Artist News Business News Deals Digital Gigs & Festivals Industry People Labels & Publishers Live Business One Liners Releases

One Liners: Chvrches, Patrick Leonard, Flying Lotus, more

By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 21 April 2021

DEALS

Primary Wave has acquired the copyrights and royalty rights of producer Patrick Leonard. The deal covers his share of songs and recordings performed by artists such as Madonna, Elton John, Bon Jovi and more. “I am extremely excited to welcome Patrick Leonard to Primary Wave as he fits in perfectly with our family of artists”, says CMO Adam Lowenberg. “I’m THRILLED to begin developing innovative initiatives to help continue making the public aware of Patrick’s musical genius”.

Italy-based record label Artist First has made a “significant” investment into booking agency Colorsound. Says Artist First founder Claudio Ferrante: “Colorsound are one of the most revered live music booking agencies in Italy and when the chance to make a significant investment into their business and bring them closer to the A1 family [came about] we jumped at [it]. It is important to us that we offer a full service to our clients and this is another step towards being able to add even more value to our existing offering”.

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DIGITAL & D2F SERVICES

I’m sure we’re all aware of the story of the guy who used $30 worth of bitcoin in 2010 to buy two pizzas, only to realise in 2020 that those same bitcoins would now be worth $200 million. Well, anyway, dance music-centric Beatport is now the first digital music retailer to accept bitcoin. It’s going to be doing one of those stupid NFT things too, because you can never have too much blockchain. “For Beatport, this is just the beginning of our exploration into the metaverse and we are committed to the long-term opportunities this revolutionary technology portends”, says CEO Robb McDaniel.

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APPOINTMENTS

Sony Music Publishing in the US has promoted Ian Holder to SVP Creative. “Ian has been critical to the success of Sony Music Publishing’s songwriters, and I am incredibly proud of Ian’s growth, passion and instincts as a creative executive”, says CEO Jon Platt. “I’m equally proud of his emergence as a leader – I look forward to working alongside Ian in this next chapter as he continues creating unique opportunities for our songwriters”.

Lyric aggregator LyricFind has hired artist, producer, record executive, entertainment lawyer, music educator, artist manager and ‘Canadian Idol’ judge Zack Werner as its new head of Business Development. “Zack will be exploring and managing partnerships for the business on all fronts including working with labels and digital aggregators, exploring partnerships for LyricMerch, and managing acquisitions”, says CEO Darryl Ballantyne. “Zack’s extensive experience with labels and artists will be a valuable resource for our team”.

Promoter Joff Hall has joined Kilimanjaro Live, moving over from TEG MJR. “It’s been a very difficult time for the live music industry but we at Kili are strongly focused on a positive future”, says CEO Stuart Galbraith. “We jumped at the chance to bring Joff onto our team, as the breadth of his experience and his good standing reputationally will further bolster our incredible promoting team”.

ATC Live has hired agent David ‘Skully’ Sullivan-Kaplan. He joins from UTA, bringing with him a roster including Larkin Poe, Steel Pulse, Polica, Gentleman’s Dub Club, Holding Absence, Hollie Cook and Lottery Winners. “Agents who excel at the job yet are universally liked and respected are a rare breed”, says CEO Alex Bruford. “Skully Sullivan-Kaplan is one of the few, and his extensive experience both as an agent and as a touring musician have given him an enviable skill set”.

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RELEASES

Chvrches are back with new single ‘He Said She Said’. Vocalist Lauren Mayberry says of the track: “‘He Said She Said’ is my way of reckoning with things I’ve accepted that I know I shouldn’t have. Things I pretended weren’t damaging to me. All the verse lines are tongue-in-cheek or paraphrased versions of things that have actually been said to me by men in my life. Being a woman is fucking exhausting and it felt better to scream it into a pop song than scream it into the void. After the past year, I think we can all relate to feeling like we’re losing our minds”.

Flying Lotus has released two new tracks, ‘Black Gold’ featuring Thundercat and ‘Between Memories’ featuring Niki Randa. Both are taken from anime series ‘Yasuke’, which hits Netflix on 29 Apr.

Villagers will release new album ‘Fever Dreams’ on 20 Aug. Here’s new single ‘The First Day’. Says band leader Conor O’Brien of the song: “I had an urge to write something that was as generous to the listener as it was to myself. Sometimes the most delirious states can produce the most ecstatic, euphoric and escapist dreams”.

Angel Olsen has released new song ‘Alive And Dying (Waving, Smiling)’, taken from her ‘Song Of The Lark And Other Far Memories’ box set that will be out on 7 May. “This song is all about chapters closing, and learning to let go of things I can’t understand”, she says. “It’s very me – I will always nosedive into love, and suffering can definitely come with that. When I hear this version the strings really bring the song to its necessary bittersweet boiling point”.

Dylan Brady’s Cake Pop have released new single ‘Satin Bedsheets’. New album ‘Cake Pop 2’ is out on 14 May.

Jai Paul has marked the tenth anniversary of his debut single ‘BTSTU’ by launching a new website that recreates his MySpace page. One difference is that it includes a new (or at least previously unreleased) song, ‘Super Salamander’.

Kevin Martin – aka The Bug – has announced that he will release a new album, ‘Return To Solaris’, on 25 Jun. The LP is a new score for 1972 film ‘Solaris’. From it, this is ‘In Love With A Ghost’.

Kojaque has announced that he will release his debut album, ‘Town’s Dead’, on 25 Jun. Here’s the title track.

Eliza Shaddad has released new single ‘Heaven’ and announced that she will release new album ‘The Woman You Want’ on 16 Jul.

Raven Bush will release his debut album ‘Fall Into Noise’ on 13 Aug. Here’s new single, ‘Start Of Something New’. Of the track, he says: “‘Start Of Something New’ was the first track that was made and completed on ‘Fall Into Noise’. It all emerged from some chords I recorded as a voice note whilst playing the piano at my dad’s house”.

Belvedere have released new single ‘Camera Obscura’. Their new album ‘Hindsight Is The Sixth Sense’ is out on 14 May.

Piglet has released new single ‘Mill’. “The song ‘Mill’ is about how my understanding of my own transness/queerness has evolved and how much better I’ve felt since I realised that my gender and sexuality don’t have to be easily definable and unchanging”, he says.

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GIGS & TOURS

Following his somewhat unsuccessful meet-and-greet tour of the UK on Sunday, AJ Tracey has announced a proper tour of arenas in November. He’ll finish at the O2 Arena in London on 25 Nov.

Squid have announced a socially distanced tour in May and June that will see them previewing work-in-progress new material. Tour dates and tickets here.

Check out our weekly Spotify playlist of new music featured in the CMU Daily – updated every Friday.