business
Mark Opitz, Record Producer for AC/DC, INXS and More, Recognized In Queen’s Birthday 2020 Honours List
Record producer and audio engineer Mark Opitz has been awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia in the 2020 Queen’s Birthday Honours List, announced Monday (June 8). The Queenslander was feted for his service to the performing arts, particularly to music production, and is one of 933 Australians honored for their outstanding achievement. Opitz is among the very best in the business, having produced albums for a string of ARIA Hall of Fame-inducted artists including INXS, Cold Chisel, AC/DC and The Divinyls. During the ’90s, Optiz served with Warner Music as head of A&R and, later, joined the executive team at Michael Gudinski’s Mushroom Group, where he was responsible for overseeing Australian artists’ music projects. Opitz also had a productive stint oversees, during whic...
Atlantic Records UK Names Former Apple Music Exec Austin Daboh Executive VP
Former Apple Music executive Austin Daboh is moving over to Atlantic Records UK as executive vp, parent company Warner Music UK (WMUK) announced Tuesday (June 9). As Apple Music’s head of editorial for the UK and Ireland, Daboh oversaw the streaming platform’s playlist ecosystem, developing the Agenda brand which built out playlists with live concerts and immersive marketing initiatives. In his new role at Atlantic UK, he will be responsible for signing and developing domestic artists, and will join the WMUK leadership team. He’ll also work with Atlantic Records in the U.S. to “break the label’s black music roster in the UK,” according to a press release. Daboh will report to Atlantic co-presidents Ed Howard and Briony Turner, reporting more broadly...
Sports Team, All Time Low & Lady Gaga Lock Horns For U.K. Albums Chart Title
English indie-pop outfit Sports Team and U.S. alternative rock veterans All Time Low are in a tight battle for this week’s No. 1 on the Official U.K. Albums Chart. At the halfway point, Sports Team’s debut album Deep Down Happy (Big Desert/Island) has an advantage of just 300 chart units over All Time Low’s eighth studio album, Wake Up Sunshine (Atlantic). Deep Down Happy has the most vinyl sales over the weekend and comes in at No. 1 on the Official Chart Update, while Wake Up, initially released in April 2020, has the most CD sales to reenter the chart at No. 2. Lady Gaga is still in the hunt with Chromatica (Interscope), which last week blasted to No. 1 with the most sales of any album this year. Chromatica is the most downloaded and streamed album of the week so far and sits ...
How We Work Now: Concord Senior VP Synch Licensing Brooke Primont
In a series amid the coronavirus pandemic, Billboard is asking individuals from all sectors of the music business to share stories of how they work now, with much of the world quarantined at home and unable to take in-person meetings, attend conferences or even go into the office. Submissions for the series can be sent to HowWeWorkNow@Billboard.com. Read the full series here. This installment is with Brooke Primont, Concord’s senior vp of synch licensing. Brooke Primont: I commute into [Manhattan] every single day. I live in a small town about 40 minutes outside of New York, so when this came down, it wasn’t as painful for me because it’s an hour and 15, sometimes two hours, door to door, depending on the day. So the idea of working from home was welcomed, in a sense. But there...
Lady Gaga’s ‘Chromatica’ Debuts at No. 1 in Australia
Lady Gaga scores her fourth No. 1 in Australia as Chromatica (Interscope/Universal) debuts at the summit of the ARIA Albums Chart. Gaga’s sixth studio set eclipses the No. 2 best of Joanne, from Oct 2016, though it’ll need some real staying power to match her soundtrack to A Star Is Born, which spent eleven weeks at No. 1 in 2018/2019. Previously, the U.S. pop superstar snagged top spot in Australia with The Fame Monster (April 2010) and Born This Way (May 2011). Also making a splash this week is Kip Moore’s Wild World (MER/Universal), which bows at a career-high No. 4. It’s the followup to Slowheart, which peaked at No. 6 in September 2017, and the November 2018 EP Room To Spare: The Acoustic Sessions, which hit No. 18. Rounding out the top five is Cold Chisel’s classic third album East (...
Lady Gaga and DaBaby Battle It Out For U.K. Chart Supremacy
Lady Gaga has a chance of securing the U.K. chart double. Though a rockstar stands in her way. DaBaby’s “Rockstar” (Interscope) featuring Roddy Ricch takes a narrow early lead in the sprint to the U.K. singles chart crown. “Rockstar” is the most streamed song in the week so far to lead the First Look survey, while “Rain On Me” (Interscope) by Gaga and Ariana Grande is close behind. “Rain On Me” has the advantage on downloads in the first two days of the chart cycle and is firmly in the race, according to the Official Charts Company. Don’t count out Gaga just yet. Her sixth and latest album Chromatica on Friday landed the biggest opening week for any artist on the U.K. albums chart this year. Making moves on the sales blast are dance tracks “Flowers” (No. 11 via A...
Ennio Morricone and John Williams Honored For Film Scores
A Spanish foundation on Friday (May 5) awarded one of the country’s most prestigious awards to composers Ennio Morricone and John Williams for their film work. The jury that decides the Princess of Asturias Awards said the Italian and American composers “have enriched hundreds of films with their talent.” The pair “demonstrate complete mastery of composition as well as narrative, building emotion, tension and lyricism at the service of cinematographic images.” Williams, 88, has scored movies such as “Star Wars,” “Jaws,” the “Indiana Jones” series and the first three “Harry Potter” films. Morricone, 91, has over the past seven decades created more than 400 scores for cinema and television. The €50,000 award ($56,700) is the first of eight prizes, including in the arts, social sciences and s...
Sony Music Launches $100M Fund to Support Social Justice & Anti-Racist Initiatives
The company has also pledged to expand mental health resources for employees and work with outside experts to advise the company on its inclusion and diversity commitments. Sony Music Group has launched a $100 million fund “to support social justice and anti-racist initiatives around the world,” the company announced Friday (June 5), noting it will immediately begin donating to “organizations that foster equal rights.” “Racial injustice is a global issue that affects our artists, songwriters, our people and of course society at large,” said Sony Music Group chairman Rob Stringer in a statement. “We stand against discrimination everywhere and we will take action accordingly with our community fully involved in effectively using these funds.” Sony Music earlier revealed it would be mat...
Movement For Black Lives Is Seeking Policing Reforms on Black Out Tuesday
The music industry is taking a day to reflect on Tuesday (June 2) as part of Black Out Tuesday/#TheShowMustBePaused, an industry-wide effort to “disconnect from work and reconnect with our community.” In conjunction with the day of reflection — which was coordinated by Atlantic Records executives Jamila Thomas and Brianna Agyemang in reaction to the police-involved killings of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and others — the Movement 4 Black Lives, a coalition of 100 black-led organizations, is calling for five days of action, each focused on a specific set of demands. “It feels important to really move the needle on how we’re relating right now and call for very specific national asks that people can drill down at a local level in response to persisten...
A Letter From Billboard: Why the Show Must Be Paused
The racism and police brutality we’ve seen across the country in recent weeks has been devastating — and even more punishing in what was already a terrifying time of health and economic crisis. Yet the violence has been all too familiar for the Black community, to whom we owe so much of our greatest music. Two young music executives, Jamila Thomas and Brianna Agyemang, decided that business couldn’t go on as usual without both music companies and consumers placing as high a value on the lives of Black creators as they do on their art, sagely declaring that “the show must be paused.” On the website for what’s been dubbed “Black Out Tuesday,” they’ve encouraged the music sector to use June 2 “for an honest, reflective, and productive...
Lady Gaga’s ‘Chromatica’ Sets Impressive Pace For Midweek U.K. Chart Lead
Lady Gaga’s Chromatica (Interscope) is sprinting to the U.K. chart title. At the midweek stage, Gaga’s sixth studio album is outperforming the rest of the top 20 combined, the Official Charts Company reports. The new LP, which dropped last Friday (May 29), leads across all formats — physical, download and streaming — and is the fastest-selling vinyl album on the year, based on three days of sales. Across all formats, Chromatica has shifted more than 40,000 chart sales to take top spot on the Official U.K. Albums Chart Update. Gaga has tasted life at the U.K. Albums Chart summit on three occasions, with 2009’s The Fame/The Fame Monster, which was packaged as one album in the U.K.; 2011’s Born This Way and 2013’s Artpop. Elsewhere on the midweek albums chart, Norwegian prod...
Here’s What Streaming Services Are Doing for Black Out Tuesday and Beyond
Spotify, Bandcamp, SiriusXM and more are meeting the moment with a range of initiatives. As protests sparked by the death of 46-year-old Minneapolis resident George Floyd heated up this weekend, music companies began making statements in support of the movement to end police brutality against black Americans. On Friday, a number of companies and artists began sharing a statement posted under the hashtag #TheShowMustBePaused, which calls for “a day to disconnect from work and reconnect with our community” and “an urgent step of action to provoke accountability and change.” Started by Atlantic Records marketing executives Brianna Agyemang and Jamila Thomas, who are both black, the call for a day of action — which is now being called “Black Out Tuesday” — sparked other compa...
