International
Universal Music Group & Tencent Music Launch New Label in China
Universal Music Group and Tencent Music Entertainment Group (TME) are strengthening their ties with a new joint venture music label that will develop, produce and showcase Chinese artists, the companies announced Monday (Aug. 10). The news came with announcements UMG had reached a multi-year licensing extension with Tencent, as well as a new multi-year licensing deal with Chinese streaming platform NetEase Cloud Music. Under the renewed agreement between Tencent and UMG — first signed in May 2017 — Tencent will continue to distribute UMG content on its associated streaming platforms QQ Music, Kogou Music and Kuwo Music, as well as the karaoke platform WeSing. {“nid”:”9399541″,”type”:”post”,”title”:”Universal Musi...
Taylor Swift’s ‘Folklore’ Tops Midweek Chart In U.K.
Taylor Swift’s Folklore is in pole position for a third consecutive week at No. 1 in the U.K., though her challengers aren’t far behind. Folklore is the most streamed album week in the first half of the chart cycle to lead the Official Chart Update. Glass Animals’ Dreamland (Polydor) is just 600 chart sales behind in second place, and is the week’s best seller on physical formats, the OCC reports. Dreamland should give the English psychedelic pop outfit their first Top 10, besting the No. 23 peak of their sophomore 2016 album How To Be A Human Being. {“nid”:”9431667″,”type”:”post”,”title”:”Taylor Swift's 'Folklore' Outraces Fontaines D.C.'s 'A Hero\u2019s Death' For U.K. Chart Title”...
Taylor Swift’s ‘Folklore’ Enters Second Week at No. 1 In Australia
Taylor Swift’s Folklore (Republic/Universal) rules Australia’s albums chart for a second successive week in Australia as Jawsh 685 and Jason Derulo’s “Savage Love (Laxed – Siren Beat)” (Columbia/Sony) bounces back to the summit in its eighth week on the singles survey. Folklore is one of six Swift albums to hit No. 1 in Australia with her 2014 set 1989 logging the most time at the top, at nine weeks. Wollongong surf rock duo Hockey Dad land a career best with their third album Brain Candy (BMG/Warner), new at No. 2. It’s the followup from 2018’s Blend Inn, which peaked at No. 6 on the ARIA Albums Chart. Brain Candy is this week’s best-seller on vinyl. Dropping in at No. 3 is the new album from veteran singer-songwriter Paul Kelly and pianist/composer Paul Grabowsky, Please Leav...
Taylor Swift’s ‘Folklore’ Outraces Fontaines D.C.’s ‘A Hero’s Death’ For U.K. Chart Title
The U.K. chart week was a game of two halves as Taylor Swift’s Folklore started slow but pulled away to snag a second successive week at No. 1. Folklore fell to No. 3 in the first half of the week, with Irish rockers Fontaines D.C. looking well set for their first No. 1 with A Hero’s Death (Partisan). However, Swift and her U.K. record company EMI changed the course of the race by bringing forward the release of Folklore on CD, and the LP dashed to the finish line in first position. When all streams and sales were tallied up, Folklore finished 3,500 chart sales ahead of Fontaines D.C.’s second set, which starts at No. 2 on the Official U.K. Albums Chart and is the market-leader in vinyl sales. {“nid”:”9431617″,”type”:”post”,”title”...
Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s ‘WAP’ On Track For Highest New Chart Entry In U.K.
Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion new collaboration “WAP” has bolted out the gate in the U.K., while Joel Corry and MNEK’s “Head & Heart” (Asylum/Perfect Havoc) is on track for a fourth week at No. 1. “Head & Heart” leads the Official Chart First Look, based on preliminary sales and streaming data from the first 48 hours of the chart cycle. It’s an unchanged top five on the chart blast with Jawsh 685 & Jason Derulo’s “Savage Love (Laxed – Siren Beat)” (RCA), Nathan Dawe featuring KSI’s “Lighter” (Atlantic), Harry Styles’ “Watermelon Sugar” (Columbia) and AJ Tracey & Mabel’s “West Ten” (AJ Tracey) filling up the top spots, respectively. {“nid”:”9431667″,”type”:”post”,”title”:”Taylor Swift's 'Folk...
Mika Shares Letter to the Lebanese People ‘Devastated by the Apocalypse’
A massive warehouse explosion in Beirut last Tuesday (Aug. 4) killed at least 157 people and injured thousands more, devastating the city’s port area. As investigators continue to comb through the rubble, protesters have vented their anger against the Lebanese government, accusing leaders of years of negligence in the storing of 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate linked to the blast. British glam-pop star Mika (real name Michael Holbrook Penniman Jr.), who was born in Beirut and whose mother was of Lebanese descent, wrote a letter to the Lebanese people to share in their grief and anger over the incident. Billboard was sent an English-language transcript: My dear Lebanon, My dear Beirut, It’s still early in the morning on the other side of the Mediterranean and I feel so close and yet so far a...
20 Questions With Monsta X
Monsta X will perform during an epic virtual concert, Live From Seoul with Luv, on Saturday (Aug. 8). Presented by LiveXLive, the one-of-a-kind livestream will serve as the idols’ only live music event for the year, and will feature them performing a combination of tracks from their 2020 English-language LP All About Luv and hits in their native Korean, including “Fantasia,” “Follow,” “Dramarama” and more. Ahead of the much-anticipated concert event, (which was postponed to this weekend after originally being scheduled for July 27), the K-pop group chatted with Billboard over email about everything from the first music they ever purchased, the dream concerts they’d want to attend, what’s left on their bucket list as a band, their devoti...
Australian Music Industry Launches Anti-Harassment Initiative ‘Don’t Be That Guy’
BRISBANE, Australia — Enough is enough. A nucleus of Australian music industry professionals has banded together for a campaign with a message to all the misogynists out there, “don’t be that guy.” This week saw the launch of the Music Industry Collaborative Commitment, a shareable tool and resource for artists to use as they enter into one-to-one situations with collaborators or potential business partners. The Commitment is a set of common-sense commandments, intended to create a platform for safety and confidence for music-makers as they pursue opportunities where, sadly, barriers still firmly exist. {“nid”:”9429485″,”type”:”post”,”title”:”Wayne Connolly, Celebrated Australian Producer and Engineer, Laun...
Taylor Swift’s ‘Folklore’ CD Gets Early Release In U.K.
Game on. Taylor Swift has pulled out the big guns in her battle with Fontaines D.C. for the U.K. chart title. Swift’s latest album Folklore blasted to No. 1 on the Official U.K. Albums Chart last week, based on streams and downloads alone (37,000 combined chart sales in total). Though at the midway stage in the chart cycle, Folklore had slipped behind Irish rockers Fontaines D.C.’s sophomore album A Hero’s Death (Partisan) and Creeper’s Sex Death & The Infinite Void (Roadrunner). {“nid”:”9428399″,”type”:”post”,”title”:”Fontaines D.C. Push Taylor Swift From Midweek U.K. Albums Chart Summit”,”relative_path”:”\/articles\/news\/9428399\/fontaines-dc-taylor-swift-midweek-uk-albums-chart\/”,”...
Rod Stewart Reschedules Australian ‘Hits’ Tour to 2022
Rod Stewart’s tour Down Under has been pushed back to 2022 due to the health crisis. The veteran British artist was slated to bring his The Hits! 2020 Tour to Australia this October and November for a run of open-air and arena shows, produced by Live Nation, plus four A Day On the Green winery dates, produced by Roundhouse Entertainment in conjunction with Live Nation. Sorry to say that The Australia and New Zealand tour of The Hits!, originally scheduled for October and November of 2020, will be rescheduled. BUT I'll be there in 2022, March and April, and it’s going to be GREEEAAAAT! Hold on to your tickets! pic.twitter.com/qMqLA2evd2 — Sir Rod Stewart (@rodstewart) August 6, 2020 Due to ongoing travel restrictions, border closures and ongoing limitations on mass gatherings in ...
One Direction Streams, Sales Spike In U.K. Following 10th Anniversary
The 10-year anniversary celebrations for One Direction were a lightning rod for the pop band’s sales and streams in the U.K., new data reveals. According to data published by the Official Charts Company, almost 25 million streams of the group’s songs were generated in the days leading to and following the July 23 anniversary date. As previously reported, three of their catalog albums — Take Me Home, Made in the A.M. and Four — last week returned to the Official U.K. Albums Chart Top 40. {“nid”:”9427696″,”type”:”post”,”title”:”One Direction Re-Enters Social 50 Chart After Celebrating 10th Anniversary”,”relative_path”:”\/articles\/business\/chart-beat\/9427696\/one-direction-return-soc...
Wayne Connolly, Celebrated Australian Producer and Engineer, Launches Scenic Drive: Exclusive
Wayne Connolly, the celebrated Australian producer, engineer and artist who has collected eight ARIA Awards — and counting — for his work, has launched his first label, Scenic Drive. Based in Sydney, Connolly’s latest venture begins life with its debut signing The Nagging Doubts, whose breezy first single “Shot In The Dark” is due out Aug. 20, supported by a gig that night at The Vanguard in Newtown. They’re an “impressively self-sufficient band who are really good at home recording and they have stockpiled dozens of ideas and demos that need finishing,” Connolly tells Billboard. Scenic Drive should be a breath of fresh air, hitting fifth gear at a time when creatives are feeling stifled by the health crisis and the troubling second wave currently pummeling the state of Victori...
