State Champ Radio Irving Azoff
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David Israelite’s guest column on October 23, 2025 explained how little music creators get paid across different streaming services. I just want to lay out the facts and be clear: YouTube pays the least for music, full stop. They always have and always will unless someone stands up to them. They’ll throw up smoke screens and tempt you to look the other way, but let’s not be fooled.
YouTube recently touted that it paid artists $8 billion over the past year. This sounds impressive, but it’s not. During the same period, Spotify generated roughly $18 billion in revenue and paid about $12 billion to music rights holders — nearly 67% of its revenue. By contrast, YouTube generated $60 billion in revenue and paid only $8 billion to rights holders — about 13%. YouTube will say they’re not just a music service. But I would argue that YouTube never would have become such a successful platform without music, and even if only one-third of their revenue comes from music (and it’s likely higher), they certainly should be paying more than Spotify, not 50% less.
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How does YouTube pay less than their competitors? They are a behemoth bully. They have 2.7 billion monthly active users and more than $60 billion in annual revenue. It’s the dominant video platform, with more hours streamed than Netflix. It’s the largest music service, with more users than Spotify. And in the “traditional” TV space, it’s on track to surpass Comcast as the largest U.S. cable provider. This company now owns audience and content delivery in a way the world has never seen before.
Their tyranny isn’t just limited to music. If you read the headlines, you will see a pattern of coercion: YouTube vs. Televisa/Univision. YouTube vs. NBCUniversal. YouTube vs. Fox. YouTube vs. Paramount. And now YouTube vs. Disney. The playbook is always the same: if you refuse to accept YouTube’s below-market terms, YouTube threatens to go dark until you capitulate. They then shift the blame and spin the story — when in reality, YouTube just wants to pay less.
And now they’re trying to dictate terms to consumers too. If you’re a YouTube TV subscriber, you received an email saying “if Disney’s content is unavailable for an extended period of time,” YouTube will give you a paltry $20 credit. So, YouTube gets to unilaterally decide for consumers how long is too long and how much ESPN is worth to them? They bully the people creating the content and then they bully the consumers who want access to it.
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Disney understands that “content is king,” but at YouTube, content is just a pawn in their game. And the game at YouTube is clearly about aggregating services and market power (across Google and YouTube) and using that market power to strong-arm everyone in the ecosystem — rights holders, content creators, advertisers, everyone — for their own financial gain. YouTube is showing us what happens when unchecked power and greed collide.
Thankfully, Disney is standing up to YouTube, and we all need to support Disney because enough is enough. As artists, consumers, and companies, let’s voice our support for Disney in this battle with YouTube. And in parallel, Washington needs to take a good hard look at YouTube’s abuse of market power and explore whether it’s time to break up Google so that YouTube, YouTube Music, and YouTube TV are separate businesses that finally have to compete on a level playing field.
YouTube: without the artists, athletes, and actors, there is no business.
Irving Azoff holds the title of chairman and CEO of The Azoff Company and is the personal manager of the legendary Eagles, Jon Bon Jovi, U2, John Mayer, Van Halen, Gwen Stefani, Steely Dan, Maroon 5, and many others. The Azoff Company is a privately held media and entertainment company dedicated to investing in positively disruptive businesses that put artists and fans first. Azoff was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2020.
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Music Artists Coalition (MAC), a nonprofit dedicated to advocating for music creators, has responded to Universal Music Group’s new AI deal with Udio, asking questions about how artists will be compensated. “We’re cautiously optimistic but insistent on details,” said Jordan Bromley, leader at Manatt Entertainment and board member of MAC, in a press release put out by MAC on Friday (Oct. 31).
The UMG-Udio deal, which was announced Wednesday night (Oct. 29), is multifaceted. First, it involves a “compensatory” legal settlement for UMG, which sued Udio last summer, along with the other major music companies, for copyright infringement of their sound recordings during Udio’s training process. (Sony and Warner’s lawsuit against Udio is ongoing.)
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It also provides go-forward licensing agreements for UMG’s recorded music and publishing assets, which is said to open up a new revenue stream for the company and its signees who decide to opt in. Those artists and songwriters who participate will be compensated for both the training process of the AI model and for its outputs, according to a source close to the deal.
As part of the agreement, Udio plans to pivot its offerings significantly. In 2026, the company will launch a new platform “powered by new cutting-edge generative AI technology that will be trained on authorized and licensed music. The new subscription service will transform the user engagement experience, creating a licensed and protected environment to customize, stream and share music responsibly, on the Udio platform.” This will include new tools that let fans remix, mashup and create songs in the style of participating UMG artists. It will also allow fans to use UMG artist voice models.
Opting into the Udio deal is not a one-size-fits-all approach. According to a recent interview with Udio CEO Andrew Sanchez about the deal, the company “[has] built and invested an absolutely enormous amount into controls. Controls over how artists’ songs can be used, how their styles can be used, really granular controls…One of the things that you’ll see is we’re going to launch with a set of features that has a spectrum of freedom that the artist can control.”
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One area that Sanchez and UMG’s announcement about the deal did not provide clarity on was how exactly participating artists will be compensated. This is why MAC put out a press release on Friday (Oct. 31) asking exactly what is going on — and noting the organization is only “cautiously optimistic” about the agreement.
As Irving Azoff, top artist manager, entrepreneur, board member and founder of MAC, put it in the announcement: “Every technological advance offers opportunity, but we have to make sure it doesn’t come at the expense of the people who actually create the music — artists and songwriters. We’ve seen this before — everyone talks about ‘partnership,’ but artists end up on the sidelines with scraps. Artists must have creative control, fair compensation and clarity about deals being done based on their catalogs.”
The press release goes on to say that while MAC appreciates that the deal is “opt-in” and with “granular control,” the organization still has questions, which are quoted below:
“Meaningful consent: How do artists actually control what uses they authorize? What happens when multiple songwriters or performers on a single song disagree about participation?”
“Revenue splits: What percentage of revenue goes to artists versus the label versus the AI company when their music is used to train models or generate new works?”
“Data and deal transparency: Was settlement money paid? How will that be distributed to artists? Will artists’ pay-outs for a new revenue stream just be applied to old unrecouped balances? Will artists see exactly how their work is being used within the AI system and have ongoing visibility into its use?”
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“Artist opt-in sounds promising, but participation without fair compensation isn’t partnership; it’s just permission,” said Ron Gubitz, MAC’s executive director, in the press release. “Artists create the work that makes these AI systems possible. They deserve both control over how their work is used and appropriate compensation for its value generation. It’s the three C’s: consent, compensation, and clarity.”
“The music industry is at a crossroads,” Gubitz added. “The decisions being made right now will shape how music gets created, distributed, and monetized for decades to come. That’s exactly why MAC exists — to ensure artists have a seat at the table when those decisions are made.”
Bromley added: “True partnership requires appropriate oversight and remuneration for all involved parties. The industry needs to get this right — for artists, for fans, and for the future of music itself.”
Don Henley and his longtime manager Irving Azoff are being sued by one of the men who was criminally charged — and later vindicated — for allegedly attempting to sell handwritten lyrics connected to the Eagles‘ 1976 album Hotel California, claiming they and their attorneys engaged in a “malicious prosecution” that harmed his reputation and caused him financial losses and emotional distress.
The complaint, filed in New York state court on Thursday (Feb. 6), was filed against Henley, Azoff and the firms that represented them in their case: Manatt, Phelps & Phillips and Loeb & Loeb. In it, Horowitz claims the parties falsely alleged that he and his two co-defendants in the criminal case “knew or had reason to believe” that the lyric sheets “had been unlawfully obtained” and nonetheless attempted to profit off of them via an online auction. However, Horowitz claims the men and their attorneys knew all along that the notes had been acquired through legal means in the first place.
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Horowitz, a rare book dealer, and his co-defendants — Rock & Roll Hall of Fame curator Craig Inciardi and memorabilia auctioneer Edward Kosinski — were criminally charged in 2022 over an alleged conspiracy to resell the lyrics that had been handwritten by Henley while working on the Eagles’ iconic Hotel California album. At the time, prosecutors had accused the three men of hiding the fact that the documents had been stolen from Henley’s home by Ed Sanders, a journalist hired by Henley and Azoff to write a never-published book on the Eagles in the late 1970s.
But in a stunning turnaround in March 2024, Manhattan prosecutors dropped the case after Henley produced new evidence previously withheld under attorney-client privilege that cast doubt on his and Azoff’s allegations. The judge in the case subsequently dismissed the charges and chastised Henley, Azoff and their attorneys for “obfuscat[ing] and hid[ing] information that they believed would be damaging to their position that the lyric sheets were stolen.”
According to Horowitz’s attorney Caitlin Robin, the evidence cited by prosecutors and the judge in dropping the charges — a series of emails between Henley, Azoff and their attorneys — proves they were aware that Sanders had legally obtained the lyric sheets in the course of writing the never-published Eagles book. Nonetheless, she alleges they “purposefully withheld any disclosure thereof because they knew it would exculpate Plaintiff GLENN HOROWITZ and essentially destroy the fraudulent allegations they made about him.”
As a result of his “unjust prosecution,” Horowitz claims he “was deprived of his liberty and suffered humiliation, defamation, media harassment, diminished reputation, loss of business and/or loss of wages amounting in more than ten million dollars ($10,000,000.00), in addition to mental anguish, indignity, frustration and financial loss.” The complaint further alleges that Horowitz’s wife Tracey (who is listed as a co-plaintiff) also “suffered humiliation, defamation, media harassment, diminished reputation, and mental and emotional anguish” as a result of her husband’s prosecution.
In a statement sent to Billboard, Henley and Azoff’s attorney Dan Petrocelli said, “Don Henley was a witness and a victim in a criminal trial brought by the Manhattan District Attorney after a formal indictment of Glenn Horowitz by a New York grand jury. The indictment highlighted the dark underbelly of the memorabilia business that exploited the brazen, unauthorized taking and selling of Mr. Henley’s handwritten lyrics. The only malicious prosecution involved here is the filing of this case by Mr. Horowitz.”
The Horowitzes are asking for damages “in excess of the jurisdictional limits of all the lower Courts of the State of New York.”
Manatt, Phelps & Phillips and Loeb & Loeb did not immediately respond to Billboard‘s requests for comment.
Global Music Rights (GMR), the boutique U.S. performance rights organization that represents Bruce Springsteen, Drake, the John Lennon estate and among others, is in advanced talks to sell a majority stake to the private equity firm Hellman & Friedman, sources tell Billboard.
Co-founded by Irving Azoff and Randy Grimmett in 2013, GMR’s majority owner, Texas Pacific Group (TPG), has signed a letter of intent to sell its undisclosed majority stake to Hellman & Friedman (HF), according to sources close to the talks. Other sources described the status of the talks as having reached an “understanding” to sell. The Azoff Company, which manages GMR among other companies in its portfolio, will retain its stake and continue daily management of GMR if the deal proceeds, sources say, although some say it, too, has earned a payout by selling a portion of its minority stake in the deal. Music Business Worldwide reported news of the sale on Thursday.
Institutional investors and private equity funds like New Mountain Capital and Blackstone have bought significant stakes in competing U.S. performance rights organizations in recent years, attracted by the key role that PROs play for businesses looking to access music in a commercial context.
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Multiple reports put the price for GMR at $3.3 billion. Sources tell Billboard that is the company’s valuation, and that GMR generates between $450 million and $500 million annually; other informed sources say the valuation is lower than that and dispute that revenue figure. With the Azoff Group retaining part of its stake in GMR, the price TPG fetches for its stake will be less than the headline $3.3 billion figure, those sources point out. GMR is being advised by the investment bank Moelis.
Representatives for TPG, HF and The Azoff Company declined to comment.
Hellman & Friedman is a San Francisco-based private equity firm that specializes in traditional buyouts in the technology and financial services sectors. Among media and entertainment companies, HF previously invested in the German media company Axel Springer and Getty Images. It has since sold its stakes in both companies.
The deal, which is expected to close this year, will not change anything “for the writers or the GMR management team,” a source familiar with the matter says. “GMR’s goal will remain the same: to transform the industry and bring more value to songwriters and their publishers. This is just a deal where one private equity firm investing in a company will be replaced by another. TPG’s exit from GMR is simply an exercise in realizing return on investment.”
Knowledgeable financial sources suggest the complex deal could involve TPG stakes in The Azoff Company, the umbrella holding company that oversees not only GMR but the artist management company Full Stop Management; the private equity-funded investment arm Iconic Artists Group, which buys artist and songwriter music rights; and Giant Music, an independent record label. Other sources say that even though TPG is exiting its GMR investment, it still retains a small minority equity stake in Giant Music.
GMR has built a reputation for being highly selective when it comes to signing songwriters, even more so than rival boutique performance rights organization SESAC.
Founded in 1930, the Blackstone-owned SESAC currently represents only songwriters it has invited to join for representation, an approach that has resulted in a carefully-curated song roster that allows it to command market rates commensurate with its catalog.
In contrast, the two largest U.S. PROs, ASCAP and BMI, operate under DOJ-mandated consent decrees and must accept any songwriter who wants to join. They are also subject to government mandated rates, set through rates courts in the federal Southern District of New York, if negotiations with licensees fail.
GMR has built a reputation for only signing superstar writers. Its limited catalog of about 150-200 artists and songwriters across a number of genres includes Bad Bunny, Billie Eilish, Drake, Eddie Vedder, Harry Styles, Jon Bon Jovi, Prince and others.
While sources say that GMR often pays the highest rates among PROs, those rates are not disclosed. However, in 2016, in a since-settled Radio Music Licensing Committee (RMLC) lawsuit against GMR alleging GMR engaged in monopolistic practices, the RMLC complaint quantified how large GMR is by citing that its share of radio performances sat between 5% and 7.5%, but it was charging as though it represented 15%. The complaint also said GMR lured songwriters to sign there by promising to pay out 30% more than its competitors.
If the GMR deal closes, it will mark the second time in a year that a U.S. PRO has changed hands. In February, New Mountain Capital acquired BMI in a deal believed to be valued at $1.2 billion, with sources saying that the PRO had about $145 million in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA). That implies about an 8.25 times multiple. Sources say the constraints of the DOJ’s consent decree weighed down BMI’s valuation. When Blackstone acquired SESAC in 2017, Billboard estimated the PRO’s lucrative business model helped it fetch a nearly 12 times multiple of $85 million in EBITDA for a $1 billion valuation.
Like SESAC and now BMI, GMR is secretive about its financials and none of its data is public. Depending on what GMR’s specific financials are, it could go for at least a 12 times multiple, if not higher, with some financial sources suggesting it could maybe even reach a 17 times EBITDA multiple.
One GMR characteristic that songwriters find attractive is its use of a rate card, a unique feature among U.S. PROs that is considered more transparent and easier to understand than the rate formulas employed by ASCAP and BMI, numerous sources say.
Sources say GMR’s affiliation with Azoff and his portfolio of companies that employ powerful industry executives is one of the keys to its success. In fact, some big-name artists and songwriters handled by Azoff management companies are signed with GMR. Consequently, with Azoff and Grimmett and other top Azoff executives still calling the shots, the company is expected to retain its thus-far unique status as the home of superstar and mega-hit songwriters.
The Black Keys has parted ways with its managers, Irving Azoff and Steve Moir, following the abrupt cancellation of the band’s arena tour in North America late last month. First reported by the New York Times, a representative for Azoff has confirmed the split, telling Billboard it was an “amicable parting.” Representatives for The Black […]
Two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Rod Stewart has sold his genre-bending song catalog of hits, deep cuts and more to Irving Azoff‘s Iconic Artists Group. Styled as a “wide-ranging cross-media” partnership, the deal with IAG includes the raspy singer-songwriter’s rights to his sound recordings and his interest in his publishing, as well as certain name, image and likeness rights, Billboard has confirmed.
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The company, which Azoff co-founded in January 2020, declined to offer financial particulars of its deal with Stewart, who joins an elite roster of IAG acts that includes The Beach Boys, Cher, Linda Ronstadt, Joe Cocker, Dan Fogelberg, Nat “King” Cole, Dean Martin and CSN bandmates David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash.
Concurrently, Iconic announced on Thursday (Feb. 15) that it has raised $1 billion as part of an investment from HPS Investment Partners — which it said will enable them to acquire and manage even more legendary assets.
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IAG’s arrangement with Stewart encompasses his entire career, beginning with his standout vocal contributions on Jeff Beck’s first two albums — Truth and Beck-Ola — and then the rollicking-and-randy output of the legendary Faces, his band with fellow Jeff Beck Group alum Ronnie Wood. That combo, filled out by Kenney Jones and the late-greats Ian McLagan and Ronnie Lane, produced several early 1970s gems co-written by Stewart, including “Miss Judy’s Farm” “Bad ‘n’ Ruin” and their only proper hit in the U.S., “Stay With Me” (No. 17, Hot 100).
Stewart’s solo career began in earnest during a brief window between his time in the JBG and Faces, but he truly broke through with album No. 3, 1971’s Every Picture Tells a Story, which topped the Billboard 200 and produced breakthrough hits “Maggie May” (co-written with Martin Quittenton) and a cover of “(Find a) Reason to Believe.” Throughout the decade he bagged an album’s worth of greatest hits, including “Tonight’s the Night (Gonna Be Alright),” which spent eight weeks at No. 1 on the Hot 100, as well as “You Wear It Well,” “Hot Legs,” “You’re in My Heart (The Final Acclaim)” and his foray into disco, “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy?” Plus, it was during the 70s that he established himself as an able interpreter of other people’s songs, like “The First Cut Is the Deepest” (Cat Stevens) and “Twistin’ the Night Away” (Sam Cooke ).
The 1980s saw Stewart turn to more soft rock stylings and he scored a string of top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including “Passion,” “Tonight I’m Yours (Don’t Hurt Me)” “Infatuation,” “Forever Young” and one of his biggest tracks of the decade, a cover of Tom Waits’ “Downtown Train.” The next decade produced adult contemporary hits like “Rhythm of My Heart,” off his top-10 album Vagabond Heart, and the juggernaut that was his multi-platinum Unplugged…and Seated, which capped at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 and included his wedding reception-ready version of Van Morrison’s “Have I Told You Lately.” For much of the 2000s, Stewart has released a series of highly popular Great American Songbook albums and other genre-specific collections, including ones for rock and soul. Later this month, he’ll release his 32nd studio album, Swing Fever, a salute to the big band era. The rest of the year will find him on the road and wrapping up his Las Vegas residency.
The partnership with IAG arrives less than a year after Stewart backed out of a potential catalog sale to Hipgnosis following lengthy negotiations. He said at the time that “this catalog represents my life’s work. And it’s become abundantly clear after much time and due diligence that this was not the right company to manage my song catalog, career or legacy.” (Hipgnosis went on to have a bumpy 2023 that has spilled over into this year.)
Yet now Stewart has reason to believe the “time is right” and that “I feel fortunate to have found partners in Irving and his team at Iconic that I can entrust with my life’s work and future musical legacy.”
Azoff added, “We are thrilled to welcome one of the most celebrated singer-songwriters of our time, Rod Stewart, to the Iconic family. Our new partnership with HPS provides us with the resources and flexibility to make blockbuster signings like this one and to continue the success of our legendary artists and their legacies.”
Iconic’s financial advisors during the process was Artisan and Moelis, while Kendrick & Baron acted as the company’s legal advisors. Jackoway Tyerman represented Stewart. HPS Investment Partners enlisted Lisbeth R. Barron and the team at Barron International Group, LLC as financial advisor, and Latham & Watkins as legal advisor.
Global Music Rights, the boutique performance rights organization that represents Bruce Springsteen, Bruno Mars, Prince, Drake, Pharrell Williams, John Lennon, Eagles and others, has filed a copyright lawsuit against a Vermont-based group of radio stations that has allegedly played songs for years without a license.
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The lawsuit targeted Vermont Broadcast Associates, which operates seven radio stations serving local communities in Northern Vermont, New Hampshire and Quebec. The complaint, filed in Vermont federal court Thursday, also names Bruce James names as the owner of the company and a defendant.
GMR claims that VBA’s stations have been playing 66 songs in the GMR catalog since 2017 without a license, amounting to 1,600 violations of copyright law, even though the PRO has submitted 10 separate written licenses during that time period.
“Defendants’ infringements were neither incidental nor accidental,” the group’s lawyers write in the complaint.
After being founded by longtime music exec Irving Azoff in 2013, GMR spent years in court litigating over licensing terms with the Radio Music Licensing Committee, the group that negotiates music licensing deals for more than 10,000 member stations. The case finally settled in 2022 with a long-term licensing agreement.
In Thursday’s complaint, GMR claims that VBA is a member of the RMLC but nevertheless ignored “GMR’s communications and chose not to enter into GMR licenses, but continued playing GMR songs on its stations.”
“While we only turn to litigation as a last resort, it is long established U.S. law that GMR’s clients’ copyrighted works cannot be publicly performed without a license,” GMR’s general counsel Emio Zizza said in a statement. “All the radio stations that have entered into a GMR license and are paying their fees deserve the benefit of that license. Station groups who don’t want to pay for a GMR license are not entitled to play GMR’s immensely popular catalog of songs, depriving creators of their due.”
The GMR complaint, filed by the law firms of Lynn Lynn Blackman & Manitsky, P.C.; and O’Melveny & Myers LLP — claims that “GMR is entitled to maximum statutory damages of $150,000” if willful infringement is proven for each song played without a GMR license.
In response to a request for comment, Vermont Broadcast Associates owner Bruce James said by e-mail: “I have been working with Zachary Dekel representing GMR and believe we are licensed.” He added he has contacted Mr. Dekel on Friday morning (Jan. 19) to “resolve any issues.” According to the O’Melveny & Meyers website, Dekel is a litigation counsel with the firm.
In response to James’ comment, GMR representatives say that Dekel reached out to the VBA owner many times but a GMR license was never taken, which is why the lawsuit was filed.
The case is not the first time GMR has gone after radio stations that allegedly failed to pay. In October 2022, the group filed three similar copyright cases against radio stations in California, Connecticut, Florida, claiming each had made the “strategic decision” to simply not pay performance royalties to the group and “hoped to get away with it.”
“Defendants did not get away with it,” GMR’s attorneys wrote at the time. “Its stations have been caught red-handed violating the law.”
Another legend of Laurel Canyon has partnered with Irving Azoff’s Iconic Artists Group. Joining his Crosby, Stills & Nash bandmates on Team IAG is Graham Nash in a wide-ranging deal that aims to bolster the influential singer-songwriter’s musical legacy for future generations.
Under the agreement, Iconic has purchased a controlling interest in Nash’s music intellectual property assets, including his interest in his sound recordings and compositions, as well as his name, image and likeness. The prized assets include his work with a few bands you may have heard of: The Hollies, Crosby, Stills & Nash, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Also in the mix is Nash’s solo music and his work in the Crosby & Nash duo.
IAG declined to share financial details of the deal, or the size of their controlling interest in Nash’s rights.
Nash, 81, joins an elite roster of acts at IAG, which Azoff co-founded in January 2020: Cher, Dan Fogelberg, Linda Ronstadt, The Beach Boys, Joe Cocker, Nat “King” Cole, Dean Martin and of course Stills and Crosby, who died earlier this year.
“I am thrilled to welcome Graham Nash to the iconic family, which now represents the works of all three of Crosby, Stills, and Nash,” Azoff said. “Graham is not only an incredible talent and true gentleman but a longtime friend as well. Back when I struck out on my own and started my first management company, Graham visited my office and came up with the name, ‘Front Line Management.’”
Nash co-founded the Hollies in the early 1960s with his school mate Allan Clarke, and along with guitarist Tony Hicks is credited (Lennon-McCartney style) with penning many of the British invaders’ original songs, including “On a Carousel,” “Carrie Anne,” “Stop Stop Stop” and “King Midas in Reverse,” among others.
By 1968, Nash was feeling creatively stifled with the Hollies and moved to California where he formed a supergroup of sorts with Crosby (The Byrds) and Stills (Buffalo Springfield). The trio’s 1969 self-titled debut, with its sterling three-part harmonies, miraculously gelled despite having three distinctly different songwriters. Nash’s keystone contribution to the set was the rolling “Marrakesh Express,” written for the Hollies but rejected, which peaked at No. 28 on the Hot 100. For the band’s next album, 1970’s Déjà Vu with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Nash brought a pair of all-timers with “Teach Your Children” and “Our House,” the latter written about the home he shared with Joni Mitchell.
Through their various configurations, the band produced eight studio albums and five live albums.
Nash launched a solo career in 1971, starting with the critically acclaimed Songs for Beginners, which includes “Chicago” and “Military Madness,” and then a few years later with Weird Tales. His latest studio album, Now, his seventh overall, was released in May. Throughout the 1970s, he and Crosby paired their voices for a series of similarly acclaimed albums: Graham Nash David Crosby (1972), Wind on the Water (1975) and Whistling Down the Wire (1976). Nash wrote their lone Top 40 hit, the politically-charged “Immigration Man” off their debut. The pair teamed again in 2004 for their Crosby & Nash double album. Nash also reunited with the Hollies in the mid-1980s for an album, What Goes Around…
The two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee (CSN in 1997 and The Hollies in 2010) said he looks forward to working with Azoff and his team on “various projects to further the legacy of CSN’s music and my own.”
Rolling Stone founder Jann Wenner was given a final chance to explain himself to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation on Saturday (Sept. 16) during an emergency conference call before he was voted off the organization’s board of directors. But instead of quelling outrage at comments he made regarding female and black artists in a New York Times interview that ran Friday Friday, the 77-year-old media icon angered longtime allies on the board with his “bad apology,” sources tell Billboard.
In the New York Times piece, Wenner said women and Black artists didn’t “articulate” on a high enough level in his interviews with them to be included in his new book The Masters — a book consisting of his interviews with the likes of Bono, Bob Dylan, Jerry Garcia, Mick Jagger, John Lennon and Pete Townshend during his time at Rolling Stone. An emergency meeting was called with the board’s high-profile music industry executives dialing in, including Youtube global head of music Lyor Cohen, music manager and executive Irving Azoff and former chairman and CEO of Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment Doug Morris, as Wenner made a “self-serving” and poorly articulated attempt to explain himself, according to a source.
Underwhelmed by Wenner’s Mea culpa, board members like Rob Light, managing partner and head of the music at Creative Artists Agency, lambasted Wenner’s conduct and eventually a vote was held. Every board member on the call voted to end Wenner’s tenure with one exception — music manager Jon Landau, who cast the single no vote. (Landau was formerly a music critic, who wrote in Rolling Stone’s inaugural issue and for years following.) After a few quick remarks, the meeting was adjourned, and a press release was quickly drafted to announce the decision. Landau and Light did not respond to request for comment.
“Jann Wenner has been removed from the Board of Directors of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation,” read the press release. No more information was given.
Wenner’s controversial statements to The New York Times were made when asked why the book does not feature any interviews with people of color or female musicians. Wenner notes in his introduction that neither are in his “zeitgeist.”
“When I was referring to the zeitgeist, I was referring to Black performers, not to the female performers, OK? Just to get that accurate,” Wenner told the Times’ David Marchese. “The people had to meet a couple criteria, but it was just kind of my personal interest and love of them. Insofar as the women, just none of them were as articulate enough on this intellectual level.”
Speaking on Black artists, Wenner said “You know, Stevie Wonder, genius, right? I suppose when you use a word as broad as ‘masters,’ the fault is using that word. Maybe Marvin Gaye, or Curtis Mayfield? I mean, they just didn’t articulate at that level.”
Wenner helped found the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1983 with Atlantic Records founder and chairman Ahmet Ertegun, as well as record executives Seymour Stein, Bob Krasnow and Noreen Woods, and attorneys Allen Grubman and Suzan Evans.
He was was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as a non-performer in 2004 and served as chairman from 2006 through 2020. Wenner left Rolling Stone in 2019 when the publication was acquired by Penske Media Corporation, which now also owns Billboard.
She’s already one of the most famous mononymous celebrities in the world, and now Academy Award, Emmy and Grammy winner Cher has partnered with Irving Azoff’s Iconic Artists Group to expose new generations to her prolific, six-decade-long music career.
IAG has acquired Cher’s full interest in her past sound recordings and compositions for a sum that the company declined to reveal.
The 77-year-old singer-actress, who is now recording her first holiday album, has landed a No. 1 single on one of Billboard’s charts in each decade from the 1960s through the 2010s, beginning with her work as half of the duo Sonny & Cher, whose pop hits led to the hit CBS prime-time variety show, The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour, which ran from 1971 to 1974. But she got her start when she was 17, singing background vocals for late producer Phil Spector, whom she refers to as “Phillip.”
Like many acts on IAG’s growing roster, Cher has a relationship with Azoff that goes back to the ’70s, when they were introduced by Cher’s sister, Georganne LaPiere, who was a close friend of Azoff’s. “I’ve never worked with her professionally,” he says, “but obviously have been a fan.”
Cher says her decision to make a deal with IAG came down to the respect Azoff shows artists. “I trust Irving,” she says in an exclusive interview with Billboard. “If he has a great idea, I respect him. And if I have a great idea, I know he will listen attentively. My voice will be heard.”
IAG’s first project with Cher will celebrate the 25th anniversary of “Believe,” her electro-pop hit that arrived in October 1998 and was Billboard’s No. 1 song of 1999.
Although she has yet to talk strategy with IAG, Cher says she and Mark Taylor, who co-produced the song, discussed building a box set around “Believe” and her album of the same name — a conversation in which Taylor proposed an ambitious agenda for her. “I said I’d like to do a concert with my favorite songs, and he said, ‘Why don’t you do an album?’ I said, ‘OK.’ And he said, ‘Why don’t you do a concert for the Christmas album?’ And I went, ‘Wait, dude. C’mon,’ ” she recalls with a laugh.
Cher, who is managed by Roger Davies and Lindsey Scott, concluded her last major tour in 2005 and a Las Vegas residency in 2011. Asked if she plans to tour again, she replies: “I don’t know,” although she says there will not be live performances tied to the anniversary of “Believe”: “I’m not going to be ready that soon.”
She would also like to explore releasing a box set of her lesser-known songs, including some of her more recent recordings. “Some of my favorite, favorite songs weren’t hits,” she says. “I wasn’t a very good singer until, oh, my God, I was 40. I met my teacher [Adrienne Angel]. She made me a real singer.”
Her wish list for such a compilation would include tracks that fared well on the dance charts but weren’t necessarily mainstream pop hits, including 2001’s “Song for the Lonely”; 2010’s “You Haven’t Seen the Last of Me,” which won composer Diane Warren a Golden Globe; and 1991’s “Save Up All Your Tears.”
There are also plans to license her vast catalog of hits for film/TV synchs. “I think that’s great because they’re good songs,” Cher says. “Not all of them, but a lot of them are really good. I’m surprised sometimes that people know me or know my songs.”
IAG’s acquisition includes the international share in her late ex-husband Sonny Bono’s publishing catalog, which she received in their 1975 divorce — a collection that Azoff says is “vastly underappreciated” and includes such Sonny & Cher hits as “The Beat Goes On” and “I Got You Babe.” Cher says she would love for those songs to find new ears, but adds, “It never actually occurred to me that kids would want to hear those old songs.” (IAG does not have a stake in her Los Angeles-based CHERlato pop-up gelato truck, which serves flavors like Snap Out of It! and kefir and cardamom.)
IAG president Jimmy Edwards says the company plans to mine all decades of Cher’s career. “She’s the symbol of empowerment,” he says. “She’s successful in everything she does — music, film, TV, fashion, you name it. There’s so much story to tell. That’s our goal, always: to make sure we’re working with our partners to help curate that story.”
