.” TikTok says that now the vast majority of Merlin members have signed direct deals with the company.
Multiple members say TikTok offered them new agreements around the time that Billboard broke the news in late September that Merlin’s negotiations with TikTok had collapsed. But not every member received an offer — which tracks, considering TikTok’s claim that fraudulent activity allegedly stemmed from specific members of Merlin. TikTok’s music licenses typically last two years, and most of the new deals offered this October will expire in late 2026.
Three sources say that the compensation terms provided under the new, individual offers from TikTok are not significantly better or worse than what Merlin previously negotiated, but that there have been some key changes. First, TikTok is now paying out music licensors based on views that videos featuring a song receives, rather than “creates” (how many videos are created with a given song in the background).
Specifically, TikTok will calculate market share based on views, and then the payment will be divided up from there. This does not mean TikTok now pays a certain royalty per view. “It makes sense,” says one indie executive. “I don’t know why they didn’t always pay based on views.” Another exec added, “It won’t lead to a major difference in how much we are paid. We are still doing the math, but it seems like there will be about a 4% difference in what we take in from TikTok, give or take.”
“TikTok was always paying us badly, so none of this is a financial problem in the short term,” says the indie label executive who initially wanted to hold out. “They are one of the biggest social media companies in the world, and the smallest revenue earner for a music company.” Another indie label source had a similar feeling. “It’s a promotional avenue more than anything else,” this person said. “I think there’s value in TikTok deals, but it’s, like, 1% of every company’s books. It’s not a big part of anyone’s business. I truly think the royalty conversation wasn’t the deal breaker, but there were other material terms that we wanted.”
One of those key term changes had to do with “ad credits,” which can also be referenced as “marketing credits.” Three sources said that the deals TikTok sent them did not include these credits, which amount to money offered by TikTok that a label can put toward advertisements and marketing on the app. One source says the previous, Merlin-negotiated agreement guaranteed a budget in the millions for ads and marketing on TikTok, with the sum of credits divided among individual members based on their size. Now, at least some labels, particularly the ones with less bargaining power, might not get them at all.
The three sources also said that while the previous contract included a “most favored nations” (MFN) clause, which gives licensors the right to the same terms and benefits as other licensors who enter similar contracts with TikTok, the new agreements did not. One also said their individual agreement included a new clause requiring “know your customer” (KYC) checks — which would require verification of artists’ identities before allowing them to upload songs — something TikTok says is designed to curb bad actors and fraudsters from getting their music on to TikTok. It also serves to place more responsibility on the labels and distributors for the content they deliver. The executive also claimed, however, that the provision’s language is vague and seems difficult to enforce.
Four sources suggested UMG’s previous licensing dispute with TikTok was the catalyst for TikTok to walk away from Merlin. “[UMG] definitely emboldened TikTok,” says one source close to the situation. “They lost that war, and they created a really bad situation for Merlin. Sony and Warner are up next year, too. If I was them, I’d be terrified right now.”
Still, another indie label executive, whose releases run through a Merlin distributor, holds a different view — that, maybe, TikTok is not so important now after all. “We’re sticking with Merlin,” the executive says. “I don’t know what’s going to happen. If this happened a year, two years ago, I’d be freaking out. But these days, TikTok isn’t moving the needle for our artists like it used to.”
While his artists used to “easily get tens of thousands of views on most TikToks without any spend,” he says the social media platform is too “saturated” now, and he’s watched as his artists’ impressions have tanked. He’s not alone. In a recent Billboard story about the modern creator campaign on TikTok, multiple digital marketing sources expressed that it is harder than ever to get a song off the ground on the service. But, as one source put it, “It’s still the best thing we have.”
“But what does not having a deal even mean at this point?” another indie label executive asked. “When these things come down, it just encourages the bootleg use of songs on these platforms. The music will be up, just not properly attributed.” During UMG’s boycott of TikTok earlier this year, it was common to still find Universal songs on the platform, just as bootlegged remixes, not as official audio. Sometimes, to skirt the effects of the boycott, top UMG stars like Olivia Rodrigo would even use these bootlegs to promote their latest releases.
TikTok originally told Merlin members that the deadline to finalize their individual agreements with the service was Oct. 25, but one label executive said they have heard that TikTok has offered extensions to certain members. Three sources believe that smaller Merlin members won’t have room to negotiate past the original boilerplate offer, but the larger players will find more wiggle room. Those who received extensions or finalized deals will not have their music removed from the app today, but TikTok says it has already started removing songs from those members that chose not to strike a deal. The company assures that the vast majority of Merlin members have already cemented their deals.
“I wish it had worked out differently between Merlin and Tiktok,” one Merlin member says. “But if our partnership needs to be direct with ByteDance in order to serve our clients, then you know, that’s the avenue that we have to take. Only time will tell how this all plays out.”
Additional Reporting by Elias Leight
British indie band The Maccabees have announced that they will reunite for a live show in London next summer.
The band split in 2017 and released their last album, Marks To Prove It, in 2015, which landed at No.1 on the U.K. Official Album Charts. The Maccabees will perform their first live show in eight years at London’s All Points East festival in Victoria Park on August 24, 2025.
Tickets go on general sale at 10 a.m. GMT on October 31 from the festival’s official website. Special guests for the 50,000-capacity show will be announced in due course.
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Speaking of the reunion guitarist Felix White said in a statement: “In the intervening years we’ve been to All Points East a lot, separately. It’s become a bit of a landmark festival for us, always checking who’s on the line-up. I’d go and have a great time throughout the day, but there was always this pinch of regret watching headliners that we could’ve done it ourselves one day too. I thought that moment had passed, and it was something I was prepared to come to terms with that I was always going to miss. I think we’re all kind of shocked and excited that we get to do it together again.”
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His brother, guitarist Felix White, added that The Strokes‘ performance at the festival in 2023 was part of the motivation to get the band back together. “I could see that they were enjoying it, realizing how great what they had created together was. Being a band, you are usually in a mindset of, ‘We can do better’ and you’re always chasing something else,” Felix said.
“This is an opportunity to realize that whatever we had in that moment was pretty special and get to enjoy it again. It’s a chance to appreciate everything, and especially how it impacts other people and created a community.”
The band formed in London in 2004 and released four studio albums: Colour It In (2007), Wall Of Arms (2009), Given To The Wild (2012) and Marks To Prove It (2015). They split in 2017 and performed a farewell tour in the U.K., which included three nights at the capital’s 10,000-capacity Alexandra Palace.
Following the band’s split, frontman Orlando Weeks released a string of solo records, while brothers Felix and Hugo White formed 86TVs, which released its self-titled debut in August.
They are the first act to be announced for 2025’s All Points East festival. This year’s edition included headline sets from Kaytranada, Loyle Carner, Mitski, LCD Soundsystem and more.
We’re very excited to say we are getting back together to headline @allpointseastuk on Sunday, August 24th. Pre-sale is Wednesday 10am and general on sale Thursday 10am.Good luck. We’re looking forward to seeing you at Victoria Park. With love,The Maccabees x pic.twitter.com/tmrizZvJ0m— The Maccabees (@themaccabees) October 28, 2024
“It’s always interesting to meet your peers that you’ve influenced,” says Zac Hanson.
As the trio Hanson, Zac and his brothers Taylor and Isaac have, after all, been making music together for 30 years — the equivalent of an entire career for many artists. Those peers have included some of today’s biggest hitmakers, who’ve looked to Hanson’s success and stability as a potential model for their own.
“We sat in our studio with Billie Eilish and FINNEAS when they happened to be in town, [with] their parents talking to us saying, ‘We basically decided they should make music ’cause we saw Hanson and you guys seemed like you were OK,’” Taylor recalls. “Like, that’s insane … and here they are, they’ve done incredible, beautiful work.”
Other artists, the brothers reveal, have visited Hanson simply looking to get their take on new music. “In the same studio, Ed Sheeran, when he was opening for Taylor Swift, [was] like, ‘I wanna play you some songs.’ … And you’re just going, ‘This is really fun!’” Isaac says with a laugh.
Hanson is currently celebrating 20 years since going independent and starting their own label, 3CG Records, where they released their third album, Underneath. The band is on a North American tour in support of a deluxe re-release, Underneath: Complete.
“These songs are all richer, layered, we produced a great deal of it,” Taylor says of Underneath. “It’s a record that really works well in a live setting and it’s exciting to go back and really lean into those songs,” which include the radio hit “Penny and Me.”
In a wide-ranging and loose chat with Billboard News, the Hanson brothers also talk about their foray into beer-making with their Mmmhops Pale Ale, also getting a re-release, alongside a new beer, Pink Moonlight Hazy Peach IPA, created in collaboration with noted independent craft brewery Destihl.
Watch the full interview — in which the brothers also discuss their thoughts on how to, as Isaac puts it, “fix the music industry” — above.
Declan McKenna is in a transitional state. When Billboard speaks to the British musician in early October, he’s surrounded by boxes while he moves apartments in London. He’s also packing his gear for a string of live headline dates in North America, which include a role as a special guest on Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet tour, his first-ever arena gigs. It’s a period of fresh beginnings and new opportunities.
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Then there’s the biggest change: after a decade signed to Columbia Records, McKenna is going independent. McKenna signed with the label in 2015 aged 16 following the success of his viral single “Brazil” and his victory in Glastonbury Festival’s Emerging Talent Competition. The indie–pop song was a riposte to soccer governing body FIFA and their decision to name Brazil as hosts for the 2014 World Cup without addressing deep-seated inequality and poverty. The track is approaching 675m streams on Spotify.
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McKenna released three LPs on Columbia, most recently What Happened To The Beach? which charted at No.3 on the UK Albums Charts in February. There were shades of Paul McCartney’s 1971 solo record Ram and a looser West Coast feel to the record which was made in LA with producer Gianluca Buccellati, whose credits include Arlo Parks and RAYE. McKenna also played a 10,000 capacity headline show at London’s Alexandra Palace to accompany its release.
As the deal was approaching its end, McKenna started plotting a new path forward. Now, he’s self-releasing his music via his label Miniature Ponies, a joint venture with ADA, a distribution company owned by Warner Music Group.
“I did like the idea of being independent and not having to explain what you’re doing and why you’re doing it,” McKenna says. “I feel quite confident that I know how to do it, and it felt like the right time to try and get something else out.” He’s effusive with praise with some of his collaborators at the label, but says the relationship had met its natural end having fulfilled his obligations for three studio albums.
McKenna toasts to the new era with a double AA-side single “Champagne” and “That’s Life,” the first release on Miniature Ponies. On the two tracks he fuses more electronic elements into his sound, and retains his passion for hooky songwriting; McKenna’s melodies and choruses are some of the best to come out of British pop in recent years. Both songs examine the ludicrous excesses and follies of success, and on “Champagne” we’re drawn into vacuous conversations where the social currency is attention: “Of course I didn’t mean what I said, I just wanted them to laugh,” he begrudgingly admits.
A key reason behind the decision to go independent, McKenna says, was to streamline the decision making process and to work freely with potential collaborators across his music and visuals.
“If I were there advising my younger self I would say ‘you need to stick to your guns on this,’” McKenna says. “There’s a lot of working through fear from all different corners of the industry but pushing past that and letting creativity happen naturally is so necessary and important.”
Outwardly facing, his catalog so far has shown little signs of compromise. His ambitious 2017 debut What Do You Think About The New Car? was produced with former Vampire Weekend member Rostam Batmanglij and James Ford, whose credits include Arctic Monkeys and Florence + The Machine. 2020’s Zeroes, meanwhile, nodded to ‘70s glam-rock and embraced the imperfect nature of the creative process, and boasts one of his finest songs in “The Key To Life On Earth.”
Likewise, McKenna’s voice continues to be forthright. In 2019 he released the single “British Bombs” which highlighted the role that British arms companies play in fuelling conflict on a global scale; it’s now a fan favorite and a staple of his live performances.
The new independent era dovetails with some of McKenna’s biggest shows. From Nov. 1, he’ll join Carpenter as her main support at arena shows in Los Angeles, Seattle, Denver and more. He said the pair met at Lollapalooza Festival in Chicago last summer where Carpenter revealed she was a fan of his work. Earlier this year Carpenter invited McKenna to join as a special guest, following on from fellow British artist Griff who also got the call for the tour.
“It might be surprising for some people, and it was surprising for me to an extent, because I’m not exactly the bookies favorite to do this gig,” he laughs. “Sabrina, along with a couple other pop artists that are quite obvious, has brought a sense of fun back to pop music”
He adds: “Most of the music I love isn’t super clear about the lyric meanings and intentions. Sabrina has a bit of that. She can hammer home a concept, but also have fun.”
After that he’ll head to Australia for a string of co-headline dates with Northern Irish indie heroes Two Door Cinema Club and next summer McKenna will join Imagine Dragons on their stadium run through Europe, his biggest ever venues. The final date will arrive at his beloved soccer team Tottenham Hotspur’s Spurs Stadium in London. “I feel very lucky as that is a dream gig,” McKenna says.
Next step in his journey as an independent artist is to increase the speed of releases. He says he’s still “hoarding” music that he’s keen to share, something that falls squarely on Miniature Ponies’ label boss: himself.
“I’ve always spearheaded what I’m doing and who I’ve worked with creatively, but there’s a different layer to it now where I don’t have someone looking over my shoulder,” he concludes. “It’s a freeing thing.”
Neon Gold and Avenue A Records have joined together to create Futures Music Group, a tech-forward collective of indie labels with an artist-first mentality.
Distributed through Virgin, Futures was co-founded by Neon Gold’s Derek Davies (Charli XCX, Tove Lo, Marina & The Diamonds, Passion Pit, Matt Maeson) and Avenue A’s Dave Wallace (Barns Courtney, Blossoms, Palace, Self Esteem) in early 2024. When the label group’s first release as Futures, “Home” by Good Neighbours, quickly went viral in January, the song quickly put the band on the map and served as a proof-of-concept for the Futures model. Perhaps the biggest debut single by any artist this year, “Home” was certified platinum in less than nine months.
The Futures roster also includes Phantogram, The Knocks, Barns Courtney, Palace and Mt. Joy, the latter of which was signed through a joint venture with the band’s own Bloom Field Records. (Good Neighbours first EP, including “Home,” are also through Futures until the band’s deal with Capitol/Polydor kicks in January 2025).
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Over time, Futures Music Group will grow to include more indie labels (and artists) under its umbrella. It also intends to build an internal team for digital marketing, sync licensing, sales, content production and more that can be shared between the individual labels.
At Futures, artists are signed to license-based deals, keeping master ownership in the artists’ hands, and the royalty split is kept equitable between the label and artist. In some instances, the split moves further into the artist’s favor after certain profit thresholds are met. This allows for what Davies calls “maximum incentive alignment” between both parties, and it rewards the artist for success.
The deal terms and options are “shorter and less onerous than most competitors,” Davies adds. “Our thing is if we do a great job, then we hope people will just keep rolling through and working with us,” says Wallace. “Keeping artists happy is the name of the game. We don’t want to work with an artist who is only working with us because of a contract. There are not many successful record campaigns that come out of a relationship where the artist is unhappy,” adds Davies.
The company also wants to do right by songwriters. The label group has pledged from now on to give points on every master to any non-producing and non-performing songwriter from the label’s share. (Exact deal points for this are handled on a case-by-case basis).
Along with their commitment to artists, Davies and Wallace of Futures have also spent the last few years studying and investing in how new technology will disrupt the music business. Davies, for his part, co-founded the start-up Medallion, which helped artists like Santigold, Greta Van Fleet, Tycho and more build and own direct relationships with their most passionate fans using web3 technology. The co-founders have also been strategic investors in Big Effect, a digital marketing platform founded by Spotify and UMG alum Mike Biggane, and Notes.fm, a royalty management platform from Stem co-founder Tim Luckow.
“We believe the future of the music industry has never been brighter for artists and the independent sector,” says Davies. “The industry has reached what we believe to be the largest inflection point in the history of the label system, as we are moving into a new music economy that is rightly trending towards artist ownership. We believe there’s a meaningful opportunity for a well-financed and resourced label group with a proven track record to deliver major results for artists on indie terms, which is what we’ve set out to build with Futures.”
The founding team includes: Davies (co-CEO), Wallace (co-CEO), Sarah Kesselman (CMO, general manager), Nicky Berger (COO) and Jeff Lin (CFO).
2025 marks the 20th anniversary of the acclaimed indie film Garden State – and on March 29, a star-studded celebration will take over the Los Angeles’ Greek Theater. Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news Nearly every artist featured on the Grammy-winning soundtrack – including The Shins, Iron & […]
Last week, rising British pop acts Rachel Chinouriri and Cat Burns released the emotional new single “Even.” The song addressed the pair’s respective rise over the last few years. Chinouriri released her debut album What A Devastating Turn Of Events in May and enlisted actor Florence Pugh for the “Never Need Me” music video; Burns, meanwhile, hit No. 2 on the U.K. Singles Charts with “Go” and was nominated for a Mercury Prize for her debut LP, Early Twenties.
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The song speaks to the double standards Black artists are held to in the U.K. music industry, as well as the mislabeling of their releases. Despite their love of indie music and varied inspirations across genres, they’ve been frustrated with the battles they’ve faced to be heard.
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“Wish I didn’t have to climb twice as high / For them to see me, isn’t it crazy,” Burns reflects on “Even,” while in the chorus, the pair asks: “We talk the same, dress for fame / Why does no one else believe in / Us the same?”
Fellow British artist Master Peace – real name Peace Okezie – is credited as a songwriter on “Even” and knows the issues all too well. He released his debut album, How To Make A Master Peace, earlier this year, which featured contributions from alternative legend Santigold and dance producer Georgia. The record was infused with indie rock stylings and nods to Bloc Party and The Streets, but he says he still faces misrepresentation of his music and feels some opportunities have passed him by.
“We are from a place where we have to work a hundred times harder than the average white guy, because people see as Black artists and just chuck us in the R&B space. It’s a cop-out,” Peace tells Billboard.
In 2020, Tyler, The Creator spoke out against the categorization of his music as rap while collecting a Grammy Award and criticized the use of the ‘urban’ music category. There’ve been similar issues in the U.K. A 2021 study by Black Lives In Music reported that 63% of Black music makers had faced racism in the U.K. music industry, and included testimonies by artists of microaggressions and mislabeling of their music.
“For the work that we’ve put in, we should be further than we already are,” he says of Chinouriri, Burns and himself. “You can easily fall victim to it and think ‘it’s never going to work because there’s no Black U.K. pop stars,’ or you could be like us and step up and cut through.”
How to Make A Master Peace was released in March this year and charted at No. 30 on the U.K.’s Official Album Charts. He’s since landed an Ivor Novello Award for their rising star trophy, collecting alongside fellow ceremony winners like Bruce Springsteen. He supported Kasabian at their massive homecoming show in Leicester, England, earlier in the summer and recently landed a nomination at the Independent Music Awards (AIM) in the best music video category. A run of live dates is now taking place in the U.K., but he still feels like people within the industry and potential listeners need convincing of his credentials.
“On paper when you look at all the achievements you think ‘why would he complain?’”, Peace says. “I wouldn’t say I feel like an outsider in my scene, but do I feel like I’m held up the same way as certain bands or artists? Probably not.”
He signed to Universal’s EMI in 2020 and had a string of releases under the label. He says that hype around his live shows – particularly given the lack of releases – was what got the majors involved. “As a result,” he says, “people had nothing to reference [my music] to” beyond a YouTube freestyle which saw him creatively rap over a-ha’s “Take On Me.”
When his A&Rs left EMI, he followed them and inked a deal with PMR Records, whose previous success stories include Disclosure, SG Lewis and Jessie Ware.
“At EMI it was about dropping tunes, but I don’t think they understood what we wanted to build; maybe at the time I didn’t even understand.” He started again from scratch as an independent artist, but refined his direct, party-starting sound and continued collaborating with songwriters and producers like Julian Bunetta, who has credits on Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” and her 2022 single “Nonsense.”
His album’s release dovetails with the ‘indie sleaze’ hype in recent years, a moment where younger fans on have revisited works by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Strokes and more, and been enraptured by Lizzy Goodman’s Meet Me In The Bathroom oral history and documentary. “Where I’ve come from and my background, I’ve always been in fight-or-flight mode. I’ve always wanted to take a leap and risk things,” he says. “It was a big risk making an indie sleaze-inspired album when no one knew about what that was all about.”
Now Peace is keeping the momentum up with How To Make A(nuva) Master Peace, a new EP that acts as a deluxe record to his debut. “Dropping the album when I did got me so many amazing opportunities, so I want to keep it up,” he tells Billboard.
But most of all, he wants the music world to recognize his work and what his contemporaries are doing without stereotyping. “I’m a Black, alternative artist that makes pop music and sits in that space. I want to be that guy who people look at and think, ‘His thing is valid’.”
The Leeds, England-based English Teacher released its debut EP, Polyawkward, in 2022, and its first album, This Could Be Texas, in April. So it surprised even them that they sold out New York’s Bowery Ballroom in June — on a Monday, no less.
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Frontwoman and lyricist Lily Fontaine and lead guitarist and producer Lewis Whiting chalk it up to relentless touring, which has honed the band into a tight unit that melds Radiohead-style guitar and synth sonics with hard funk flourishes and elegant melodies that showcase Fontaine’s literary lyrics about place, identity and broken relationships. (The quartet has actually been playing together since 2018 when they were a very different dream pop band called Frank.) At the Bowery Ballroom, Fontaine’s electric stage presence also galvanized the crowd, as she paced the stage and alternated between rhythm guitar and synth.
English Teacher ‘This Could Be Texas’
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English Teacher’s road work and original sound resulted in This Could Be Texas garnering stellar reviews and a Mercury Prize nomination this year. At the end of August, they continued their momentum with a new EP, English Teacher: Live From BBC Maida Vale — which includes covers of Billie Eilish‘s “Birds of a Feather” and LCD Soundsystem‘s “New York I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down” — and on Sept. 15, they return to the road, playing a slew of dates in North America and Europe.
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Fontaine and Whiting (briefly) Zoomed in from the United Kingdom to talk about the band’s success, the origin of its name, its songwriting process and its plans for the future.
You’re a very tight band. Is there a lot of practice involved?
Whiting: Less than you think.
Fontaine: We’ve been on tour for at least the past four or five months, and we’re about to start up again. We don’t really have time to practice because we’re playing the set over and over again.
That’s practice of a sort. I do think that strong live shows are crucial to building a fan base. Lily, you’re riveting onstage. Were you influenced by any other artists in terms of stage presence.
Fontaine: It’s not really a conscious thing to be honest. I’ve been doing it for such a long time — 10 years — that I feel quite confident now on stage. I also think that being a music fan, the affectations of people that I have enjoyed slip in with my stage personality.
How did the band’s name come about?
Fontaine: Ugh.
Whiting: It was a name Lily came up with quite a while back. There are different ways of looking at it. Like, a lot of our family members we’re English teachers and it’s a bit of a connection.
Fontaine: Now, I like the idea of what an English teacher is. We go to so many different countries, and the English language is so prevalent— people do speak it everywhere now — that people sometimes resent it. I hate the name, but also I like the idea of an English teacher being perceived negatively or positively depending on which country you’re in.
How did you all get signed to Island UK?
Fontaine: It was baby steps.
Whiting: Yeah. We’d gotten some support slots, Our guys were floating about. Nothing happened for a long, long time after that. They must have been aware of us and then yeah, the EP came out, we started to play more and they started sniffing around a little bit more.
A number of bands are striking deals with labels that enable them to keep their masters. Was that something you did?
No. It was like a split. We have a percentage.
What are the best and worst parts of touring?
Whiting: The best parts are being able to travel to places and play music that we’ve written to people who don’t know it as well. That’s the best bit, and then I suppose all the rest of it is the bad bit. The traveling is taxing for sure.
The price of touring has ratcheted up, which particularly effects indie bands. What has your experience been?
Fontaine: We don’t really make money. We only ever break even or lose money.
Regarding the title of your album, This Could Be Texas, you could have chosen any state or city here. Why Texas?
Whiting: It must have been in our minds subconsciously because it had just come up on the news about [us playing] South by Southwest. I think it was the best descriptor for where we stood. It was a really hot day and we were at a car park. At first it was a bit of a joke phrase, but then it morphed and attached itself to the song, which is about the process of writing the album. Then it became us saying this should be the title for the album. It wasn’t a sorted-out thing from the start. It just kind of presented itself.
Lily, on “The World’s Biggest Paving Slab,” you sing, “I’m the world’s biggest paving slab, and the world’s smallest celebrity.” Can you give me some context behind that?
Fontaine: I grew up in Colne, Lancashire, and outside the town hall there’s a giant paving slab and that’s one of the town’s local celebrities if you will. The song is about exploring this great display and not necessarily ever leaving the town. It’s a juxtaposition of exploring feelings of grandeur and feelings of self-deprecation.
There also seems to be a little bit of, “Don’t tread on me.”
Fontaine: Yeah, definitely. I think that’s the grandeur element.
Do you and the rest of the band write songs collaboratively?
Fontaine: It’s different every time. Sometimes, one of us will come in with a song quite finished and sometimes just a bit of poetry and a riff come together. Sometimes it’s separate songs. Sometimes it’s all together. It’s different. We like to work like that. So far, it’s been all right.
Whiting: It’s a quite chaotic approach. It’s kind of just throw things together.
Another standout song on the album is “R&B.” On it, you sing, “Despite appearances, I haven’t got the voice for R&B.” Is that subtext about expectations of you as an artist because of your skin color?
Fontaine: The whole song isn’t about that, but part of it is. At the time, I had writer’s block and the only thing I could come up with in my head was a melody for an R&B song. I thought that was so ironic because that is the genre that people always assume that I make when they look at me. Not always, but there’s been times when we meet another musician, and the look on their face is a big shock when I say that I make guitar music.
You come from a mixed-race family?
Fontaine: Yeah, my dad’s side of the family are from Dominica in the Caribbean and my mum’s just I don’t know, England I guess. They’re both British.
Now that Kamala Harris is a presidential candidate, race issues are at the forefront of the campaign. I don’t know if it made news in the U.K., but Donald Trump made headlines here when he said that Harris only recently had decided to identify as Black instead of Indian. Is that kind of racism familiar to you?
Fontaine: Definitely. It’s so funny because it depends on who you’re with. It depends on how Black you are, how white you are. So, if I’m with my white friends, then I’m the Black one, but if I’m with my Black family I’m the whitest person in the room. Race is fluid in a sense — and what a prick [Trump] is. Sorry.
Are you following the presidential race here?
Whiting: I’m following it closely. Biden dropping out was an extremely good call. I can’t say I knew a crazy amount about Harris before this, but I like following American politics. I’m an avid American politics podcast listener.
Fontaine: I don’t have as much knowledge of [politics] as Lewis because I don’t listen to any podcasts or anything. I’m glad that Biden dropped out. I think that was an obvious decision. We’re going to be in the U.S. when the election is happening, so it will be an interesting time to be there.
Lily, the lyrics to “Broken Biscuits” are quite powerful and sound very personal. Is there an autobiographical element to it?
Fontaine: That’s probably the most personal song on the album actually. Yeah, it’s really personal. There’s this John Cooper Clarke poem, “Evidently Chickentown,” that has a lot of repetition, and I wanted to see how many different ways I could use the word “broken.” Then I was seeing how I could use all those different ways to relate to things in my life that were broken or that have been broken.
There are references to all sorts of things: breaking in shoes and broken homes, but also “Smithereens,” which is a Black Mirror episode and the show’s creators [Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones] call their company Broke and Bones, which I use in the lyrics. There’s lighthearted stuff in there as well. It’s not all sad. But a lot of it is quite dark actually.
Do you come from a broken home?
Fontaine: That’s me. Yeah, my parents split up when, I don’t know — maybe I was like one. It was when I wasn’t conscious, which is a blessing probably.
I noticed that the band worked in more melodies on This Could Be Texas than you have on prior work. Has that been a natural progression?
Fontaine: That’s probably because when we were writing the first EP and some of those earlier songs. I was listening to more post-punk. That was the time of the post-Brexit, post-punk resurgence in the U.K., and I was quite influenced by that. That trend wore off, and I was listening to a lot of classic songs — not classical music. I’m coming to music as a singer, and I felt it was just natural that I would probably go back towards that eventually.
At the end of August, English Teacher put out a live EP that includes covers of Billie Eilish’s “Birds of a Feather” and LCD Soundsystem’s “New York I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down.” Why did you choose those?
Fontaine: LCD felt natural, because we all really like them, especially that song. I think it felt like a song that we could tackle given the instruments that we had at our disposal. With “Birds of a Feather,” we were asked to do a cover for BBC Radio One which is as you probably know is more of the pop end of the spectrum. So, we looked at what had come out recently — and my boyfriend said, “You should do this song.” We listened to it together, and I was just crying. I found it really moving, and I was like, “I want to do this.” We put it together in a day, and it felt right.
Are you working on the next album?
Fontaine: Yeah, we’ve got a few songs written actually. It seems like it’s come around so fast. Yeah, I’ve got ideas of the concept for it and everything.
Can you share the concept?
Fontaine: It’s too early to say really, and it’s not entirely up to me. But I don’t think I would want to put out a body of work that didn’t have some kind of unifying aspect to it. It happens naturally when you pull everything together that something connects it. It’s not exactly a concept album but always a bit of a through narrative. Thematically, it will probably be a sadder and darker album.
You are clearly into literature, poetry and media. Is there anything that has your attention these days?
Fontaine: Yeah. I’m going through a big phase with Octavia Butler, the science fiction writer. I’m obsessed with her and I just finished the second of two of her books. I’ve immediately ordered the next one because I want to read it whilst I’m still in that world.
She’s my focus at the moment. I’ve been watching The Bear. I think it’s amazing. The writing is brilliant, and the acting is so realistic that it’s kind of scary that people can act but also be so human at the same time. I love food as well so it’s a good one.
In August 2022, Allison Crutchfield, an A&R executive at ANTI- Records, traveled to Asheville, N.C., on a mission to sign the rising singer-songwriter known as MJ Lenderman. By year’s end, Crutchfield succeeded — and had also joined his tight-knit circle of friends.
“I’ve never had a meeting with an artist where they’ve been like, ‘Just come over and we’ll have a barbecue, we’ll just drink beer and eat,’ ” recalls Crutchfield, who got to know Lenderman at the property where he was living with several others, including members of the ascendant alt-country group Wednesday.
At the time, Lenderman had just released his breakthrough album, Boat Songs, a collection of detailed vignettes set to fuzzed-out country-rock riffs, on independent label Dear Life Records. And the 25-year-old hasn’t slowed down since: In late 2023, Lenderman made his ANTI- debut with his acclaimed live album Live and Loose!; in early 2024, he hit the road with Wednesday, for which he sings and plays guitar; and in March, Waxahatchee (fronted by Crutchfield’s twin sister, Katie) released her lauded album Tigers Blood, for which she invited Lenderman into her small creative circle. Lenderman made his Billboard chart debut, on Adult Alternative Airplay, with his feature on that set’s aching lead single, “Right Back to It,” and performed it alongside Waxahatchee on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
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As Lenderman’s profile grew, he was assembling Manning Fireworks, which is set for release Sept. 6 and his first studio album for ANTI-. “It was kind of strange,” he says when reflecting on the whirlwind that accompanied becoming one of indie rock’s most heralded new artists. “I guess it was more of an obstacle of making the new record — just trying to figure out how to not think about that and make a record like I would before.”
For Lenderman, that wasn’t so long ago. A child of music lovers — “My dad was a Deadhead,” he says, detailing the Derek Trucks and Gov’t Mule shows he saw as a kid growing up in Asheville — Lenderman began playing guitar in early grade school and eventually gravitated toward indie and punk music as a teenager playing in bands around his hometown. Soon he began recording, and the pandemic afforded him more time to complete 2021’s Ghost of Your Guitar Solo and, eventually, Boat Songs.
When Lenderman’s manager, Rusty Sutton, passed along a Boat Songs promo to Crutchfield, she knew she had to sign him “probably 10 seconds” into its opening song. “In a medium like indie rock,” she explains, “where there really is only so much you can do, for someone to do something where they’re honoring the tradition of this type of music but to do it in a way that does totally feel refreshing and like something that we haven’t heard, it’s really exciting.”
Lenderman is heavily influenced by Neil Young — “I can trace back most bands that I like to Neil,” he says, citing the rock legend’s scuzzy mid-’70s phase — and he also counts Drive-By Truckers, Dinosaur Jr. and Will Oldham as key touchstones. But his music has connected with younger audiences thanks to its modern sensibility and the way it careens from absurdist humor to deep, sometimes dark, profundity. (One new song, “Wristwatch,” is an ode to loneliness where the narrator notes that he’s “got a houseboat docked at the Himbo Dome.”)
“Obviously, my real life is going to bleed through a little bit, but I try to keep it more from a third-person perspective,” he says. “I feel like that opens more possibilities — and it’s kind of more fun writing fiction.”
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For Manning Fireworks, recorded whenever he could find time between tours, Lenderman followed a familiar approach, reuniting with producer Alex Farrar at Asheville’s Drop of Sun Studios, where he has recorded tracks several times before. But the album, which expands Lenderman’s country-rock creative palette without losing its signature wit or intimacy, is far from a redux.
“I want my records to be dynamic,” Lenderman says. “For a while, I was trying to maybe take it up a notch and go louder or faster or something — and then that just really wasn’t where I was at. So I decided to go in the opposite direction and make it more acoustic and quieter.”
On Manning Fireworks, Lenderman does a bit of both. The music has never sounded richer, with fiddle and brass bolstering his guitar, but he also explores the flip side, like on album closer “Bark at the Sun,” which ends Manning Fireworks with a multiminute noise outro driven by “bass clarinet abuse drone.” While Lenderman “couldn’t tell you why” he made the creative choice — “it just felt right to me” — it’s indicative of his growth. “There’s a level of confidence coming from [him] at this point that feels different from Boat Songs,” Crutchfield says. “This is a person who is unbelievably talented and now understands how to wield that.”
Not that the eternally nonchalant Lenderman would ever describe his intuitive choices so grandly.
This story appears in the Aug. 24, 2024, issue of Billboard.
At least half a dozen independent music distributors are fundraising or exploring selling their businesses as investors and major music companies, including Warner Music Group, vie for a piece of the business sector serving DIY artists.
Stem, the indie distribution darling that started as a fintech platform offering royalty splits, is in the early stages of a fundraising round that will be its largest to date, while Larry Jackson’s gamma. concluded its second round of fundraising. Downtown’s board of directors is exploring a sale and has held talks with Believe after an earlier dialogue with WMG fizzled. (Sources say WMG continues to eye acquisition targets.) ONErpm aims to put together around $40 million next year for its own mergers and acquisitions (M&A) fund, and indie streamer/distributor SoundCloud is expected to move into the final stages of either a sale or fundraising round later in 2024 to replace some of its existing shareholders.
Already this year, Believe founder and CEO Denis Ladegaillerie bought 95% of the outstanding shares of the French music company with roughly $1.7 billion in backing from investors that include TCV and Swedish private equity firm EQT in order to take the company private. And the Chicago-based firm Flexpoint Ford bought a stake in Create Music Group for $165 million. Last year, Exceleration Music bought indie distributor Redeye for an undisclosed sum, and gamma. launched with a $1 billion war chest.
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Indie executives say there are numerous factors pushing them to seek funding; among them are the growing influence of artificial intelligence in music-making and next-gen creators’ evolving feelings about independence. Some would rather take a big check from a major if it comes with guaranteed autonomy — which means indie distributors must achieve scale to survive.
Meanwhile, these indies’ collective share of the market is growing, prompting major music companies to make acquisitions and investments as a defensive play. And backers outside the music industry, such as private equity funds and institutional investors, see opportunity in betting on these companies that purport to have the pole position serving the music-makers of tomorrow. Non-major labels and self-releasing artists’ share of the global recorded-music market was 36.7% in 2023, up from 28.6% in 2015, according to MIDiA Research.
“The amount of money being thrown around right now is more than I’ve ever seen,” Stem co-founder and CEO Milana Rabkin Lewis says. “If you’re not out there fundraising right now, you’re not doing your job.”
Another reason to invest: Indie distribution companies are handling an increasing share of the songs that do best on streaming services. In the first half of 2024 in the United States, such companies were responsible for 13.6% of tracks played between 100 million and 500 million times and 22.1% of those played between 50 million and 100 million, according to Luminate.
That said, the indie digital distribution sector remains highly fragmented, and executives say they expect significant consolidation as the roughly 25-year-old segment of the music industry matures.
“You’ll see a lot of DIY distributors sell over the next six months,” says Greg Hirschhorn, CEO of Too Lost, an indie distributor that Hirschhorn says distributes music for over 300,000 artists and labels. “It’s a good time to run an indie distributor.”
Earlier this year, French securities regulators forced WMG to disclose it was considering making a $1.8 billion bid for Paris-based Believe. Warner CEO Robert Kyncl has said the company backed out before making a formal offer because of the brief amount of time it had to undertake due diligence for the deal, among other reasons.
The consortium of investors led by Ladegaillerie ultimately succeeded in taking Believe effectively private this summer, leaving WMG and others that bid on the company, like BMG, hunting elsewhere for acquisitions. Sources say WMG’s decision not to submit an offer for Believe may lead to more deals in this space.
Downtown has been a beneficiary of that fallout. Its chief investor, the family of late New Zealand beer baron Douglas Myers, has been mulling an exit for months. The company’s board has held exploratory talks with WMG and Believe, among others, according to sources.
Downtown declined to comment about any deal talks, but executive chairman Justin Kalifowitz says the current spate of deals is a natural next step resulting from the significant amount of investment dollars that flowed into music-related businesses between 2018 and 2022.
“A lot of cool ideas were born out of that. Some of them have grown up to be real companies, achieving scale but not profitability,” Kalifowitz says. “There is an efficiency that these businesses in the services sector are providing that is frankly not available at the majors.”
A significant portion of outside investment that flowed into music in recent years went to acquire song catalogs, which indie executives point out provide more stable, though lower, returns than active companies. Private equity funds controlled by banks like Goldman Sachs are warming to music companies, one executive says. “You could buy an asset and forecast it 20 years into the future. But in a music world, that’s really hard,” the executive says. “They realize that music acts like an annuity.”
ONErpm CEO Emmanuel Zunz says the indie distribution space is facing an inflection point in its maturation driven by more than investment and deal-making. Moments like this put pressure on companies that may have loads of debt or aren’t profitable to prove their business makes sense. Zunz estimates the company he founded roughly 15 years ago now ranks third, behind Believe and Downtown, among the largest full-service independent music companies. ONErpm, which has no debt and operates off its own earnings, is planning to put together a $40 million M&A fund next year to buy smaller companies around the world.
“It’s going to be interesting to see how it plays out over the next two to three years,” Zunz says. “Some folks are going to crash and burn. There’s going to be consolidation. But the ones that stay are going to have a compelling offer that provides a lot of value for artists.”
Additional reporting by Elias Leight.