Round-up of music industry and music tech news

Rolling Stone to Launch Its Own Music Charts in Challenge to Billboard
Rolling Stone is planning to launch its own music charts on Monday (May 13), competing with the Billboard 200 and the Hot 100, as Vanity Fair and Variety point out. The “Rolling Stone Charts” will include a singles chart updated daily, rather than every week. Rolling Stone also plans to incorporate more streaming data and make the ranking calculations more transparent. Three other weekly charts that will launch Monday are the Rolling Stone Artist 500, ranking the most-streamed artists; the Rolling Stone Trending 25, a list of the fastest-moving songs based on a number of metrics; and the Rolling Stone Breakthrough 25, which will look at artists who have entered the charted for the first time.

How New Age Music Journalists are Turning Their Passion Into a Music Industry Career
“I wholeheartedly recommend that all journalists branch out and try new things, whether it’s managing an artist they really believe in, curating events, or even A&Ring,” says Millan. Leverage the connections, too. “I was able to connect with top tier producers in the industry that allowed me to place records with underground artists before they signed with major labels,” says Delancy about his blogger days when he also worked as a manager. These connections have been very important to my success in this industry so far.”

Groundbreaking Metadata Alliance Announced Between Music, Film, TV Industries
The music industry is notorious for its disastrously disorganized metadata and billions in unmatched royalties. But despite extremely contentious accusations of incompetence and outright fraud, a number of companies are potentially forcing accountability through tech solutions.

The Unstoppable Rise of Music Streaming
According to Nielsen’s 2018 Year-End Music Report, Americans streamed a record of more than 900 billion songs during the past 12 months. At 611 billion, the number of on-demand audio streams grew by 49 percent in 2018, as subscription-based services such as Spotify and Apple Music grew increasingly popular among American music lovers.

Farewell, YouTube Premium? Video Platform Unveils Free, Ad-Supported Originals Offering
Despite the presence of more than 2 billion monthly active users (MAUs), YouTube executives are struggling to get people to sign up for its paid services. Notably, YouTube Premium & Music Premium.

Strategies for Overcoming Fear and Making It Your Superpower
Luckily, I had practiced using fear, doubt and vulnerability as a way to deeply connect with clients. It’s the art of being fully present in the moment and having zero expectations of myself or those before me. Even though I didn’t know the music industry, I knew I understood business. And because I wasn’t wasting energy fueling the fear and doubt, I was able to make connections between my existing knowledge and the gaps in their business. I had done my homework, so I was able quickly to point out opportunities and show them how I could grow their business in a matter of weeks.

40 Years of Music Industry Sales
Looking back at four decades of U.S. music industry sales data is a fascinating exercise as it charts not only the rise and fall the record company profits, but seismic shifts in technology and consumer behavior as well.

10 Ways The Music Industry Will Change In 10 Years
With more music being created than ever before, artists will need to use their singles and albums as marketing tools to open doors, while anchoring on to other industries such as clothing, film, TV, etc. as a means to build their bank accounts. Today’s true music superstars had already diversified pre-streaming and don’t have the added weight of needing to stand-out from the flood of music being created today.

What Every Musician Should Do Before Releasing an Album or Single
In the Ultimate Album Release Checklist will find information about digital and physical distribution methods. How to get artists profiles on Spotify, iTunes and YouTube. How to sign up for a PRO, get copyrights and collect royalties. Learn about sales tracking and Billboard music charts. How to set up preorders and the new Spotify Pre-saves and Apple Music Pre-adds. Tips on how to get a musician’s Knowledge Graph panel on Google’s search engine results page. And, some cool new growth hacking tools for musicians.