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Several gunmen burst into a big concert hall on the edge of Moscow on Friday and sprayed visitors with automatic gunfire, injuring an unspecified number of people and starting a massive blaze in an apparent terror attack days after President Vladimir Putin cemented his grip on the country in a highly orchestrated electoral landslide.
There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the raid, the worst terror attack in Russia in two decades that came as the fighting in Ukraine dragged into a third year. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin described the attack as a “huge tragedy.”
Russia’s top domestic security agency, the Federal Security Service, said there are dead and wounded but didn’t give any numbers.
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Russian news reports said that the assailants threw explosives, triggering a massive blaze at the Crocus City Hall on the western edge of Moscow. Video posted on social media showed huge plumes of black smoke rising over the building.
The attack took place as crowds gathered for a concert of Picnic, a famed Russian rock band, at the hall that can accommodate over 6,000 people. Russian news reports said that visitors were being evacuated, but some said that an unspecified number of people could have been trapped by the blaze.
The prosecutor’s office said several men in combat fatigues entered the concert hall and fired at visitors.
Extended rounds of gunfire could be heard on multiple videos posted by Russian media and Telegram channels. One showed two men with rifles moving through the mall. Another one showed a man inside the auditorium, saying the assailants set it on fire, as gunshots rang out incessantly in the background.
More videos showed up to four attackers, armed with assault rifles and wearing caps, who were shooting screaming people at point-blank range.
Andrei Vorobyov, the governor of the Moscow region, said he was heading to the area and set up a task force to deal with the damage. He didn’t immediately offer any further details.
Russian media reports said that riot police units were being sent to the area as people were being evacuated.
Russian authorities said security was tightened at Moscow’s airports and railway stations, while the Moscow mayor cancelled all mass gatherings scheduled for the weekend.
White House National Security Advisor John Kirby said Friday that he couldn’t yet speak about all the details but that “the images are just horrible. And just hard to watch.”
“Our thoughts are going to be with the victims of this terrible, terrible shooting attack,” Kirby said. “There are some moms and dads and brothers and sisters and sons and daughters who haven’t gotten the news yet. This is going to be a tough day.”
The attack followed a statement issued earlier this month by the U.S. Embassy in Moscow that urged the Americans to avoid crowded places in the Russian capital in view of an imminent attack, a warning that was repeated by several other Western embassies.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, who extended his grip on Russia for another six years in the March 15-17 presidential vote after a sweeping crackdown on dissent, earlier this week denounced the Western warnings as an attempt to intimidate Russians.
A group of companies representing Spotify, Deezer, Epic Games and others, applauded the U.S. Department of Justice’s antitrust lawsuit filed against Apple on Thursday (March 21), calling it a “strong stand against Apple’s stranglehold” on mobile apps.
“[Apple] stifles competition and hurts American consumers and developers alike,” Rick VanMeter, executive director for The Coalition for App Fairness (CAF), said in a statement. “As this case unfolds in the coming years more must be done now to end the anticompetitive practices of all mobile app gatekeepers.”
Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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In its sweeping lawsuit filed in New Jersey federal court on Thursday, the U.S. Justice Department alleged that Apple violated antitrust laws by undermining apps and products that could compete with Apple or that could make customers less reliant on its iPhone systems, such as its digital wallet.
The U.S. case follows similar legal actions brought against Apple in the European Union, the United Kingdom and Asia, and it addresses some of the Apple policies that Spotify founder/CEO Daniel Ek has railed against for years.
“There’s global consensus that Apple’s abuses of its monopoly power have stifled innovation and threaten the digital economy,” Avery Gardiner, a lawyer and competition policy advocate for Spotify, wrote on X. “The DOJ case makes it clear that Apple harms the developers and creators who are hard at work to build the very best products and services for consumers.”
Both CAF and Gardiner acknowledged the DOJ’s case will take time to have any impact, and they urged Congress to pass The Open App Markets Act, a bill Ek has lobbied for since it was introduced in August 2021.
The Open App Markets Act would bar Apple, Google and other app stores with more than 50 million users from forcing app developers to use their payment systems as a condition of distribution. It would also block app store owners from punishing app developers if they extend deals to customers or offer their app for lower prices elsewhere.
Ek has argued that Apple and others act as anti-competitive gatekeepers because the terms required for inclusion in their app stores prevent Spotify and others from telling consumers about potentially cheaper bundle options, like Spotify’s duo and family plans. Currently, Spotify has to send customers to its website to sign up for those plans.
The Justice Department’s case also seeks for Apple to loosen restrictions on its messaging tools and to add features to the Apple wallet. Gardiner and CAF praised the case for what they described as an attempt to level the playing field.
“Competition is the foundation of innovation, and [this case] represents the latest step in the fight for a fair and competitive internet,” Gardiner wrote.
China‘s Tencent Music Entertainment Group saw its profit jump 36% to 5.22 billion yuan ($735 million) in 2023 as growth in paid subscriptions helped offset mixed results in its social media business, according to an earnings filing on Tuesday (Mar. 19). The leading music streaming company in China — Tencent Music operates QQ Music, Kugou […]
When video-blogger Martina Sazunic moved from Seoul to Tokyo in 2016, she was shocked to learn that — unlike in South Korea — using music by some of Japan’s biggest pop stars on her YouTube channel was not permitted. Doing so, she quickly learned, would result in the offending video being taken down at the request of the rights holder.
“In [South] Korea, the record labels were open to uploading music videos and that encouraged people to share and spread Korean music. At the same time in Japan, labels refused to upload their music,” says Sazunic, a Canadian expat, who has spent 15 years producing content for YouTube and since 2021 has run the popular lifestyle channel King Kogi (188,000 subscribers), featuring videos about her adopted homeland.
For many years, local labels were reluctant to upload official music videos on YouTube through fear of cannibalizing physical sales and would only release truncated versions of songs on the platform. Use of sound recordings in user-generated content would, for the most part, be blocked and taken down. The rising popularity of streaming in the world’s second-biggest recorded music market — worth $2.7 billion in 2022, according to IFPI, behind only the United States — has, however, been transformative, leading local labels and management companies to pivot away from blocking songs on UGC platforms and towards licensing and monetizing them.
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“It’s been an uneasy process for consumers in Japan and that’s entirely down to Japanese rights holders, but the market is moving wholeheartedly into embracing music usage on UGC,” says Rob Wells, chief executive of Los Angeles-headquartered Orfium, one of several international tech firms now fighting it out to grow their share of the country’s emerging, yet potentially huge, UGC music market.
At present, UGC monetization is in its infancy in Japan, says Wells, but he predicts the market will rapidly grow over the next five years to deliver rights holders the kind of returns they already receive from other major music territories.
In 2022, Alphabet-owned YouTube says it paid out a record $6 billion to the music industry, although executives in Asia tell Billboard that only around 5% of that total — around $300 million – went to rights holders in Japan. That’s despite YouTube being the most popular video platform in the country with over 70 million monthly active users (YouTube declined to comment when contacted by Billboard for this article).
The main reason why Japan’s digital music market lags behind other countries is down to stakeholders’ historic desire to protect the enduring popularity of physical music formats, primarily CDs and music DVDs/Blu-ray discs, which accounted for 66% of revenues in 2022, according to the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ).
Digital’s share of the market is fast-growing though with streaming revenues rising 25% year-on-year to 93 billion yen ($618 million) in 2022, fueled by increased consumer take up of subscription services during the pandemic. That same year, overall digital music sales exceeded 100 billion yen ($665 million) for the first time since the RIAJ began tracking the data in 2005.
In response to the changing market, many of Japan’s leading labels and management companies (which often own the master recording rights for their acts) are rushing to partner with copyright technology companies to track and monetize the use of their content online.
Orfium, which generates income for clients by tracking and monetizing the use of music in broadcast and UGC platforms, has been active in Japan since 2022 when it acquired social media firm Breaker and is now one of the biggest operators in the local market. Others include Los Angeles-based PEX, Swiss-based Utopia Music, Spain’s BMAT and California-based Vobile.
French Music company Believe began operating in Japan last year and recently launched PLAYCODE, a new imprint dedicated to championing Japanese hip-hop acts. Prior to the company entering the market, Erika Ogawa, general manager of Believe Japan, said YouTube was being “under-utilized” by the music industry in Japan.
“It has untapped potential, particularly in terms of monetization, audience engagement and artist development which should be exploited by leveraging all its capabilities,” said Ogawa last year in a blogpost.
“I see Japan as being a huge opportunity for us and the wider industry,” says Wells, who served as Universal Music Group’s president of global digital business before joining Orfium in 2017. The company now has over 700 employees across nine territories in Europe, Asia and the U.S.
Wells says the company’s clients in Japan, which include Warner Music Japan, Victor Entertainment and leading music and entertainment company Avex Inc, have seen a 77% year-on-year rise in the number of YouTube UGC views being monetized with revenues growing 34%. (Wells declined to provide equivalent financial figures. Globally, Orfium says it generated more than $200 million in incremental revenue in 2022. Notable U.S. clients include Sony Music Publishing, Warner Music Group, Warner Chappell Music, Kobalt, Ingrooves and Hipgnosis.)
In recent months, the company has ramped up its operations in Japan, signing a deal with JASRAC, Japan’s largest collective management organization. It has also started working with entertainment company Bandai Namco Music Live, a leading player in the Japanese anime music market that represents an extensive catalog of more than 100,000 sound recordings and compositions, as well as more than 3,000 digital creators, including many YouTubers and Virtual YouTubers — a popular trend in Japan where online creators use virtual avatars and are known as VTubers.
The Bandai Namco deal marks Orfium’s entry into the global anime market — a rapidly growing sector that generated almost $25 billion in 2023, according to Morgan Stanley Research, and is projected to rise to over $35 billion within the next three years. The rising global prominence of Japanese anime opens up opportunities for the country’s creators of anime music, says Alan Swarts, CEO of Orfium Japan. Anime ranks as one of the continent’s most popular music genres behind only pop and Enka (traditional Japanese music), with 11 of last year’s top 30 songs in Japan being either anime theme songs or anime related. Anime titles in Bandai’s catalog include the hugely popular Love Live series, One-Punch Man and The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya.
Swarts points to last year’s launch of a new weekly global chart by Billboard Japan, ranking the top 20 Japanese songs based on streaming and/or sales activity from more than 200 international markets, excluding Japan, as a significant development in the country’s music business that has heightened local labels’ focus on reaching global audiences.
“For a long time, Japan was a very insular physical-based market. That’s now changed and within Japanese music companies there is a big push to go global and make Japanese music as a big as Latin and K-pop has become outside their native territories,” says Swarts. “Utilizing streaming services and UGC platforms like YouTube will be key towards achieving that aim.”
“For us, Japan is the jump off point – the gateway to the rest of Asia,” says Wells. “People will soon realize that there are no more blocks on them being able to share music on these [UGC] platforms and that will quickly accelerate the growth.”
The Oak View Group (OVG) will soon enter a key phase of its long-planned pivot to international markets with the opening of Coop Live in Manchester, United Kingdom, next month.
After its record post-pandemic run — which included opening seven arenas in 16 months, including Climate Change Arena in Seattle, UBS Arena in New York and Acrisure Arena in Palm Springs, Calif. — the Tim Lewieke-led management and development company will transition from U.K. venue developer to U.K. venue operator in one of Europe’s largest concert and live entertainment economies.
First Manchester, then the world, says Francesca Leiweke-Bodie, OVG’s COO (and Leiweke’s daughter). She explains the United Kingdom will be the launch point for expanding the company’s private-public partnership model, which looks to government groups to aid in land acquisition in exchange for fully private financing and development work. Leiweke-Bodie says the model is key to driving expansion opportunities into Africa, Asia and the Middle East, where huge gaps in the world’s touring infrastructure prevent popular arena and stadium tours from accessing hundreds of millions of fans.
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Billboard recently caught up with Leiweke-Bodie to discuss the opening of Coop Live and detail OVG’s near-term expansion plans around the globe.
Why did OVG decide to begin their international expansion efforts with the Manchester project?
London and the U.K. have always been a frontrunner for where we as a company want to plant a flag and show the other countries and municipalities that we’re speaking to about public-private partnerships and prove what is possible when the private sector can step in and invest. That doesn’t happen as much overseas, where the market is really heavily driven by municipal financing. Having this project in the U.K., a $375 million privately funded arena with huge community support and more than $1 million going back to the local business — when other potential partners come to Manchester and see what we are doing, there is no doubt that we’re the real deal and will deliver on our promises.
What’s the biggest challenge OVG faces in its efforts to expand internationally?
I think the hardest thing to come by, whether it’s domestically or internationally, is land. We want to build in the urban core. We want to be where the fans want to be — in the city centers. We can do everything else. We’ll build it. We’ll finance it. We’ll book it. We’ll take the risk. But the partnership that we’re always looking for is the land opportunity. Most of these cities are much older than the United States with dense urban cores that we can’t even fathom. To find four or five acres available to build these types of projects with access to public transit is the crux of what we’re trying to create with these city partnerships. There’s also inbound opportunities from local owners and developers that see an opportunity to take land that they might have identified for retail and say, “Let’s rethink this.”
Once the Manchester facility opened, what’s next for OVG?
Hamilton, Ontario is next. It’s an existing 18,000-seat arena we’ve already started work on, taking the building down to its studs and [which] will reopen in late April. It’s the first project in Toronto that was a public-private partnership and ultimately became a renovation project, but it’s effectively a new arena. In North America, there’s only a few strategic markets left where one could make a really big difference with another arena. But overseas, we have a tremendous amount of opportunity because of the growth internationally of global music, from American country music to Latin.
What other metropolitan characteristics appeal to OVG?
Countries or cities that not only attract from surrounding countries but serve as the point of destination for a much broader area. One example is Sao Paulo in Brazil. From a financial perspective, Sao Paulo is an incredible point of destination for not only Brazil, but for Latin America. That’s why we want to plant our flag there because it doesn’t have an arena. Vienna, Austria is the same thing. You know, it is central to continental Europe. You can get to it from six different countries via car. We have about two dozen cities like that we’ve identified.
How does programming and booking drive the OVG strategy?
That’s such a key element. The first domino that we were really thinking about and analyzing from a construction and design perspective is making sure that the building is both turnkey and equipped with all acoustic treatments and back-of-house amenities to accommodate major tours. We talk to local promoters, and figure out what is coming in the rider and work with our partners at the building to alleviate costs. Arenas have to compete with the stadium shows and we have to make the economics work so we’re really looking at the take-home revenue for an artist to make sure that their touring costs are competitive and can exceed the expectations of fans and market partners.
The global record business will soon pop the champagne to celebrate another year of streaming-led revenue growth, judging from the handful of individual country revenue figures for 2023 made public so far this year. The IFPI won’t release its 2023 report until Thursday (Mar. 21), but major markets such as the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain and Japan have already released data that shows 2023 produced another bumper harvest for record labels.
But while streaming continues to push markets in positive directions, growth has slowed, and revenue in some markets remains well below the levels of the CD era. Worse yet, some countries may have insufficient streaming growth to get back to earlier peaks.
SNEP, the recorded music trade group in France, issued a stark warning this week when it announced that the country’s 2023 revenue rose a respectable 5.1% to 968 million euros ($1.05 billion at the average exchange rate in 2023). But even though digital revenue rose 8.8% to 620 million euros ($671 million) and streaming revenue climbed 9.2%, a 10% increase in subscription streaming revenue “remains too weak to fully fuel the development of the market even though it is the primary source of value creation,” SNEP wrote in its 2023 report.
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France might reasonably be expected to be faring better in 2024. The country was the sixth-largest recorded music market in 2022, according to the IFPI, and is the home of Deezer, an early entrant to the music subscription market. But in 2023, France had only a 16% penetration rate for paid subscribers, according to SNEP, “one of the lowest among the main music territories. The growth in revenue from these subscriptions is slowing down here while our market is far from having reached maturity.” This isn’t a brand-new concern: SNEP sounded the same alarm a year ago.
So, while streaming is creating new opportunities globally for labels, publishers and creators, it hasn’t grown enough to help France recapture revenue lost during the fall of the CD in the 2000s. France’s revenue of 968 million euros in 2023 was 25% below the 1.3 billion euros of revenue it enjoyed in 2002. In contrast, the U.S. market’s $15.9 billion in recorded music revenue was well above the peak of the CD era, $14.5 billion, set in 1999, according to the RIAA.
Elsewhere, some major recorded music markets have announced decent gains in 2023 without voicing the kind of dire warning seen in France.
The German recorded music industry grew 6.3% in 2023, the BVMI announced Mar. 6. Digital revenue grew 8.4% and accounted for 81.5% of total revenue. Audio streaming rose 8.4% and accounted for 74.8% of the total market and 92% of digital revenue. Physical sales accounted for 18.5% of total revenue and rose 0.1% from 2022. CD sales dropped 5.9% but accounted for 11.3% of total revenue and about 61% of physical revenue. Vinyl sales grew 12.6%.
Spain’s recorded music market grew 12.3% to 520 million euros in 2023, Promusicae announced Tuesday (Mar. 12). Streaming grew 17.3% to 398.6 million euros ($432 million) and accounted for 77% of total revenue, which was a remarkable 150% higher than the low point of 159.7 million euros ($212 million) in 2013. But, like France, Spain has yet to match its peak revenue from the CD era. Last year’s revenue was on par with the 475 million euros ($534 million) seen in 2005, itself a sharp decline from revenue that surpassed 700 million euros ($630 million) in 2001.
Aside from SNEP in France, only the BPI in the United Kingdom sounded an alarm of any sort. The market’s recorded revenue rose 8.1% in 2023 to a record 1.43 billion pounds ($1.78 billion), the organization announced Thursday (Mar. 14), with streaming revenue increasing 8.4% to 962 million pounds ($1.2 billion) and accounting for 67.4% of total revenue, up from 67.3% in 2022 and well above the 8.6% seen a decade earlier. But BPI CEO Dr. Jo Twist cautioned not to take the growth for granted and emphasized the need for “significant label investment” to keep the market prosperous.
There’s a reason the kind of gains music markets are seeing currently might not feel like unqualified success stories: inflation. Adjusted for inflation, revenue in France last year was actually 48% below 2002; and in 2022, the United States was 38% below its 1999 peak.
These major markets’ failure to return to CD-era highs helps explain the music business’s unprecedented land rush as companies invest in developing markets in search of export-ready artists and untapped streaming potential. Both majors and independents are investing in Africa, the Middle East/North Africa, Asia and South America — regions with large populations, under-monetized streaming markets and exportable music that could generate royalties in Western countries.
Those developing markets, and some major ones like the United States and United Kingdom, helped global recorded music trade revenue reach a new high of $24 billion in 2021, surpassing the $23.2 billion from 1999 (unadjusted for inflation). While both the United States and United Kingdom surpassed their CD era peaks in 2021 (without adjusting for inflation), some other major markets are still trying to recapture their glory days. Growth-minded companies in those markets may have to look beyond their borders to get there.
Billboard Power Players is expanding to Canada for the first time in 2024, nominations have now officially opened via this nomination form.
For its relative size, the country has produced some huge international success stories over the last decade, with artists like Drake, The Weeknd, Shawn Mendes, Justin Bieber and Tate McRae making big waves on the world stage.
That’s the case behind the scenes, too, including previous Power List honourees like Kristen Burke, the president of Warner Music Canada and the only female head of a major label in Canada; Wassim “Sal” Slaiby of The Weeknd’s XO Records and the founder of Universal Arabic Music; and Michael Rapino, the Canadian-born president and CEO of Live Nation who finished fourth on the recently revealed 2024 Power 100 list, behind only Taylor Swift and the global CEOs of two major labels.
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Billboard Canada Power Players, however, will be the first time the award will be exclusive to Canadians or those who’ve made an impact in Canada’s music industry. – Richard Trapunski
New U.S. Visa Fees Could Prove Costly for Canadian Musicians
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has published its final rule updating visa fees in several categories, along with a Frequently Asked Questions page summary.
Overall, creative arts petitioners will be hit with higher costs, increased petition prep requirements, and lengthier times for premium processing. This will affect Canadian and other musicians, as well as art workers, travelling across the border to play in the U.S.
After consultation with stakeholders including the American Federation of Musicians, final fees have been reduced from the initial amounts proposed by the Department of Homeland Security for nonprofits and certain small businesses with 25 or fewer employees.
The new fees, though, could prove costly for Canadian musicians, for whom crossing the border is a necessary part of a music career.
The fee increases were originally for early 2023, but will now take effect on April 1, 2024. – David Farrell
Music Declares Emergency Will Host a Climate Summit in Halifax Ahead of the Juno Awards
Music Declares Emergency (MDE) Canada is looking to spark conversation about the climate crisis at this year’s Juno Awards. Ahead of the ceremony on March 24, the advocacy organization will host a Mini Music Climate Summit at the Halifax Central Library, on March 22, to promote the need for climate action in the music industry.
The free, one-day event will consider topics such as sustainable transportation, carbon calculation, merch and food, and much more, providing an opportunity for industry members to share best practices and develop strategies around curbing emissions in the industry. MDE Canada previously held Canada’s first Music Climate Summit in Toronto in 2022.
The climate summit accompanies MDE Canada’s Climate Emergency Concert on March 17 in Halifax, where artists like Talia Schlanger and Jenn Grant will pay tribute to Neil Young and Joni Mitchell, two Canadian musicians who have used their platforms to promote environmental awareness. – Rosie Long Decter
Last Week ‘In Canada’: No to ‘Laughs,’ But Yes to Women in Music
LONDON — Strong growth in streaming, vinyl and even CD sales saw music spending in the United Kingdom increase for a ninth consecutive year in 2023, according to annual figures from labels trade body BPI published Thursday (March 14).
Total U.K. recorded music sales — comprising digital and physical revenues, public performance rights and sync — climbed 8.1% to 1.43 billion pounds ($1.8 billion) last year.
That’s the highest nominal amount ever achieved in the U.K in one year, although when the figures are adjusted for inflation, last year’s record revenues are actually 478 million pounds ($610 million) below the 1.9 billion pounds ($2.4 billion) where the music industry should have been in real terms since 2006, the first year when public performance and sync were included in the annual total, reports BPI.
Driving the growth was an 8.4% year-on-year rise in streaming revenues, which increased to 962 million pounds ($1.2 billion) and accounted for just over 67% of annual trade revenues in 2023 — broadly flat with its share of the U.K. market in the previous 12-month period. Ten years prior, streaming represented just 8.6% of British labels’ income.
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Breaking down streaming revenue, paid subscriptions to services like Spotify and Apple Music generated 827 million pounds ($1 billion), up 8.1% on 2022, while ad-funded revenue grew by over 12% to 71 million pounds ($90 million) and video streaming trade income rose 6.9% to 64 million pounds ($82 million).
Download sales fell 5.8% to 26 million pounds ($33 million), while total digital revenue was 989 million pounds ($1.2 billion), up 7.9% on the previous year.
BPI reports that nearly 2,250 artists registered more than 10 million audio streams in the U.K. last year — a rise of 17% over the past two years — with Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers” the most-streamed track, racking up almost 200 million audio and video streams. Behind Cyrus was Dave and Central Cee’s “Sprinter” (160 million streams) and “Escapism” by Raye featuring 070 Shake (142 million streams).
In terms of physical format sales, labels and artists received 243 million pounds ($310 million) in 2023, up almost 13% on 2022, when physical trade revenues dropped by a tenth.
Fueling physical’s recovery was a double-digit (18.6%) rise in vinyl album revenues, which totaled £142 million ($181 million) on the back of popular new releases by Taylor Swift, The Rolling Stones and Lana Del Rey, who had the top three best-selling vinyl titles in the U.K. last year with 1989 (Taylor’s Version), Hackney Diamonds and Did You Know There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, respectively.
More surprisingly, CD revenues also grew in 2023, up 5.4% year-on-year to just under £100 million ($127 million) with Take That’s This Life the year’s biggest-selling CD release.
Despite the compact disc’s resurgence, which BPI partly attributed to high-profile annual marketing events such as Record Store Day and National Album Day, vinyl moved further ahead as the country’s leading physical format in terms of label income, making up just over 58% of all physical music trade revenue, compared to 55% the previous year.
Public performance revenue climbed 7% year-on-year to 155 million pounds ($198 million), while sync sales dropped 7.6% to just under 40 million pounds ($51 million).
BPI’s year-end figures differ from those released by the Digital Entertainment and Retail Association (ERA) in January as the two organizations have different counting methods.
BPI’s financial figures are based on Official Charts Company (OCC) data and a survey of its record label members, which include the U.K. arms of Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group, as well as over 500 independent labels. ERA’s year-end results, which also use OCC data, also include retail value, hence the higher numbers.
The U.K. is the world’s third biggest recorded music market behind the U.S. and Japan with sales of just under $1.7 billion in trade value, according to IFPI’s 2023 Global Music Report.
“Led by streaming, this ninth consecutive annual rise in recorded music revenues highlights how a balanced and prosperous market enabled by significant label investment can help even more artists to succeed,” said BPI CEO Jo Twist in a statement.
A London appeals court on Thursday (Mar. 14) overturned the murder conviction of Jamaican dancehall star Vybz Kartel, ruling that the 2014 guilty verdict was tainted by allegations that one juror attempted to bribe others.
The ruling came more than a decade after Kartel — a popular Jamaican artist who has worked with Rihanna, Jay-Z and others — and three others were convicted in Kingston, Jamaica of the 2011 killing of an associate named Clive “Lizard” Williams, whose body was never found.
In the decision, the appeals court ruled that the judge overseeing the 2014 trial had made a “fatal” error: allowing the jury to proceed to a verdict despite news that one of the jurors had attempted to bribe others. That juror was not removed, and soon after the jury returned a guilty verdict.
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“There should have been no question of allowing Juror X to continue to serve on the jury,” the appeals court wrote Thursday. “Allowing Juror X to continue to serve on the jury is fatal to the safety of the convictions which followed. This was an infringement of the defendants’ fundamental right to a fair hearing by an independent and impartial court.”
The decision came from the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, a London court that decides last-resort appeals from certain countries belonging to the Commonwealth of Nations, including Jamaica.
The ruling overturned Kartel’s conviction and his 32-year prison sentence, but he could still face a retrial on the same accusations. The appeals court said that Jamaican courts would decide whether such a trial will take place.
Kartel — along with co-defendants Shawn Campbell, Kahira Jones and Andre St John — faced a 64-day jury trial in early 2014 over accusations that they had killed Williams after he failed to return two unlicensed firearms they had lent him.
But on the final day of the trial, the judge was told that Juror X had attempted to “persuade another member of the jury” to acquit the defendants by offering bribes of 500,000 Jamaican dollars (roughly $3,200 US).
After receiving that information, the judge was faced with an unusually difficult choice. Because another juror had already been discharged over a separate issue, the only choice was to end the trial entirely after weeks of testimony or allow the case to continue to a verdict.
“It might have been possible simply to discharge a miscreant juror and to allow the remaining members of the jury to return verdicts [but] that was not possible here,” the appeals court wrote Thursday.
Though the appeals court said it had “considerable sympathy with the judge’s dilemma,” it said the decision to proceed with the problematic juror had been a “serious irregularity” that would result in a “miscarriage of justice” if allowed to stand.
“In coming to this conclusion, the Board is mindful of the very serious consequences which may flow from having to discharge a jury shortly before the end of a long and complex criminal trial,” the appeals court wrote, noting that England has statutes aimed at dealing with such situations.
“However, in the absence of such a provision — and there is no such provision in Jamaica — there will be occasions on which, as in the present case, a court will have no alternative but to discharge a jury and end the trial in order to protect the integrity of the system of trial by jury,” the court wrote.
Sherine Abdel-Wahab’s illustrious musical career has flourished over two decades, defined by a versatile body of work that resonates deeply with audiences. With a portfolio of hits, Sherine Abdel-Wahab’s music continues to captivate hearts, dominating playlists across diverse streaming platforms and scaling the heights of the Billboard Arabia charts. Sherine’s impressive achievements and triumphs have paved the way for her to clinch a prestigious Global Force Award at Billboard’s 2024 Women in Music ceremony.
Since the launch of Billboard Arabia Hot 100 and Artist 100 charts in late 2023, Sherine has dominated the Top 100 Artists chart for eight out of 12 weeks, holding the No. 1 spot for the majority of that time and consistently ranking within the top three positions during the remaining weeks. Additionally, her presence on the Hot 100 chart has been formidable, with six of her songs maintaining a spot for a continuous 12-week period.
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The lasting success of Sherine’s tracks like “Kalam Einieh (Words of His Eyes),” which was the No. 1 song on Billboard Arabia’s Hot 100 when the chart released twelve weeks ago, and still holds the No. 5 slot, and the presence of several other tracks from her album Nassay (A Person Who Forgets), are a testament to Sherine’s ability to make timeless music. Meanwhile, her song, “Sabri Aleel (My Patience is Wearing Thin),” has persisted on Billboard Arabia’s charts and streaming platforms, where it continues to reign supreme even two decades after its debut. Meanwhile, the song has garnered viral attention on TikTok, finding new life by captivating a global audience, while transcending language barriers and cultural divide.
“I am thrilled that both my old and new songs are loved by listeners,” says Sherine. “They have embraced everything I’ve poured my heart into from day one. Seeing my tracks still topping the charts after twenty years is truly amazing! That was my dream and it feels great seeing it come true.”
Sherine’s musical journey is marked by a prolific discography and numerous collaborations. In 2005, she released her album Lazem Ayeesh (I Must Live) with Free Music Company, featuring hits like “Ala Bali” (On My Mind) and “Qal Saaban Alieh” (Everyone Feels Sorry for Him). Transitioning to Rotana, she dropped Batamenak (I Reassure You) in 2008, followed by Habeit (I Loved) in 2009 and Esaal Alaya (Ask About Me) in 2012, featuring standout tracks like “Beh Tehky Fe Eh?” (What Are You Talking About?) and “Wel Nabi Law Gani” (I Swear If He Comes to Me). Her sixth album, Ana Kteer (I’m a Lot), released in 2014, included memorable songs like “W Meen Ikhtar” (Who Chose?) and “Ya Layali” (Oh Nights!). Sherine also contributed to the soundtrack of the drama series Tareky (My Way), collaborating with poets and composers.
In 2016, she teamed up with Hossam Habib for the duet “Kol Ma Aghanni” (Everytime I Sing). Sherine’s 2018 album Nassay (A Person Who Forgets) garnered millions of views with diverse tracks such as “Kazbain” (The Liars) and “Al Watar Al Hassas” (The Sensitive String). Returning to Rotana, she released hit singles like “El Hob Khedaa” (Love is a Trick) in 2019, “Mish Qadd Al-Hawa” (I Can’t Afford to Love) in 2020, and “Kollaha Ghayrana” (All of Them Are Jealous) and “Khasimt Al-Num” (I Forgot About Sleep) in 2021.
Sherine attests much of her success to the ability to keep things simple, and real, saying, “It’s all about keeping it real. I’m just me, and that authenticity is what’s helped me connect with fans. Ultimately, it’s their love and support that fuels my success.”
About a decade ago, Sherine teamed up with global hip-hop star Nelly for the duet “Just a Dream.” The song became a massive hit upon its release and recently resurfaced on streaming platforms and social media. She recalls it fondly: “To be honest, Nelly and I hit it off right away. Despite my limited English, we managed to understand each other. I remember we were backstage and I really liked his mic, so I asked him if I could borrow it when we’re singing on stage, and he gladly gave it away!”
Sherine’s virality isn’t limited to the charts. In recent years her songs have found new life on social media, particularly through the remixes of several DJs, chief among them DJamil. In July 2023, DJamil mashed up Sherine’s “Eh Eh” with Drake’s “Hotline Bling,” clocking nearly 20 million views, followed by “Sabry Aleel” mixed with Busta Rhymes “I Know What You Want” in September 2023, which went on to amass upwards of 34 million views.
When revisiting some of the pivotal moments that left a lasting impact on her journey, she reminisced about her first performance on the legendary stage of Baalbek in Lebanon, and shared some insights into her special connection with the Lebanese audience, whom she considers a tough nut to crack.
“Standing on the same stage that Umm Kulthum graced 48 years earlier as the first Egyptian artist to perform in Baalbek was surreal,” says Sherine. “It felt like the Lebanese were not just welcoming me, but also paying tribute to me, and that was an incredible feeling. It’s moments like these that make all the hard work worth it.”
Last month, Sherine dropped her latest single “El Dahab,” which serves as an exciting preview of her highly anticipated new album. Fans have been eagerly awaiting this release, especially following her last album Nassay in 2018. Sherine graciously shared some details about what to expect from her upcoming album: “The new album has some great songs all set, but I’ve decided to wait a bit with Ramadan approaching. After Eid, I’ll start releasing them one by one. Times have changed, you know – it’s all about the singles now.”
As for the Global Force award she received at Billboard’s 2024 Women in Music, Sherine said she couldn’t be happier about such a global nod to the impact of her music, especially knowing that even the younger generations, including her own daughters, have taken to listening to her songs.
“My girls go to an English school and didn’t know much about my songs,” she says. “But recently, my daughter Hana began listening to my music and it’s incredible to see that I’m striking a chord with kids their age and the young generation who listens exclusively to English-language music. It’s a real thrill knowing they’re enjoying my Arabic melodies.”
She adds: “This recognition is huge for me. Seeing my daughters witness this global honor brings me immense joy, and it means a lot to me knowing they’re proud of their mom. At the end of the day, my fans and my daughters mean the world to me.”
Sherine Abdel Wahab
Hassan Hendawi
