News RZA strikes partnership with Irving Azoff’s Iconic Artists, LL Cool J’s Rock The Bells to expand Wu-Tang Clan brand The deal centers around a plan to to expand Wu-Tang’s music to film, TV, merchandise, and brand partnerships
News The MLC fires back at Spotify’s proposed motion to dismiss bundling lawsuit The MLC says Spotify's motion to dismiss 'entirely ignores the proper legal standard for a motion to dismiss'
News Wasserman doubles down on M&A, bringing in private equity exec Steve Murray to lead acquisitions strategy Exec joins from Providence Equity Partners, where he was instrumental in helping Wasserman complete M&A deals
News Ralph Kink named head of digital transformation at GEMA "Digitalization and now generative AI are turning the music industry upside down. The tasks that GEMA faces are huge."
News Justice Department responds to TikTok’s lawsuit against US divest-or-ban law, calls platform a national security risk The DoJ has responded to TikTok's lawsuit against the new US law, arguing the platform is a national security risk
News Blue Raincoat Music hires BMG’s Roman Tagoe as Chrysalis Records Director of Streaming UK Tagoe joins Blue Raincoat Music from BMG, where he served as Director of Streaming for global catalog recordings
News Gloria Gaynor sues music producer for alleged copyright infringement, breach of contract Gaynor alleges that producer named in lawsuit is falsely claiming to own the rights to a number of her works
Interviews ‘Artists like Drake and Travis Scott push me to go to my limits every time I make music for them.’ From a small village in Switzerland to the top of the charts alongside Drake and Jack Harlow, OZ tracks his journey and tells his story...
News Alison Donald, Kobalt’s Head of Global Creative, to exit company Exec announces departure after seven years at Kobalt
News TikTok launches hum- or sing-to-search feature, taking on YouTube Music and Shazam The tool is TikTok's answer to popular music identification apps like Shazam, and to YouTube's recently launched music search feature
News Apple Music expands artist analytics tools with global radio monitoring Artists using Apple Music's analytics tools will be able to track radio plays across 40,000 stations worldwide
News Apollo leads $700m investment into Sony Music Group partnership. (It’s a kind of magic!) Sources told MBW earlier this month that Apollo had co-funded Sony's takeover of Queen's catalog
Analysis News From Universal Music’s Q2 results to Spotify’s new ‘deluxe’ tier… it’s MBW’s Weekly Round-Up The biggest stories from the past week – all in one place…
News Confirmed: Hipgnosis Songs Fund to delist from stock exchange this month, completing Blackstone takeover Hipgnosis Songs Fund will officially delist from the London Stock Exchange
News Spotify co-founder cashes out $85.8m in stock after streamer posts record profit… as songwriters brace for $150m royalty cut this year Spotify exec shareholders have wasted little time cashing out stock following the company's share price bounce
News Spotify estimates that it would have to pay out $50m if the MLC wins its bundling lawsuit The MLC sued Spotify in the US for allegedly underpaying royalties to songwriters and publishers as a result of its decision to reclassify its Premium tiers as 'bundles'.
Analysis News Why UMG’s slowdown in streaming revenue growth is (partly) an illusion… and 4 other things we learned from Universal’s latest earnings call UMG's leadership team isn't worried about one quarter's worth of results, and says they're looking at the long term
News Alexis Lanternier appointed as the new CEO of Deezer He will succeed interim CEO Stu Bergen at the France-headquartered music streaming service