The late ’70s, when punk exploded and disco imploded, were tumultuous years for the music industry. A time bomb embedded in legislation from that era, the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, could bring another round of tumult to the business, due to provisions that allow authors or their heirs to terminate copyright grants.
There was a time when most aspiring musicians had the same dream: to sign a deal with a major record label. Now, with the structure of the music business shifting radically, some industry iconoclasts are sidestepping the music giants and inventing new ways for artists to make and market their music – without ever signing a traditional recording contract. The latest effort comes from Brian Message, manager of the alternative band Radiohead, which gave away its last album, “In Rainbows,” on the Internet. His venture, called Polyphonic, which was announced this month, will look to invest a few hundred thousand… Read more »
Not much rattles Apple. Disciplined and focused, the company lavishes attention on its own elegant products and rarely deigns to discuss rivals. Yet here was Tim Cook, Apple’s chief operating officer and designated stand-in for ailing CEO Steve Jobs, erupting during an earnings call in late January at the mere mention of a pip-squeak competitor. The pest in question was Palm, the fallen pioneer of handheld digital organizers, which two weeks earlier had unveiled a new smartphone, the Palm Pre, to rave reviews. Not only did the Pre have features the iPhone couldn’t match – snazzy multitasking, universal search, a… Read more »
LOS ANGELES — Concert promoter Live Nation Inc and ticketing giant Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc. confirmed their merger plans Tuesday and got right to work addressing antitrust concerns that have taken center stage Ticketmaster Chairman Barry Diller to be chairman of the new company – which would be called Live Nation Entertainment – sought to dispel the notion that the deal would lead to higher ticket prices. “Ticketmaster does not set prices. Live Nation does not set ticket prices. Artists set the prices,” he said, without mentioning the ticket surcharges Ticketmaster relies on for much of its revenue. Under the deal… Read more »
List of winners at the 51st Annual Grammy Awards Album of the Year: ” Raising Sand” Robert Plant and Alison Krauss ; T Bone Burnett producer; Mike Piersante, engineer/mixer; Gavin Lurssen, mastering engineer (Rounder) Rap Album: ” Tha Carter III” Lil Wayne (Cash Money/Universal Motown) Male Pop Vocal Performance : “Say,” John Mayer ; track from “Continuum” (Columbia) Record of the Year: “Please Read The Letter,” Robert Plant and Alison Krauss; T Bone Burnett, producer; Mike Piersante, engineer/mixer; track from “Raising Sand” (Rounder) New Artist: Adele Rock Album: “Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends,” Coldplay (Capitol) Pop… Read more »
There is no chance that Axl Rose and his former Guns N’ Roses bandmate Slash will reunite. One of the pair will “die” before such an event could occur, Axl Rose said. The frontman told Billboard that the dispute between the pair would never be healed. He went on to say that Guns N’ Roses in its current guise, could tour in the near future. “In regards to Slash,” he said, “I read a desperate fan’s message about, ‘What if one of us were to die, and looking back I had the possibility of a reunion now.’ My thoughts are,… Read more »
For anybody wondering why Microsoft and the top record labels continue to promote subscription music services, the answer was revealed Thursday. David Ring, executive vice president of business development for Universal Music Group’s digital arm, said at the EconMusic Conference that the recording industry simply can’t sustain itself with download sales alone. “If what we’re trying to do is one-by-one downloads…that’s not a business that can grow,” Ring told conference attendees during panel discussion he participated in. “It won’t be healthy for the industry.” Prior to Ring’s statement, Chris Stephenson, an executive in Microsoft’s entertainment unit, was ballyhooing the progress… Read more »
After years of watching music fans flood online social networks to interact with their favorite recording artists, the music industry is starting to get serious about adding community features to its own websites. Hoping to become a big player in that effort is networking giant Cisco, which during the Consumer Electronics Show January 8-11 in Las Vegas introduced its Eos platform — a set of hosted online tools designed to enable media and entertainment companies to build social networking functions into websites. For record labels that means adding fan community services to artist sites. Warner Music Group (WMG) is the… Read more »
In another sign of the music industry’s recently announced retreat from a five-year-old antipiracy strategy, the Recording Industry Association of America has dumped the company it used to help it gather evidence for mass lawsuits it filed against people it claimed were illegally uploading copyrighted music. The RIAA long used a company called MediaSentry to troll the Internet in search of people who uploaded large amounts of music. The information that MediaSentry collected became an integral part of the RIAA’s aggressive litigation campaign. Since 2003, the RIAA — a trade organization representing Vivendi SA’s Universal Music Group, Sony Corp.’s Sony… Read more »
Project Playlist, who late last week had its widget banned from MySpace at the request of “major music companies”, today announced an agreement with SONY BMG for both audio and video. A least one other label is rumored to be close to deals as well. Prior to the MySpace takedown, Project Playlist’s web site and widgets had more than 40 million users according to ComScore. The service provides music fans with the ability to easily discover digital music, build custom playlists, and share them anywhere on the Web…other than MySpace. Facebook thus far has ignored the labrl take down notices.… Read more »
