Record Labels
Verzuz Founders Swizz Beatz & Timbaland Talk Triller Partnership: ‘This Puts a Light Back on Creatives’
The ultimate payoff, says Swizz Beatz, is “hearing everybody being so floored about having shares in the company and feeling like they belong. That’s the real currency. It’s going to take the creative to save the creative.” What initially attracted you to Triller? Swizz Beatz: The whole time that Tim and I were building this platform, we didn’t really have any plans from a monetization or even a business side. We never even built out the technology for it. It was more about wanting to do this from a celebration, educational side; to give people some life, love and happiness during these hard times with COVID-19. Then as the platform started growing it turned into a business with sponsors coming in and offers from people wanting to buy ownership in the company once w...
Grimes Signs to Columbia Records: Exclusive
Grimes has signed with Columbia Records, a source tells Billboard. This marks her first foray into the major label system, having released albums only on independent labels previously. After releasing two albums in 2010 on Canadian indie Arbutus Records, Grimes’ last three albums were released on 4AD — Visions (2012), Art Angels (2015) and Miss Anthropocene (2020). Collectively these projects have earned 736,000 album consumption units, of which 307,000 are in album sales and 554 million on-demand song streams in the U.S., according to MRC Data. You Deserve to Make Money Even When you are looking for Dates Online. So we reimagined what a dating should be. It begins with giving you back power. Get to meet Beautiful people, chat and make money in the process. Earn rewards by...
Bhaskar Menon, Legendary EMI and Capitol Records Head, Dies at 86
In the 2003 documentary The Making of the Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason acknowledged Menon’s outsized influence on the album’s success. “The story in America was a disaster, in that we really hadn’t sold records,” he said at the time. “And so they brought in a man called Bhaskar Menon who was absolutely terrific. He decided he was going to make this work, and make the American company sell [Dark Side of the Moon]. And he did.” Born Vijaya Bhaskar Menon in Thiruvanthapuram, India, on May 29, 1934, to father KRK — a notable civil servant who would go on to serve as India’s first Finance Minister — and mother Saraswathi, Menon would form a love of music via the Indian ragas his mother played in their home growing up. After earning his master’s degree f...
Stalley Announces New Partnership With Mello Music Group: Exclusive
Mello Music Group placed the welcome mat to Stalley by teaming him up with Joell Ortiz, Namir Blade and Solemn Brigham for their latest collaboration, “Black Rock.” The record will reside on the label’s forthcoming compilation album titled Bushido. Slated for production include vets Alchemist, illmind, and Apollo Brown, while the rap side will boast features by Skyzoo, Open Mike Eagle, B-Real, Murs, and Stalley. The project will officially be out on April 2. You can pre-order here. “While my debut Mello Music project will be released later this year, I’m eager to showcase my talents with the rest of the label on the Bushido Compilation album and debut “Black Rock”; the single is dope!” Stream “Black Rock” bel...
Swedish House Mafia Parts Ways With Columbia Records: Exclusive
Two sources familiar with the matter also tell Billboard that Swedish House Mafia has parted ways with their manager, Patriot Management’s Ron Laffitte, who took over for longtime manager Amy Thomson following the group’s 2018 reunion show. After splitting up in 2013 following their 53-date One Last Tour, the trio reunited for a show-closing performance at Ultra Music Festival 2018. There they teased a full-on reunion, with SHM member Axwell announcing to the crowd, “It’s Swedish House Mafia for life this time.” In the three years since, the group has played about a dozen dates in Europe, Asia, Mexico and Saudi Arabia, with these shows containing new, as-yet-unreleased music. In June of 2019, due to supposed scheduling conflicts, band members Sebasti...
David Crosby Sells Legendary Catalog to Irving Azoff’s Iconic Artists Group
Irving Azoff‘s newly-launched venture Iconic Artists Group has partnered with David Crosby on a wide-ranging deal to monetize the California singer-songwriter’s life work in the digital era, the two parties announced today (March 3). Under the agreement, Iconic has purchased the publishing and recorded music rights to Crosby’s catalog, which includes his solo work as well as his output as a member of The Byrds, Crosby, Stills & Nash, and the later Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. The deal also includes Crosby’s songs as a duo with Nash. “I’ve known David as a friend and have admired him as a great artist since our earliest days at Geffen Roberts Management shortly after I moved to Los Angeles,” Azoff said in a statement. “This is an incre...
Executive of the Week: Columbia Records Exec VP/Co-Head A&R Imran Majid
While buzz for “Calling My Phone” first began to simmer when the song was teased on TikTok, helping it vault into the top five of the Hot 100, Majid says the song’s success comes more from Columbia’s track record of artist development and trusting the A&R process. And Tjay, despite being just 19, is far from a brand new sensation, as his debut album, State of Emergency, reached No. 5 on the Billboard 200 in 2019, while Polo-Tjay collaboration “Pop Out” climbed all the way to No. 11 on the Hot 100 that same year. But “Calling My Phone” is a singular moment for the Bronx-born MC and one that Majid says reflects on Columbia as a destination for great music. Here, Majid talks the success of “Calling My Phone,” the crop of rising hip...
Breaking Down BTS Label Big Hit’s 2020 Earnings
A new BTS album, Map of the Soul: 7, and four mini album releases by the group Seventeen from Big Hit’s investment in K-pop label Pledis in May, helped Big Hit sell 13.2 million albums. That’s up 54% from 2019, with $288.5 million of revenue — a 196% improvement. Eight tracks from Map of the Soul: 7, released last February, spent time on the Billboard Global 200 Chart in 2020, with BTS’ later singles “Dynamite” and “Life Goes On” both reaching No. 1. In the U.S., Map of the Soul: 7 sold 674,000 units in 2020 while its tracks were streamed 715 million times, according to MRC Data. Normally, Big Hit’s holistic business model is well suited to the modern music business. But the pandemic killed touring, traditionally Big Hit’s largest revenue stream, and favored record companies that can...
It’s a Growth Story: What’s Behind UMG’s Accelerated IPO Plans?
Vivendi could earn about 9 billion euros ($10.9 billion) from the IPO, if it maintains majority ownership by unloading just just under 30% of UMG at the same 30 billion euros ($36.3 billion) valuation used last year when it sold a 20% stake to a consortium led by Chinese tech giant Tencent Corp. At that head-turning 36-times EBTIDA valuation, a multiple often seen in fast-growing tech companies, Tencent “made people take a step back and look at the valuations of music companies,” says Michael Poster, the head of Michelman & Robinson’s corporate and securities department. That’s not an unreasonable valuation: a rapidly-growing streaming market, believed by Goldman Sachs to reach 1.15 billion subscribers...
Vivendi Planning to Move Forward With UMG IPO This Year
The idea is to avoid the so-called “conglomerate discount,” under which a company could be valued by the market as less than the sum of its parts — especially by investors looking for more direct exposure to the music sector at a time when streaming is fueling growth and optimism. “This plan is the result of the joint efforts in recent years by the Vivendi and the Universal Music Group, under the leadership of Sir Lucian Grainge, to further the company’s position as the music industry’s undisputed leader,” Vivendi said in a letter about the move that was shared internally at Universal by Grainge, the company’s chairman and CEO. “Recently the successful opening of UMG’s share capital to an international consortium led by Tencent has confirmed its attractiveness with strategic investor...
BMG Announces Restructuring, Ups Thomas Scherer to Repertoire & Marketing President
Since Scherer signed on to lead the Los Angeles marketing & repertoire team in 2014, the company has seen success on the recording side with releases from Run the Jewels, Jason Mraz, KSI and Curtis Waters, among others. He also launched a long-term partnership with Dark Horse Records and has led the charge on developing a stable of rock-focused acts in Los Angeles. A number of other executive promotions were also announced as part of the restructure. Monti Olson and Dan Gill have been promoted to executive vp roles and will be responsible for U.S. publishing and recorded music in Los Angeles, respectively, reporting to Scherer. In his new role, Olson will lead BMG’s Los Angeles, Nashville and New York creative teams, in addition to creative services for the company’s film and TV p...
Marilyn Manson Off Label’s Site After Evan Rachel Wood Claims Abuse
As recently as Jan. 1, Loma Vista was offering more than 25 Marilyn Manson related items through its online site, ranging from limited edition vinyl to We Are Chaos puzzles, socks and candles, according to the Internet Archive. Manson’s first release through Concord imprint Loma Vista was 2015’s The Pale Emperor. Concord’s chief label head and Loma Vista founder Tom Whalley had worked with Manson when Whalley ran Interscope Records. Manson’s last album, We Are Chaos, came out Sept. 11, 2020, and debuted at No. 8 on the Billboard 200 and at No. 1 on the Top Rock Albums chart. Wood’s post accuses Warner, whom she began dating when she was 18 and Warner was 38, of “grooming her,” adding I was brainwashed and manipulated into submission. I am done living in fear of retaliation, slander, o...
