Super Bowl LV weekend has passed.This one was definitely different. I wasn’t chancing it at a Super Spreader Sunday event. We are nearing the end of this thing and it would be a shame to get Covid now. I’m imagining a magical Summer and “the new normal" soon thereafter.Watching from the comfort of my own home had its benefits. I was more involved in the game’s intricacies than in year’s past. As always, many cultural touchpoints throughout the day revolved around music: from Miley Cyrus’s TikTok Tailgate; to the Shaq Bowl, which was hilariously packed with celebrities, artists, brand sponsors, and viral moments; to, of course, the commercials (more on that below).As for the official programming, I loved Alicia Keys' surprise cameo with a theme around racial injustice. H.E.R.’s rendition of “America The Beautiful” was phenomenal and it was great to see a collaborative National Anthem between Eric Church and Jazmine Sullivan, the first since Aretha Franklin and Aaron Neville’s Super Bowl XV performance.The Weeknd did a solid job for the Pepsi Halftime show. He promised a PG performance with no guest and it was just that. The show was packed with hits and even had its “memeable” moment (which is important). It’s crazy to think that The Weeknd came $7 million out of pocket to get the production where he wanted (the other $13 million was covered). The results came with it: The Weeknd dominated the charts Monday, holding eight of the top 10 slots when I woke up. The Recording Academy is no doubt having second thoughts about its Grammy noms.It was also great to see growth in terms of the NFL’s handling of racial injustice. Everything was solid with no duds. I credit our evolving times, the NBA’s success, and the hiring of Jay-Z/Roc Nation to lead on curation. It’s working. Now we need more power in the players' hands.Besides Tom Brady re-cementing his GOAT status and sticking it to the Patriots, the best part of the game was the commercials.Music was again a central theme. There were fun uses of music in nostalgic and reimagined settings, like Cheeto’s “It Wasn’t Me” and Michelob Ultra’s Tribe Called Quest license of “Can I Kick It.” There were also some cool product and artist alignments, like Lil Baby x Rockstar Energy Drink and Stella Artois with Lenny Kravitz. I loved how, after many years and attempts, Jeep finally landed Bruce Springsteen in a theme around the “ReUnited States of America.” And the Lil Nas X LogicTech ad was a cool music+tech moment. I love how he continues to embrace tech with his partnership choices. Who could forget Oatly’s catchy, oddball win featuring the CEO singing? They even dropped a remix album this morning with more interpretations of their now infamous, once banned jingle “Oh Wow…No Cow.”The Twitterati is going predictably ham. I could give you a full play-by-play from a music perspective, but instead, I’ve collected a very savvy crew of music and culture marketing aficionados to talk about all of these music moments and more, tonight on Clubhouse. You are welcome to join (see here for more info). Let me know if you need an invite to the app. I’ve got a few to spare for the Beats & Bytes community. Hope to see you there from 7-8:30pm!
BEATS
Why Brands Need A Chief Entertainment OfficerIt’s 2021 and the world we once knew is no more. It’s harder than ever to cut through the noise of a busy digital landscape. So, when events come back, they will be more important than ever. In 2020, partnerships ran rampant and were a big success. In 2021, these collaborations between the entertainment business, brands and tech platforms are going to continue to accelerate. (Ad Age)
A Field Guide to Music’s Potential Crypto BoomWhat if the music industry’s hundreds of thousands of artists — who are especially cash-strapped when they can’t tour, like right now in the Covid-19 pandemic — didn’t have to wait a cripplingly long time to get their royalties, but rather could receive streaming money instantaneously? Broaden that thought experiment. (Rolling Stone)
Music is the Creator Economy CatalystIn his book The Passion Economy Adam Davidson argues that our current century is one where people set up businesses that centre around their passions. This contrasts with the main tenet of the previous century, where the focus was on commoditization, production and scale. (Music Tech Future)
The Sober Rebranding of Rock ‘N’ RollThroughout modern music, the mantra “sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll” has been both a catalyzer and a destructor. The cautionary tale practically writes itself: Artist finds purpose in music, sees commercial success, indulges in every substance known to man, falls, bottoms out, loses a career, climbs back out of the darkness through sobriety. That’s the happy-ending version; there are plenty who aren’t as fortunate. (Variety)
How Bruce Springsteen Agreed to Do a Super Bowl Commercial for JeepAfter driving “Thunder Road” for decades, Bruce Springsteen is taking a detour on Madison Avenue. The musician known as “The Boss” will command two minutes of commercial time in Super Bowl LV Sunday night, all part of a mammoth Jeep ad meant to reflect a national mood of coming together after four years of politics and polarization. (Variety)
McDonald’s Preps Lunar New Year with 88risingLunar New Year is a time to set aside the old while welcoming the new. As many people across the country anticipate the Year of the Ox, in the spirit of celebrating new beginnings and the start of the lunar calendar, McDonald’s has partnered with 88rising, a leading global Asian artist collective, to create the Golden Start experience for customers and fans. (Reel Chicago)
Hoobastank Delighted by TikTok Popularity as ‘The Reason’ Goes Viral, Signaling Resurgence of ’00s HitsPerhaps due to the song’s wide range of lyrical relatability and its nostalgia factor, TikTok users have posted over 64,000 videos using the tune in the past few weeks. It also sparked a new hashtag — #NotAPerfectPerson — which has 434 million views, with most of the videos using the song. You read that right: 434 million. (Variety)
MelodyVR Rebrands As Napster, Confirms London Stock Exchange ListingMelodyVR acquired Napster last year and is working to intergrate their operations. Napster is now set to be listed on the London Stock Exchange’s AIM listing on February 12.The investment from Swiss corporate finance firm Nice & Green will commence this month. (Music Week)
Lil Yachty, Mattel Team for Action Comedy Based on UnoThe rapper will prodcue, with an eye at a starring role.Rapper Lil Yachty and Mattel are teaming on a feature adaption of the popular children's card game Uno. The movie is described as an action heist comedy, set in the underground hip hop world of Atlanta. Yachty is attached to produce, with an eye to star in the movie. (Hollywood Reporter)
Questlove’s ‘Summer of Soul’ Breaks ‘Boys State’s’ $12M Sundance Doc Sales Record in Searchlight/Hulu AcquisitionThe documentary was acquired for north of $12 million, two sources with knowledge of the deal tell Variety, resetting the documentary sales record previously broken when Apple and A24 acquired “Boys State” at Sundance last year. (Variety)
SoundCloud Will Host a Gaming Tournament Inside FortniteTurns out the cloud has room for more than just sound. On Wednesday, music streaming platform SoundCloud announced that it is partnering with Twitch — the gamer-centric livestreaming service — to launch SoundCloud Player One, a three-hour gaming tournament that will start on February 18th at 8 p.m. Eastern Time. (Rolling Stone)
NFTs Are Blockchain’s Hottest New Use Case For Music.What if a piece of art is recorded into a distributed database? Why the hype?The current cultural moment is strongly influenced by the pandemic. Artists saw a big drop in income. Streaming revenue isn’t cutting it for most. So the big experimentation began. Artists searched for revenue through things like livestreaming, fan clubs, ticketed virtual meet & greets, online courses, and NFT auctions… (Music Tech Future)
YouTube advertising revenues grew 46% to $6.9bn in Q4 2020Google and YouTube’s parent company Alphabet published its latest financial numbers yesterday, including advertising revenue figures for YouTube. They show a big bounce-back from the initial hit caused by the Covid-19 pandemic: YouTube ads made $6.89bn in the final quarter of 2020, up 46% year-on-year. (Musically)
These Are the Hip-Hop Mixtapes We Need on Streaming Services ASAPAs hard as it may be for some to believe, there was definitely a world before streaming services. In the really early days, you had to go to a store to buy your favorite vinyls, tapes and then CDs. Technology changed everything when MP3s were created, turning music into easily transferable files. (XXL Mag)
BYTES
6 GRAMMY’s. 25 nominations. 2 Emmy’s. Selling more than 170 million combined albums and singles, Whitney Houston is the “voice of a generation”. This “Black Girl Songbook” podcast discusses some of the best singers in Super Bowl history, and where this year’s LV performances fall.
R&B icon H.E.R. breathed life into ‘America The Beautiful’ this past Sunday at Super Bowl LV with an electrifying guitar solo and high notes only should could hit - capturing the audience’s attention with her dazzling outfit.
SoundCloud is preparing to introduce a new payment system that would allow fans to pay artists directly, multiple sources close to the situation tell Billboard, setting what could be a game-changing precedent for the streaming world. (Billboard)
Wow no cow! Vegan milk brand Oatley put their product on display during this year’s Super Bowl LV commercials, with CEO Toni Petersson hitting some… less than graceful high notes. Nevertheless, their jingle spurred much conversation around the healthy milk alternative and our collective mental state during the pandemic.
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!