This week we hosted one of my favorite CRWN episodes to date. The guest was none other than Wale. Wale and I go way back -- before his Rick Ross and Mark Ronson days -- and it’s awesome to see him at #1 on the Billboard hip-hop and radio airplay charts with this single, “On Chill.” His album is fantastic and his stories light up the room on CRWN, which drops Friday. Here’s a sneak peek.Mondo is also taking place this week in NYC. I put together a panel called “Marketing 20/20,” which was a deep dive into the myriad marketing opportunities available to today's creators. From crowd participation and rewards to smart media, digital collectibles, targeted releases, merch, and non-traditional touring, our esteemed guests discussed the not-so-obvious yet cutting-edge ways emerging artists can get ahead. Many of these opportunities lie hidden in plain sight in high growth industries such as video games, e-sports and the intersection of digital and physical experiences (think 29 Rooms or the BET Experience). I’m going to write a story on key takeaways from this.Lastly, I’m very excited to be doing a symposium at Brandweek in Palm Spring on Monday, November 4th. It’s called “Fine-tuning Your Marketing Strategy With Music.” Here’s the description:Music is the universal language and one of the lowest cultural barriers to entry. However, music partnerships are an undervalued marketing asset and a seemingly complicated world to navigate. Get familiar with the state of the industry and discuss upcoming trends and practical ways to include music into your strategy.The kicker? Swizz Beats is on the bill! Swizz is a brand and music mogul, so do not miss this. Get tickets here with a discount.That Q4 hustle is real. But I’m real ready.
BEATS
China’s Tencent Is Setting a Trend That Spotify May Have to Follow The gravestone of the much-maligned record-industry practice of “windowing” has a date etched on it: April 13th, 2018. That was the day country superstar Jason Aldean released his latest album, Rearview Town, which, in streaming terms, appeared exclusively on premium/paid-for tiers (including Spotify’s) during its first two weeks on sale. (Rolling Stone)
Spotify’s Pitch To Podcasters: Valuable Listener Data Spotify is going to give podcasters listener data they can’t get anywhere else. The company is taking its Spotify for Podcasters dashboard out of a beta today, giving more podcasters a chance to see data like their listeners’ music taste, age, gender, location, and how long they listened to a particular episode. (The Verge)
More Radio, More Live: Where Apple Music's Headed in 2020 Beats 1 went on air in 2015 and is accessible round the clock through iTunes and Apple Music. What Lowe has done with the platform is to essentially give musicians their own "clubs", in the form of freeform radio shows. Four years in, the station has graduated to a full-on scene, first under the stewardship of producer and Beats Electronics co-founder Jimmy Iovine, and now under Oliver Schusser, the current head of Apple Music. (Wired)
Bandsintown Launches First-Ever Predictive Touring Charts For Established and Emerging ArtistsBandsintown has launched 24 Worldwide, US and City Live Music Charts that will be published on Bandsintown, Bandsintown for Artists, and Hypebot starting today. The concert discovery platform has also partnered with Billboard to exclusively publish the Billboard + Bandsintown Tour Index, four weekly charts launching later this month. (Hypebot)
YouTube partners with Merchbar to sell music artists’ swag underneath videosYouTube is partnering with Merchbar on a new integration that will allow artists to sell their official merchandise to their worldwide fans from a shelf just below the video. The addition is the latest deal focused on helping video creators make more money from their videos, beyond the revenue brought in through advertisements and subscriptions. (Tech Crunch)
How to Promote Your Music on SoundCloud: The 8 TipsSoundCloud has a reputation as a platform for launching careers and finding your first audience. However, with 20 million music creators on the platform, cutting through the noise and getting yourself in front of the audience is still a massive challenge. (Sound Charts)
Holiday Songs You Can Cover for FreeWith all the holiday music out in the world, it may seem almost impossible to create an original hit that will blow the socks off the masses. However, doing a cover of a holiday classic can be an awesome way to throw your unique spin onto something old and seemingly overplayed. (Symphonic Distribution)
Music Business Is Being Re-Defined By Generation Z While for years millennials were the target demographic of most music business marketing, Generation Z has since risen up as the primary stakeholder in the contemporary marketplace, which is in turn reshaping how artists, labels, and companies market themselves. (Hype Bot)
Music Business Is Being Re-Defined By Generation Z While for years millennials were the target demographic of most music business marketing, Generation Z has since risen up as the primary stakeholder in the contemporary marketplace, which is in turn reshaping how artists, labels, and companies market themselves. (Hype Bot)
Remembering the Weirdest Album Launch Stunts of the 2010s Asking your crush to the prom isn’t the same these days. You can’t just come out and say it. You need a stunt—a “promposal,” if you will. Over the past 15 years, high school “promposals” have grown increasingly elaborate. There was the kid who snuck an alarm clock into his paramour’s room and programmed it to wake her up at 3 a.m. with a promposal message.
The Future Teen Stars of America Live on TikTok Last September, he was a high school senior living in the suburbs of Atlanta, acting in high school plays and planning to study video game design one day. Like so many before him, he was also just trying to get through adolescence without being teased. (NY Times)
David Byrne Launches Reasons to be Cheerful Online Magazine Talking Heads frontman and noted solo artist David Byrne has announced a new editorial venture called Reasons to be Cheerful. The online magazine, which follows an eclectic collection of recent solo ventures including the Broadway adaptation his 2018 album American Utopia, is dedicated to covering solutions found to the many problems facing our tumultuous world. (Spin)
How Music Publishers Are Driving a Full Stack RevolutionMusic publishing catalogues are gaining momentum fast as an asset class for institutional investments, with transactions ranging from large catalogue mergers and acquisitions (M&A) through to investment vehicles for songwriters’ shares such as the Hipgnosis Fund and Royalty Exchange. (Music Industry Blog)
How Twitter Changed Music What we now know as Music Twitter officially started on July 28, 2010, when Kanye West logged on. “Up early in the morning taking meetings in Silicone Valley,” he tweeted. Forty-eight minutes later came the correction: “Lol I spelled Silicon wrong ( I guess I was still thinking about the other type of silicone ITS A PROCESS!! : )” (Pitchfork)
Forget DMs. Celebrities Want You to Text Them Diddy wants you to text him. So do Paul McCartney, Sophia Bush and Marshmello. Over the last few months, some celebrities and influencers have been posting phone numbers on Instagram, Twitter and YouTube and encouraging fans to reach out to them. (NY Times)
The 40 Best New Bands Of 2019Every autumn here at Stereogum, we look long and hard at the last 12 months and pinpoint which new artists make us excited about the future of music. We then organize those artists into our annual Best New Bands list, celebrating what they’ve already accomplished and highlighting them as someone to keep an eye on moving forward. (Stereogum)
BYTES
Last month at an Advertising Week event in New York, Linda Holmes had the chance to sit down with a legend of public radio and of good conversation. Terry Gross has hosted Fresh Air since 1975. She still brings listeners daily conversations about news and books, film and science. Today, we're sharing an edited version of that conversation.
James Corden invites Chance the Rapper for a commute through Los Angeles that includes the two singing Chance's biggest songs, and James attempting to open Chance's mind about adding vegetables to his diet. And Chance tells James how he would handle getting a subpar verse from a collaborator on one of his tracks.
Stationhead, the mobile app that turns its users into streaming radio DJs, got a big upgrade today. Where Stationhead DJs were previously limited to broadcasting live, they can now record their shows, making them available on-demand for anyone to listen later. (Tech Crunch)
On his sixth album, Wow… That’s Crazy, Wale taps into the two impulses that have fueled the best of his music for the past ten years: His love for women (especially Black women) and unrelenting need to vent on social issues and how they affect his mental state. (Uproxx)
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!