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CMU’s One Liners: BMG, Universal Music, Three Six Zero, more
By Chris Cooke and Andy Malt | Published on Friday 4 March 2016
Other notable announcements and developments today…
• Alistair Norbury, an ex-label exec and music publisher and, most recently, artist manager, has become EVP International Artists at music rights firm BMG, part of the company’s plan to further expand its recorded music and artist services business. BMG boss Hartwig Masuch is “particularly pleased” about the hire.
• Universal Music has nabbed Sony Music’s merch and trademark licensing dude Mat Vlasic to run its big merchandising business Bravado. He replaces Tom Bennett as CEO of the merch division, the outgoing chief being off to launch his own thing.
• Management firm Three Six Zero has only bloody well hired Amy Wheatley, previously off of Columbia Records, as its new Head Of UK Marketing, so that she can do some marketing gubbins with all of the agency’s musical acts. Three Six Zero CEO Mark Gillespie is “delighted”. Wheatley herself is – wait for it – yep – “THRILLED”.
• Rhapsody saw its revenues rise just over 16% in 2015 while the streaming service’s user-base went up 45%. Oh, and losses rose over 66% to $33.5 million. So, growth all round then. These figures come via a financial report from RealNetworks, still a key shareholder in the streaming firm, which operates as Napster outside the US.
• Spotify has landed itself a new Global Head Of Content Partnerships to be based out of New York. And who is it? Well, it’s only bloody Tom Calderone, formerly President of VH1 which, for younger readers, is a thing called a television channel that plays music videos, like YouTube, but on a bigger screen and with no option to skip the shit.
• Surprise! Kendrick Lamar has released a new album after basketball player LeBron James told him to. ‘Untitled Unmastered’ contained eight tracks and is available right now.
• Norway’s Band Of Gold have been awarded the Nordic Music Prize at the by:Larm festival for their eponymous debut album, which judges praised for its “skilful, fascinating melding of varied styles and tropes”.
