Hello, Frens. I hope your break was productive and smooth. I took a good amount of time to recharge, relax, reflect, and look forward.Traditionally, this time of year is when I’m dropping predictions for the music business and the upcoming year. But I’m not doing that this year.These lists provide interesting perspectives, but the bottom line is they are superfluous. Pretty much every list I’ve read over the past 10 years missed the two most transformative events of my lifetime: Covid and Web3. If anybody predicted those, please let me know and I’ll rush to read their 2022 predictions.Recently, The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel and the writings of top tier investors like Warren Buffet have changed my mind about predicting the future: it’s a fool's game! What you want to do instead is prepare for the future and be situated to act quickly on trends that arise. So right now, rather than making bold, public proclamations, I’m going to be watching, listening, and getting ready to strike.What I’m watching should be obvious by now. There’s more transformation and opportunity in music than ever. Web3, DAO’s, music rights, and online events are where the action is. Change won’t be instant and innovation takes time, but everywhere I turn, the pillars of culture are crumbling.We’ve always been believers in tech as the music industry’s savior. The same way it decimated the old structures during the digital revolution at the turn of the century, we will see even more disruption amid the blockchain’s rise. We expect more untraditional releases and collectives that help move the balance of power into the creator's hands. It’s time to build. It’s time to drop projects. It’s time to workshop ideas. We’re here to help more artists and brands navigate these spaces and to shine our light on the talent and ideas that need amplification.Beats & Bytes is a resource and ally to your music, tech and marketing needs. Let’s talk about our new iteration and how we can provide the most value to our industry.
BEATS
Omarion: ‘I Am an Artist, Not a COVID Variant’Since the omicron variant of COVID-19 surfaced in the United States, social media pundits, have flippantly (or accidentally) referred to it as the Omarion variant. Well, the R&B artist has heard all the jokes and he’s running with it. (Variety)
How The Emerging Web3 Will And Won’t Disrupt Music StreamingThe largest obstacle to understanding the developments in the web3 space is the belief that it’s there to replace everything we know. Innovation doesn’t work that way. Innovation lives side by side with past innovations. (MusicX)
How Much Do Artists Make Per Stream? Here’s the Latest Breakdown — From Rapper T-PainRapper T-Pain has reignited discussion about the question that so many in the music industry have asked “How much do artists make per stream?” with a new social-media post. (Digital Music News)
Justin Bieber Sets New Record For Most Songwriters On Song Of The Year Grammy NominationBieber released "Peaches" featuring Daniel Caesar and Giveon from his JUSTICE album in March, and as well as being nominated for Record Of The Year at the 2022 Grammys, "Peaches" is also up for Song Of The Year, which is a songwriters award. (The Line of Best Fit)
Grammy Awards “Likely” To Be Postponed For Second Year In A Row Due to COVIDMultiple sources have claimed that it's "likely" that this year's Grammy Awards could be postponed for a second consecutive year due to the Omicron variant. (The Line of Best Fit)
The 2022 State Of Pop AddressIt’s time to carry on with the annual tradition of looking ahead to the next year in pop music, aka the 2022 State Of Pop Address. (Stereogum)
Saweetie and Cher Star in MAC Cosmetics’ ‘Challenge Accepted’ CampaignSaweetie’s newest campaign with MAC Cosmetics is here — and it involves none other than Cher.The rapper and music icon feature in MAC’s “Challenge Accepted” campaign, which challenges its users to put their makeup to the test and shine a light on their performance. (WWD)
Concerts In The Metaverse Could Lead To A New Wave Of AdoptionAmong the first to get the Animal Concerts treatment was Grammy-winning rapper Future, who performed at an in-person Animal Concerts-themed Halloween party in Miami, which was filmed in such a way that it can later be broadcast in the Metaverse. In this startling new land, there are no COVID restrictions nor travel bans, and artists can sell NFT memorabilia to fans with little overhead, investment or middlemen. (Coin Telegraph)
Vinyl Sets New Weekly Sales Peak for Modern EraOver two million vinyl LPs were sold last week, making it the biggest vinyl sales week since at least 1991, Billboard reports via MRC Data. The total—2.11 million vinyl albums sold—bested the 1.842 million LPs sold during the week ending December 24, 2020. (Pitchfork)
The Crypto Music IndustryThe move from analogue to digital fundamentally changed how people interact and engage with content; the Recording, Publishing and Live industries are linked but distinct. Similarly, Crypto Music will exist as a standalone industry and also create new models of interaction between actors in the market. (Dan Fowler)
How Crypto Could Be Like the Music IndustrySo the question is this: When people patronize crypto institutions, will they attach significance to the “innovator” or to the “intermediary”? Or, to continue the analogy with the music industry, the artist or the venue. (Bloomberg)
How Johnny Klimek And Tom Tykwer Infused EDM And Orchestral Music To Bring "The Matrix Resurrections" To LifeFollowing 2003's The Matrix Revolutions, the new film stars Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jonathan Groff, and Jessica Henwick. Together, the cast brought a whole new story to the iconic franchise that feels deeply intimate and thrilling. (EDM.com)
Symphonic Distribution Raises $37M, Having Generated $12m In Net Revenue In 2021One player in this space that has steadily carved out a solid global market for itself is Florida-headquartered Symphonic Distribution, which was launched in 2006 by former music producer – and now Symphonic’s CEO – Jorge Brea. (Music Business Worldwide)
Shazam Reveals Its 5 Artists to Watch in 2022At the top of every year, Shazam uses its data to predict five artists to watch — last year it did pretty well with Masked Wolf and Tai Verdes — and on Tuesday the song-identifying app used a combination of its its “uniquely predictive data and algorithms” as well as some selections from its parent company Apple Music’s global editorial team to pick five “artists to watch” in 2022. (Variety)
We Are All Musicians Now—What If That’s Bad?If we accept that we are all musicians now, then believe me, the subscriptions are coming for you, too. Again, observe musicians: we have no power to bargain collectively against the streaming services. (Zogblog)
BYTES
Kevin is joined by Alexis Ohanian, founder of venture capital firm SevenSevenSix and co-founder of Reddit. Here, they discuss youthful Digg vs. Reddit rivalry, Web2 lessons for Web3 aspirants, the cultural and economic benefits of diversifying the crypto space, NFT collecting, the future of investment, Bored Apes vs. CryptoPunks, the power of community, and much more.
The Future. Ryan Reynolds and his Maximum Effort banner are celebrating hundreds of thousands of works of art entering the public domain with a Mint Mobile commercial called “Winnie-the-Screwed”) — The ad hilariously shows how beloved titles (like Winnie-the-Pooh) can be remixed and satirized for a new generation, which may open the floodgates to a wave of media that builds upon beloved works.
Ultimately, this will take some time to play out. Many people will never use the product—they don’t care about technology or at least don’t want it infringing on certain parts of their life—but no one is getting younger, and as our world continues to evolve, I think Oculus will end up playing a super important role in the future. (Joseph Pompliano)
What was once just a marketing idea, is now a part of every December for Tyler Barth. Check out his mix on Spotify here.
This week's newsletter was carefully curated by the Nue Agency staff and our editor Rachel Meisner. If you think we missed something this week or have any suggestions/comments for next week's newsletter, let us know!