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Struggling music company EMI Group PLC, beset by profit warnings and an accounting scandal in Brazil, was thrown a potential lifeline Tuesday with a possible new takeover bid by former suitor Warner Music Group. A tie-up would bring a badly needed infusion of top U.S. artists including Madonna and the Red Hot Chili Peppers to London-based EMI – whose Beatles remix album has dropped off Billboard’s top 40 and whose great hope for cross-Atlantic appeal, Robbie Williams, has drawn more publicity for rehab than music. EMI confirmed Tuesday it had been approached by Warner, but that it has received no… Read more »

Ten years ago, as the Internet began to mushroom in popularity and emerging technologies enabled consumers to make nearly perfect copies of digital content, the recording industry embarked on a two-pronged strategy in response to the changing business environment. First, it emphasized copy-control technologies, often referred to as digital rights management (DRM), that many in the industry believed would allow it re-assert control over music copying. Second, it lobbied the Canadian government for a private copying levy to compensate for the music copying that it could not control. While the industry’s approach proved successful on the legal front — the… Read more »

Warner Music Group Corp., home to recording artists such as Red Hot Chili Peppers, James Blunt and Daniel Powter, said Thursday its first-quarter profit fell 74 percent due to fewer albums released during the period and soft domestic and European sales. Its shares fell nearly 5 percent. The New York-based recording company said net income declined to $18 million, or 12 cents per share, from $69 million, or 46 cents per share, during the same period a year ago. Total revenue fell 11 percent to $928 million from $1.04 billion during the prior-year period. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial expected… Read more »

In a rare open letter from CEO Steve Jobs on Tuesday, Apple urged record companies to abandon digital rights management technologies. The letter, posted on Apple’s Web site and titled “Thoughts on Music,” is a long examination of Apple’s iTunes and what the future may hold for the online distribution of copy-protected music. In the letter, Jobs says Apple was forced to create a DRM system to get the world’s four largest record companies on board with the iTunes Store. But there are alternatives, Jobs wrote. Apple and the rest of the online music distributors could continue down a DRM… Read more »

Sony Corp and Bertelsmann AG have refiled a request for EU regulators to clear a 2004 deal merging their music units, the European Commission said Thursday. Regulators have to re-examine the deal they cleared in July 2004 because an EU court struck down their original approval last July, citing “manifest errors” in how authorities decided that combining the two music majors would not restrict customer choice. The judgment sent lawyers into a flurry because it undermined the legality of the Sony BMG deal that formed the world’s second-largest record label behind Universal, bringing Sony artists like Aerosmith, George Michael and… Read more »

By now, you might be aware that Fall Out Boy’s new album, Infinity on High, somehow leaked online over the weekend. What you might not know is what FOB’s label, Island Records, plans to do about it. You may have heard that the label was thinking about moving the album’s release date up a week, from February 6 to January 30. And you probably read the reports on various message boards that FOB mouthpiece/bassist Pete Wentz all but confirmed that move onstage at a Friends or Enemies Tour stop in Atlanta. Well, it turns out that none of that information… Read more »

Drummer Travis Barker is leaving a European tour with his new band +44 because of an unhealed fractured arm. The former Blink-182 drummer had been on tour despite a fractured right arm he suffered Sept. 9 while filming a video, according to Interscope Records. Barker, 31, will return to Los Angeles to be treated. The band, fronted by former Blink-182 singer and bassist Mark Hoppus, has not announced a replacement drummer. A message left at Interscope Records was not immediately returned Sunday. Barker starred in the MTV reality series “Meet the Barkers” with former Miss USA Shanna Moakler, to whom… Read more »

EMI Group Plc, which ousted its two top music executives last week after issuing a profit warning, announced on Thursday two key appointments to its EMI Music management team. JF Cecillon will become chairman and chief executive of the newly established EMI Music International unit which will focus on EMI’s recorded music business outside the UK and North America. Cecillon, who was previously in charge of EMI Music for continental Europe, will now oversee Asia, Latin America and Australia and New Zealand. Ian Hanson, previously senior vice president, chairman’s office, EMI Music, has been promoted to the global role of… Read more »

EMI Group PLC said Friday two top music executives are leaving the company and said it expects revenue to fall at its music division after lower-than-expected sales over the Christmas period. EMI Music Chief Executive Alain Levy and Vice-Chairman David Munns will leave the world’s third-largest music company with immediate effect, EMI said. EMI, home to Coldplay and Robbie Williams, said in October that it expected the bulk of its full-year sales to be generated in the second half of the financial year ending March 30. However, on Friday, the company downgraded its full-year revenue forecast significantly. It expects a… Read more »

Fall Out Boy will headline the 2007 Honda Civic Tour, which will begin April 18 in Charlotte, N.C. The full routing and support acts will be announced later this month; tickets go on sale to the general public beginning Feb. 17, with pre-sale information to be announced. In honor of the tour, Fall Out Boy has created a custom Honda Civic Hybrid that will be showcased at each performance. At the end of the tour, one lucky fan will win the car, which features Fall Out Boy graphics, hemp upholstery, Alpine Electronics subwoofers and amplifiers and an audio system loaded… Read more »