Earlier this week, Digital Music News trailed a story that it claimed would explode the streaming royalties and major artists issue. It was published last night, complete with a characteristic ‘How Streaming Services are Screwing Lady Gaga (and Every Other Artist’ headline. The basis for this claim: a clause in what appears to be Gaga’s contract with UMG subsidiary Interscope Records: “Notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained herein, no royalties or other monies shall be payable to you or Artist in connection with any payments received by Interscope pursuant to any blanket licenses under which the Licensee is granted access to all or a significant portion of Interscope’s catalog”. The obvious response, made by many commenters on the piece, is to question the assumption that streaming services are doing the ‘screwing’. The more nuanced reaction from others is to wonder what Gaga got in the form of an advance, and what the clause really does cover. Even so, at a time when Beats is being bought for $3bn and Spotify is expected to IPO, this isn’t the last time the question of how artists benefit from such exits, as well as advances paid by streaming services. An old issue, but a much more emotive one at this point in time.
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Tools: Kaiber
In the year or so since its launch, AI startup Kaiber has been making waves,…