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CMU Digest
CMU Digest 04.02.19: Kanye West, Rolling Stone, Youth Music, Ticketbande, Pandora
By Chris Cooke | Published on Monday 4 February 2019
The key stories from the last week in the music business…
Kanye West settled the lawsuit over his “never, never” tweet and began legal action against Sony and Universal. West was sued by a fan for stating that – having given Tidal an exclusive on his 2016 album ‘The Life Of Pablo’ – it would “never, never” be on Apple. It then popped up on Apple Music six weeks later. The lawsuit has rumbled on ever since but the litigious fan last week confirmed he had now settled with the rapper. Meanwhile West filed separate lawsuits against Sony’s EMI Music Publishing and two Universal labels seeking to reclaim rights given up earlier in his career. [READ MORE]
Penske Media Corporation took complete control of Rolling Stone magazine. The media firm, which also owns industry title Variety, bought 51% of the music mag off its founder Jann Wenner in 2017. Wenner had already sold 49% to Singapore-based BandLab Technologies. Penske confirmed last week that it had now bought that 49% off BandLab giving it full ownership of the publication. [READ MORE]
A report commissioned by Youth Music found that music was the favourite pastime of young people in England. Of the 1000 people aged seven to seventeen surveyed, 97% had listened to music in the previous week and 67% were involved in music-making. The amount of young people making music is up because of digital tools and platforms that allow them to pursue music projects by themselves. Youth Music said that music educators needed to support those projects, which include a range of music-making activities not traditionally recognised by music education. [READ MORE]
The live sector in Germany welcomed a ruling in the German courts putting new restrictions on ticket resale website Ticketbande. The site was told to not list tickets marked up by more than 25% where terms on the original ticket forbid such a thing. It must likewise refrain from listing ‘named tickets’, which are tickets with a box where the buyer’s name is printed. Promoters hope that the ruling is a step towards better regulating and restricting the resale of tickets for profit across Germany. [READ MORE]
Pandora shareholders approved a takeover by Sirius XM. The latter announced its intent to acquire the former last year, having already bought a significant slice of the Pandora company back in 2017. Several senior execs at Pandora will now exit the company, including CEO Roger Lynch, General Counsel Steve Bene, CFO Naveen Chopra and Chief HR Officer Kristen Robinson. [READ MORE]
The big deals from the last seven days in the music business…
• Warner Music signed a new agreement with Doğan Group [INFO]
• New Songs Administration acquired the Lynn Hatch Music catalogue [INFO]
• Kobalt signed a deal for the Gregg Allman song catalogue [INFO]
• Sentric Music and Strictly Confidential renewed their deal with Joe Hammill [INFO]
