Management
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Cortez Bryant’s Blueprint Group, Jared Gutstadt’s Audio Up and Anthony Martini’s Gravel Road have formed a new management partnership to represent the Compton Cowboys and its leader, Randy Savvy.
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The Compton Cowboys are a childhood group of eight friends from the Compton neighborhood of Los Angeles, who use music, horseback riding and equestrian culture to improve their inner-city community. Savvy, who is also a musician, launched the collective in 2017.
The first endeavor in the new alliance is to launch Compton Cowboys Coffee, in partnership with creative studio Avenue C, which helped design, package and build the coffee line. The brand will launch in the third quarter of 2024 with the first range of flavors named after song titles on Compton Cowboys Presents Street Country Street Country Vol 1: Once Upon A Time In Compton, a mixtape from Savvy that will come out in April via Gutstadt’s Virgin Music Group-distributed Audio Chateau label, timed to Savvy’s April 28 appearance at Stagecoach. Flavors include High Horse, Bad Apple, Cali Hold ‘Em, Iced Out Bolo and Regulate.
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The first single from the project, “High Horse,” comes out today (March 8) and features Reggaeton duo Jowell and Randy. The song is featured in the Audible original scripted podcast, Finding Pierre: A Hip Hop Odyssey, produced by Audio Up. The six-part series stars and is loosely based on NBA star JaVale McGee and his career as an NBA champ and record producer. Audio Chateau Records will release the podcast’s soundtrack on March 29.
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“Randy has created an incredible brand with the Compton Cowboys. Throughout my career I’ve never looked at the artists I’ve worked with as just musicians, but as powerhouse brands! That’s literally been my Blueprint (pun intended),” said Bryant, who has worked with Lil Wayne, Nicki Minaj and Lil Nas X, in a statement. “Randy will surely be one of the great music entrepreneurs, having already established the Compton Cowboys brand. The best part is it’s not just about the music, it’s also about community, it’s about exposure and opportunity to take inner city kids and give them a view of equestrian life. This will create a narrative in the world of country music that’s inclusive.”
The partnership will be looking at several non-music opportunities as well, including fashion, media and brandings. “We see this moment as a ‘go big’ scenario for the Compton Cowboys / Randy’s brand,” said Gutstadt, who co-founded JinglePunks and Audio Up Media, as well as worked with Jelly Roll and Steven Tyler. “Over the past several years it’s been a time of incredible turbulence- which is great for disruptors. Randy is one of those. Music discovery continues to be among the biggest challenges, and most artists have to think beyond what a typical release schedule looks like. By tethering together a media business with music, product and content, we believe that artists of the future can have it all from day one and not be tethered to antiquated ideas such as TikTok, YouTube and Instagram.”
“When I first met Randy Savvy on his family’s ranch in Compton, I came away impressed and inspired and immediately wanted to bring him into Gravel Road for management. What he’s done with Compton Cowboys goes beyond music and products, so I wanted to assemble a supergroup of like-minded partners to help expand the brand and push forward Compton Cowboys’ mission of helping communities through horses,” said Martini, who has also worked with Jelly Roll. Lil Dicky and Tyga. “By combining the resources of Gravel Road, Audio Up and Blueprint Group, our reach is vast across all verticals with each of us bringing a unique skillset to build Compton Cowboys into a multimedia force for positive change.”
Raphael Saadiq has signed with Forward Artist Management, Billboard has learned exclusively. The new agreement with the Los Angeles-based firm follows in the wake of the Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter-producer’s latest success: co-writing and co-producing Beyoncé’s first Hot 100 No. 1 country single, “Texas Hold ‘Em.”
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Forward Artist Management head Tyler Childs tells Billboard, “Raphael is one-of-one. He’s been making history, creating some of the biggest musical moments of the last 30 years. He continues to write and rewrite the playbook on what an elite artist, producer, songwriter and creative is. The entire FAM team is thrilled to support him and excited to get to work.”
In addition to “Texas Hold ‘Em,” Saadiq co-wrote and co-produced Beyoncé’s concurrently released country single “16 Carriages.” He also won the best R&B song Grammy last year for Beyoncé’s “Cuff It,” which he co-wrote and produced for her most recent album Renaissance. A founding member of seminal R&B trio Tony! Toni! Toné! — which reunited in 2023 for a sold-out national theater tour, its first in 25 years — Saadiq has worked with a diverse slate of superstar artists during his lengthy career. That roster includes Stevie Wonder, Whitney Houston, Usher, Erykah Badu, Mary J. Blige and Solange.
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His latest project as a solo artist was 2019’s Jimmy Lee. He also co-wrote the Academy Award-nominated song “Mighty River,” from the film Mudbound, with Blige and Tara Stinson. Saadiq is represented by Tim Mandelbaum of Fox Rothschild.
Forward Artists’ Childs also manages RZA and The Wu-Tang Clan, who launched the first-ever hip-hop residency at The Theater at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas last month with two more dates scheduled for March 22-23. Additional Forward Artist clients include Benjamin Booker (managed by Jacob Greene), Tyler Cole and Sarah Cothran.
Prior to Forward Artist Management, Childs served as vp of A&R/creative at Sony ATV Music Publishing. While there, he worked with artists and songwriters such as Ilsey Juber (Panic at the Disco’s “High Hopes,” Shawn Mendes’ “Mercy” and Mark Ronson and Miley Cyrus’ “Nothing Breaks Like a Heart”), Walk the Moon (“Shut Up and Dance”), Imagine Dragons (“Whatever it Takes”) and Pitbull featuring Ne-Yo (“Time of Our Lives”). Other artists that Childs collaborated with include Clairo, James Blake and Tegan and Sara.
Range Media Partners has opened a Nashville office and signed Tanya Tucker as a management client.
Tucker joins a robust roster of country clients that includes Russell Dickerson, Dylan Gossett, Stephen Wilson Jr., Shaboozey, Drayton Farley, Yola, Luke Grimes, Ryan Bingham, songwriter Geoff Warburton (with Big Machine Music), Midland (with Sandbox Entertainment), and Hailey Whitters and Brent Cobb (both with Make Wake Artists).
The opening of the office, located in the Wedgewood-Houston neighborhood, follows last summer’s hiring of Nashville-based executives William Lowery and Shawn McSpadden. Lowery, senior vp of partnerships and business development, came from Brigade Media Capital and managing partner McSpadden came from Red Light Management. Range co-founding managing partner Jack Minihan also relocated to Nashville at the end of last year. Additionally, Range Media Partners managing partner/music division founder Matt Graham and Range artist manager/head of touring Kyle Wilensky will split their time between Nashville and Los Angeles.
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In addition to the music team that numbers around 10, the office will include Range Sports’ head of football Kyle Strongin, who represents roughly 40 NFL players, including San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy.
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Even though Range has managed country artists for the last few years, establishing a physical Nashville office “is the thing that really lets people know that you’re in town,” Graham tells Billboard. “It’s one thing to get on a plane and be there, it’s another to open an office and have full-time employees that are making it a living, breathing organism on a daily basis and a place where other companies and artists can come and sit and have a conversation. It sends a different message of commitment.”
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Graham says Range picked the Wedgewood-Houston area, also home to Apple Music, because “that area is such a beehive of activity and energy in the music business right now. We’re certainly not making everyone be there every day, but we want people to come in and be social and be thoughtful and be creative.”
The newest addition to the Nashville artist roster is icon and Country Music Hall of Fame inductee Tucker. “The Midland guys have a really great relationship with her. They’ve done some shows together, she did their podcast. I’m a huge fan of her career and I think she’s having a real resurgence,” Graham says of Tucker, who took home the Grammy for best country album in 2020. “I think all the pieces are in place for her to have a massive next wave of her career. There’s a real 360 approach to the things that she can do going forward that is not just going to be about recording music and touring. And I think that’s what she found really appealing about Range.”
On the other end of the spectrum, Range is experiencing tremendous success with newcomers Dylan Gossett, whose song “Coal” has surpassed 100 million streams and has sold out a pop-up show in London with a 2,500-person waiting list; Stephen Wilson Jr., who made his late night debut on Late Night with Seth Meyers in February; and Nigerian-American artist Shaboozey, of whom Kacey Musgraves has already declared herself a fan.
Graham says Range is actively looking to add more artists to its curated roster. “I think in Nashville, it’s very important that we stick to what we’re good at and know,” he says. “We like artists that push boundaries and are visually interesting and are breaking new ground in different ways. There’s just so many different new pockets and sub-genres of country that have emerged in the past few years. We want to keep looking into new territory. I think just looking to pick up tried-and-true country radio artists that are leaving disgruntled management situations is just not as exciting for us as building new talents.”
Range will share its Nashville space with Get Engaged, a branding entertainment company that has worked with such companies as Raising Cane’s, Morphe Cosmetics and Ryl Tea with Morgan Wallen, as well as country artists like Cole Swindell, Kane Brown and Chris Young.
Since launching in 2020, Range Media Partners’ music division has formed its own label in partnership with Capitol Music Group and Virgin Music & Artist Label Services and represents artists including Jack Harlow, Saweetie, Pentatonix, Paul Russell, Alec Benjamin and Lauv.
Chris Young has joined the artists roster at Coran Capshaw’s Red Light Management, the company tells Billboard. At Red Light, Kailyn Finnegan will serve as Young’s manager. Finnegan worked with Young at his previous management home, The AMG. Prior to The AMG, Finnegan worked at Live Nation. “I’m excited to work with her and everybody […]
Martin Kirkup, the well-respected co-founder of Direct Management Group, died Sunday, Feb. 4 while vacationing in Hawaii, according to his family. He was 75.
Kirkup currently managed Katy Perry, k.d. lang and Au/Ra, but over his decades-long career had also worked with artists including the B-52s, Counting Crows, Tracy Chapman, the Go-Go’s, Adam Lambert and many others.
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“Martin Kirkup and I conceived Direct Management while drinking Raki at a restaurant high above the Bosphorus in Istanbul, escaping the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984,” said Direct Management Group co-founder Steven Jensen in a statement. “We were both fans of alternative pop music and focused on establishing a boutique management company to support that exciting genre of music. I’m proud to have built Direct Management with Martin and Bradford Cobb to the global presence it has today, with integrity, honor and ingenuity, much of which was contributed by Martin. His influence is a permanent fixture of the Direct Management culture.”
The Tynemouth, U.K.-born Kirkup came to the U.S. in 1973 as a visiting professor of English Literature at the University of Rhode Island. Shortly thereafter, he moved to New York and joined A&M Records as east coast publicity director, eventually ascending to vp of artist development and working with such artists as Peter Frampton, Styx, Squeeze, Joe Jackson, the Police and Joan Armatrading.
Kirkup and Jensen opened Direct in Los Angeles in April 1985, with early clients Boy Meets Girl, Echo & The Bunnymen and Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark, as well as guiding Roxy Music’s Bryan Ferry on his first solo international tour. In 1989, Direct experienced tremendous success with the B-52s’ quadruple-platinum album, Cosmic Thing, which included the massive hit “Love Shack.”
In the ‘90s, Direct continued to grow, working with the Counting Crows for a decade during which the band sold more than 25 million albums. Other clients during that decade included David Byrne, Joe Jackson, Seal and the New Radicals. In 1998, Bradford Cobb joined the company as a manager, becoming a partner in 2012.
Under the three principals, the company flourished in the early 2000s, overseeing the careers of lang, Perry, the Go-Go’s and Jamie Cullum. Subsequent clients also included Lambert and Steve Perry. Signing Katy Perry in 2004 was automatic, Kirkup told Billboard in 2012. “To us, it’s not remarkable that she’s hugely successful-without sounding like wise-asses, that’s why we signed her,” Kirkup says. “We really believed in her and felt she had huge potential.”
“Martin Kirkup was a class act, a gentleman, and he was brilliant,” Cobb told Billboard in statement. “Over my 25 years working alongside him at Direct, he had a major influence on my growth as a manager and a human. Of his many talents, one that I admired most was his ability to take a problem and dissect it down to its core, finding a solution with a calm demeanor that gave everyone around him confidence. Martin had excellent taste in music, and he had great reverence for the artists who created it. He was witty with a wicked sense of humor. Martin was also warm and genuinely caring, and it was an honor to be his partner.”
Kirkup, who was on Billboard Power 100 list in 2017, was a fierce advocate for his artists, but always found time to help the next generation of executives. He doled out advice freely, mentoring a number of younger managers who came to him for advice.
He is survived by his wife Lale Kirkup, daughter Melisa Kirkup Blatt and son-in-law Ben Blatt, son John Kirkup and daughter-in-law Lorien Kirkup, and three grandchildren, Sam, Abigail, and Ivy. Details on a celebration of life will come at a later date.
Kesha has signed with Crush Management, the company confirmed with Billboard. She will be co-managed by Charlie Adelman, Jonathan Daniel and Bob Mclynn. In December, the pop icon parted ways with longtime manager Jack Rovner and Vector Management. “Jack Rovner confirms, after 16 years, Kesha and Vector Management have agreed amicably to part ways, with […]
More than three decades into their career, the Wiggles continue to evolve and make history with No. 1 records, awards, arenas shows and more. Now, the beloved kids entertainers set another new mark, with the appointment of Luke O’Neill to the newly-created position of chief executive officer.
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The incoming CEO will be expected to lead the organization’s digital transformation and global expansion.
Among his tasks, O’Neill will be expected to expand the Wiggles’ digital footprint, develop new products, grow the commercial operations of the business, and build greater distribution channels to reach larger audiences.
“The Wiggles have always been pioneers in delivering high-quality, educational, and entertaining content for children,” O’Neill comments. “I am thrilled to lead the team as we explore new opportunities in the digital and commercial spaces and expand our global presence. Together, we will continue to create memorable experiences for children and families around the world.”
The incoming chief carries experience in accelerating growth and leading digital transformations for businesses in real estate, hospitality, and events industries, and has served as a consultant with the Wiggles since mid-2023.
O’Neill has already played “a crucial role in shaping the strategic direction for the brand’s future,” reads a statement announcing his appointment, by “leading the development of a new digital strategy, while refocusing efforts in consumer product licensing and sponsorship opportunities.”
The Wiggles and their big red car aren’t slowing down. The group celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2021, then found a new gear. Along the way, the group won triple j’s Hottest 100 countdown for the first time (with a cover of Tame Impala’s “Elephant”); landed a No. 1 album on the ARIA Chart (also a first), became the first band in Australian history to perform two national arena tours in a single year; and scooped the Ted Albert Award for outstanding service to Australian music (a first for a kid’s entertainment act). Last year, the Wiggles teamed up with the Pinkfong Company for a four-part Baby Shark collaborative series.
Since 1991, the Wiggles have sold over 30 million albums and DVDs and 8 million books globally.
Luana Pagani, one of Latin music’s most respected female executives, is launching her own company following a 12-year run with Latin entertainment powerhouse SeitrackUS.
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The new venture, called Fairwinds, will focus on the development of new and established artists in the U.S. and international markets, with Pagani using her expertise in marketing, promotion and management.
“After 12 amazing years of partnership with Seitrack in the U.S. where we established a profitable operation in the market, and I had the chance to grow professionally and work with people that I love and respect, I have decided to move on and start my own agency, remaining as an outside consultant for SeitrackUS,” Pagani tells Billboard.
This is not the first time Pagani branches out on her own. The multi-lingual exec for years was the senior vp of global marketing, Latin, for Sony and a central figure in the development of superstars like Shakira, Ricky Martin and Chayanne, at the height of the first “Latin explosion” of the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Then, in 2007, when she was the most senior-ranking woman in a major Latin label, she left Sony to launch her own consultancy firm. She eventually partnered with SeitrackUS, which is part of giant OCESA Seitrack, and took the role of president here in the U.S., working with artists like Ha*Ash, Los Angeles Azules and Alejandro Fernández in their management, booking and overall development.
Although Pagani will continue to work as an outside consultant for Seitrack, she will also have other artists and companies as clients.
“Artist development is, and has always been my passion,” says Pagani. “At a time when there are so many possibilities to reach new audiences, it is a privilege to be able to work with dynamic artists who are redefining the musical scene. I thank Ocesa-Seitrack and its people for this wonderful ride and look forward to continuing working with everyone in this great industry, most of you my friends.”
RBD and Guillermo Rosas, the group’s business partner who helped reunite the band after 15 years, have officially parted ways, Billboard can confirm. The news of the split comes just a month after the Mexican pop group — composed of Anahí, Dulce María, Maite Perroni, Christopher von Uckermann and Christian Chávez — wrapped their massive […]
Nuria Andreu has joined GTS and is appointed manager of Spanish singer-songwriter Aitana, Billboard can report. In her new role, as part of the GTS (Global Talent Services) team in Spain, she will be exclusively dedicated to the growth and further development of Aitana’s career, which was previously managed by Olga Palma at GTS.
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Based in Madrid, Andreu will report directly to Narcís Rebollo, president, Universal Music Iberian Peninsula.
After beginning her career in the pharmaceutical sector with experience in other fields, such as communications and strategy, Andreu founded her own marketing and production agency in 2018. In 2020, she joined Sony Music Spain as head of communications and PR and, in 2023, was appointed communication director of Rosalía’s company, Motomami S.L. Before joining Universal, she was Rosalía’s personal manager.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity to join a company like GTS and the project of an artist with Aitana’s talent and strength,” Andreu said in a statement. “Wishing to contribute and continue adding success hand in hand with the magnificent team that She already has.”
Aitana, who signed with GTS in 2018, added, “looking forward and excited to start a new stage in my career and my artistic development [and] continue growing little by little and learning about music together.”
With more than 11 million monthly listeners on Spotify, the 24-year-old artist wrapped her Alpha Tour in 2023 with a sold-out show at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium in Madrid, which sold all tickets in a record-breaking 72 hours, becoming the first Spanish artist to do so.
“I am certain that with her experience and skills, Nuria’s incorporation to GTS will be key to Aitana’s continued success, boosting her unstoppable career development and consolidating the GTS strategy of growth and service to our artists, as a leading company in the sector,” expressed Rebollo.