juliandonald

[juliandonald]

Research company Technavio recently released a research report monitoring and forecasting the next four years in the music industry. Despite this crazy year, Technavio predicts growth of $137.8 Billion Dollars from 2020-2024. It also predicts a 12% Compound Annual Growth Rate over that period. It has major trends in the music streaming sector and how piracy and copyright has risen due to the internet and how that impacts the music industry.

[juliandonald]

In recent news, one of the major companies in the music industry Ticketmaster announced its plan for how concerts could be conducted in 2021. A couple weeks ago, pharmaceutical company Pfizer announced that the vaccine it has been working on is about 90% effective. This is huge news, once a vaccine is out and distributed that could be a way for things to get back to normal in society and particularly in the music industry this is big news. My prediction is that the return of concerts and festivals is going to create a renaissance period for the music industry. We are going to see shows and concerts bigger and better and more exciting than ever before. 

Ticketmaster said that they plan to require proof of a COVID-19 vaccine as well as a negative COVID test at least 24 to 72 hours prior to the concert. This is going to be weird, but as long as everyone is safe and it doesn’t feel forced or rush I feel it could work. Obviously in an ideal world the presence of the virus would be none, but this is just a product of how this pandemic has been handled by the U.S. and this is just how it might be. 

[juliandonald]

One of the trends we are seeing nowadays is the decline of TV ratings, and the incline of social media interaction with sports. There is a direct correlation between the emergence of social media and the decline of TV ratings. There are a few issues at hand, one is that Gen Z is a demographic that is not into sports as much as older generations. They are fans of players but not teams, and have more interest in watching a Zion play but don’t have any interest in watching the Pelicans. There is a shift towards individuality versus the team.

A way I believe these sports teams can continue to retain attention is by being active on social media and posting highlights, interviews, etc. and getting views and intercation that way. 

Recently the Arizona Cardinals came to a six figure settlement with a major record label because of the use of a song in a video. Record labels are becoming more forceful in enforcing copyright infringements and it is something to keep watching for. In a year where music artist and labels main source of income, touring, is not happening they are most likely looking to make as much money as possible on the distribution and use of their music. This will not come close to making up losses but it is a way the industry is trying to stay alive.

[juliandonald]

This is a bit off topic from the main topics discussed on this blog, but it was a video I watched recently which was very interesting for me. The popular Disney+ show and Star Wars spinoff The Mandalorian has been using LED Walls and virtual sets instead of using a green screen. The video talks about how this will become more and more popular and the green screen will begin to decline in use. The virutal sets and LED walls create a more real and immersive set for the actors. It’s a very interesting and quick 6 minute video, check it out.

[juliandonald]

This year like many other festivals the annual event Twitchcon festival took place virtually, however with the new name Glitchcon. It was a multi-day online event and was completed entirely on the Twitch platform. Twitchcon typically is an event to celebrate the streaming platform Twitch and its creators, which are typically video game streamers. The platform is also used by musicians and DJ’s especially this year given the rise of livestream shows.

One emerging musician on Twitch since the pandemic has been producer Kenny Beats. He began streaming almost every day a week back in March and began a weekly “beat battle” involving the young, up and coming producers that watch his streams.

Over the last several months, he was built an incredible community. Cumulating winners each week and giving away prizes like production gear. During Twitchcon, he selected a few of the best and had one final beat battle to determine a winner of the season. The winner was young UK producer Matt Zara, who received $10,000 and a mix of his winning beat by famous mix engineer and fellow Twitch streamer MixedByAli. 

The entire beat battle is provided in the YouTube link above. Check it out!

[juliandonald]

Snapchat is dipping its toes in yet another innovation that will likely make its way to the Snapchat app after aquiring Voisey. Voisey is a U.K. startup where you can layer your voice singing or talking over music instrumentals. The app allows users to use audio filters and upload instrumentals of their own, making the app super personal.

"Voisey has been described in the past as a 'TikTok for music creation'. And it does look a little like the popular video app, which like Voisey is also focused around user-generated content. Voisey has a distinctly stronger creator feel to it, and there has even been at least one singer discovered on the platform."

Looks like Snapchat is continuing to ride its current momentum, expect some new features on the app here soon.

[juliandonald]

LA-based music event company Brownies & Lemonade is teaming up with music label Proximity to produce its' third livestreaming show of the COVID era, titled Friendsgiving.

A popular tradition among the american youth, friendsgiving is an alternative to thanksgiving meant to bring together you and your closest friends.

Recently there have been several lockdown and curfew mandates in cities like NYC and LA, and friendsgiving is being frowned upon given the rise in COVID cases.

Alas, Brownies & Lemonade is here to save the day. With performances by Louis The Child, Nitti Gritti, Tchami b2b Dr. Fresch, Zhu b2b NGHTMRE, and YehMe2, it is going to be a fun time.

The festival will be Friday November 27 and Saturday November 28 with a schedule coming soon. This news made my entire week, I am so excited to be able to catch these artists during a livestream.

In addition, Brownies & Lemonade and Proximity will be accepting donations throughout the event which 100% of the proceeds will benefit the Save our Stages Relief fund and the performing artists.

[juliandonald]

We have a copyright infringement case between Wixen Music Publishing and the popular music app Triller.

Triller, is very similar to TikTok, you can make videos using clips and such and add music to the videos. Essentially the same app.

Wixen Music Publishing is accusing Triller of allowing its' users to use their music although Triller has not obtained a license to include music by artists under the Wixen Music Publishing umbrella.

Wixen is saying that in order for Triller to legally distribute its works it must obtain a license, and that Triller was aware of this but continued to let its users use and alter their songs.

Wixen seeks an award for damages and an award for costs and fees.

[juliandonald]

Tencent Music Entertainment is a major leading music company out of China who recently announced a strategic partnership with LA-based virtual concerts company Wave.

Tencent Music will show Wave events on their own music streaming platforms in China, QQ Music, Kugou Music, Kuwo Music, and the WeSing app to name a few.

"The collaboration with Wave marks an important step forward in our efforts to integrate technology and music, aiming to amplify the immersive music experience for our users, enhance user engagement and promote content consumption.." - TC Pan, TME group VP of content cooperation, said.

Wave was originally started as a platform for virtual reality concerts, but has since began to stream more regular livestream shows. This partnership will unite american artists and livestreams with the Chinese market.

[juliandonald]

Apple announced in its new wave of MacBook laptops that they have created their own chip for the device. Their chip, the “M1,” is going to offer a better battery life along with an overall better performance.

I know this blog is mostly music, so to tie that into this exciting news the background music for this video is by Chicago artist Whethan and is titled “Wave.” Whethan just released his debut album only a few weeks ago (which is amazing) and at only 21 years of age is an exciting young talent. 

P.S. - Another song of his off the album “Drumdown Mambo” was used in Apple’s commercial promoting the iPhone 12 the same day of his album release.

[juliandonald]

Musimap is an Artificial Emotional Intelligence company that plans to help businesses in  music, video, media, advertising, and e-commerce by building automated engines that will help with targeting, emotional profiling and responsiveness. 

“Musimap owns one of the largest manually annotated music databases in the world. This human expertise is empowered by the latest machine learning and deep learning technologies.”

They recently welcomed music and entertainment industry guru Quincy Jones on as an investor. 

[juliandonald]

Chaos Audio is an Audio Tech startup which recently announced the creation of a guitar pedal which connects through bluetooth to guitars. Adding effects and allowing full creative abilities to the guitarist without any chords.

“The pedal, dubbed Stratus, has been referred to as a Swiss Army knife for guitarists. Stratus is a Bluetooth enabled multi-effects platform that combines a customizable digital pedal board, guitar tuner, looper, metronome, and more. All the tools are seamlessly interfaced through Stratus and are controlled via the Chaos Audio smartphone app available on both Android and iOS devices. Users can access an online library of new audio effects through the mobile app to continuously shape their sound.”

Landon McCoy, founder and CEO of Chaos Audio, looks back at his life as a college student when it was difficult to afford a nice guitar pedal. This cutting edge technology should be available to all creatives and McCoy is helping with that.

[juliandonald]

Cercle is a livestream and music event group that hosts livestream performances from “carefully selected and unusual places.” These places tend to be remote, exotic, or in places you wouldn’t suspect musicians to be performing. They highlight mostly DJ’s and have been around for a few years now. Seeing that livestreaming has taken off since the rise of coronavirus, Cercle had been doing these livestreams and posting these sets long before, making them an even more relevant company nowadays. I highly recommend checking these out. 

[juliandonald]

Spotify announced this last week that they are offering a new deal for artists and labels where in exchange for lower royalty payments off of streams, these artists and labels can request that Spotify boosts their algorithm and get whatever song they choose prioritized. This is kind of a crazy deal, artists and labels already get very little for a stream, about $ 0.005 per stream, which means the song would have to be streamed 200 times to make a dollar. Not to mention if the artist doesn’t own 100% of the royalties to the song the label takes all the rest. It is essentially a tradeoff where the artist and label assume that Spotify’s algorithm will have the song prioritized and played or placed on enough playlists that it can make up for the money lost, which already is very little. Another thought is the effect on the artists who do not wish to use this feature, but would father receive all of their royalties and let their song be played regularly. Will the new algorithm favoring songs from artists and labels who’ve agreed to this deal significantly take away from artists and labels who are not participating?

Interesting to think about.

#streaming

[juliandonald]

This week TikTok and Sony Music signed a new licensing agreement that will help Sony Music and its artists within the TikTok app. TikTok users and creaters will now have easier access to songs in the Sony Music catalog which will help the exposure and attraction towards Sony Artists. According to the article, TikTok already had shorter term licensing deals with Sony, Universal and Warner but not they’ve locked up a longer term deal which helps TikTok avoid any sort of copyright infringement. The deal is certainly mutual though, as there have been so many hit songs that became hits primarily because of their popularity on TikTok, like Doja Cat for example. I wonder when the music charts will begin to incorporate interaction on apps like TikTok. 

[juliandonald]

Smule is a very cool App that is similar to Karaoke, but you can sing and create videos with friends. There are over 10 million songs available to sing solo or collaborate with, and allows for different audio and visual filters and effects when creating videos. Their mission is to continue to connect people with music, and allow anyone and everyone to join in.

[juliandonald]

Daouda Leonard is founder and CEO of the music tech from CreateSafe, and they recently launched an extremely cool app called CreatOS, which is a record deal simulator for independent artists and managers, to help them properly value their music and provide financial literacy so that they can properly value themselves as artists which in turn will help them leverage future deals.