business
The Deals: A$AP Ferg Joins Roc Nation; UTA Music Signs Dillon Francis
Dillon Francis has signed with UTA Music to oversee the DJ’s film, television and alternative media pursuits in addition to his international touring business in Europe, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. Francis will continue to be represented by Canopy Media Partners and TMWRK. Having just put out his fifth record Happy Machine, Francis is working on endeavors outside of music, penning scripts for his animated series titled Gerald’s World, which is currently in development. He is also putting together a treatment for a show about his alter-ego DJ Hanzel. Big Loud Records has signed rising country singer Jake Worthington to its growing lineup of artists. Worthington, who emerged as a finalist on NBC’s The Voice in 2014,...
Olivia Rodrigo Leads 2021 American Music Awards Nominations: Full List
The AMAs added three new categories this year: favorite trending song (with nominees from TikTok on the year’s most viral songs), favorite gospel artist (to go along with the returning favorite inspirational artist) and favorite Latin duo or group. With this year’s continued expansion of the Latin field, there are now as many awards for Latin (five) as there are for pop and country. That’s remarkable because there weren’t any categories for Latin at the American Music Awards until 1998, when Julio Iglesias took the first award for favorite Latin artist. This year, there are four awards each for hip-hop and R&B and one each for rock, inspirational, gospel and dance/electronic. Three categories that were on last year’s nominations list are MIA on this year’s list: favorite social artist ...
Mort Sahl, Top Comedian & Host of First Grammy Awards Ceremony, Dies at 94
At a time when comics often traded in tired jokes about their mothers-in-law, Sahl demonstrated that he had read the paper. Mort Sahl, one of the most successful and influential comedians of the 1950s and 1960s, died Tuesday at age 94. On top of many other things, Sahl owns a little piece of Grammy history. On May 4, 1959, Sahl emceed the presentation of the first Grammy Awards in the Grand Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif. The black-tie dinner and awards presentation, which was not televised, drew such guests as Henry Mancini (whose Music From Peter Gunn won album of the year), Frank Sinatra (who was the night’s leading nominee with six nods but won only for best album cover), Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Gene Autry, Johnny Mercer and Andre Previn. Sahl was al...
Elton John, Rüfüs Du Sol Aiming for Top Debuts on Australia’s Albums Chart
It’s all still to play for, as Rüfüs Du Sol’s latest effort Surrender aims high. The Sydney electronic act, now based in Los Angeles, is coming off a career-defining release in 2018’s Solace, which was nominated for two Grammy Awards (for best dance/electronic album and best dance recording) and three ARIA Awards (winning for best dance release) and was voted as the best electronic album of 2018 by Billboard’s Dance. None of the act’s three previous albums have charted lower than No. 2. Their debut Atlas (from 2013) and Bloom (2016) both hit No. 1 in Australia, while Solace peaked at No. 2. Keep an eye out for Lana Del Rey’s chart position with Blue Banisters, which could give the American alternative pop singer her seventh Top Ten title and second album for 2021. And finally, British...
CISAC 2020 Report: Global Publishing Collections Fell 10.7% Last Year
That 10.7% overall decline for music, however, was “considerably less disastrous than was foreseen one year ago,” as Oron observed, while TV and radio — still the largest sources of income for collection management organizations — declined less than expected due to a resilient economy. At the front-end of the COVID-19 pandemic, CISAC was anticipating a 25%-30% decline in collections for 2020, based on estimate reports then from member organizations, Oron tells Billboard. As well, “digital collections have managed to mitigate the fall in other income sources in many countries,” Oron said. “The surge of digital collections globally is a tribute to the efforts of CISAC societies to change strategy, shift resources and step up digital licensing activit...
Walter ‘Herbie’ Herbert, Manager Who Helped Launch Journey, Dies at 73
He was a protege of Bill Graham, and also worked with Santana, Steve Miller Band, Roxette and Europe during his career. Longtime artist manager Walter James “Herbie” Herbert II, who worked with groups including Journey and Santana, has reportedly died. According to Variety, Herbert was 73 years old. Herbert began his career in the early 1970s working with famed promoter Bill Graham. Graham helped Herbert land a gig as a roadie for Santana, whom Graham managed at the time. Herbert befriended Santana musicians Gregg Rolie and Neal Schon, and after they went on to found Journey they recruited Herbert to work alongside them. Schon was one of the first people to acknowledge Herbert’s passing in a Facebook post Monday, saying, “I’ll cherish all the incredible times and trials and tribu...
Ryman Hospitality Properties, Inc. Revives Plans to Acquire Austin’s Block 21 Complex
The deal is set to close near the end of the fourth quarter of this year. Opry Entertainment, one division of Ryman Hospitality Properties, includes the Grand Ole Opry, Ryman Auditorium, WSM 650 AM, Ole Red, and Circle, a country lifestyle media network owned via a joint venture with Gray Television. The $260 million price tag includes the assumption of nearly $138 million of existing mortgage debt. Ryman Hospitality Properties will also receive approximately $11 million of existing cash reserves. Colin Reed, chairman and CEO of Ryman Hospitality Properties, said, “We are pleased to again have the opportunity to add this one-of-a-kind asset to our growing entertainment portfolio. Much like Nashville, Austin’s leisure and hospitality industry is recovering and is well-positioned for growth ...
Daniel O’Donnell Extends U.K. Chart Record With ‘60’
The latest, easy-listening effort is produced by Nigel Wright, who worked on the records of many Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals, including the film versions of Evita — starring Madonna and Antonio Banderas —The Phantom of the Opera, and other TV and film projects. On the LP, O’Donnell performs versions of such standards as “Let Your Love Flow”, “I’ll Never Find Another You”, “Happy To Be On An Island In The Sun” and “Somethin’ Stupid,” a duet with his wife Majella. For the record, O’Donnell is still 59. He doesn’t turn 60 until Dec. 12. You Deserve to Make Money Even When you are looking for Dates Online. So we reimagined what a dating should be. It begins with giving you back power. Get to meet Beautiful people, chat and make money in the process. Earn rewards by cha...
Here Are the Most & Least Crowded Categories for the 2022 Grammys
There are surprises galore here. Music videos are sometimes thought to be decades past their peak, but there are more entries for best music video (1,185) than for any other category — even record and song of the year. Similarly, rock is sometimes portrayed as being on its last legs, but rock leads in two classifications: There are more entries for best rock song than for any other genre song award and more entries for best rock performance than for any other genre performance award. Among genre album categories, best rock album is third, behind best score soundtrack for visual media (includes film, television, video games and other visual media) and best spoken word album (includes poetry, audiobooks and storytelling). The fact that those two categories include so many subcategories...
Elton John and Duran Duran Battle For U.K. Albums Chart Crown
Close behind is Duran Duran, whose 15th studio album Future Past (BMG) opens at No. 2. With Future Past, the alternative rock veterans could nab their highest-charting record in 38 years, since 1983’s Seven And The Ragged Tiger led the chart. Duran Duran’s most recent album, 2015’s Paper Gods, debuted and peaked at No. 5 in the U.K. Meanwhile, Lana Del Rey’s Blue Banisters (Polydor) starts at No. 3 on the chart blast. It’s the U.S. alt-pop artist’s eighth record and second release of 2021. Scottish rock favorites Biffy Clyro start at No. 4 on the midweek chart with The Myth Of The Happily Ever After (Warner Records). As the chart race enters its second stage, it’s all to play for. According to the Official Charts Company, just 4,500 chart sales currently separate the all-new Top 4. C...
Adele Sets Homecoming 2022 Concerts
Adele’s comeback track “Easy On Me” blasted to No. 1 on the Official U.K. Chart last Friday, setting records along the way. The song is roaring up the charts around the planet, as it starts at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and Global Charts, Australia’s national survey and elsewhere. “Easy On Me” is the first track lifted from Adele’s 30, her forthcoming fourth album due out Nov. 19. It’s the followup to 2015’s 25, an album so popular, Adele was crowned IFPI Global Recording Artist of the Year for the year, an award which recognizes the top artist across physical sales, downloads and streaming. Her global tour in support of that album was pure box office dynamite. When it wrapped, Adele stepped away from the public glare for five-long years, until “Easy On Me” dropped in full earlier this...
Here’s Where Justin Bieber’s ‘Peaches’ & More Top 10 Hits Are Competing for 2022 Grammy Noms
Bieber’s 2021 album, Justice, is also vying for a nod as best pop vocal album, but the victory for Bieber is that his pop/soul jam “Peaches,” which could have gone either way, is competing in R&B — along with such other hits as Silk Sonic’s “Leave the Door Open” and SZA’s “Good Days.” If “Peaches” is nominated, it would be Bieber’s first Grammy nod in an R&B category. But how about the other songs that were released in this eligibility year (Sept. 1, 2020, to Sept. 30, 2021) and became top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100? Let’s see where they wound up in the 64th annual Grammy Awards process. Note: Not all top 10 hits are listed here. Artists and their representatives are savvy enough not to flood the zone with multiple entries that could divide their support. So “Drivers Li...
