Wishing you a happy May 5th, otherwise known as Cinco de Mayo.Cinco de Mayo is a holiday that celebrates the Mexican army’s 1862 victory over France at the Battle of Puebla during the Franco-Mexican War. Though Mexico won the battle, it did not win the war.So, it is odd that this relatively minor Mexican holiday is celebrated by Americans with tequila shots. This evolution into a commemoration of Mexican culture and heritage, particularly in areas with large Mexican-American populations, began in the mid-20th-century.Critics observed that enthusiasm for the holiday did not take off with a broader demographic until it was explicitly linked with the promotion of Mexican alcoholic beverages. Many U.S. festivities tend to both perpetuate negative stereotypes of Mexicans and promote excessive drinking. It is one of America’s top 5 drinking days of the year.As brands have looked to commercialize the moment, it’s led to often offensive costumes and caricatures of Mexican culture and people acting foolish in the name of "Mexican culture.” Not to mention, you'll probably see many people wearing sombreros, fake mustaches, and ponchos, which is undeniably prejudiced and appropriative.But the times are changing, and change is goo. This isn’t about being “woke,” this is about the evolution of our country and operating at a higher level of consciousness. It’s an opportunity to do things differently. I challenge brand marketers to look to celebrate Mexican culture in America in fresh ways.The Latinx community, in many ways, will decide America’s future. Not only is it driving politics and culture, but it is massively moving the needle in music. Latin music listening was up nearly 16% last year with Bad Bunny leading the trend. In 2020, he streamed more than 8.3bn times on Spotify alone. According to Rolling Stone, “revenues for the genre in 2019 reached a new high of $554 million - roughly one-third, or 28% more than the previous year. It is the highest figure the market has seen since 2006.” This growth is expected to continue, with artists like Jhay Cortez, Maluma, and J Balvin exploding in popularity.At Nue, we are working with several major brands and content platforms who are committed to engaging the Latinx audience in authentic ways and utilizing music as a core component in their marketing strategies. By seeking counsel and guidance from key cultural leaders and influencers from this community, we can co-create respectful, credible, and reflective programming and messaging.I’m all for celebrating Mexican culture. Let’s do it responsibly.
BEATS
Music in the AirAfter nearly two decades of disruption, the music industry is undergoing a massive revival. Artists, labels and publishers are cashing in on the growing popularity of streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music — and consumers are signing up for subscriptions like never before. (Goldman Sachs)
The Next Bet in Music: Artist ServicesThis week, Downtown sold a library of 145,000 owned copyrights of hit songs recorded by artists including Adele, Aretha Franklin, Beyoncé and Lady Gaga for $400 million, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company is shifting focus to what it says will be a more valuable business: artist services, a catchall term for distributing, marketing, licensing, financing music and collecting royalties on behalf of musicians. (WSJ)
Twitch’sRockonomicsTwitch offers a unique way for artists to reach fans and earn money. The growing criticism from music industry trade bodies about Twitch’s licensing strategy appears to be based on a misunderstanding of what Twitch is and isn’t – which is understandable, given that live streaming on Twitch is a new paradigm. Key to this seachange are Twitch’s roots in the culture of gaming. You can bring a horse to water, or you can bring water to the horse. Twitch is bringing music to gaming. (Twitch Rockonomics)
Why Fanbases Need To Be Networks, Rather Than ChannelsThe foundations of the music business lie in an age of channels. Many current success models still focus on channels, despite living in an age of networks. Due to this mode of operation, a renewed demand for channels has created a landscape of influential gatekeepers over the past decade. But you can still opt to play the network game instead. (Music Tech Future)
Spotify CEO Says Live Audio Content Is The Next ‘Stories’Live audio experiences will be adopted by every major platform just like Stories have been, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek told investors on Wednesday’s earnings call. The streaming service recently acquired a live audio app, Locker Room, whose technology it expects to use to power a range of new live audio conversations centered around sports, culture and, of course, music. (Tech Crunch)
He's Shaping The Future Of Spotify, One Moonshot Idea at a TimeSpotify (SPOT) is frequently one step ahead of us, suggesting undiscovered songs, artists and podcasts based on what you listened to in the past. But who is helping Spotify stay one step — or 10 years — ahead in the audio industry? The company hired Máuhan "M" Zonoozy as its first and only head of innovation earlier this year to do just that. Zonoozy previously worked at BCG Digital Ventures where he helped big corporations think about and adapt to the future. (CNN)
The Sachetization Of Music ConsumptionSachetization comes from the fast-moving consumer goods industry and refers to the bite-size packaging – e.g. one biscuit, or 15ml shampoo – of goods that used to be available only in bigger, and thus more expensive, packages. Music consumption has seen a little bit of sachetization, but there is significant growth to be had if platforms and services will pick up this strategy more broadly.(Music Tech Future)
Yousician Raises $28M In B Round, New Investors Include Amazon Alexa Fund And Paul Mccartney’s MPL VenturesMusic education platform Yousician has closed a $28 million Series B round of funding for its platforms, bringing its total raised to $35 million. The company states that its on-demand music school Yousician and instrument tuner platform GuitarTuna are used by 20 million people worldwide each month and that in 2020, its “recurring revenue increased by 70% from $30m to $50m”. (Music Business Worldwide)
We Told You Warner Music Group Was Becoming A Media Company – Now It’s Launched An Advertising Division.MBW has previously noted that, over the past two years, Warner Music Group has started evolving into a fully-fledged media publisher. We broke the news about WMG’s acquisitions of media brands UPROXX (in 2018) and and HipHopDX (in 2020). And we also broke the news that WMG had bought Instagram and TikTok meme-maker IMGN a couple of years back for around $85m. (Music Business Worldwide)
Lil Yachty Announces Launch of New Nail Polish Brand CreteInclusivity and individualism have been part of Yachty’s mission since he first captivated the country in 2017 with the cover of his debut album, Teenage Emotions. Yachty has also become known for painting his nails with graphics and designs as a form of artistic expression. So when Yachty learned that 17-year-old Trevor Wilkinson was suspended from school in Texas for wearing nail polish, he took it upon himself to defend Wilkinson. (Complex)
Funk Flex Has Stories to TellFunk Flex has an opinion about everything. Pick any topic about rap, from its origins until now, and he’ll unleash an endless stream of thoughts on the matter. Right now, he’s lounging on a vampire red leather couch in “the man cave” of his Westchester County home, spewing out his hottest takes. Some of his opinions are direct, like, “Radio doesn’t break artists anymore. It helps them become superstars.” (Complex)
Cherie Hu Explains The NFT Music MarketMusic technology and music industry master Cherie Hu goes deeper into NFT in her Google Doc. Her high-points. Musicians have sold over 55,000 total NFTs since June 2020, worth over $60 million. Independent artists still run the show, but major artists and labels are quickly catching up. Several technical, legal and political challenges remain to mainstream NFT adoption in the music industry. (Falseto)
TikTok Launches Music Station on iHeartRadio, TikTok TrendingTikTok is ramping up its musical push, launching a pop-up music station on the Australian Radio Network’s (ARN) iHeartRadio. TikTok trending will showcase the music and artists taking off on the platform, as well as the tracks experiencing a revival due to viral trends or rediscovery from different generations. The station will feature creators as hosts, including musicians G Flip and Isaiah Firebrace, as well as local TikTok star Tannar and emerging musician Avneesha. (The Music Network)
Stylus Counsel: Music Industry Execs On The 2021 Vinyl BoomIt’s official: the vinyl revival is here to stay. As Music Week revealed in our Q1 analysis, sales of vinyl LPs were up 16.1% year-on-year in the first three months of 2021 to pass a million units (1,080,653), according to Official Charts Company data. Remember, those results were achieved during a national lockdown. Last year, vinyl sales were also up – by 11.5% to 4.8 million units – despite the effects of the pandemic on retail and release plans. (Music Week)
Wasserman Music, The COVID Diaspora & The Changing Music Agency UniverseLast week, Paradigm’s NA music division became Wasserman Music. The shake-up comes at a time when everyone is hoping for a return of IRL shows after more than a year. We thought we’d take this moment & use ROSTR’s data to look at. To understand the impact on the ecosystem, we compared data from early 2020 (pre-COVID) with data from this week; the top 100 agencies by roster size, the average artist size & the total audience size. (Rostr)
Jay-Z Reportedly Finalizes Tidal Sale To Jack Dorsey For $302M… As Platform Boasts Of Paying ‘4x More Per Stream’ Than RivalsTIDAL is now majority-owned by Jack Dorsey’s Square, after a deal was reportedly finalized between Dorsey and Shawn ‘Jay-Z’ Carter on Friday (April 30). The acquisition was for more money than expected, according to TMZ, which reports that Square paid $350 million to buy an 80% stake in TIDAL. That figure is bigger than the number the two parties announced in March ($297 million), when they said they had entered into a definitive agreement for Square to acquire its majority stake. (Music Business Worldwide)
BYTES
Did you know that the creator of the precursor to TikTok was a futurist? That the app was initially for educational videos? And that he switched to music and entertainment after watching teens fill time on a train? Bloomberg Tech reporter Shelly Banjo takes a look, in this awesome edition of "Foundering, The TikTok Story." Hosts Denise Pellegrini and Ed Baxter feature the best stories of the day from Bloomberg Radio, Bloomberg Television, and over 150 Bloomberg News bureaus around the world on Bloomberg Radio's Bloomberg Best.
The psychedelic rock group Flaming Lips have established themselves as one of music's most prolific (and delightfully weird) bands. And don't think a global pandemic might have slowed down their creative output. Correspondent Luke Burbank talked with band members Wayne Coyne and Steven Drozd about their latest effort, the Space Bubble Concert, recently held in Oklahoma City, in which the band and audience were sealed into giant bubbles.
Rapchat, an app that lets people create music tracks — raps, as its name suggests, is a platform that crowdsources beats and lets people put vocals on top of them. The platform has recently raised $2.3 million, co-led by Sony Music Entertainment and NYC VC firm Adjacent. This is an extension to Rapchat’s seed round of $1.7 million back in 2018, and CEO and co-founder Seth Miller says it’s coming as the startup is getting ready for a bigger Series A.
He’s back with... another one. DJ Khaled’s 12th studio album Khaled Khaled has arrived, and like usual for Khaled releases, it’s full of A-list co-stars. The 14-song tracklist features everyone from Jay-Z to Nas to Cardi B to Drake. Hell, Khaled was feelin’ himself so much that he put Justin Bieber and 21 Savage on the same damn song. No one can hype up their own album quite like Khaled can. Announcing the project’s release date with a giant billboard and dozens of Instagram posts, Khaled told fans, “This my name. This is my legacy. Time to bring more light.” Then he took things to a new level by listing Allah as an executive producer.
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!