- 13 minutes ago
From restructuring at Universal Music Group to legal disputes between Summer Walker and her label and the landmark court ruling about termination rights, October 2026 shaped up to be a busy month in the music industry. On this special bonus episode of Billboard On The Record, host Kristin Robinson sits down with Billboard executive editor of business Dan Rys to break down some of the month’s biggest headlines.
Love what you hear? Don’t forget to rate, review and subscribe so you never miss an episode of Billboard On The Record.
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Billboard On The Record is a podcast in partnership with SickBird Productions.
Host:
Kristin Robinson
Executive Producers:
Diona DaCosta
Jade Watson
Produced By:
Kayla Forman
Mateo Vergara
Edited By:
Rachel Derbyshire
Love what you hear? Don’t forget to rate, review and subscribe so you never miss an episode of Billboard On The Record.
Love what you hear? Follow Billboard On The Record on Instagram, TikTok, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Youtube @billboard so you never miss an episode.
Billboard On The Record is a podcast in partnership with SickBird Productions.
Host:
Kristin Robinson
Executive Producers:
Diona DaCosta
Jade Watson
Produced By:
Kayla Forman
Mateo Vergara
Edited By:
Rachel Derbyshire
Category
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MusicTranscript
00:04hello and welcome to on the record a music business podcast from billboard and sickbird
00:09productions as always i'm your host kristen robinson and today we are here on a monday
00:13on a special bonus episode of the podcast where we break down the biggest headlines of the past
00:18month today i'm going to be joined by executive editor of business dan rice once again to talk
00:24through those headlines and tell you guys what you need to know for the month ahead
00:28also i wanted to make sure that you guys know that on wednesday we are going to be coming back
00:32with
00:32our regularly scheduled episode of the podcast this week it's going to be with jason lipschitz
00:37who's the co-chief content officer at billboard and we're going to be talking about the business
00:41of boy bands and his new book on one direction so be sure to stay around for that but let's
00:47start
00:47to my conversation with dan all right dan rice executive editor of business at billboard welcome
00:52back to the pod thank you so much for having me again all right okay so we are going to
00:56do a monthly
00:57news breakdown and we're going to break down four stories today i'm going to read those out for
01:00you guys now so you know what's ahead um so first things first we're going to talk about umg's shake
01:05up they've had a lot of restructuring over there then we're going to talk about summer walker's
01:10dispute with interscope records then we'll talk about the copyright termination case that everyone
01:15is talking about and finally goldman sachs's music in the air report is out so we'll get into those
01:21numbers as well um but first first things first let's talk about universal universal music group and
01:26their new shakeup so here's the headline universal music group shakeup def jam polydor and interscope
01:33execs to exit company as the company completes their 2024 restructure plan so a little bit more on this
01:40is that there's been a lot of layoffs restructuring and now even promotions at umg the world's largest
01:48music company so top execs like the ceo of def jam interscope's co-heads of anr polydor's president
01:55uh some c-suite executives over at umg uk and the heads of umg ireland and switzerland austria
02:03have left the company as part of this um so you're also seeing below that some restructuring and
02:10layoffs within rank and file employees as well that includes people at capital motown mca and more
02:16dan you and i have both been reporting on this so i just kind of want to start by asking
02:21you
02:21why is this happening now in 2024 that was the last time that the majors really went through this
02:29big public what i what i refer to as molting um essentially uh back then universal announced
02:37a plan that over the course of three years would result in 250 million dollars in annualized savings
02:44um initially that was a big wave of reconfiguration um into what we had been referring to as the loose
02:54east coast west coast label structure that they had actually previously employed but this re reorganized
03:01everything under republic on the east coast and interscope capital on the west coast that led to
03:08a lot of layoffs at the time a lot of re reconfiguration um in terms of putting some services in
03:17what they
03:17refer to as more central services um where each individual imprint did not necessarily have their own teams
03:24in every department then there was a little bit of a calming um and i think what we saw in
03:32the past month
03:33was the furthering of that initial 2024 plan to get to the end of that 250 million annualized cost savings
03:42and that's not to say that all of that is over now um but that was the impetus as to
03:47why this was
03:48happening and why it was happening now yeah i mean honestly for me i even i as a reporter who
03:54reported on
03:54this in 2024 with you and then we both reported on this again in 2026 i kind of forgot that
03:59they had actually
04:00promised in 2024 that this would be over by the end of 2026 and here we are we're approaching november
04:07now so um it basically was all going according to the plan that they already told people publicly in
04:132024 it's just like hard to remember um after how much culling happened in 2024 that it actually was
04:19not over and that it was going to happen again um so this was kind of a i see it
04:23as kind of like a
04:24buzzer beater to get down to those cost savings i think the other aspect of it is that it also
04:28came
04:29amid this broader financial conversation involving the universal music group where after their second
04:35quarter earnings were released uh their stock took a 25 dive uh overnight i believe and um there's been
04:45like broader pressure from investors and analysts for universal to cut costs and i think that that was
04:52what a lot of people you know us included had initially thought that this was related to the fact
04:58that it was actually related to the 2024 announcement um leaves open some questions as to whether there would
05:06be further cuts in the future or whether this would be it you know in that in that respect um
05:13the answer is
05:14that we don't really know um but that you know this is again kind of part of a broader thing
05:21that
05:21all of the major record companies are going through as they reposition themselves to become essentially
05:27more digital first companies given the change in technology yeah i mean this this definitely is an
05:34industry-wide thing umg just being the world's largest music company is going to be the most visible and also
05:38given they're publicly traded sometimes like when you get up to a certain amount of cost savings you do have
05:42to
05:43disclose this and talk about it and so that's why we know a lot more about umg than some of
05:47these
05:47other layoffs that have certainly taken place over the course of this year or restructuring that's
05:52taken place over the course of this year um so you know i i'm even hearing about other companies
05:57the week that we're filming this uh that have been going through layoffs um it it feels like
06:03unfortunately for a lot of artists and managers and lawyers like they're waking up to figure out that
06:09the initial team that they had signed with at whichever record label it is that's doing these
06:15layoffs they're waking up and realizing oh my anr is gone now or my champion marketing yeah like they're
06:22gone or the sync person that really had my back and really believed in my project is out and um
06:27i think
06:28that's the thing that gets lost sometimes when we look at these from a high level is that there's some
06:33people who lost their champions at these record companies in the past few months and i feel for
06:39them i i sincerely hope the best for for everyone who uh has you know active record deals right now
06:46that are seeing their teams switch up right out from under their feet um but you know yeah and i
06:52think
06:52you know it's worth thinking of what the effect will be in the future um obviously you know layoffs in
06:58the
06:59record industry this this is not a new thing this is certainly something that happens you know every
07:03couple years unfortunately um and artists over the years have often had to deal with exactly what you
07:09just mentioned i think some of the other aspects of this is that now you have potentially hundreds of
07:15very talented music executives and employees that are unemployed and that then can reconstitute and
07:23reinvigorate what we've already seen as a certainly a re-energized independent
07:28music scene so you know one of the things that we always talk about is okay so what are the
07:34other
07:34companies that are going to emerge out of this kind of talent pool that now is looking around for
07:39the next thing to do yeah i mean okay what's also super interesting about what you just said
07:43i i completely agree like there's going to be i think a huge boom in kind of independent record
07:50labels independent management companies independent publishers that come out of these executives who are
07:55out of work and looking for some new leadership position to create for themselves but what's
08:00really interesting is these majors have really shifted to uh have a model where they they offer
08:07distribution services or publishing administration services which are kind of like the the pipes that
08:13all of these independent companies will need and so funny enough like some of these executives who have
08:19been laid off from major music companies or large independent music companies and are starting their own they might
08:25actually still end up working as part of these larger companies because they need the distributor
08:32relationship or they need the publishing admin relationship um it's it's really fascinating how
08:38the market is shifting towards i i i foresee it being a lot of small independent labels that are all
08:44running through the same pipes essentially zeroing back in on umg specifically with their restructure the
08:49restructure is not just layoffs there's also some promotions that are in the pipeline and you know
08:55we've gotten the names of quite a few people who are set to have promotions but not all of those
08:59have been
08:59announced yet which is very interesting to me so over the coming weeks i would definitely watch out
09:05for a few names and what new positions they're going to hold at umg one of the ones i really
09:09have
09:10my eye on is tyler arnold he's a young executive he is i believe the ceo of mercury is his
09:15official
09:15title um but he's been killing it and i could very well see him getting a great promotion within that
09:22realm um over the next few weeks we already know his name is confirmed as one of the people who
09:26will
09:26get some sort of a promotion we just don't know what it is um additionally we do know a few
09:31names that
09:32actually have already gotten their promotions we have michelle on who's been up to become the
09:37president and chief creative officer at interscope geffen a&m and then laura carter and ramon alvarez
09:43michael are going to be the co-presidents of urban at iga as well so there's a lot more to
09:49come and i
09:50think we'll probably see it all by the end of the year so yeah and i think that you know
09:54broadly
09:54speaking you can look at this as essentially a youth movement i mean tyler is you know in his 30s
10:01i think you'll see um justin and imran and island get bigger roles and they're still you know
10:07on the on the rise as executives themselves um this is a new generation stepping up and stepping
10:13into larger leadership roles within the universal structure yeah great point okay let's move on to
10:19our next headline summer walker can break her record deal but there's a 50 million dollar catch
10:25so summer walker signed to interscope in 2017 and she's calling on a california labor code tracing back
10:33to an 1872 law which limits personal service contracts to seven years in california and she
10:39wants to terminate her deal but the problem is is that she actually has not finished her deal with
10:44interscope so for those who are not familiar record deals actually run on how many albums you've
10:49committed to rather than a set number of years so basically she has not finished her album commitments
10:55but she is over that seven-year mark which she has mentioned um so now interscope is suing her for
11:01trying to leave seeking 50 million in profits lost on albums that summer has still not delivered to
11:07them so there was this 1987 exemption to the seven-year rule um which was lobbied by the music industry
11:14by the way um which lets labels do this so that they can try to get back some of the
11:19profit that they
11:19lose when these record deals are not actually completed um so this is this is quite messy uh
11:26whenever you see a record label suing their artist you know that they're at kind of a last resort kind
11:32of place um dan what's your what's your sense of how far this lawsuit will actually go though i think
11:39uh
11:39your point is a good one um you know a record company would never wants to sue an artist um
11:46and i think
11:47that you know i i don't necessarily anticipate this going to a trial in any sense of the word um
11:56you know i think really the crux of it is it's a tough one i mean breaking new artists is
12:02the most
12:03expensive thing that a record company does um they have to make a lot of bets on a lot of
12:08a lot of
12:09different you know rising acts and really hope that one or two of them breaks through and eventually can
12:16pay them back on all of the different bets that they've made it um it is some form gambling in
12:22that respect um with a little bit of science involved um but uh you know then at the same
12:28time you see someone like summer who you know has really grown into this artist who is consistently
12:35delivering number one number two albums i'm sure that's that's where in a scope comes with this number
12:40is they're saying if she gave us two more albums we'd be making this amount of money off of it
12:46um and you know summer wants as as is probably you know understandable she wants a bigger cut of what
12:55she's uh what she had initially signed back in the day so you can see both sides of it i
13:01don't
13:01anticipate this being something that you know where we get to see all of the terms of the contract and
13:06all
13:09conversation yeah i think we're definitely going to see this settle um i mean that's my guess of
13:15course but i mean this is not the first time that this has happened where an artist and a record
13:19label have gotten into it over the seven-year rule uh forza ruhida uh they invoked this against rancho
13:25humilde and then also her sued her record label back in 2022 so this is something that is happening
13:31i think what's really interesting about this is it seems like based on what we've seen from this
13:36lawsuit that summer walker had a five album deal and a five album deal is quite customary historically
13:43in the music industry but in the last few years we've started to see record deals get way more
13:48flexible than that and way more short term so we're seeing a lot more people opting for things like
13:53distribution deals which means they take a much smaller cut maybe it's more flexible of when you leave
13:59um you know i don't think you're seeing a ton of new like super hot acts that have a little
14:04bit of
14:04leverage signing a deal this long of a term of course it all depends like i don't want to say
14:10no one's signing a five album deal but um you know i'm wondering in the future with this seven-year
14:17rule
14:17like if we're going to see less disputes about it as record deals start to get shorter and more
14:22more flexible but only time will tell so it's interesting let's move on to our next headline the
14:30supreme court's copyright termination music case explained what happened and what happens next
14:37okay so termination rights are basically part of u.s copyright law which allows artists and songwriters
14:42to terminate an agreement that they made with their publisher label decades before and get all of their
14:48rights back so this is a really really big deal for artists and songwriters to be able to ask for
14:54the
14:55termination of their copyright with their initial agreement that they signed decades before and to get it back
15:00but there's been this whole dispute about how you interpret this because this is part of u.s copyright
15:06law and so you know of course publishers and labels have said well this is u.s specific so you
15:12can get
15:12your u.s rights terminated and sent back to you but not everything around the world we get to keep
15:17the uk we get to keep europe we get to keep asia we get to keep south america
15:22but you know obviously artists and songwriters would love to get all of it back so that's been the thing
15:27that
15:27has been in dispute and basically the supreme court has upheld that actually songwriters and
15:34artists who properly do this whole process of termination can actually get their rights back
15:38worldwide and the big problem with this for labels and publishers is that you know some of them weren't
15:45anticipating this some of them have bought catalogs not thinking that worldwide all of those rights might
15:51go away for them someday um or they've invested in the artist or songwriter assuming that they would
15:56always have some of these rights at least x us um so dan i'm curious like what you've been hearing
16:03about this case um how are artists and songwriters feeling about it how are the labels and publishers
16:08feeling yeah so there's a lot um going on here and this is one of those things that we love
16:13to talk
16:13about as being uh uh uh it's very dense on the surface but it is supremely important um yeah you
16:21know to your point you know this has been part of u.s copyright law for um decades now at
16:27that after 35
16:28years you could get your you could petition and get your rights back in the u.s obviously the united
16:32states is the largest music market in the world but as you just pointed out big world out there and
16:38there's a lot of revenue that's on the table the major labels in particular are you know companies
16:44that carry a lot of catalog and if that catalog starts to you know terminate away from them that
16:52that kind of nest egg that they're sitting on that uh has been the traditional kind of business model
16:58dating back you know to the 50s you know even further than that yeah that becomes threatened and you
17:05know even as we pointed out earlier um on this podcast that you know publicly traded companies
17:11like warner and universal are you know that becomes a tough thing for them uh if the perception is that
17:17they're losing uh that that big kind of catalog on the artist side this ruling or sort of a a
17:26lack
17:26of ruling from the supreme court because really what it was is that the majority of justices uh had to
17:32recuse themselves allowing the lower court decision to stand that means that they are in line for
17:39something potentially uh that they didn't really think was possible uh this this idea that u.s
17:47reversion could apply globally and so of course there's a lot of interest here there's a lot of potential
17:54money on the table there's a lot of um anxiety on both sides and there's a lot more to come
17:59here as
18:00well because this isn't really a binding um decision i think what right now we're waiting for
18:07further lawsuits to come both in new york and or la that could set further precedent and then bring it
18:14back to the supreme court in a way that the supreme court will actually have to rule out and i
18:18think
18:18that is something to keep an eye on for sure yeah this is certainly something that is not over but
18:23this
18:23does bode well so far for artists and songwriters who want to get their rights back and honestly what
18:28artists and songwriter doesn't want to get their rights back after 35 years obviously but one thing
18:33that i think is going to be really interesting about termination rights in the future is that
18:37this could present a really big opportunity for independent music companies so it's very possible
18:43that an artist and saw an artist or songwriter they want to get their rights back they properly go
18:49through the termination process and they do get that stuff back to them whether it is us or globally
18:54they get all their rights back and then they have the choice of who they partner with next
18:58you know usually you do need someone to help you collect your royalties so you're going to have to
19:02partner with someone but you can get any kind of deal you want and if you're a legend and you've
19:07cemented yourself in the popular music canon over the last 35 years with your iconic works
19:12you can shop it around to pretty much anyone and they'll want to work with you and they'll give
19:16you really nice terms that were never possible 35 years ago so i think this is going to pose
19:21a really good opportunity for independent music publishers and independent record labels and
19:27distributors to start bidding on these iconic works that have now come back to the songwriter and the
19:32artist and it's going to be great for the artist and songwriter too so they can make a an informed
19:39choice now 35 years into their career or 35 years into making a certain song or you know whatever
19:46uh to make a new choice about who they want to work with well it and it provides more opportunity
19:53for some of the majors to get involved in you know artist careers that they hadn't been involved in
19:58before but also i think one of the things that's fascinating about this is when you think about how
20:02the chain goes you know you said yes it opens up possibilities for independent companies it also forces
20:08all of these companies to be a little more innovative right to to try to offer a little bit more
20:13to entice some of
20:15these um some of these artists to bring their their entire business over to one of these companies it
20:21should raise rates as you pointed out to make everything more competitive and it should keep
20:27everybody on their toes in a business um in terms of the catalog business specifically that has often
20:35often seemed like a bit of like a oh we'll do reissues like a bit of a an afterthought kind
20:39of thing
20:40and make it more into an active part of the business and as we're seeing more and more private equity
20:47companies coming in and buying up rights and things like that to your point they're also going to need
20:51music companies to administer this kind of thing to collect on their behalf to help you know raise the
20:57value of these catalogs and i think it'll it'll ultimately if all of this stands really benefit
21:05artists and songwriters um moving forward yeah yeah all right let's move on to our final one so
21:11we're looking at goldman sachs music in the air report this is something that they put out every single year
21:16um and so goldman sachs raises music industry growth forecast for the first time in three years
21:22okay so i'm going to go over a few of the key things i found within the music in the
21:26air report
21:27and we'll talk through it so first things first i thought it was interesting uh the goldman sachs report
21:32was saying that we should expect more regular price hikes from streaming services so basically
21:37what they found was that streaming services once they did their first price hike pretty recently
21:43they didn't actually have a lot of people leave the service people were not churning as they call it
21:47people were sticking around they still want their spotify subscription they still want their apple
21:51music subscription whatever it is and so goldman sachs is predicting that we're going to start seeing
21:56this happen more regularly like every 12 to 24 months that we're going to see a price hike
22:00and while that is great for you know more music coming into uh the royalty pool obviously for
22:08consumers kind of sucks to see that you're going to have to pay more for spotify every year
22:12um but you know that is still a prediction so we'll see another thing that goldman sachs pointed out is
22:18that they upped their forecast for the for recorded music revenue from 55 billion in june 2025 up to 56
22:26.1
22:26billion in 2026 another thing uh goldman sachs projects a 10 percent uplift in the music business
22:33due to ai and new kind of opportunities for revenue streams from that that previously did not exist
22:40but they also point out that ai could still pose a threat so as much as it poses this opportunity
22:45for
22:4610 higher growth it could also undercut the royalty pool if a bunch of ai music ends up on streaming
22:52services and ends up competing with human made music in the market which we're already seeing
22:56and we've been reporting on that a lot and then the last thing that i wanted to point out is
23:00that
23:00live music keeps powering growth and goldman says that live revenue is forecasted to grow six percent in
23:072026 so live music's not slowing down although concert ticket prices seem extremely high and it's a shocker
23:14that people can still afford to go out to some of these shows at the prices that they are set
23:19at
23:20it's still growing people still want to be outside uh and i mean honestly to me dan like reporting on
23:26ai
23:27i feel like i'm seeing this kind of um i'm seeing this shift towards irl experiences people want to be
23:34outside they want to be connecting in person when you can't trust anything you're seeing online and
23:39there's slop everywhere and you know there's all this backlash to what we're seeing in tech i think that
23:44it makes a lot of sense to me that there would be a premium place on live music but i'm
23:48curious for
23:48you like dan what do you think are are some of the most important takeaways of this report yeah so
23:53i think it's uh this report is uh i think met with a little bit of skepticism in the music
24:02business
24:02itself uh due to the numbers i think that people don't necessarily believe the numbers that goldman
24:07puts out there uh at the same time i do think it's directionally um on point i mean i think
24:14when you think about you know live music keep continuing to grow i mean it's it is truly like
24:22monumental some of the numbers that like live nation is is putting up um you mentioned concert
24:28ticket prices like the fact that people are still willing to pay this stuff is it is giving the music
24:34the live music business no reason to shy away from it you know yeah um but i also think that
24:39you're
24:39seeing you're seeing investment in this as well um there's more music venues being built because
24:46you know a lot of this uh i think price stuff also has to do with the fact that there's
24:52just not as many
24:53places for some of these top tier acts to be playing all the time and so that creates and then
25:01you're
25:01seeing artists like harry styles not do two nights at madison square garden three nights in madison square
25:06garden he's doing six weeks at madison square garden you know you're seeing every one of these
25:10major headliners not just do one night in a city and move on they're doing two or three nights in
25:14the city and moving on that creates scheduling conflicts for everybody and then you're seeing
25:20more and more music venues being built in a lot of these major venues i think that then you'll see
25:26more stadium shows more arena shows and that's just going to kind of continue to build on itself
25:30i see that as you know again directionally accurate from the report i think the ai thing
25:36um it really does depend you know we were talking about some different tools that may be coming
25:42online in the next couple months um that would be purely additive to um musicians bottom lines and
25:50uh i think that you know that even gets into another point that the the report made um about super
25:57fans
25:57and direct to consumer um you know i think that there was some and even you know this the price
26:03hike thing there was always a little bit of like uh walking on eggshells around but how much are people
26:09going to really be willing to pay and once that ceiling was sort of cracked a little bit now you're
26:14seeing those price hikes come up and now you're seeing well what if we offer this what if we offer
26:19this
26:19could you know would a fan pay 3.99 for this you know what if we offered a little bit
26:26extra this you
26:27know and i think that the report is really reflecting the fact that the more the industry kind of you
26:34know
26:34takes little steps forward on that they're not seeing really much pushback and so it's really opening
26:41the business's eyes to being like well maybe there is more revenue out here that we can capture
26:47yeah it is a little unfortunate because i think like super fans you know to some extent are going
26:53online and complaining about ticket prices they're complaining about the cost of merch when you go to
26:57the show they are complaining about the price but also it seems that they are still willing to pay it
27:02in the end and so that emboldens people to keep going with it um but you know i want to
27:08i want to go
27:09back to the to the ai point yes okay maybe there are these new revenue streams that are going to
27:16appear
27:16because of these new ai licensing deals that are being struck and some of these things do seem
27:20additive um like spotify is working on this ai music remixing feature and if you opt in to be part
27:26of
27:27that remix feature it's considered a bonus add-on to a spotify subscription this is not launched yet but
27:32you know it's going to cost extra if a subscriber wants to have access to do ai remixing
27:38um and you know that's a new royalty pool um that is going to potentially generate some some decent
27:45money for those who are participating but the thing that i'm really concerned about with you know these
27:50projections that ai is going to bring this new growth to the music industry is who is benefiting
27:56most from this because yeah 10 growth would be great that would be great obviously but i just don't
28:03really know how much this is going to trickle down to the individual songwriter the individual artist
28:08um you know we just don't know much about how the rates are actually going to look and i don't
28:13mean
28:13to discourage you know people from from trying i mean if it opens up a new revenue stream that's great
28:18but we're looking at this from a very macro perspective right now and 10 is great for the
28:23industry overall but for an individual songwriter who participates in one of these things and let's
28:28say they're a little nervous about doing it a lot of them are they're really nervous about
28:32their fans perception of what they're doing with the with with ai licensing all that stuff if they're
28:37willing to take the risk i just really hope that they actually see some good return on that risk
28:42and i'm not really sure that they will so well and actually to that exact point i think you know
28:48when we're talking about 10 growth we're talking about 10 growth to the industry yeah okay uh who's
28:55getting that money and i think that that's really uh a question that i think should be asked more you
29:01know okay the industry as a whole is going to get 10 more revenue of that okay is six percent
29:10of that
29:10revenue going to go to the one percent of the one percent of artists who want to remix a taylor
29:15swift
29:15song because she's the biggest artist in the world like is my favorite band going to benefit from this
29:20remix uh thing probably not you know like who is is that middle class of artists really going to benefit
29:27from something like that i don't know we'll have to see what these kind of tools and models look like
29:31and how the revenue structures work out but i think you know that's another thing about this
29:37kind of report it's like this amorphous music business will grow by all of these billions of
29:43dollars but we all of the songwriters and artists who are powering this business we're not sure if that
29:49means a couple extra pennies on you know the royalty check every three months you know yeah i think all
29:56the things that we've talked about like especially going back to the super fans point the ai point you
29:59were just making i think that like for the established artist with a rabid fan base they stand to benefit
30:05from a lot of these developments like higher ticket prices people will pay a lot of money to go see
30:10a top
30:10tier artist people pay a lot of money for merch people pay a lot of money to maybe maybe to
30:16remix their song
30:17using ai on one of these platforms whether it's spotify or clay or gray or all these other ones
30:22that are set to launch soon um these are all things that i totally see the vision for as being
30:29beneficial for the top tier of artists but for the people who are still establishing themselves
30:34it's really hard to get someone to pay uh even more money for a ticket for an artist who's playing
30:40a 500 cap room like i don't really know if they're going to see the benefits of like the super
30:45fan
30:45growth in the same way that the top tier will but you know these all remain to be seen um
30:51but
30:52to close us out i want to start a new tradition on our monthly news roundup and that is honorable
30:58mentions because we only broke down four stories today there's a million more that we did this month
31:04between us and the rest of our staff here at billboard so dan what is an honorable mention
31:10story from the last month that you think that all of our listeners here should go and read about
31:14after this podcast well i'll just bring up one that's top of mind because uh it published while
31:20we were here talking um which was the the q3 uh market share report which i just did uh which
31:27you
31:28know it's it's always it's fascinating to me to see the jockeying between all of the record labels
31:34the distributors and everything um on a quarter by quarter basis and you're you're really seeing how
31:39uh realignments but also acquisitions are continuing to to reshape the music business
31:46the u.s music business specifically and in this quarter the thing that jumped out to me the most
31:52is uh virgin music groups full acquisition of downtown is now starting to see uh to reflect itself and um
32:03um you're seeing universal's market share jump but also virgin which has been you know in second
32:12place to the orchard as the premier distribution channel in the united states for a very long time
32:18the orchard has been there's this like class above for years now virgin's really making some big gains
32:25now because of this downtown acquisition and we're going to continue to see how this manifests itself
32:29moving forward um but you know you're also seeing columbia has been on an upswing because of ella langley
32:36you know you're seeing how atlantic is being uh able to kind of you know throw its weight around a
32:44little bit because they've rolled up 10k and ada and 300 into their market share um and just some of
32:51the shifts you know as we're given the realignment that we talked about earlier in the podcast you know
32:56these numbers really kind of wind up showing how that manifests itself in the marketplace and i think
33:01that's fascinating yeah that's a great point and i definitely want to look up those virgin numbers
33:06right after this and see how they've changed um and it also i think you know you pointed out with
33:11columbia it's amazing how one massive hit like choose in texas can change the fortunes for a label for
33:16that quarter or that year um it is really amazing how big a hit can get um and choose in
33:23texas as we've
33:24seen has been smashing records left and right so not a big surprise there um so my honorable mention
33:29to end us off is the copyright royalty board it would take me an hour to properly explain to you
33:36guys exactly how the copyright royalty board works but trust me when i say that it's very important
33:41um basically there we're at the very beginning stages as of this past month of what will probably
33:47eventually become a trial over what songwriters should be paid in the united states on streaming services
33:53for a five-year period of time this is redone every five years and basically all the stakeholders so
34:00like music publishers who get paid for these royalties songwriters streaming services they all
34:05come together and at this thing called the copyright royalty board and they have to kind of argue their
34:10case before a set of three judges about what they think that the streaming royalty rate for songwriters
34:15should be for that next five-year period um so this is very consequential and stakes are high um and
34:22i
34:22would say that there's a lot of animosity between the stakeholders right now in ways that we didn't
34:28see during the last five-year period uh the nmpa the national music publishers association or the trade
34:33organization representing music publishers uh has had quite a big beef with spotify i'll leave it at that
34:40there's tons of coverage that we've done on the copyright realty board and on that dispute between
34:45the two and i think you're just going to see this be a bit of a fight for the next
34:50year so we're at
34:51the beginning stages there's still time to catch up i have an explainer on it on our site um but
34:56with that
34:57dan rice thank you so much for coming to on the record and bringing down the news with me
35:01thank you so much for having me it's always a pleasure
35:04all right all right well you've been listening to on the record a music business podcast from
35:09billboard and sickbird productions i'm your host kristen robinson and follow us on social media on
35:13instagram and tiktok at billboard on the record so you can see new clips of the show every single week
35:17we'll see you next time