#one a press release from UMG | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

still-single · 10 months

Text

Records I Am Glad to Have Found in 2023: Part 2

"Part" may be the wrong way to express this as a series but it's too late now.

Superdragons – "Super Dragon" promo 12" (Mercury, 1976)

There's a shop north of Chicago that's the kind of place where the immediate charms of digging for wild records are often rewarded. I have a regularly scheduled appointment out near this shop, which gives me an excuse to stop in every few months and see what's changed. Every time I go, I seem to clean out a section that doesn't immediately get replenished, but in typical crypt-style record store fashion, there's always something more to find.

In recent years, that section has been their 12" singles. If this is the thing you're looking for, record shops with heavy inventory truly cannot be beat. You won't typically have much competition getting down on the floor and looking under the browsers or whatever dusty, low-traffic area this format is typically relegated to.

Which is to say, on a previous visit I found a promo-only Bohannon single and was regaled with a story about The Gilbert Kong collection. Kong was a Mercury Records mastering engineer who at some point dipped out to work on his own, but I'm told he kept his contacts and worked with the label steadily throughout the '70s. His craft is most readily apparent on a series of 12" promo singles, pressed for radio and disco use, which were generally not for sale. A relative who had inherited his collection wound up selling it to this store, they found an acetate of the first Rush album out of it (which they donated to a Rush museum, apparently, after being rebuffed when presenting UMG with the chance to use it for a reissue), and most of the 12"s quietly went out for sale.

You can identify these records by their monochromatic, plain sleeve art, and a catalog prefix of MK. In every instance I've come across, the record is mastered LOUD, with incredible fidelity and bass response. Kong had no compunction about spreading three minutes of music across an entire side of a 12", and the results are about as deep and rewarding as you'd expect from an audio standpoint. Whether the music – typically disco records pushed by the PolyGram fam, top 40 hopefuls, and sampler albums – is your bag, that's another thing. A frequent target of bootlegging, these promos weren't pressed in significant quantities; the appeal of DJing with a really full, loud copy of, say, the Osmonds "I, I, I", as opposed to the squashed fidelity of the same song on the LP, cannot be overstated. Second-market pricing on these varies wildly, from a few bucks to a few hundred.

I grabbed a bunch of these releases on my last visit, sound unheard. The bare, red print of "Super Dragon DISCO VERSION" by Superdragons did its best to blend in, but the anonymity of it all, a heady year of release, and a production credit for Bunny Sigler held promise.

youtube

Did it ever! Clearly a product of Philly's finest studio musicians, "Super Dragon" looks to glom as many popular song ideas together as a single track could hold, with panicked, immediate strings, parping brass, rolling rhythms and virtually nothing at all to say. "Draaa-gon! Draaa-gon! Super dragon, super dragon." That's all you get! You also get notions of Bobby Womack's "Across 110th Street," Rhythm Heritage's "Theme from S.W.A.T.," and Steve Miller's "Fly Like an Eagle," three tracks I wouldn't have thought should go together until now. "Super Dragon" is a full-tilt disco hustler with big main title soundtrack energy, and I wasn't surprised to find out it was used for just that (an excerpt turns up in a Bruce Le movie, 1978's Bruce and Shaolin Kung Fu).

Superdragons left it all out on the field after this one; the B-side contains the same song, in case you wear it out. Apart from a customary pressing as a 45 (with Part 1 and Part 2 indicators), this was it. This 12" presents a unique disco mix with no side break, and at 5+ minutes runtime gives you everything you came for and a little more.

Crown Heights Affair – "Say a Prayer for Two" b/w "Galaxy of Love / I'm Gonna Love You Forever" promo 12" (De-Lite, 1978)

Probably don't need to say much about this known disco slammer, presented here with a little more of an intro. The bass response on this one is fucking insane, and if this isn't getting your floor moving/potted plants dancing off the shelf, you might be doing it wrong. A high point in these Mercury promo offerings, and my favorite song from this group.

youtube

City Boy – "5.7.0.5." promo 12" (Mercury, 1978)

Loved this song from the first time I heard it. City Boy's biggest hit, this has some real right place/right time energy, the vaguely new wave screamer ELO never really had in 'em (at least not in '78). Grooves on this one are cut so wide you can almost sightread them from across the room. I was hoping one of these would be in with the rest at this shop.

youtube

(Doug Mosurock)

#superdragons #super dragon #disco #bruce le #Youtube #crown heights affair #city boy #5705 #but there's no reply #dialtone

3 notes · View notes

statementlou · 2 years

Note

To add to your independent post, Billboard considers Bad Bunny and Taylor Swift as Independent Artist because they are not under the Big 3. Bad Bunny is signed as a distribution deal with a Puerto Rican Label and releases in the US under a contract with Universal Latin and another company so it doesnt count as UMG and Taylor is with Republic Records. Billboard does an Independent Artist Chart each week www billboard com/charts/independent-albums/

thank you for this, very interesting!! (about this) I feel like this really shows how stupid this distinction has become, since obviously by any rational metric Taylor Swift and Bad Bunny (and Louis) have major league representation who operate in particular ways that are basically the same as the Big 3 and are playing on the same level. So it makes sense that despite technically being "independent" Louis considers himself a major label artist. He said that he considered going independent, which in the way he means would mean he (/his team) would have to handle promo, manufacturing, distro deals, wrangling with streaming platforms, everything, themselves, and without the infrastructure to just slot into that a big label have, a part of which is the handshake network of ins at radio stations and tv shows etc etc- but to get that he takes on the trade off of having a label who press for hits and for him to do certain things (both of which he mentioned in yesterday's interview wrt BMG who thought BTM was too alternative and that he should press for radio play, but it's worth noting that Louis got his way with BTM and didn't seem too bothered about going out to do the US thing, this isn't SYCO, it's just a little trade off). And the way Louis phrased it ("what I didn’t want to do is go out on my own and then be sat on me rocking chair when I’m 60, 70 going, maybe I should’ve had one more go with a major label") to me says that even though he had made the decision that his priority was to do what he wanted even if it meant not getting hits, he didn't want to cut off the possibility of having it all, the control and the hits. I love how grounded he seems about it all- like yeah wouldn't that be fun and I will try for it within what feels good for me but beyond that, no, and if it doesn't happen NBD. But yeah, he likes the numbers, he wants to fill stadiums, he's said it and I think he'd say it more if people could also believe that he's also good without it instead of latching onto that as unhappiness with anything less. Anyway IDK anything about the Billboard indie chart thing but I can't help but wonder if it used to actually be a chart for artists who were out there doing things small scale and DIY and because of the ridiculousness of this semantic issue is now just always topped by Bad Bunny or whatever. Honestly the definition should get fixed because there are still artists putting things out themselves or on small labels and not going through major distros or having access to major league promo and for them to share a category with these behemoths (Louis included) who are benefitting from corporate connections and handlers just doesn't make any sense. But since the (outdated and useless) definition does remain in place, I will point out that the fact that Louis can claim and play both sides works out quite nicely for him, and you know that's not just happenstance or luck, he's very clever about these things.

#blah blah blah #I am happy for bad bunny + taylor etc for their business acumen and keeping the money they make #for themselves #I love the idea of BB keeping that money in PR - iconic #maybe he can singlehandedly fund independence

5 notes · View notes

portglasgow · 1 year

Text

Tidal Live Officially Launches Amid Streaming-Reform Initiative

Photograph Credit score: Tidal

Because it continues to collaborate with Common Music Group (UMG) on an up to date streaming-compensation mannequin, Tidal has formally launched “Dwell,” which execs are billing as “a brand new means for followers to spontaneously share music.”

Tidal only in the near past rolled out Dwell, which had been known as “DJ” throughout a previous early entry program. In line with the Block-owned streaming platform, Dwell is enabling paid customers (not these with ad-supported accounts, it seems) to share tracks with others, in addition to connecting listeners with “music tastemakers.”

A cursory look on the acceptable music service reveals that Dwell basically capabilities as a digital-radio possibility inside the in any other case on-demand streaming providing. Hosts select songs (presumably from a selected style or centering on a particular temper), and listeners can mute however not pause or skip the chosen works, the Tidal app reveals.

“When beginning a Dwell session, TIDAL subscribers can select the session title to set the tone for what they’re taking part in and share a hyperlink for others to hitch,” the platform spelled out of Dwell, which is accessible on Android and iOS alike. “Shareable hyperlinks to Dwell classes let anybody be part of – from textual content messages and social media, to emails.”

Artists together with Diplo and Aluna have already put out Dwell classes – or what are successfully playlists that compel listeners to take pleasure in every featured monitor in its entirety and in a exact order. Tidal’s “style consultants” are poised to unveil “specifically curated classes” of their very own shifting ahead, and international head of product Agustina Sacerdote in a press release touted Dwell’s perceived potential as a discovery and social device.

“Via music, we’re giving followers a solution to join with one another or with different creators, manufacturers, and personalities by easy, one-click sharing,” mentioned the greater than five-year Block exec Sacerdote. “Utilizing Dwell provides music followers a easy path to discovering new music from different followers in-app or wherever a hyperlink is shared. We’re excited to see how Dwell is used to energy moments by sharing music and bringing folks collectively.”

Within the approaching months, it’ll be value maintaining a tally of the capabilities and attainable buildout of Tidal’s Dwell, which arrives on the scene simply days after Turntable LIVE raised $7 million.

Although restricted in scope at current, the newest function from Tidal (the dad or mum firm of which additionally owns Money App) may doubtlessly function a basis for chat choices, direct connections between high-profile acts and their most diehard supporters, pop-up digital shops, and extra down the road.

After all, “launch events” and once-off live shows have lengthy been happening in digital universes like Roblox and Fortnite, delivering seemingly sturdy promotional and income advantages. And when explaining his perception “that the financial mannequin for streaming must evolve,” UMG head Lucian Grainge pointed to “undervalued” artist contributions and fan interactions.

“There’s a rising disconnect between, on the one hand, the devotion to these artists whom followers worth and search to assist and, on the opposite, the way in which subscription charges are paid by the platforms,” Grainge said. “Beneath the present mannequin, the crucial contributions of too many artists, in addition to the engagement of too many followers, are undervalued.”

Deezer can also be coordinating with UMG on the aforesaid streaming-payouts program, and whereas Spotify is discontinuing its live-audio app, the Stockholm-headquartered firm intends to proceed facilitating “reside interactions between artists and followers” on its major platform, per higher-ups.

#Tidal Live Officially Launches Amid Streaming-Reform Initiative

1 note · View note

newmusicradionetwork · 2 years

Text

Andrew Reed & The Liberation “Too Little Too Late”

This is a guy that has gone as DEEP as possible into the experience of LIFE, often isolating himself from society in a rustic cabin surrounded by 13,000 acres of wilderness, to find out for himself, “What’s it all about?” without the influences or hypnotism of a “made up” world, observing Nature and making common cause WITH ITand the way life ACTUALLY works on this planet. Dubbed a “rock mystic” by the Indie press after multiple Billboard and other charting releases, Reed actually lives “liberation” and those in his presence “feel” this Zen or “Unfazed” approach to life. A nonconformist and misunderstood by most, he combines music with intellect in an artistry that flies in the face of the traditional music business world. With him, it is ALL about the artand nothing else. Expressing what cannot be said or communicated any other way. His interviews with press usually leave them confounded, but also inspired. He changes style from one album to the next, and even sees far enough in advance to create, not just a single albums, but album “trilogies.” He will often move on from a budding success before the full commercial potential of a musical direction can be realized, which is scandalous in the music business. He has been known to pull down his entire catalog, like after his Universal Music/INgrooves deal or to further explore material. His live performances are intermittent, but are EPIC and unpredictable, where one doesn’t know what is going to happen. According to Reed, “ROCK was never meant to be pretty, or an over-rehearsed commercial production, but desperate, bombastic and scandalouswhere it could go off the rails at any moment You have to feel like you could throw your life away in the moment” But despite these idiosyncrasies, his work in music & intellectual domains have impact. Not many artists, have the guts to pull all their music downto pursue a particular artistic vision or attainment But that’s the kind of person Andrew is One that can’t be bought or sold. It is all about the musicand one gets that he is literally throwing his life away on itwith a confidence that is inspirational. NEW BOLD RECORDING INNOVATIONS Reed writes not just “concept albums” but “Trilogies” that represent “significant and coherent” bodies of work with unifying sonic themes throughout each trilogy. With musicality pouring out of him, this super guitarist can move from acoustic-oriented to far-out psychedelic rock. Through a “vision” after the catastrophic loss of his son, Reed built a 3 story-mountaintop, World-Class recording studio and compound where he “isolates” and has ventured into bold new recording territory, recording the first of a series of Trilogy albums, 1) As a Bird of the Air 2) As a Lily of the Field 3) As Grass in the Furnace by saturating analog tape running 3x (times) normal speed, capturing performances at the time of inspiration using vintage gear. Also, because of the respect he has gained in the science and health-science communities, especially in the research of consciousness, Reed as incorporated proprietary consciousness-altering technologies into many of his works as well as into the recording process like Monroe Sound Science. “What’s it all about?” Reed’s work serves to help all perhaps create a visionto be completely “liberated” within ourselvesand to live “Guiltless Lives” of complete Self-Acceptance on an odyssey or oscillation of ups and downs, but with an overall momentum UP! Additional Artist/Song Information: Artist Name: Andrew Reed & The Liberation Song Title: Too Little Too Late Publishing: Artists International Broadcasting Publishing Affiliation: BMI Album Title: As A Bird Of The Air Record Label: Artists International Record Label: Artists INTL/WorldSound/INgrooves/UMG Andrew Reed 828-489-9715 [email protected] Radio Promotion: ADD Promotion Gary Lefkowith 203-727-5010 [email protected] Manager: WorldSound Warren Wyatt 808-333-4224 [email protected] Read the full article

0 notes

nftdawnio · 2 years

Text

Mars is making Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT-themed M&M's candy that will only be available for a limited time. The deal is between Mars and the 10:22PM label of Universal Music Group. The Ape NFT images were licensed from a well-known collector. The owners of Bored Ape Yacht Club have used their rights to allow commercialization to put their Ethereum NFT images on clothes, toys, alcohol packaging, and even restaurants. But now, thanks to limited-edition M&Ms, you can actually eat a few Bored Apes. Mars announced today that it has made a deal with Universal Music Group (UMG) label 10:22PM to make limited edition M&Ms based on its virtual band Kingship, which is made up of avatars from the Bored Ape Yacht Club and the Mutant Ape Yacht Club. "Consumers' expectations of what they want from their favorite brands have changed," said Mars Wrigley Global Vice President Jane Hwang in a press release. "With such a well-known brand as M&M's, we know we need to be more creative than ever." Last November, it was found out that Kingship was a "metaverse band" made up of NFTs that investor and entrepreneur Jimmy "j1mmy" McNelis owned. The label 10:22PM has made characters out of the Bored Ape drawings and is making original music for the group, which will play concerts in metaverse worlds. This is similar to what the popular virtual band Gorillaz did. https://twitter.com/therealkingship/status/1562439603809751041 The band has also made its own "key cards" for NFT that give holders special benefits and access. NFT owners were able to buy M&M's candy before anyone else. As part of the deal, Mars has made a limited number of branded M&M's chocolate candies with images from Bored Apes and Kingship. Mars will only sell a total of 10,000 packages of the candies in gift boxes and jars. Decrypt tried to get more information from UMG about the terms of the deal and how the partnership came about, but we didn't hear back right away. An NFT is a blockchain token that can be used for things like profile pictures, artwork, and collectibles. It works like a deed of ownership for a virtual item. As the NFT market has grown, with trading volume reaching $25 billion in 2021 alone, more and more brands are getting involved through partnerships or their own digital collectible drops. The Bored Ape Yacht Club is probably the most popular project in the space. According to data from CryptoSlam, the NFT collection from Yuga Labs has been traded for nearly $2.4 billion so far. Bored Ape-related NFTs have made more than $5.6 billion in secondary trading so far, thanks to follow-up and spin-off projects. To be clear, this M&M's deal is not a partnership with Yuga Labs or the real Bored Ape Yacht Club brand. Instead, Bored Ape NFT holders can use their own images to make products and projects, and they can sell licenses to brands for that artwork if they want to. One example of a licensing deal is the one between Kingship and UMG's 10:22PM label. This new Mars deal adds another layer to it. Images of Bored Ape have also been used in fast food restaurants, on the packaging of marijuana and alcohol, on clothing, in collectibles, and in other places. Bored Apes has also gotten a lot of attention in the music world. Timbaland, a well-known musician and producer, has also put out music based on his Bored Ape avatar and started a record label so that other artists can do the same. Eminem and Snoop Dogg have also made a music video with their Apes in it, and Snoop is opening a dessert place with one of his Apes as the theme. https://nftdawn.io/mms-releases-bayc-inspired-candy/?feed_id=1762&_unique_id=630734c3817d3

0 notes

mysmorgasbordoffantabulosa · 3 years

Text

Run BTS hiatus... OH MY GOD THEY MUST BE ENLISTING!!!! (Note Sarcasm to be used when reading)

OK so BigHit release the latest Behind Run BTS, in which the following clip sent ARMY into a collective tizz and melancholy:

OK and from this everyone is concluding Run BTS is going on a 2-year hiatus. A natural assumption to make.

Personal Note: I personally felt there was going to be a long break and that a new show(s) of some kind will replace in the meantime.

What this clip then snowballed into everyone saying:

"This proves they're enlisting next year and RM's going to announce this on 3rd December PTD on Stage concert"

Note: Paraphrasing here

So could this be true...

What makes me think it could be true is, next year is the latest (based on current Korean law) that Jin can enlist without penalty. It would make sense financially/logistically that all the member enlist together. This is something that most people have speculated for a long time.

But there are a lot of things that make me think it might not be true, these are:

The change in Record Label:

The fact that BTS are now going to be managed internationally by UMG, wouldn't they be pissed off to have one of their newly signed acts sidelined less than a year later for nearly two years? How does that benefit them. Although, the reason, BTS haven't released a full album yet, and I believe this was because they were waiting for UMG to takeover their distribution. It just doesn't make sense, business wise. UMG and HYBE would have had to of had that discussion each other before signing this close to enlistment.

A possible Tour in 2022:

I still think a tour is going to happen next year, as a lot more artists are announcing tours in 2022, it makes sense for BTS to do so also.

The Korean National Assembly is due to discussion possible exemptions for BTS and other similar cultural acts:

Back in Sept the KNA were set to discuss BTS enlistment and possibly making them exempt, but had to postpone it because of lack of time. This is due to happen over the next few months and could change enlistment requirements for BTS as I have speculated.

RM's 3rd December announcement

RM is due to make announcement on the 3rd Dec, the last PTD on Stage in LA concert. What could it be? I think it's like to be one or a combination of these: a new PTD on Stage Tour and/or a new album PTD Album.

To me it doesn't make sense for BTS to just announce at their concert, something that's to celebratory (if the online concert is to go by), by making a sad announcement about enlisting to the military (particularly, as it's going to be live-streamed as well).

To me it makes much sense to announce something positive at the final 'ment' on 3rd just before they sing the uplifting and positive PTD at the close.

Additionally, I don't think they will announce enlistment because a few days later they are performing at the Jingle Ball and would be bombarded with questions by the press, therefore over overshadowing their performance and the event.

If they ever announce their enlistment in the next year, I think it's much more likely that HYBE would want to completely control the situation with a formal press conference, where the world's media would be in attendance, as well as ARMY via a live stream. This would allow HYBE to control the narrative more effectively than at a concert.

But what about RUN BTS?

When watching the last couple of episodes, I did feel a sense of finality to them, and I wondered if they were going to go in a different route for next year. Maybe they will bring back one or two of the old shows they did before RUN BTS, like BTS GAYO. Or maybe they are going to do more Korean Variety shows. Or maybe RUN BTS is returning next year at some point and BTS have just played us all for fools.

Also remember, we've got to get through Awards season yet.

But regarding enlistment/RUN BTS, just give them a break and let them announce whatever they're announcing and when (if ever) they enlist just know that Adele waiting 6 years between albums, Beyoncé's last sole studio album was 5 years ago. I think BTS/HYBE and ARMY can handle between 18 and 21 months without any major content (Although I do think BTS will be allowed to release music and content when they enlist).

So in summary...

No I don't think RM will announce their enlistment, we're going to be getting possibly a tour and/or album announcement, and in the New Year we'll see BTS do a variety show (but not RUN BTS) on Weverse (or some other similar content that's new and fresh!

#bts #run bts #bts military #bts military enlistment #BTS GAYO #bts ptd on stage #bts ptd on stage tour

10 notes · View notes

tswiftdaily · 4 years

Link

In the 2010s, she went from country superstar to pop titan and broke records with chart-topping albums and blockbuster tours. Now Swift is using her industry clout to fight for artists’ rights and foster the musical community she wished she had coming up.

One evening in late-October, before she performed at a benefit concert at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, Taylor Swift’s dressing room became -- as it often does -- an impromptu summit of music’s biggest names. Swift was there to take part in the American Cancer Society’s annual We Can Survive concert alongside Billie Eilish, Lizzo, Camila Cabello and others, and a few of the artists on the lineup came by to visit.

Eilish, along with her mother and her brother/collaborator, Finneas O’Connell, popped in to say hello -- the first time she and Swift had met. Later, Swift joined the exclusive club of people who have seen Marshmello without his signature helmet when the EDM star and his manager stopped by.

“Two dudes walked in -- I didn’t know which one was him,” recalls Swift a few weeks later, sitting on a lounge chair in the backyard of a private Beverly Hills residence following a photo shoot. Her momentary confusion turned into a pang of envy. “It’s really smart! Because he’s got a life, and he can get a house that doesn’t have to have a paparazzi-proof entrance.” She stops to adjust her gray sweatshirt dress and lets out a clipped laugh.

Swift, who will celebrate her 30th birthday on Dec. 13, has been impossibly famous for nearly half of her lifetime. She was 16 when she released her self-titled debut album in 2006, and 20 when her second album, Fearless, won the Grammy Award for album of the year in 2010, making her the youngest artist to ever receive the honor. As the decade comes to a close, Swift is one of the most accomplished musical acts of all time: 37.3 million albums sold, according to Nielsen Music; 95 entries on the Billboard Hot 100 (including five No. 1s); 23 Billboard Music Awards; 12 Country Music Association Awards; 10 Grammys; and five world tours.

She also finishes the decade in a totally different realm of the music world from where she started. Swift’s crossover from country to pop -- hinted at on 2012’s Red and fully embraced on 2014’s 1989 -- reflected a mainstream era in which genres were blended with little abandon, where artists with roots in country, folk and trap music could join forces without anyone raising eyebrows. (See: Swift’s top 20 hit “End Game,” from 2017’s reputation, which featured Ed Sheeran and Future.)

Swift’s new album, Lover, released in August, is both a warm break from the darkness of reputation -- which was created during a wave of negative press generated by Swift’s public clash with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian-West -- as well as an amalgam of all her stylistic explorations through the years, from dreamy synth-pop to hushed country. “The skies were opening up in my life,” says Swift of the album, which garnered three Grammy nominations, including song of the year for the title track.

She recorded Lover after the Reputation Stadium Tour broke the record for the highest-grossing U.S. tour late last year. In 2020, Swift will embark on Lover Fest, a run of stadium dates that will feature a hand-picked lineup of artists (as yet unannounced) and allow Swift more time off from the road. “This is a year where I have to be there for my family -- there’s a lot of question marks throughout the next year, so I wanted to make sure that I could go home,” says Swift, likely referencing her mother’s cancer diagnosis, which inspired the Lover heart-wrencher “Soon You’ll Get Better.”

Now, however, Swift finds herself in a different highly publicized dispute. This time it’s with Scott Borchetta, the head of her former label, Big Machine Records, and Scooter Braun, the manager-mogul whose Ithaca Holdings acquired Big Machine Label Group and its master recordings, which include Swift’s six pre-Lover albums, in June. Upon news of the sale, Swift wrote in a Tumblr post that it was her “worst case scenario,” accusing Braun of “bullying” her throughout her career due to his connections with West. She maintains today that she was never given the opportunity to buy her masters outright. (On Tumblr, she wrote that she was offered the chance to “earn” back the masters to one of her albums for each new album she turned in if she re-signed with Big Machine; Borchetta disputed this characterization, saying she had the opportunity to acquire her masters in exchange for re-signing with the label for a “length of time” -- 10 more years, according to screenshots of legal documents posted on the Big Machine website.)

Swift has said that she intends to rerecord her first six albums next year -- starting next November, when she says she’s contractually able to -- in order to regain control of her recordings. But the back-and-forth appears to be nowhere near over: Last month, Swift alleged that Borchetta and Braun were blocking her from performing her past hits at the American Music Awards or using them in an upcoming Netflix documentary -- claims Big Machine characterized as “false information” in a response that did not get into specifics. (Swift ultimately performed the medley she had planned.) In the weeks following this interview, Braun said he was open to “all possibilities” in finding a “resolution,” and Billboard sources say that includes negotiating a sale. Swift remains interested in buying her masters, though the price could be a sticking point, given her rerecording plans, the control she has over the licensing of her music for film and TV, and the market growth since Braun’s acquisition.

However it plays out, the battle over her masters is the latest in a series of moves that has turned Swift into something of an advocate for artists’ rights -- and made her a cause that everyone from Halsey to Elizabeth Warren has rallied behind. From 2014 to 2017, Swift withheld her catalog from Spotify to protest the streaming company’s compensation rates, saying in a 2014 interview, “There should be an inherent value placed on art. I didn’t see that happening, perception-wise, when I put my music on Spotify.” In 2015, ahead of the launch of Apple Music, Swift wrote an open letter criticizing Apple for its plan to not pay royalties during the three-month free trial it was set to offer listeners; the company announced a new policy within 24 hours. Most recently, when she signed a new global deal with Universal Music Group in 2018, Swift (who is now on Republic Records) said one of the conditions of her contract was that UMG share proceeds from any sale of its Spotify equity with its roster of artists -- and make them nonrecoupable against those artists’ earnings.

During a wide-ranging conversation, Billboard’s Woman of the Decade expresses hope that she can help make the lives of creators a little easier in the years to come -- and a belief that her behind-the-scenes strides will be as integral to her legacy as her biggest singles. “New artists and producers and writers need work, and they need to be likable and get booked in sessions, and they can’t make noise -- but if I can, then I’m going to,” promises Swift. This is where being impossibly famous can be a very good thing. “I know that it seems like I’m very loud about this,” she says, “but it’s because someone has to be.”

While watching some of your performances this year -- like Saturday Night Live and NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert -- I was struck by how focused you seemed, like there were no distractions getting in the way of what you were trying to say.

That’s a really wonderful way of looking at this phase of my life and my music. I’ve spent a lot of time recalibrating my life to make it feel manageable. Because there were some years there where I felt like I didn’t quite know what exactly to give people and what to hold back, what to share and what to protect. I think a lot of people go through that, especially in the last decade. I broke through pre-social media, and then there was this phase where social media felt fun and casual and quirky and safe. And then it got to the point where everyone has to evaluate their relationship with social media. So I decided that the best thing I have to offer people is my music. I’m not really here to influence their fashion or their social lives. That has bled through into the live part of what I do.

Meanwhile, you’ve found a way to interact with your fans in this very pure way -- on your Tumblr page.

Tumblr is the last place on the internet where I feel like I can still make a joke because it feels small, like a neighborhood rather than an entire continent. We can kid around -- they literally drag me. It’s fun. That’s a real comfort zone for me. And just like anything else, I need breaks from it sometimes. But when I do participate in that space, it’s always in a very inside-joke, friend vibe. Sometimes, when I open Twitter, I get so overwhelmed that I just immediately close it. I haven’t had Twitter on my phone in a while because I don’t like to have too much news. Like, I follow politics, and that’s it. But I don’t like to follow who has broken up with who, or who wore an interesting pair of shoes. There’s only so much bandwidth my brain can really have.

It’s sort of an amalgamation of all of it. People who aren’t active fans of your music, who like one song but love to hear who has been canceled on Twitter. I’ve had several upheavals of somehow not being what I should be. And this happens to women in music way more than men. That’s why I get so many phone calls from new artists out of the blue -- like, “Hey, I’m getting my first wave of bad press, I’m freaking out, can I talk to you?” And the answer is always yes! I’m talking about more than 20 people who have randomly reached out to me. I take it as a compliment because it means that they see what has happened over the course of my career, over and over again.

Did you have someone like that to reach out to?

Not really, because my career has existed in lots of different neighborhoods of music. I had so many mentors in country music. Faith Hill was wonderful. She would reach out to me and invite me over and take me on tour, and I knew that I could talk to her. Crossing over to pop is a completely different world. Country music is a real community, and in pop I didn’t see that community as much. Now there is a bit of one between the girls in pop -- we all have each other’s numbers and text each other -- but when I first started out in pop it was very much you versus you versus you. We didn’t have a network, which is weird because we can help each other through these moments when you just feel completely isolated.

Do you feel like those barriers are actively being broken down now?

God, I hope so. I also hope people can call it out, [like] if you see a Grammy prediction article, and it’s just two women’s faces next to each other and feels a bit gratuitous. No one’s going to start out being perfectly educated on the intricacies of gender politics. The key is that people are trying to learn, and that’s great. No one’s going to get it perfect, but, God, please try.

At this point, who is your sounding board, creatively and professionally?

From a creative standpoint, I’ve been writing alone a lot more. I’m good with being alone, with thinking alone. When I come up with a marketing idea for the Lover tour, the album launch, the merch, I’ll go right to my management company that I’ve put together. I think a team is the best way to be managed. Just from my experience, I don’t think that this overarching, one-person-handles-my-career thing was ever going to work for me. Because that person ends up kind of being me who comes up with most of the ideas, and then I have an amazing team that facilitates those ideas.

The behind-the-scenes work is different for every phase of my career that I’m in. Putting together the festival shows that we’re doing for Lover is completely different than putting together the Reputation Stadium Tour. Putting together the reputation launch was so different than putting together the 1989 launch. So we really do attack things case by case, where the creative first informs everything else.

You’ve spoken before about how meaningful the reputation tour’s success was. What did it represent?

That tour was something that I wanted to immortalize in the Netflix special that we did because the album was a story, but it almost was like a story that wasn’t fully realized until you saw it live. It was so cool to hear people leaving the show being like, “I understand it now. I fully get it now.” There are a lot of red herrings and bait-and-switches in the choices that I’ll make with albums, because I want people to go and explore the body of work. You can never express how you feel over the course of an album in a single, so why try?

That seems especially true of your last three albums or so.

“Shake It Off” is nothing like the rest of 1989. It’s almost like I feel so much pressure with a first single that I don’t want the first single to be something that makes you feel like you’ve figured out what I’ve made on the rest of the project. I still truly believe in albums, whatever form you consume them in -- if you want to stream them or buy them or listen to them on vinyl. And I don’t think that makes me a staunch purist. I think that that is a strong feeling throughout the music industry. We’re running really fast toward a singles industry, but you got to believe in something. I still believe that albums are important.

The music industry has become increasingly global during the past decade. Is reaching new markets something you think about?

Yeah, and I’m always trying to learn. I’m learning from everyone. I’m learning when I go see Bruce Springsteen or Madonna do a theater show. And I’m learning from new artists who are coming out right now, just seeing what they’re doing and thinking, “That’s really cool.” You need to keep your influences broad and wide-ranging, and my favorite people who make music have always done that. I got to work with Andrew Lloyd Webber on the Cats movie, and Andrew will walk through the door and be like, “I’ve just seen this amazing thing on TikTok!” And I’m like, “You are it! You are it!” Because you cannot look at what quote-unquote “the kids are doing” and roll your eyes. You have to learn.

Have you explored TikTok at all?

I only see them when they’re posted to Tumblr, but I love them! I think that they’re hilarious and amazing. Andrew says that they’ve made musicals cool again, because there’s a huge musical facet to TikTok. [He’s] like, “Any way we can do that is good.”

How do you see your involvement in the business side of your career progressing in the next decade? You seem like someone who could eventually start a label or be more hands-on with signing artists.

I do think about it every once in a while, but if I was going to do it, I would need to do it with all of my energy. I know how important that is, when you’ve got someone else’s career in your hands, and I know how it feels when someone isn’t generous.

You’ve served as an ambassador of sorts for artists, especially recently -- staring down streaming services over payouts, increasing public awareness about the terms of record deals.

We have a long way to go. I think that we’re working off of an antiquated contractual system. We’re galloping toward a new industry but not thinking about recalibrating financial structures and compensation rates, taking care of producers and writers.

We need to think about how we handle master recordings, because this isn’t it. When I stood up and talked about this, I saw a lot of fans saying, “Wait, the creators of this work do not own their work, ever?” I spent 10 years of my life trying rigorously to purchase my masters outright and was then denied that opportunity, and I just don’t want that to happen to another artist if I can help it. I want to at least raise my hand and say, “This is something that an artist should be able to earn back over the course of their deal -- not as a renegotiation ploy -- and something that artists should maybe have the first right of refusal to buy.” God, I would have paid so much for them! Anything to own my work that was an actual sale option, but it wasn’t given to me.

Thankfully, there’s power in writing your music. Every week, we get a dozen synch requests to use “Shake It Off” in some advertisement or “Blank Space” in some movie trailer, and we say no to every single one of them. And the reason I’m rerecording my music next year is because I do want my music to live on. I do want it to be in movies, I do want it to be in commercials. But I only want that if I own it.

Do you know how long that rerecording process will take?

I don’t know! But it’s going to be fun, because it’ll feel like regaining a freedom and taking back what’s mine. When I created [these songs], I didn’t know what they would grow up to be. Going back in and knowing that it meant something to people is actually a really beautiful way to celebrate what the fans have done for my music.

Ten years ago, on the brink of the 2010s, you were about to turn 20. What advice would you give yourself if you could go back in time?

Oh, God -- I wouldn’t give myself any advice. I would have done everything exactly the same way. Because even the really tough things I’ve gone through taught me things that I never would have learned any other way. I really appreciate my experience, the ups and downs. And maybe that seems ridiculously Zen, but … I’ve got my friends, who like me for the right reasons. I’ve got my family. I’ve got my boyfriend. I’ve got my fans. I’ve got my cats.

#taylor swift #interview #billboard #women in music #woman of the decade

451 notes · View notes

path-of-my-childhood · 4 years

Text

Billboard Woman of the Decade Taylor Swift: 'I Do Want My Music to Live On'

By: Jason Lipshutz for Billboard Magazine Date: December 14th issue

One evening in late October, before she performed at a benefit concert at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, Taylor Swift’s dressing room became - as it often does - an impromptu summit of music’s biggest names. Swift was there to take part in the American Cancer Society’s annual We Can Survive concert alongside Billie Eilish, Lizzo, Camila Cabello and others, and a few of the artists on the lineup came by to visit.

Eilish, along with her mother and her brother/collaborator, Finneas O’Connell, popped in to say hello - the first time she and Swift had met. Later, Swift joined the exclusive club of people who have seen Marshmello without his signature helmet when the EDM star and his manager stopped by.

“Two dudes walked in - I didn’t know which one was him,” recalls Swift a few weeks later, sitting on a lounge chair in the backyard of a private Beverly Hills residence following a photo shoot. Her momentary confusion turned into a pang of envy. “It’s really smart! Because he’s got a life, and he can get a house that doesn’t have to have a paparazzi-proof entrance.” She stops to adjust her gray sweatshirt dress and lets out a clipped laugh.

She also finishes the decade in a totally different realm of the music world from where she started. Swift’s crossover from country to pop - hinted at on 2012’s Red and fully embraced on 2014’s 1989 - reflected a mainstream era in which genres were blended with little abandon, where artists with roots in country, folk and trap music could join forces without anyone raising eyebrows. (See: Swift’s top 20 hit “End Game,” from 2017’s reputation, which featured Ed Sheeran and Future.)

Swift’s new album, Lover, released in August, is both a warm break from the darkness of reputation - which was created during a wave of negative press generated by Swift’s public clash with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian-West - as well as an amalgam of all her stylistic explorations through the years, from dreamy synth-pop to hushed country. “The skies were opening up in my life,” says Swift of the album, which garnered three Grammy nominations, including song of the year for the title track.

She recorded Lover after the Reputation Stadium Tour broke the record for the highest-grossing U.S. tour late last year. In 2020, Swift will embark on Lover Fest, a run of stadium dates that will feature a hand-picked lineup of artists (as yet unannounced) and allow Swift more time off from the road. “This is a year where I have to be there for my family - there’s a lot of question marks throughout the next year, so I wanted to make sure that I could go home,” says Swift, likely referencing her mother’s cancer diagnosis, which inspired the Lover heart-wrencher “Soon You’ll Get Better.”

Now, however, Swift finds herself in a different highly publicized dispute. This time it’s with Scott Borchetta, the head of her former label, Big Machine Records, and Scooter Braun, the manager-mogul whose Ithaca Holdings acquired Big Machine Label Group and its master recordings, which include Swift’s six pre-Lover albums, in June. Upon news of the sale, Swift wrote in a Tumblr post that it was her “worst case scenario,” accusing Braun of “bullying” her throughout her career due to his connections with West. She maintains today that she was never given the opportunity to buy her masters outright. (On Tumblr, she wrote that she was offered the chance to “earn” back the masters to one of her albums for each new album she turned in if she re-signed with Big Machine; Borchetta disputed this characterization, saying she had the opportunity to acquire her masters in exchange for re-signing with the label for a “length of time” - 10 more years, according to screenshots of legal documents posted on the Big Machine website.)

Swift has said that she intends to rerecord her first six albums next year, starting next November, when she says she’s contractually able to - in order to regain control of her recordings. But the back-and-forth appears to be nowhere near over: Last month, Swift alleged that Borchetta and Braun were blocking her from performing her past hits at the American Music Awards or using them in an upcoming Netflix documentary - claims Big Machine characterized as “false information” in a response that did not get into specifics. (Swift ultimately performed the medley she had planned.) In the weeks following this interview, Braun said he was open to “all possibilities” in finding a “resolution,” and Billboard sources say that includes negotiating a sale. Swift remains interested in buying her masters, though the price could be a sticking point, given her rerecording plans, the control she has over the licensing of her music for film and TV, and the market growth since Braun’s acquisition.

However it plays out, the battle over her masters is the latest in a series of moves that has turned Swift into something of an advocate for artists’ rights, and made her a cause that everyone from Halsey to Elizabeth Warren has rallied behind. From 2014 to 2017, Swift withheld her catalog from Spotify to protest the streaming company’s compensation rates, saying in a 2014 interview, “There should be an inherent value placed on art. I didn’t see that happening, perception-wise, when I put my music on Spotify.” In 2015, ahead of the launch of Apple Music, Swift wrote an open letter criticizing Apple for its plan to not pay royalties during the three-month free trial it was set to offer listeners; the company announced a new policy within 24 hours. Most recently, when she signed a new global deal with Universal Music Group in 2018, Swift (who is now on Republic Records) said one of the conditions of her contract was that UMG share proceeds from any sale of its Spotify equity with its roster of artists - and make them non-recoupable against those artists’ earnings.

During a wide-ranging conversation, Billboard’s Woman of the Decade expresses hope that she can help make the lives of creators a little easier in the years to come - and a belief that her behind-the-scenes strides will be as integral to her legacy as her biggest singles. “New artists and producers and writers need work, and they need to be likable and get booked in sessions, and they can’t make noise - but if I can, then I’m going to,” promises Swift. This is where being impossibly famous can be a very good thing. “I know that it seems like I’m very loud about this,” she says, “but it’s because someone has to be.”

While watching some of your performances this year - like SNL and NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert - I was struck by how focused you seemed, like there were no distractions getting in the way of what you were trying to say. That’s a really wonderful way of looking at this phase of my life and my music. I’ve spent a lot of time re-calibrating my life to make it feel manageable. Because there were some years there where I felt like I didn’t quite know what exactly to give people and what to hold back, what to share and what to protect. I think a lot of people go through that, especially in the last decade. I broke through pre-social media, and then there was this phase where social media felt fun and casual and quirky and safe. And then it got to the point where everyone has to evaluate their relationship with social media. So I decided that the best thing I have to offer people is my music. I’m not really here to influence their fashion or their social lives. That has bled through into the live part of what I do.

Meanwhile, you’ve found a way to interact with your fans in this very pure way - on your Tumblr page. Tumblr is the last place on the internet where I feel like I can still make a joke because it feels small, like a neighborhood rather than an entire continent. We can kid around - they literally drag me. It’s fun. That’s a real comfort zone for me. And just like anything else, I need breaks from it sometimes. But when I do participate in that space, it’s always in a very inside-joke, friend vibe. Sometimes, when I open Twitter, I get so overwhelmed that I just immediately close it. I haven’t had Twitter on my phone in a while because I don’t like to have too much news. Like, I follow politics, and that’s it. But I don’t like to follow who has broken up with who, or who wore an interesting pair of shoes. There’s only so much bandwidth my brain can really have.

You’ve spoken in recent interviews about the general expectations you’ve faced, using phrases like “They’ve wanted to see this” and “They hated me for this.” Who is “they”? Is it social media or disparaging think pieces or... It’s sort of an amalgamation of all of it. People who aren’t active fans of your music, who like one song but love to hear who has been canceled on Twitter. I’ve had several upheavals of somehow not being what I should be. And this happens to women in music way more than men. That’s why I get so many phone calls from new artists out of the blue - like, “Hey, I’m getting my first wave of bad press, I’m freaking out, can I talk to you?” And the answer is always yes! I’m talking about more than 20 people who have randomly reached out to me. I take it as a compliment because it means that they see what has happened over the course of my career, over and over again.

Did you have someone like that to reach out to? Not really, because my career has existed in lots of different neighborhoods of music. I had so many mentors in country music. Faith Hill was wonderful. She would reach out to me and invite me over and take me on tour, and I knew that I could talk to her. Crossing over to pop is a completely different world. Country music is a real community, and in pop I didn’t see that community as much. Now there is a bit of one between the girls in pop - we all have each other’s numbers and text each other - but when I first started out in pop it was very much you versus you versus you. We didn’t have a network, which is weird because we can help each other through these moments when you just feel completely isolated.

Do you feel like those barriers are actively being broken down now? God, I hope so. I also hope people can call it out, [like] if you see a Grammy prediction article, and it’s just two women’s faces next to each other and feels a bit gratuitous. No one’s going to start out being perfectly educated on the intricacies of gender politics. The key is that people are trying to learn, and that’s great. No one’s going to get it perfect, but, God, please try.

At this point, who is your sounding board, creatively and professionally From a creative standpoint, I’ve been writing alone a lot more. I’m good with being alone, with thinking alone. When I come up with a marketing idea for the Lover tour, the album launch, the merch, I’ll go right to my management company that I’ve put together. I think a team is the best way to be managed. Just from my experience, I don’t think that this overarching, one-person-handles-my-career thing was ever going to work for me. Because that person ends up kind of being me who comes up with most of the ideas, and then I have an amazing team that facilitates those ideas. The behind-the-scenes work is different for every phase of my career that I’m in. Putting together the festival shows that we’re doing for Lover is completely different than putting together the Reputation Stadium Tour. Putting together the reputation launch was so different than putting together the 1989 launch. So we really do attack things case by case, where the creative first informs everything else.

You’ve spoken before about how meaningful the reputation tour’s success was. What did it represent? That tour was something that I wanted to immortalize in the Netflix special that we did because the album was a story, but it almost was like a story that wasn’t fully realized until you saw it live. It was so cool to hear people leaving the show being like, “I understand it now. I fully get it now.” There are a lot of red herrings and bait-and-switches in the choices that I’ll make with albums, because I want people to go and explore the body of work. You can never express how you feel over the course of an album in a single, so why try?

That seems especially true of your last three albums or so. “Shake It Off” is nothing like the rest of 1989. It’s almost like I feel so much pressure with a first single that I don’t want the first single to be something that makes you feel like you’ve figured out what I’ve made on the rest of the project. I still truly believe in albums, whatever form you consume them in - if you want to stream them or buy them or listen to them on vinyl. And I don’t think that makes me a staunch purist. I think that that is a strong feeling throughout the music industry. We’re running really fast toward a singles industry, but you got to believe in something. I still believe that albums are important.

The music industry has become increasingly global during the past decade. Is reaching new markets something you think about? Yeah, and I’m always trying to learn. I’m learning from everyone. I’m learning when I go see Bruce Springsteen or Madonna do a theater show. And I’m learning from new artists who are coming out right now, just seeing what they’re doing and thinking, “That’s really cool.” You need to keep your influences broad and wide-ranging, and my favorite people who make music have always done that. I got to work with Andrew Lloyd Webber on the Cats movie, and Andrew will walk through the door and be like, “I’ve just seen this amazing thing on TikTok!” And I’m like, “You are it! You are it!” Because you cannot look at what quote-unquote “the kids are doing” and roll your eyes. You have to learn.

Have you explored TikTok at all? I only see them when they’re posted to Tumblr, but I love them! I think that they’re hilarious and amazing. Andrew says that they’ve made musicals cool again, because there’s a huge musical facet to TikTok. [He’s] like, “Any way we can do that is good.”

How do you see your involvement in the business side of your career progressing in the next decade? You seem like someone who could eventually start a label or be more hands-on with signing artists. I do think about it every once in a while, but if I was going to do it, I would need to do it with all of my energy. I know how important that is, when you’ve got someone else’s career in your hands, and I know how it feels when someone isn’t generous.

You’ve served as an ambassador of sorts for artists, especially recently - staring down streaming services over payouts, increasing public awareness about the terms of record deals. We have a long way to go. I think that we’re working off of an antiquated contractual system. We’re galloping toward a new industry but not thinking about re-calibrating financial structures and compensation rates, taking care of producers and writers. We need to think about how we handle master recordings, because this isn’t it. When I stood up and talked about this, I saw a lot of fans saying, “Wait, the creators of this work do not own their work, ever?” I spent 10 years of my life trying rigorously to purchase my masters outright and was then denied that opportunity, and I just don’t want that to happen to another artist if I can help it. I want to at least raise my hand and say, “This is something that an artist should be able to earn back over the course of their deal - not as a renegotiation ploy - and something that artists should maybe have the first right of refusal to buy.” God, I would have paid so much for them! Anything to own my work that was an actual sale option, but it wasn’t given to me. Thankfully, there’s power in writing your music. Every week, we get a dozen synch requests to use “Shake It Off” in some advertisement or “Blank Space” in some movie trailer, and we say no to every single one of them. And the reason I’m rerecording my music next year is because I do want my music to live on. I do want it to be in movies, I do want it to be in commercials. But I only want that if I own it.

Do you know how long that rerecording process will take? I don’t know! But it’s going to be fun, because it’ll feel like regaining a freedom and taking back what’s mine. When I created [these songs], I didn’t know what they would grow up to be. Going back in and knowing that it meant something to people is actually a really beautiful way to celebrate what the fans have done for my music.

Ten years ago, on the brink of the 2010s, you were about to turn 20. What advice would you give yourself if you could go back in time? Oh, God - I wouldn’t give myself any advice. I would have done everything exactly the same way. Because even the really tough things I’ve gone through taught me things that I never would have learned any other way. I really appreciate my experience, the ups and downs. And maybe that seems ridiculously Zen, but... I’ve got my friends, who like me for the right reasons. I’ve got my family. I’ve got my boyfriend. I’ve got my fans. I’ve got my cats.

Taylor Swift Discusses 'The Man' & 'It's Nice To Have a Friend' In Cover Story Outtakes

Billboard // by Jason Lipshutz // December 12th 2019

During her cover story interview for Billboard’s Women In Music issue, Taylor Swift discussed several aspects of her mega-selling seventh studio album Lover, including its creation after a personal “recalibrating” period, her stripped-down performances of its songs and her plans to showcase the full-length live with her Lover Fest shows next year. In two moments from the extended conversation that did not make the print story, Billboard’s Woman of the Decade also touched upon two of the album’s highlights, which double as a pair of the more interesting songs in her discography: “The Man” and “It’s Nice To Have A Friend.”

“The Man” imagines how Swift’s experience as a person, artist and figure within the music industry would have been different had she been a man, highlighting how much harder women have to work in order to succeed (“I’m so sick of running as fast as I can / Wondering if I’d get there quicker if I was a man,” she sings in the chorus). The song has become a fan favorite since the release of Lover, and Swift recently opened a career-spanning medley with the song at the 2019 American Music Awards.

When asked about “The Man,” Swift pointed out specific double standards that exist in everyday life and explained why she wanted to turn that frustration into a pop single. Read Swift’s full thoughts on “The Man” below:

“It was a song that I wrote from my personal experience, but also from a general experience that I’ve heard from women in all parts of our industry. And I think that, the more we can talk about it in a song like that, the better off we’ll be in a place to call it out when it’s happening. So many of these things are ingrained in even women, these perceptions, and it’s really about re-training your own brain to be less critical of women when we are not criticizing men for the same things. So many things that men do, you know, can be phoned-in that cannot be phoned-in for us. We have to really — God, we have to curate and cater everything, but we have to make it look like an accident. Because if we make a mistake, that’s our fault, but if we strategize so that we won’t make a mistake, we’re calculating.

“There is a bit of a damned-if-we-do, damned-if-we-don’t thing happening in music, and that’s why when I can, like, sit and talk and be like ‘Yeah, this sucks for me too,’ that feels good. When I go online and hear the stories of my fans talking about their experience in the working world, or even at school — the more we talk about it, the better off we’ll be. And I wanted to make it catchy for a reason — so that it would get stuck in people’s heads, [so] they would end up with a song about gender inequality stuck in their heads. And for me, that’s a good day.”

Meanwhile, the penultimate song on Lover, “It’s Nice To Have A Friend,” sounds unlike anything in Swift’s catalog thanks to its elliptical structure, lullaby-like tone and incorporation of steel drums and brass. When asked about the song, Swift talked about experimenting with her songwriting, as well as capturing a different angle of the emotional themes at the heart of Lover. Read Swift’s full thoughts on “It’s Nice To Have A Friend” below:

“It was fun to write a song that was just verses, because my whole body and soul wants to make a chorus — every time I sit down to write a song, I’m like, ‘Okay, chorus time, let’s get the chorus done.’ But with that song, it was more of like a poem, and a story and a vibe and a feeling of... I love metaphors that kind of have more than one meaning, and I think I loved the idea that, on an album called Lover, we all want love, we all want to find somebody to see our sights with and hear things with and experience things with.

“But at the end of the day we’ve been searching for that since we were kids! When you had a friend when you were nine years old, and that friend was all you talked about, and you wanted to have sleepovers and you wanted to walk down the street together and sit there drawing pictures together or be silent together, or be talking all night. We’re just looking for that, but endless sparks, as adults.”

Read the full Taylor Swift cover story here, and click here for more info on Billboard’s 2019 Women In Music event, during which Swift will be presented with the first-ever Woman of the Decade award.

[link to this tweet]

Was there ever a part of you that was like, “Oh shit, I like this darker vibe, let’s go even further down that path?” I really Loved Reputation because it felt like a rock opera, or a musical, doing it live. Doing that stadium show was so fun because it was so theatrical and so exciting to perform that, because it’s really cathartic! But I have to follow whatever direction my life is going in emotionally... The skies were opening up in my life. That’s what happened. But in a way that felt like a pink sky, a pink and purple sky, after a storm, and now it looks even more beautiful because it looked so stormy before. And that’s just like, I couldn't stop writing. I’ve never had an album with 18 songs on it before, and a lot of what I do is based on intuition. So, you know, I try not to overthink it. Who knows, there may be another dark album. I plan on doing lots of experimentation over the course of my career. Who knows? But it was a blast, I really loved it.

I mean, look, a Taylor Swift screamo album? I’ll be first in line. I’m so happy to hear that, because I think you might be the only one. Ha! I have a terrible scream. It’s obnoxious.

Why Taylor Swift's Lover Fest Will Be Her Next Big Step

Billboard // by Jason Lipshutz // December 11th 2019 - [Excerpt]

On why she chose to put together Lover fest: “I haven’t really done festivals in years - not since I was a teenager. That’s something that [the fans] don’t expect from me, so that’s why I wanted to do it. I want to challenge myself with new things and at the same time keep giving my fans something to connect to.”

300 notes · View notes

blazinbeautywrites · 4 years

Text

Band Wars: Rise of the Phoenix

Note: Due to the rampant uprising of plagiarism on this site and others I am stating once and once only that this is my ORIGINAL work. If I find out that you have stolen/taken any part of my work I will handle you and the situation the way I see fit.

None of the pics or gifs I use belong to me so full credit goes to the originators of said gifs and pics.

Length: 2,356 words

A/N: Sorry it took me so long to get this out guys. I was not happy with the final results and when I was I still was unsure so I rewrote it again and decided to just post it. I’ll let yall be the judge lol.

Genre: Honestly idk lmao

Chapter 1

Universal Music Group (UMG) decides to debut a new girl group, PHOENIX on their first ever reality show “Next Big Thing.” The winners of the show get a 5 year, 5 album recording contract and will tour with CNCO 1 year after they debut. The winner of the show was Zania Reye Bloom, followed by London Monroe Jones, Jolene Maria Sanchez, Siane Rei Choi, and Avery Lynn O'Reilly. The band is composed of 5 talented women with different ethnic backgrounds, ages 24-25.

Since the show served as the girl’s training they were immediately thrusted into the spotlight after the show ended. They went to work on their debut album and as the release date approached the girls were getting antsy. Now only were they about to release their baby onto the world, but they were finally meeting CNCO today and discussing ideas for their tour.

*UMG headquarters in LA*

“Yoooo I’m fucking excited! Can yall believe our debut album is coming out in a couple days?” London said as she led a couple of her members to the elevators.

“Girl this tour bout to be lit as fuck. Bruuuh we’re going to fucking Sweden. I didn’t even think we had fans out there.” Zania said.

“Yeah you can thank that girl Astrid who made the finals. She was Swedish.” Avery said.

The girls finally heard the elevator ding at their floor and immediately got out. The girls walked into a meeting room where they saw their other 2 members Jolene and Siane bonding with the boys of CNCO.

“Finally you bitches show up. What took yall so long?” Siane asked.

“Avery thinks she’s still in Ireland and almost drove us into a damn ditch.” Zania said.

“You’re alive aren’t you? So quit complaining.” Avery said as she took a seat opposite Erick.

“Anyways if yall are done….THIS is CNCO ladies. This is Zabdiel, Christopher, Erick, Joel, and this is Richard.” Siane said as she pointed to each boy as she introduced them. Richard definitely caught Zania’s eye and she quickly averted her eyes so he wouldn’t catch her ogling him. Little did she know, he was checking her out too.

“And I’m Zania, and of course yall met Jolene and Siane. This is London and Avery.” She said as she gestured to her other bandmates. She was about to say something else when a tall, slender woman walked into the room followed by a man wearing the loudest shade of yellow and another woman dressed in all black.

“Okay let’s make this short and sweet. I’m Veronica Pierce, you can call me Vee or Ms. Pierce, never Veronica. Get it? Got it? Good. I am your tour creative director. I’ll be working closely with you all to design your tour. And please, let’s all collectively agree on a specific concept. I will not have my people designing 2 separate stages. To my left is Chez Moa, your set designer. And to my right is Mel Carter she and her team will be styling you all so meet with her some time this week so she can get an idea of what you guys want and need. And ladies you have a busy weekend ahead. Friday you have your album release, press runs, then your album release party later that night. Saturday you’ll be on Good Day LA where you’ll be interviewed and then perform your lead single. Sunday you have a mini showcase where yall will perform some fan fave covers from the show and a few songs from the album, including your single with CNCO. You’ll have tomorrow, Wednesday, and Thursday to learn choreo for both performances. You’ll meet your choreographer tomorrow. Any questions?”

The whole room was silent as both groups stared at Veronica and her associates. Zania raised her hand and the other members of Phoenix sighed. They knew how this shit was about to play out.

“So do we get to breathe? Or do we have to pencil that in too?” Zania asked. She knew she was being an asshole but this shit was ridiculous.

“Hmmmm you must be Zania Bloom. They told me you had a mouth on you. Listen up sweetie this my show. I call the shots and if they bother you, you can leave.” Veronica said. Zania smirked at her and leaned back in her chair.

“Nah I’m good. You may continue, Ms. Pierce.” Zana said. Sarcasm dripping from her words.

“Anyways that’s all for now. And remember this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. It can be taken away in the blink of an eye so watch yourselves.” Veronica spoke. She eyed the room but everyone knew exactly who that was meant for. She, Mel, and Chez exited the room in silence. Once they left, Siane burst out laughing.

“Yo I was clenching my fucking ass cheeks. She’s soo fucking hot.” Siane said.

“Keep it in your pants Siane. And Zania, girl why did you do that? You made that shit more intense than it needed to be.” London asked.

“You know me, I just had to say something. She was a bitch to us when we did the show, now they’re making her the tour director, wtf?” Zania said.

“Am I the only one who noticed that guy had on too much yellow?” Chris said. Everyone turned to him and started laughing.

“Look, I ain’t wanna say anything but he was so wrong for that. And it was a complete contrast to Mel who had on all black.” Jolene said.

“But real shit Vee ain’t no joke, she can make or break you. So just be careful.” Richard said. He made eye contact with Zania and she smiled at him.

“Oh I’m not afraid of her. She’s on a power trip so I’ll entertain her mess for the sake of this tour. You don’t have to worry bout me baby boy.” Zania said. Everyone got up to leave but on her way to the door she was stopped by Richard.

“I don’t know if you realized but I’m a grown ass man so that baby boy shit not gon fly with me.” Richard said. Zania was amused.

“Oh did I bruise your whittle ego babe? Look it’s not that serious-”

“But it is that serious so treat me with respect or keep it moving baby girl.” Richard said as he cut her off. He walked away leaving Zania stunned in silence. She walked back to her group and chuckled.

“Yall…...that guy Richard just lowkey put me in my fucking place. Oh this tour is gonna be so damn fun.” Zania said. She and her bandmates went to find their stylists to get started on designing their perfect tour outfits.

______________

It had been a full 5 hours and the girls were hard at work on their choreo. They were thankful that most of the songs they performed were their covers from their reality show so the moves were ingrained in their heads. They breezed through their choreo for their own singles and just finished running through them a final time before Laurieann Gibson called for lunch. The girls were beyond starved and as they walked to the cafe area of the upscale dance studio they saw CNCO walk through the door.

“Oop the boys are here.” Jolene said as she fixed her slightly messy hair. She made eye contact with Zabdiel as he and the other boys walked into the dance studio they’s just left.

“Ooooohhh do I sense a little crush? London teased.

“See that tall one, Zabdiel? I promise you, I will climb him like a fucking tree.” Jolene said, much to the amusement of her group.

“Woah. Down girl, we have a whole ass tour to get through.” Avery said.

“Look if I can’t fuck Vee, you can’t fuck Zabdiel.” Siane argued.

“Girl. Zabdiel is fair game, Vee is our fucking boss. There’s a difference.” Zania said as the girls found a table near the back of the cafe. Avery went to order them some food and soon a waiter came back with a tray of fruit, some finger sandwiches, and a basket of the cafe’s homemade potato chips.

“This looks so good and I’m starving.” London said. As the girls ate they discussed the difficult choreo.

“I really thought Laureiann was gonna throw her shoe or some shit at you cuz you couldn’t get that one move down.” Siane said.

“I wish she would throw some shit at me.” Jolene said while the others laughed at her.

“What kind of shit yall think they’ll have us do with the boys?” London asked.

“Probably something sexy, ya kno to pander to the fans.” Avery answered.

“I heard that they’re partnering us up with them for the collab so whomever we pick is our dance partner for the song.” Siane added.

“Well. this should be fun.” Zania said. The girls chat a little bit longer before cleaning up and heading back into the dance studio. When they arrived they heard their song with CNCO playing. Laurieann was teaching them their choreo and once saw the girls she turned the music off and immediately began assigning pairs.

“Okay London you’re with Joel, Jolene with Eric, Zabdiel and Siane, Avery and Chris are partners and lastly, Zania, you’re with Richard. Everyone please stand with your partner. I’m only gonna do the dance two times and then you’re gonna do it and we’ll fine tune everything afterwards” Lauriann said as she read off her list. Before the girls could even process anything they quickly got into formation to do the choreo.

______________

A few hours later, both Phoenix and CNCO were spread out on the floor, exasperated. Lauriann told them to rest up and that she’d see them in the morning before she left them all a sweaty mess in the studio.

“I swear there are parts of me that are sweating I ain’t know could sweat.” Siane said as she attempted to lift her head to no avail.

“Girl I feel like my fucking feet are gonna fall off.” Zania said.

“I can’t feel my left asss cheek.” Jolene mumbled.

“Bruh at least yall voices aren’t hoarse as fuck.” Richard said.

“We should probably start heading out because I need an ice bath or some shit.” Avery said as she willed her body to move. Everyone followed suit and struggled getting to their feet. When the girls began packing up to leave, Zabdiel strolled on over to pull Jolene to the side. Zania looked on and smirked to herself. All she hoped was that whatever they had going on didn’t get in the way of her group’s path to success. She snapped out of her little daze just as Jolene made it back.

“Well, what was that about?” Zania asked.

“Girl he asked for my number. I was like no and he said can you really say no to this face. I almost fucking melted so I gave him my number. He’s so fucking cocky. I love it.” Jolene beamed. Zania could tell her friend was happy so she chose to keep her mouth shut. The girls finally made it to the elevator when Zania realized she’d left her phone in the dance studio.

“Shut yall I left my phone. Yall go on I’ll text yall once I get home.” Zania said.

“Girl we’ll wait, just hurry up.” London said. Zania jogged back to the building and ran up the stairs to be quicker. Once she got to the door of the studio she heard the boys talking.

“I really like that girl London. She’s classy, yet has a sexy side. I like that.” Joel said.

“Now see Jolene….them lips. I bet her head game on point.” Zabdiel said.

“Ew bro what the hell!” Eric exclaimed.

“I know you of all people are not talking.” Richard said.

“Even though I think she’s kind of a bitch, Zania fine as fuck too.” Christopher said.

“Yeah she is fine. Yall seen that ass? I’d love to get behind that.” Richard said. Zania had heard enough and walked into the room.

“Yall should really make sure that the door is completely closed before you talk about us. Anyways I left my phone and just came back to get it. Oh and Richard, Zabdiel? I understand that Jolene and I are attractive but please don’t talk about us like we’re pieces of meat mkay?” With that she grabbed her phone and walked out, leaving the boys a little dumbfounded. Once she got back outside she filled her girls on what she heard.

“You know. We should teach them a lesson.” Jolene said.

“Oop I sense an infamous Jolene Sanchez prank.” Siane said.

“Yep. Okay so here’s the plan.” Jolene explains the little prank they’ll play on the boys at the showcase. They’d messed with the wrong girls.

_____________

The rest of the week went by in a blur and before they knew it, their album release day was finally here. It’d only been a few hours and their album was already number 1 on a few of the urban and pop album charts. Siane screenshot the Billboard charts where their album was number 1 and sent it to their group chat. She then called them all on a video chat.

“WAKE UP BITCHES! WE NUMBER 1 BABYYYYYY!!!!1!” She yelled into the phone. The others, as groggy as they were, laughed at how hyped their member was.

“Girl you are so lucky I was up getting ready or I’d curse you the fuck out.” Zania said.

“Bitch whatever. Anyways I love yall so much! We’ve officially ARRIVED! Like we in the fucking building forreal now. WHEW! Let me start getting my shit together. See yall soon. Love ya! Siane said as she hung up the video call. The girls were buzzing and couldn’t be any happier that after almost 6 months, their hard work has finally paid off and that their fans love their album as much as they do. They couldn’t wait to see what lie ahead for them. They knew whatever it was, it was gonna be big.

#cnco #christopher velez #richard camacho #zabdiel de jesus #joel pimentel #erick brian colón #band wars: rise of the phoenix #bwrotp #cnco scenarios #christopher velez scenarios #richard camacho scenarios #zabdiel de jesus scenarios #joel pimentel scenarios #erick brian colón scenarios

12 notes · View notes

makistar2018 · 5 years

Link

Could Taylor Swift Re-Record All Her Old Songs? Should She? Legal Experts Weigh In

7/17/2019 by Gil Kaufman

Taylor Swift has made a career from speaking her mind and making her feelings crystal clear. That includes her widely read Tumblr earlier this month decrying the purchase of her former label, Big Machine, by Scooter Braun's Ithaca Holdings. Swift called it a "worst case scenario," that, according to the singer, deprived her of the chance to take control of the masters to her first six albums.

But, in a a cunning suggestion, fellow "Miss Independent" Kelly Clarkson tweeted over the weekend that Taylor could take back some real estate in the skirmish by going back to "re-record all the songs that U don't own the masters on exactly how U did them but put brand new art & some kind of incentive so fans will no longer buy the old versions." Clarkson promised she'd buy all the Taylor 2.0 songs just to "prove a point."

But could Taylor do that? And would it even make financial sense?

It wouldn't be the first time an artist had tried that tactic in a battle over masters. Both Def Leppard and JoJo went down that road, with the English rockers re-recording their hits "Pour Some Sugar on Me," "Hysteria" and "Rock of Ages" in 2012 in an effort to wrestle "control of our career back" from the Universal Music Group, which singer Joe Elliott said at the time was a negotiating tactic with their former label to obtain a new compensation agreement with more favorable terms. Their redo of "Hysteria" has since sold 121,000 downloads, "Rock of Ages" has moved 207,000 and "Sugar" has sold 785,000 to date, according to Nielsen Music. (The band didn't allow their UMG catalog on digital at the time of the re-recordings, which explains the gaudy numbers for "Sugar", but their full back catalog is now on streaming services and the re-records are no longer available.)

Pop singer-songwriter JoJo re-recorded her debut album and 2006's The High Road in 2018 after a protracted battle with her former label, the infamously opaque Blackground Records, which had not made the self-titled work available on streaming services; the albums have sold a combined 2,000 copies and generated 23.2 million on-demand audio streams for their songs in the U.S., through July 11, according to Nielsen Music. At one point Prince threatened to re-record his entire back catalog, but settled for releasing 1999: The New Master, a seven-track EP of remixes of the title track, which hit No. 150 on the Billboard 200 with total sales to date of 62,000 copies, according to Nielsen Music (all figures accurate as of July 11, 2019).

Billboard reached out to music industry lawyers (none of whom are affiliated with either side in the Swift issue and were speaking in general legal terms) to find out if the singer could, or should, hit reset on her old hits as a potential next chess move in her dispute with Braun and her former Big Machine boss Scott Borchetta. Swift's attorney, Don Passman, declined to comment, and spokespeople for Big Machine and Ithaca Holdings had not returned requests for comment at press time.

"You become a competitor of your record label if you re-record and own new master recordings from the same compositions," Brian Caplan, an intellectual property lawyer at the New York firm Reitler Kailas & Rosenblatt LLC tells Billboard. "If you have the weight of a Taylor Swift that’s one thing, because you might be able to convince a portion of the community to come to you for older [songs]. But a lot of people don't have the wherewithal to start a business and become a competitor with their old label... [however] you will cut into income streams from the [old] label, you will make more money because you’ll own it and won’t have to give a piece to the label that they're entitled to under the old contract."

Caplan says that standard recording agreements have a re-recording restriction that prohibits an artist from re-making a song that was previously delivered to the record company (sometimes even ones that were not released during the contract's duration) for a set period after the deal expires, a term that typically runs three to five years. But he's definitely been in situations where clients have threatened to re-record songs or albums as part of a negotiation tactic to get better terms when they felt their original royalty rate was too low.

Sometimes those talks include offering to extend the re-recording restriction in their original contract by a few years in exchange for higher royalty payments. "But the Taylor Swift situation is not of that ilk, it's more, 'I can't stand you and I don't want my name associated with you,' for various reasons that only she knows," he says, noting that, either way, there's no way to prohibit your label from exploiting your old masters.

Like Caplan, Fox Rothschild LLP partner and senior music lawyer Ken Abdo doesn't have first-hand knowledge of the contract signed by Swift when she began her career at age 15 with Big Machine in 2006. But he tells Billboard he'd be "shocked" if that kind of 3-5 year restriction was not in that contract, or if she was able to "renegotiate that re-record restriction entirely away." Because, after all, the primary asset that a record company has is the intellectual property that an artist creates for them: the master recording.

Abdo, a self-described artist advocate who has worked with groups ranging from Hanson and Kool and the Gang to the estate of rock progenitor Bill Haley, says he's represented a number of one-hit artists who have re-recorded their signature tunes to license them on a snippet basis for commercial use. The idea of re-recording an entire catalog to compete with the original recordings, however, is not something anyone of Swift's stature has ever done as far as he knows.

"It's impractical and super expensive, but if you do it then what?" he says. "Other than license them, if you stream all of them that would create confusion in the market and be disruptive and probably not worth it economically. On principle, maybe. But if you spent millions in this streaming economy to put it out as streams and get fractions of pennies while already competing with the originals I don't believe it would be a prudent business decision."

Music attorney Brian McPherson -- who represents acts such as Fleet Foxes and Father John Misty -- agrees with Abdo that the best-case scenario for an artist is that they may be able to re-negotiate their contract in such a way that they limit the re-recording restriction and/or shorten its length. He said the situation when it comes to re-recording has actually gotten worse for artists in an era when streaming and syncs are increasingly more vital than physical record sales.

The old rule prohibited artists from re-recording a song that appeared on an album -- but sometimes even if it didn't -- for five years after it was recorded, and then for anywhere from two-to-five years post-term, depending on how much negotiating power you have. A famous example was when the Everly Brothers jumped from Cadence Records to Warner Bros., where they promptly re-recorded all their biggest hits for a smash Very Best album released in 1964.

"It didn't take long or labels to catch on to that, so now beyond that some labels are not just saying you can't re-record stuff that appeared on records, but you can't re-record stuff for sync either, which is an area people have enjoyed a lot of success re-recording their songs in," he says, adding that it was "sweet of Clarkson to suggest Swift take that tactic, but that he would find it hard to believe that Swift's nearly 15 year-old contract, likely re-negotiated over time, doesn't have a "significant" re-recording clause. (He also points out that labels have upped the ante lately, sometimes putting in clauses that deny an artist the right to re-record a track in their own "style or feel," ensuring that any remake will not use the same arrangement, or sound like the original.)

"A lot of us are Monday morning quarterbacks on these contract issues, but 99 percent of artists signed to labels don't own their own masters! It's just the way it is," he notes. The re-recording language in most contracts is fairly boilerplate, and as a fierce artist advocate, McPherson says it's always something a lawyer tries to make as favorable as possible during negotiations.

"I'll say two things: 'it has to be released by you during the term' -- this master with this song -- so if I record a song during the term but you don't release it, I should be able to re-record that. That helps you if you get dropped and you don't release your album; if you can't negotiate a buy-back of your masters you can just go re-cut it. And you just try to make the post-term period as short as possible."

Billboard

#taylor swift #billboard #2019.07.17

84 notes · View notes

newmusicradionetwork · 3 years

Text

Andrew Reed & The Liberation "Twisted World"

This could be the soundtrack of the time… First major-label distributed release with InGrooves/UMG andrew reed & the liberation. Twisted World, this bombastic indie rock song came out of the pain & suffering from coming home to the apartment, after Reed worked a double shift as a waiter, only to find his things tossed outside & the door locked. It is really about the everyday frustrations and anxiety of the modern world, which is the FEELING people are experiencing today as they face polarization, chaos and instability with everything from economics to our relationships with others. Recorded by saturating analog tape running 3x normal speed using vintage gear, perhaps a technique that has never been used before, and capturing the performance at the time of inspiration, is the key to the explosions that erupt from the speakers with this single as well as the forthcoming release of the album, As a Bird of the Air “What are you willing to throw away your life on?” Dubbed a “rock mystic” by the Indie press and after multiple Billboard Indicator charting songs, recording/guitar creative Andrew Reed and the dynamic, super-musician jam band, “the liberation,” are challenging music conventions, defining a “new” type of art-rock by reintroducing true “album-oriented rock” concept albums that have singles, but are meant to be listened to clear through. And not just concept albums, but “Trilogy” albums that represent “significant and coherent” bodies of work with unifying sonic themes throughout each trilogy. The Spaceman Reed has musicality pouring out of himand he’s not quite grounded in this world. Most of the music is brought back from “in-between” states of consciousness. He is so far out, that he is known as “the Outlier” in the intellectual and health-science circles. Through a “vision” after a series of catastrophic personal losses, using synapse-altering sound technologies, Reed saw and built a 3 level, state-of-the-art, remote mountaintop recording compound, where he, the liberation, and other artists could reside and become completely absorbed in their projects. Reed’s deep and insightful consciousness work has put him in the company of some of the world’s leading scientists and researchers, whereby these proprietary synapse-altering technologies were developed to send artists “beyond themselves” perhaps to make Pink Floyd, Fleetwood Mac, Zappa and Beatles-type recordings. Reed is a deviant flirting with enlightenment, but one who integrates the deep world of inner experience with the common external plights of pragmatic living in modern society. Regarding the Trilogiesand “album-oriented rock,” he and the liberation have taken this to bold new territory, recording the first Trilogy albums, 1) As a Bird of the Air to be followed by 2) As a Lily of the Field and 3) As Grass in the Furnace Live, the liberation is more like a “revival” than a typical rock event, where the audience is almost speaking in tongues, as they unleash exciting, unpredictable jams that push the limits of each musician. “Rock was never meant to be pretty…but desperate, risky and bombasticwhere it could go off the rails at any moment We have no interest in safe, over-rehearsed, phoned-in gigs It must be real…a gamble This is where liberation happens” “Reed is one perhaps one of the most scandalous and even perhaps dangerous people on the planetas the ideas could prove so disruptive to corporations, traditional institutions and governments especiallyas he is taking people to a place where they can’t be controlled or manipulated” Warren Wyatt, CEO WorldSound Additional Artist/Song Information: Artist Name: andrew reed & the liberation Song Title: Twisted World Publishing: Artists International Publishing Publishing Affiliation: SESAC Album Title: As A Bird Of The Air… Record Label: Artists International/WorldSound Record Label: Artists International/WorldSound Micah Taylor 828-698-5885 [email protected] Radio Promotion: ADD Promotion Gary Lefkowith (212) 222-5212 [email protected] Publicity/PR: American Artiste Adam Mills 44 7720 893847 [email protected] Manager: WorldSound Warren Wyatt 206-444-0300 [email protected] Booking Agent: American Artiste Warren Wyatt 206-444-0300 [email protected] Read the full article

0 notes

songwriternews · 3 years

Text

New Post has been published on SONGWRITER NEWS

New Post has been published on https://songwriternews.co.uk/2021/01/shawn-mendes-justin-bieber-monster/

Shawn Mendes, Justin Bieber - Monster

youtube

Listen to “Monster” now: https://Monster.lnk.to/Single

“Wonder” the album out now Listen now: https://Wonder.lnk.to/Album

Listen to Holy + Lonely from Justin Bieber https://justinbieber.lnk.to/OutNow

Directed by: Colin Tilley Produced by: Jack Winter Creative Direction: Connor Brashier

Follow Justin: Instagram | http://instagram.com/justinbieber Twitter | http://twitter.com/justinbieber Facebook | http://facebook.com/justinbieber TikTok | https://www.tiktok.com/@justinbieber Website | https://www.justinbiebermusic.com/ Lyrics: You put me on a pedestal and tell me I’m the best Raise me up into the sky until I’m short of breath Fill me up with confidence, I say what’s in my chest Spill my words and tear me down until there’s nothing left Rearrange the pieces just to fit me with the rest But what if I what if I trip, what if I what if I fall Then am I the monster yeah, just let me know what if I what if I sin, what if I what if I break Then am I the monster yeah, just let me know yeaahhh I was 15 when the world put me on a pedestal I had big dreams of doing shows and making memories Made some bad moves trying to act cool upset by their jealousy Lifting me up, lifting me up, yeah and tearing me down, tearing me down, down, down, Take responsibility for everything I’ve done, holding it against me like you’re the holy one I had a chip on my shoulder, had to let it go Cause unforgiveness keeps them in control, I came in with good intentions then I let it go And now I really wanna know What if I what if I trip, what if I what if I fall, I fall Then am I the monster, just let me know what if I what if I sin, what if I what if I break yeah Then am I the monster, just let me know Please just let me know Please don’t let me fall Oh please don’t let me fall What if I’m the monster, what if I’m the monster yeah

All of the Artists Featured on our pages are already getting lots of publicity everywhere!

Emerging Songwriters & Artists – Songwriter News has evolved into a slick robust music press platform with a smart trendy multi-platform adaptive appearance and an increasing level of site traffic which numbers approx 30,000 page views per week – circa 120,000+ page views per month.

Fans and followers – Get access to the Latest upcoming hits and stars before everyone else ! – Artists and Songwriters get your music in front of our fast growing audience !!

Now Independent songwriters and artists have access to our platform via our online Press-Room where it is possible to create your very own press release and run a campaign to gain the attention of industry, fans, followers and other site visitors.Find out more by clicking on Press Room in the menu above. Businesses – Studios, Producers , Music Coaches Event Organisers – We have a place for you on our pages too – Click on the Advertising section to see our banner advertising rates and Find Your tribe with SongwriterNews.

#Bieber #chart #Island #Justin #LP4-5 #Mendes #Monster #music #pop #PS/#Shawn #this week #uk top 10

0 notes

perfectirishgifts · 3 years

Text

Bob Dylan's Debt To Nashville - It's About Taxes

New Post has been published on https://perfectirishgifts.com/bob-dylans-debt-to-nashville-its-about-taxes/

Bob Dylan's Debt To Nashville - It's About Taxes

When I read in the Wall Street Journal that Bob Dylan had sold his entire songwriting catalog, I immediately wished that I had been in on the tax planning for that. Here is the press release from Universal Music Publishing.

Sir Lucian Grainge, Chairman and CEO of Universal Music Group, said, “As someone who began his career in music publishing, it is with enormous pride that today we welcome Bob Dylan to the UMG family. It’s no secret that the art of songwriting is the fundamental key to all great music, nor is it a secret that Bob is one of the very greatest practitioners of that art. Brilliant and moving, inspiring and beautiful, insightful and provocative, his songs are timeless—whether they were written more than half a century ago or yesterday. It is no exaggeration to say that his vast body of work has captured the love and admiration of billions of people all around the world. I have no doubt that decades, even centuries from now, the words and music of Bob Dylan will continue to be sung and played—and cherished—everywhere.”

Yeah, yeah that’s nice, but how much was involved and how was the deal structured? Apparently, UMG is a subsidiary of Vivendi, a French media conglomerate. I haven’t been able to find the details, although some reports seem to imply it was a cash deal. And the New York Times reports an estimate of $300 million.

From Fourth Street To Nashville

I tend to associate Dylan with Greenwich Village and folk music. I am not an envious person, but how can you not envy somebody who had a relationship with Joan Baez? Too bad I was only thirteen when they broke up in 1965. Regardless, Greenwich Village and folk is just one aspect of Dylan. In 1969 he released Nashville Skyline.

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA – NOVEMBER 13: Joan Baez accepts a Lifetime Achievement Award during the 2019 … [] Latin Grammy Special Merit Awards on November 13, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Rich Fury/Getty Images)

As a music, culture critic I make a pretty good tax researcher, so I’ll leave it there. Except. Except. It turns out that it was his Nashville friends who might be saving him tens of millions in taxes this year.

Capital Gain!

There was something that I should have known that I didn’t learn until prompted by my editor Janet Novack. Assuming this is a straight-up cash deal Dylan will get capital gains treatment on the sale. This is due to one of those odd exceptions to an exception in the Code. Code Section 1221 defines capital assets very broadly, A capital asset is “property held by the taxpayer” in other words just about everything that can be owned fits the basic definition in 1221(a), which then goes on to tell us all the things that are not capital assets.

1221(a)(3) excludes “a patent, invention, model or design (whether or not patented), a secret formula or process, a copyright, a literary, musical, or artistic composition, a letter or memorandum, or similar property, held by a taxpayer whose personal efforts created such property“.

So there go all Dylan’s songs. Unless he was a front man for somebody whom he secretly paid to write them, they would not be capital assets. But there’s more.

1221(b)(3) gives us – Sale or exchange of self-created musical works – At the election of the taxpayer, paragraphs (1) and (3) of subsection (a) shall not apply to musical compositions or copyrights in musical works sold or exchanged by a taxpayer described in subsection (a)(3).

According to the regulations, the taxpayer makes the election for each work on a timely filed, including extensions, return for the year of the sale. I thought that would make for an awful thick return, but the election is made by reporting the sales as capital sales. So the preparer won’t need 600 extra pages.

Why That Exception?

The exception for musical works was added by the Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005 (passed in 2006). It was a temporary measure expiring on January 1, 2011, but was later made permanent. I haven’t found a lot about the rationale for the provision. There is this from an article – The History of Intellectual Property Taxation: Promoting Innovation and Other Intellectual Property Goals by Xuan-Thao Nguyen and Jeffrey A. Maine:

“Ironically, the 1950 law, which was designed to treat all copyright creators the same, was later viewed by some-particularly members of the country-music industry-as quite harsh to songwriters. Because the average annual income of songwriters was quite low and often came in spurts, some thought the taxing of gains realized from song sales should differ from the taxing of compensation earned by wage earners. In response, in 2006, Congress amended the 1950 law, creating an exception for sales of musical compositions and copyrights in musical works. Under section 1221(b)(3), songwriters can elect to pay tax at capital gain rates rather than ordinary income rates on the sales of their copyrighted songs. Although this exception was pushed to remove perceived tax inequity facing songwriters, it could more accurately be viewed as a response to assiduous lobbying efforts by the music industry.”

Joel S Newman has more in Sales And Donations of Self-Created Art, Literature, and Music in the Pittsburgh Tax Review.

“Country western songwriters were not happy with the provisions of § 1221(a)(3). In the early 2000’s, the Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI) lobbied the Tennessee and Kentucky Congressional delegations for a change. Congresswoman Blackburn, the head of the House Congressional Songwriters Caucus, was especially active Proposed legislation was drafted by Denise Stevens, of Loeb & Loeb in Nashville, working pro bono for the NSAI. The NSAI lobbied hard for the bill. NSAI singer-songwriter members paid their own way to Washington and took turns performing their music for members of Congress. Sometimes, at these “guitar pulls,” the members of Congress sang as well. As a result, in 2005, Congress enacted the Songwriters Capital Gains Tax Equity Act, as part of the Tax Increase Prevention of Reconciliation Act of 2005.”

Nashville music city colorful neon sign hanging on Broadway in downtown Nashville Tennessee USA

Jean Anne Naujeck had a story in the Tennessean on February 6, 2004, about forty Nashville songwriters who paid their own way to Washington to drum up support for the bill.

John Darby tells a pretty good version of how the bill came to pass in The Tall Tax Tale of Why Country Songwriters Get Capital Gain Treatment. He makes one comment that Dylan may have upended:

“The only conceivable defense for this strange and lopsided tax benefit is that the stakes appear to be quite small. Once source estimates that this tax break will cost the U.S. government just $4 million per year in lost tax revenues/ while the Joint Committee on Taxation puts the revenue loss at $29 million over the ten years from 2007 to 2016.”

Dylan may have used up more than a decade’s worth at that rate if the New York Times report that the deal was around $300 million is correct.

According to this story, the benefit might have gone away as part of TCJA, but a couple of Tennessee representatives Diane Black and Marsha Blackburn were on the ball in preventing that.

A Little Noted Dylan Cover

Dylan’s reach was really amazing. Sister Kathleen Reilly, who was a year younger than Dylan, told me that when the older nuns at the Pallotine motherhouse in Harriman, NY were upset about various things that were different from the good old days of habit wearing, the younger nuns would break into a chorus of The Times They Are A Changin‘.

You have to wonder whether anticipation of a new administration with a different view of capital gains was a spur to getting this deal done. Tim Ingham reported on a surge in interest in selling right after the election in Rolling Stone.

Recognizing an enormous capital gain is not exactly the epitome of great tax planning. So there may be something else going on. It would be really interesting if Dylan kicks the can down the road with some opportunity zone investments. It takes a lot of nerve, but I can’t help but point out that there is an OZ in the East Village that positively contains a stretch of Fourth Street.