Live Music Industry News: NIVA ’25 wraps • How scalpers evade laws • Tixel to US • DJ events rule • Eventbrite study • Blue Note to LA • MoreLatest Live Music Industry News Under The LIVE INDUSTRY NEWS tab above
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How Ticket & Scalper Financing Inflates Prices and Excludes FansChris Castle on how ticket and scalper financing inflates prices and make it harder for real fans to buy. As resellers get millions in credit to hoard tickets, fans are left paying more - or missing out entirely.
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Book Store: "501 Essential Albums of the 1980s" Edited by Gary GraffMC contributor Graff has played an absolute blinder here, working with a long list of esteemed scribes (Cary Baker, Rob St. Mary, many more) to compile the 501 essential albums of the '80s. Naturally, with any sort of book like this, everyone will point to albums that should be in there but aren’t. That said, this is damned extensive. All the appropriate new wave, new romantic, pop, and hair metal albums from that decade are present and correct. But Graff makes sure that gospel, country, jazz, punk, hip-hop, soul, and just about everything else gets a fair shake too. Essential reading for anyone with even a passing interest in that decade.(Hardcover) $40The post Book Store: "501 Essential Albums of the 1980s" Edited by Gary Graff first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

Court shoots down Sarah Silverman’s case against Meta’s AI – but declares using copyrighted works for training is NOT ‘fair use’The latest ruling contradicts another ruling on AI and fair use, issued by a different judge in the same court just two days earlier
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Streaming is both retail and radio. It shouldn’t beIn a brutally simplified view of the past, the recorded music industry had two lanes: retail and radio. Piracy killed retail. Streaming killed piracy, then went on to, if not kill, then seriously maim radio. The two lanes converged into one – reverse bifurcation. 

At first, it was all upside: the consumers that retail had lost began spending on subscriptions, and audiences migrated from lower-paying broadcast radio to higher-paying streaming. However, artists and songwriters then became unhappy with per stream rates, contextualising them against retail rather than radio. Meanwhile, record labels realised they had inadvertently capped the spending of people who in previous generations had been high spending superfans. This is the problem with squeezing two highly distinct models aimed at serving opposite ends of the music aficionado / passive massive spectrum into one space. In the growth phase – when everyone was waiting for the bright future – it felt like a best of worlds. When growth slowed, however, and everyone realised how things are now is how things will always be, it began to look like an unsatisfactory compromise that delivered the best of neither. 

If streaming was only benchmarked against radio, in rightsholder remuneration terms, it would be an undisputed success. However, because rightsholders and creators alike also depend upon it for the income stream retail used to represent, critiques and criticisms have become part of streaming’s narrative. For the majority of mid-tail artists, streaming is in many respects like radio was 15 years ago. It is a badge of success, but you have little idea who listened – or any means of connecting with them. It sets up other income streams (live, sync, merch, etc), generates income (decent, but not enough to live on), and it builds audiences rather than fanbases.

Supremium: Can streaming monetise fandom?

Enter stage left supremium. The concept is logical: tap the latent spend of superfans by delivering them scarce and high value experiences and content from their favourite artists in the app where they do their music listening. The problem is that this might not be the best place to tap fandom. Streaming has made music listening more passive with playlists, stations, and other forms of algorithmic programming. Streaming took the price point from retail but the format from radio.

The risk with fitting a superfan product into streaming is that it commodifies and generalises fandom in the same way it has music. Music might be always on, but except for a small niche of obsessives, fandom is not always on for most people. Most people are fans of multiple artists and do not listen to them all the time. As our superfan report found, many do not even listen regularly to those they consider themselves fans of the most. Social has already done its bit to commodify fandom, compelling creators to become content factories to meet the algorithm’s insatiable appetite and not be forgotten by it. Social is free and so commodification is tolerated. The premise of supremium is premium scarcity – but in an always on, on-demand environment, users will expect something much more frequent than occasional. By making scarcity frequent, it will lose its specialness and, well, scarcity. Sometimes it is better to give people what they need rather than what they want, or in this instance give them less when they think they want more.

Music listening is like breakfast, you eat every day and generally do not put too much store by it. Fandom is like eating out at a fancy restaurant – something you typically do infrequently and make an occasion of. Think about the attention you pay to an artists’ YouTube notification versus their Instagram notification. The former is likely infrequent and so you pay more attention to it, the latter is ‘great, yet another notification’.

The future of music fandom

Digital fandom products can absolutely work (as long as the expectation is to convert superfans, not suddenly turn the passive massive into superfans). In MIDiA’s recent streaming pricing study, in fact, many subscribers showed willingness to convert to a tier unlocking ‘superfan’ features. However, it will be difficult for streaming to design a product that works for those it is intended to serve. It means building a mass-market, one-size offering for a consumer segment that is inherently niche and diverse. It also means that the more consumers who sign up, the less “exclusive” and scarce the subscription becomes – and therefore, success ironically breeds failure. Fandom products may need to be somewhere else to fulfil their potential. That might mean standalone apps, but we have had a good few years of fan apps trying to make 

headway and realising that consumers already have more apps than they want. 

So, the challenge is to work out where fandom products should live (and what they should be, if not the traditional retail offerings). Social platforms would be an even poorer choice. This leaves the Bifurcation go-tos of YouTube, SoundCloud, and Twitch – each of which has respective strengths and weaknesses. 

The hard truth is that there probably is no ideal location for digital fandom products right now, but streaming is probably not the right place either. Artists and labels alike need a successor to retail. This does not necessarily have to actually be retail (e.g., Bandcamp) but it does need to be somewhere where people can be fans as frequently or infrequently as they like, converse with likeminded others, express themselves, and spend on their favourite artists, whether that be actual products or digital items.  Social platforms may enable the former behaviours, but are far less efficient when it comes to the latter (spend), at least for music. Streaming may well have taken the retail part of its equation as far as it can. Now is the time for something else to grab that baton and run with it.

The Unexpected Rise of Cringe as a Music Marketing StrategyCringe content is no longer a liability — cringe is a music marketing strategy. As audiences crave authenticity over polish, artists who lean into awkward, overly earnest moments are breaking. Continue reading
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NIVA Day 3: Frank Riley, Bandsintown and YouTube’s Ali RiveraThe third day of the NIVA ’25 independent live music conference included actionable insights, a major award and the announcement of NIVA 2026. NIVA Day 3 The National Independent Venue. Continue reading
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Indie artists can now upload videos to Spotify through DistroKid’s video serviceSpotify's music video feature is available in beta in 98 markets, but the US and Canada aren't among them
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Jay Webb Signs Global Publishing Deal with Sony Music Ahead of New AlbumJay Webb, the rising country singer-songwriter from Alabama, has officially signed a worldwide publishing deal with Sony Music Publishing. The announcement comes as Webb prepares to release his second album, Where To Find Me, scheduled for July 25.A statement from the company discloses that Sony Music Publishing Nashville EVP of A&R Josh Van Valkenburg called Webb “a superstar in the making.” He highlighted Webb’s ability to connect authentically with audiences through songs that reflect real-life struggles, while also delivering catchy, feel-good anthems. “It’s an honor to be a part of his journey and to champion his songwriting career,” Van Valkenburg said.Webb’s music draws heavily on his upbringing, which was split between country backroads and city life. He began writing songs as a teenager and built a loyal fanbase by independently releasing demos and tracks. Reflecting on his new deal, Webb said, “Songwriting is where the magic happens, and it's always been my goal to write music that real people can relate to. To now have the chance to do that with Sony is a dream come true.”His recent single, “One More Shot,” showcases his raw and honest songwriting style. The song, a poignant ballad about coping with life’s challenges, was praised by All Country News for its “equal parts gravel and gospel” vocal delivery, and serves as a preview for what listeners can expect on Where To Find Me.With this new publishing partnership and a strong upcoming album, Jay Webb is positioned to take his place among country music’s most promising voices.The post Jay Webb Signs Global Publishing Deal with Sony Music Ahead of New Album first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

NIVA ’25 Day 2: Indie Live Music Community Looks ForwardNIVA '25 Day 2 was filled with actionable insights, community building and meaningful discussions about the future of independent live music. The annual convention of the National Independent Venue Association continues in Milwaukee through Wednesday.
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Paul Koehler: Full-time Drummer AND Major Artist ManagerPaul Koehler is both the drummer for the iconic emo hardcore band Silverstein and a music industry entrepreneur. In addition to touring and recording full-time for the past 25 years,. Continue reading
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Icons On Screen: Unforgettable Music Videos by Women Artists from the '80s and '90sWhat did it mean to be iconic when MTV was blossoming, and the very concept of the music video was still (relatively) undefined? From powerful political statements to trailblazing innovations in art and technology, here are some of the most unforgettable music videos by women artists from the '80s and '90s.

Grace Jones Shows Her Jazz Hands in HollywoodPhoto credit Timothy Norris, courtesy of the LA PhilharmonicOver two days in June, the Blue Note Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl saw some of the shining stars from the jazz and jazz-adjacent worlds showcase their wares. The likes of The Soul Rebels, Derrick Hodge, The Hands of Time and many more wowed a crowd of jazz heads in the gorgeous Bowl setting. On the first day, The Isley Brothers headlined but we were there for day 2 only.On the Sunday, we arrived in time for former Return to Forever bass man Stanley Clarke and his new band N 4EVER. His previous outfit were known for a progressive jazz-fusion sound that brought new fans into the jazz fold. He's continued with that theme, and his set at the Blue Note Fest was eye-opening.Photo Credit Farah Sosa, Courtesy of the LA PhilharmonicWILLOW has clearly been on a mission to stretch her legs, spread her wings and make a real go of this music lark in recent years. Her transformation from indie-alt darling to serious singer and songwriter with the ability to genuinely blend genres has been quite staggering.Her set at Blue Note was a career-spanner, though focussed on jazzier recent effort Empathogen. She got big cheers for older songs, and rose to the occasion in front of a serious music-loving audience.Photo credit Timothy Norris, courtesy of the LA PhilharmonicNobody was stealing Grace Jones' thunder though. How would that even be possible? The icon has seen so many trends come and go, and she's literally stood tall above them all.Opening with Iggy Pop's "Nightclubbing," which she covered for her album of the same name back in the day, Jones played the art-pop diva throughout. Multiple costume changes that featured multiple pieces of extravagant headwear only added to the idea that Jones is a unique individual--a genuine artist who doesn't really believe in walls and has broken through many ceilings.There were other covers that she has made her own over the years: The Police's "Demolition Man" and The Pretenders' "Private Life," plus, later, Roxy Music's "Love is the Drug." All proved that her ability to blend classic soul with art-rock has benefitted her massively.Of course, "Pull Up to the Bumper" (with guest Janelle Monáe) and the closing "Slave to the Rhythm" were the highlights. But the entire set was a joy.
Edit this setlist | More Grace Jones setlists
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Hola, Superfans! Universal Music Group opens its own retail store inside UMusic Hotel in MadridUniversal Music Group has opened its second physical retail location globally, launching the UMusic Shop inside its UMusic Hotel in Madrid. The Madrid shop joins Universal Music’s existing retail presence in Tokyo’s Harajuku district, where the company operates a flagship store. The two-floor Madrid store will open on July 8 to coincide with the city’s … Continued
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NIVA names new President and BoardThe National Independent Venue Association (NIVA) named a new President, officers and board members at his annual convention in Milwaukee this week
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