Spotify’s Payments to the Music Industry Nearing $40 Billion

Twice-impeached former president Donald Trump hasn’t been arrested yet, but Jimmy Fallon is pretty sure he’s starting to feel the heat. During Monday night’s episode of “The Tonight Show,” Fallon joked that the location of Trump’s first official 2024 campaign rally was the clearest sign of that.On Saturday, Trump stopped in Waco, Texas to make his first official campaign bid to the people and, as always, his speech was full of lies and gripes about how he’s being treated unfairly.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Warner Chappell Music has renewed its global publishing deal with producer Marco “MAG” Borrero. A frequent Bad Bunny collaborator, MAG produced 15 of the 23 tracks on the blockbuster album “Un Verano Sin Ti,” which led to his 2022 Variety Hitmakers honor and his No. 1 position on Billboard’s Year-End Hot Latin Song Producers chart. “Un Verano Sin Ti” became the first all-Spanish album to top the year-end Billboard 200 chart as well as earn a nomination for Album of the Year Grammy award. The Brooklyn-born, Puerto Rican-Dominican producer was mentored by Max Martin — the most successful songwriter-producer of the past 25 years — and over the course of his career has also collaborated with Rauw Alejandro, Arcángel, Bebe Rexha, Imagine Dragons, Selena Gomez, and Demi Lovato.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Jay-Z’s net worth has soared to $2.5 billion, according to a new Forbes report published Friday. While the report is slim on details, it notes that the fortune of the man born Shawn Carter 53 years reached far beyond music. “Even in a year without a tour or album release, Jay-Z mints millions from his Armand de Brignac champagne and D’Usse cognac,” it says. “The Brooklyn-born rapper was crowned hip-hop’s first billionaire by Forbes in 2019, thanks to a sprawling and diversified empire,” noting assets from his Roc Nation entertainment and sports empire to a fine-art collection including works by Jean-Michel Basquiat.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Sony Music has dissolved the long-running Arista Nashville imprint, a rep for the company confirms to Variety. The news was first reported in Country Aircheck‘s newsletter. Most of the artists will be absorbed into Sony Music Nashville, with Nate Smith is going to RCA Nashville and Old Dominion and Megan Moroney moving over to Columbia Nashville. Brooks & Dunn is the most famous artist on the label, having been one of its cornerstone acts since 1991, but the duo is not a going concern on the recording front. Apart from a retrospective/duets project three years ago, they have not issued an album of new material since 2007.

according to the trade body IFPI.In addition, sales of physical formats rose by 4%, generating $4.6bn (£3.7bn) in revenues. Almost half of that figure (49.8%) came from Asia, where buying CDs and vinyl as souvenirs is a staple of the “idol” culture of Japan and South Korea.Performance royalties also rose by 8.6% to $2.5bn (£2.04bn), surpassing pre-pandemic levels.However, record labels are pushing for prices to rise to increase the industry’s income from streaming services.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor In February of last year, as controversy broiled around Joe Rogan’s racially charged language and COVID-related misinformation on multiple editions of his Spotify podcast, the streaming giant’s CEO attempted to defuse the situation by apologizing to his aggrieved staff and pledging $100 million “for the licensing, development, and marketing of music (artists and songwriters) and audio content from historically marginalized groups.” Nearly 14 months later, that $100 million “Creator Equity Fund” has spent less than 10% of its funding on that work,” according to a report in Bloomberg. The initiative was behind schedule in hiring an eight-person staff to oversee the project and “has suffered from shifting priorities,” the report said, citing unnamed people familiar with the effort. At the beginning of this year, the fund had not completed its 2023 budget and had not determined its priority projects, according to a memo the publication said it had obtained, and another fund intended to promote diversity in podcasts suffered after that business was hit by layoffs last year, a union representing workers said.

Pulse Music Group has signed punk band Turnstile to a worldwide publishing deal via a creative joint venture with Rick Rubin’s American Songs. The agreement covers Turnstile’s entire song catalog, including their 2021 record “Glow On,” which boasts Grammy-nominated singles “Blackout” and “Holiday.” “We have been waiting a very long time for the next great rock band to emerge and feel very fortunate that we will get to work with Brendan and the band,” commented Scott Cutler, co-CEO of Pulse Music Group. “Welcoming Turnstile to our Pulse Music Group roster is a great example of what we set out to do creatively when we formed our joint venture with Rick Rubin. We’re proud to welcome Turnstile to our roster and to partner with American Songs to publish culturally impactful talent.”

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Global recorded-music revenue growth slowed down dramatically in 2022 but still was up 9% according to the year-end report from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s released Tuesday. While 2021 saw an 18.5% growth, largely due to an increase in streaming numbers as the world waited at home for the pandemic to lift, a growth in global streaming numbers powered the past year’s lift, which showed total trade revenues for year at $26.2 billion. Subscription audio streaming revenues increased by 10.3% to $12.7 billion, and there were 589 million users of paid subscription accounts at the end of 2022, according to the report.  Total streaming (including both paid subscription and advertising-supported) grew by 11.5% to reach $17.5 billion, or 67% of total global recorded music revenues, according to the IFPI, which represents more than 8,000 record company members worldwide.

Ed Meza @edmezavar Paramount+ is launching its first-ever mobile-only streaming subscription plan in Mexico and Brazil. Paramount+’s Basic Plan, described as “competitively priced,” will be available from April 18. It will allow subscribers to stream content on one mobile device or tablet at a time, uninterrupted and without ads. “This new offering is part of our broader strategy to scale Paramount+,” said Marco Nobili, executive vice president and international general manager for Paramount+. “With multi-tier pricing options, Paramount+ will reach even more subscribers by fitting diverse customer choices and grow our global direct-to-consumer distribution. With mobile entertainment consumption increasing around the world, a mobile-only option will make our slate of programming more accessible to our audiences in mobile-first countries.”

Thania Garcia Warner Records today announced the launch of its first-ever flagship electronic dance music label, Major Recordings. Headed by Sam Mobarek, the label’s first signing is duo the duo Parisi, in partnership with Parlophone’s FFRR imprint. Mobarek will report to Warner Records’ co-chairman/ COO Tom Corson and co-chairman/ CEO Aaron Bay-Schuck. Mobarek has nearly two decades of experience in branding and marketing, most recently running Mob Creative, which she also founded. Prior to Mob, Mobarek led the marketing department at Ultra Music, working with Calvin Harris, Steve Aoki, Pitbull, and deadmau5; she also ran the pop imprint Lefthook under Sony Music while still a student at New York University’s Stern School of Business, and held posts at live music company SFX (now Lifestyle) as well as Beatport. In recent months, she and her team have been working with Warner’s partners on such acts as the Blessed Madonna, Eliza Rose, Luude, Skin on Skin and more.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Amazon Music has announced the launch of two new weekly flagship music series: the hip-hop-focused “Rotation Roundtable” and the Latin/pop culture show “La Semanal Live.” “Rotation Roundtable,” premiering March 15, comprises a hybrid Twitch livestream and 90-minute podcast experience inspired by Amazon Music’s “Rap Rotation” and “R&B Rotation” playlists. It is hosted by journalist and executive producer Speedy Morman, Power 105.1 host/ producer Nyla Symone, “On the Radar” creator Gabe P and veteran journalist Rob Markman. Each episode will feature a “Big Questions” segment meant to incite discourse about current events in hip-hop. The show will also consist of “Hot Takes,” guest interviews, and a debate segment fueled by chat participation.

Reese Witherspoon and Kacey Musgraves comes a new music reality competition called, which they promise is a «fresh take on» the TV genre as it «breaks down barriers in country music by providing an extraordinary opportunity to diverse artists from around the world.»  Ahead of the eight-part competition's debut on Apple TV+, the streaming platform released a trailer, offering the first look at what's to come from this one-of-a-kind experience.  On the show, three groundbreaking country artists and scouts -- Jimmie Allen, Mickey Guyton and Orville Peck -- have each handpicked a roster of what they consider to be «exceptional up-and-coming talent» and invited them to live together in a house in Nashville, Tennessee, where they'll showcase their unique sound and style for the judges.While there, the twelve contestants will vye for the chance to win «a life-changing experience from Apple, including global exposure across the Apple TV+ and Apple Music platforms.»In addition to watching the extended preview for the reality series, check out the three scout's full roster of competing artists below:    Chihuahua, Mexico Ale infuses herself into her music and bilingual lyrics with the mariachi, norteño, banda and other sounds she heard growing up in Mexico. At the age of 16 she taught herself how to play the guitar, and is now on the way to establishing herself as an independent singer-songwriter with a loyal following she’s gained from her popular YouTube channel.    New Delhi, India Dhruv, a multi-instrumentalist, composer, singer-songwriter and producer, started his musical journey at the age of seven.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Over the past couple of years, virtually every conversation about the challenges facing artists in the music-streaming economy has had one proposed quick fix: Raise subscription prices. As Milana Lewis, CEO of the distribution and payments platform Stem, told Variety last summer, “The price of everything else on earth is going up, and they all keep finding new ways to make subscriptions cheaper” via family and student plans, bundling and other initiatives. Apple Music, Amazon Music and Deezer have already done so, but others remain with the same $10 U.S. monthly price as when they started. New Warner Music CEO Robert Kyncl brings a view from the other side to the top of the music industry: He was head of business for YouTube — where he led a sea change in the streaming giant’s relationship with the music industry by, guess what, introducing a paid music subscription service — and at Netflix, where he presided over the company’s shift from DVDs to streaming.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Today we release recorded music revenue data for 2022 showing a seventh straight year of continued growth – powered by a robust 8% increase in paid subscription streaming revenues which now make up two thirds of the market. In raw numbers, paid subscriptions hit 92 million for the first time ever, continuing a decade long run of double-digit growth. That’s practically double the 47 million paid subscribers on the books just four years ago in 2018. In the last ten years, streaming has gone from 15% to 84% of U.S. recorded music revenues, a virtual overnight transformation of our industry unmatched by any other media or art form. Other formats also saw significant growth. Streaming all together – paid subscriptions plus ad-supported services, digital and customized radio, and music used in social media platforms, digital fitness apps and others – grew 7% to a record high $13.3 billion last year, while vinyl’s incredible surge continued with revenues up 17% and, for the first time since 1987, more records sold than CDs.  (Read the full report.)

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor The U.S. recorded-music industry reached an all-time high of $15.9 billion in 2022, marking the industry’s seventh consecutive year of growth. While overall streaming growth has been leveling off in recent years, with 92 million paid U.S. subscriptions, it’s clearly continuing to grow and fuel the market while the steady resurgence of vinyl continues. Collectively accounting for 84% of total revenues, streaming continued to be the largest driver with paid subscriptions, ad-supported services, digital and customized radio, social media platforms, digital fitness apps and others, according to the report. Paid subscriptions were up 7% to a record high revenue of $13.3 billion. Revenues grew 8% to $10.2 billion, passing the $10 billion mark for the first time.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor ASCAP, the only remaining not-for-profit performing rights organization in the U.S., announced that its 2022 annual revenue surpassed $1.5 billion for the first time, which fueled record royalty distributions to ASCAP’s songwriter, composer and music publisher members. Collections totaled $1.522 billion in 2022, an increase of $187 million or 14% over the previous year. According to the announcement, ASCAP’s strategic growth plan, launched in 2015, has resulted in a 6% compound annual growth rate for total revenues, and a 7% compound annual growth rate for total distributions to members.

Thania Garcia Producer Metro Boomin has sold a portion of his publishing catalog to Shamrock Capital for close to $70 million, Variety can confirm. News of the hip-hop acquisition was first published by Billboard on Tuesday morning and arrives as Shamrock continues to forge major investments in catalog sales, expanding a portfolio that includes the master recordings for Taylor Swift’s first six albums, which it acquired in 2020 from Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings. Metro Boomin is riding high on the streaming and sales success of his second full-length album, “Heroes & Villains.” The R&B and hip-hop set was released last December and was the St. Louis artist’s biggest album in terms of first-week sales. It was also his second record to debut at No. 1 on the all-genre inclusive albums chart.

Kardinal Offishall still remembers a time when nobody wanted to hire him. And he means nobody.

Bebe Rexha has no interest in dating someone who works in the music industry, and explained why during a recent interview with ET Canada’s Keshia Chanté.

Jon Stewart faced off with an Oklahoma state senator on gun regulation and the Second Amendment, calling out the lawmaker for “hypocrisy at its highest order” for his contradictory stances.In a sit-down for his Apple TV+ series “The Problem With Jon Stewart” airing Friday, the host confronted Oklahoma State Sen. Nathan Dahm on his views about regulating guns and the idea that more guns make the country safer.Dahm has written multiple bills loosening gun restrictions, including the nation’s first anti-red flag law against restricting gun access to those deemed dangerous.The Republican lawmaker stood his ground on the fact that the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms is the only one that the Constitution says “shall not be infringed,” to which Stewart shot back that it’s also the only one that uses the phrase “well regulated.” “Just for clarity’s sake, I’m not against the Second” Stewart said.