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Meet Me @ the Altar Talk With Rock Sound

Meet Me at the Altar
Jason Tate

Meet Me @ the Altar talked with Rock Sound about their new EP:

 I feel like it was a long time coming, weirdly enough. We were always going to come back to this sound, because this is where our hearts are. We love this genre and being a heavy band, and we definitely missed it when we strayed from it. We don’t regret moving away from it when we did, but playing heavier music is more in line with what we love. Just seeing everything change in front of us, we were like, ‘Okay, we already know what we have to do. Let’s just do it.’ I don’t even think a conversation needed to be had. It was just like, ‘Yeah, this is what we’re doing, and we’re going to do it.’ And we did.

Reports: Spotify to Raise Prices Next Year

Jason Tate

TechCrunch:

Spotify is planning to raise subscription prices in the U.S. in the first quarter of next year, according to a new report from the Financial Times. The move will mark the streaming service’s first price rise in the US since July 2024. The company recently raised prices in several other countries, including the U.K., Switzerland, and Australia.

A Spotify subscription currently costs $11.99 a month in the U.S. When the service first launched in the country 14 years ago, it cost $9.99 per month.

The report says JPMorgan analysts have estimated that a $1-per-month price increase in the U.S. could increase Spotify’s annual revenue by about $500 million.

To pay artists more, right?

Matt Pryor Talks With Spin

Matt Pryor
Jason Tate

Matt Pryor sat down with Spin to talk about his recent album:

One of the ways he stimulated that creative energy was via a daily writing practice, scribing 1,000 words every morning “just to see if I could do it,” he shared. Initially, some of those essays wound up on his popular Substack and social media. “I found myself writing about the six months from the end of the Four Minute Mile tour, which ended at the Union Transfer in Philadelphia, to going into the hospital and then getting out and into recovery groups.” As he started working on his new album, Pryor said he decided to stick with that theme. “I wanted to write all these stories down because I thought I might subconsciously try to forget the bad times.”

Universal, Warner, and Sony Strike Licensing Deals With AI Music Startup

AI
Jason Tate

Variety:

For the first time, all three of the major labels – Universal Music Group, Sony Music and Warner Music Group, along with their respective publishing arms – have struck individual licensing deals with the same artificial intelligence-focused music startup: Klay.

I don’t even have anything snarky to say. I find all of this so much more soulless than the most generic copycat awful neon-era scene music.

Letterboxd Announce Video Store

Apps
Jason Tate

Letterboxd have announced a new “video store.”

This isn’t a subscription service! No lock-in, no paywall. Just rent the films you want, whenever you want, and join the conversation with our community logging, reviewing and adding them to lists.

Letterboxd Video Store is a film rental platform inside Letterboxd. Think of it as curated shelves instead of just scrolling lists endlessly without being able to make up your mind on what to watch.

Suno Now Valued at $2.45 Billion

AI
Jason Tate

Suno, the AI music company, has raised a $250 million dollars and is now valued at $2.45 billion.

Instead, Suno more than doubled the predicted tranche and tacked on another $450 million to the post-cash valuation. Menlo Ventures led the sizable Series C, which drew additional support from NVIDIA’s NVentures, Hallwood Media (the professional home of Xania Monet), Anthropic stakeholder Lightspeed, and Palo Alto’s Matrix.

Addressing the raise, Suno co-founder and head Mikey Shulman, whose platform is said to be approaching 100 million total users, described his company as having a hand in “the future of music.”

Slipknot Sells Music Catalog

Slipknot
Jason Tate

Slipknot has sold the majority stake in their music catalog:

Neither Slipknot nor HarbourView disclosed financial details of the agreement regarding how much HarbourView paid or what their specific stake in the catalog is, though the company confirmed the partnership includes both publishing and recorded royalties. 

The deal had been rumored for months; Billboard reported on the deal in August, reporting at the time that the deal was worth approximately $120 million.

Tidal Offers $100,000 to Direct-Uploading Indie Artists

Tidal
Jason Tate

Digital Music News warns to read the fine print of the current Tidal contest:

According to the contest’s terms, winning indies will grant Tidal a far-reaching license – one that’s “royalty-free, fully-paid up, transferable, sublicensable,” and covering the world – to use their selected tracks. On the marketing side, an adjacent right extends to the winners’ names, addresses, likenesses, photos, social posts, and “any statements made” about Tidal.

In short, then, post-win Tidal royalties will seemingly be off the table for the chosen songs, and the platform can utilize the appropriate talent’s above-described IP “for advertising and promotional purposes without notice or additional compensation” if so inclined.

“Where applicable and to the extent permitted under applicable law,” reads perhaps the most noteworthy terms section, “you also agree to waive, and not to enforce, any ‘moral rights’ or equivalent rights, such as your right to be identified as the author of your Submission, and your right to object to derogatory treatment of such Submission.”

Bon Iver Talks Future

Bon Iver
Jason Tate

Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon talked with The Times and mentioned that he would be “very surprised” if he made another album:

Does that mean there won’t be another album as Bon Iver? “I would be very surprised,” Vernon admits. “For the first time since I was 12, I’m not writing songs. There aren’t any in here.” He points at his heart. “I have been writing since puberty and this is unfamiliar territory — but I am accepting it. It’s scary sometimes, but I’m just letting it happen …”

Survey Says Users Want AI-Music Disclosure

AI
Jason Tate

Reuters:

The study found that 73% of respondents supported disclosure when AI-generated tracks are recommended, 45% sought filtering options, and 40% said they would skip AI-generated songs entirely. Around 71% expressed surprise at their inability to distinguish between human-made and synthetic tracks. Deezer, which has 9.7 million subscribers, has seen daily AI music submissions rise to more than 50,000 — about a third of total uploads, up sharply from 18% in April. 

AI-Generated Country Artists Climbing Charts

AI
Jason Tate

Digital Music News:

This week, Breaking Rust landed the top spot on Billboard’s Country Digital Song Sales chart for the second week in a row with the song “Walk My Walk.” But Breaking Rust is not a real person or a real band. It’s an AI project credited to songwriter Aubierre Rivaldo Taylor, but the mysterious “artist” has over 2 million monthly listeners on Spotify.

Another AI-generated country singer, Cain Walker, also dominated the Country Digital Song Sales chart this week with tracks in the third, ninth, and eleventh spots. Billboard distinguishes both Walker and Breaking Rust’s music as “virtual acts,” which offers some degree of transparency that the artists and/or the art is AI generated.

We really don’t have to do this.

Vinyl Me, Please’s Unpaid Debts

Records
Jason Tate

 Zach Schonfeld, writing for Stereogum:

Madell’s post alluded to something that has become an open secret within the music industry: Vinyl Me, Please’s relationships with licensing partners and labels both small and large have deteriorated because of significant unpaid debts accrued during VMP’s downfall. Five months after VNYL’s acquisition — and one month after the new owners relaunched VMP without a website storefront, inviting customers to “Join us in this offline revolution” — both major debts and relatively minor sums owed to small businesses remain unpaid. (The terms of the acquisition were not disclosed, but sources say VNYL Inc. did not assume the debt.) The ricocheting effects of that debt have impacted customers as well, since VMP developed a habit of taking preorders for vinyl releases that never materialized. As one former employee told me, “We didn’t have the money to pay the labels to get the licenses released so that we could press the records that we had already sold to people.” 

Sabrina Carpenter To Star, Produce ‘Alice in Wonderland’ Movie

Sabrina Carpenter
Jason Tate

The Hollywood Reporter:

Superstar Sabrina Carpenter is set to star and produce an untitled movie musical based on Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland for Universal Pictures.

Lorene Scafaria, perhaps best known for writing and directing the Jennifer Lopez-starring crime movie Hustlers, will pen and helm the feature.

Marc Platt, the musical-loving producer behind both the Broadway and screen productions of Wicked, will produce the project. Also producing will be Leslie Morgenstein and Elysa Koplovitz Dutton of Alloy Entertainment, the banner behind shows such as Gossip Girl and Pretty Little Liars.

‘Gremlins 3’ Coming in 2027

Jason Tate

The Hollywood Reporter:

Warner Bros. is reviving the Gremlins franchise after more than three decades and with a couple of powerhouse names back on board.

Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav announced the greenlight of a new Gremlins film during the company’s third-quarter earnings call on Thursday. 

Zaslav said Steven Spielberg is back on board as executive producer through his company Amblin Entertainment. 

The 1984 original film’s writer, Chris Columbus, is also returning to produce and direct the film.