Back in April 2019, Universal Music announced a partnership to develop original shows with one of the biggest podcast production companies, Wondery. 18 month later, the first show is coming out this weekend. It’s called ‘Jacked: The Rise of New Jack Swing’ and will focus on the late 80s and early 90s era of Bobby Brown, Bell Biv Devoe, Tony Toni Tone and more.
Actor Taraji P. Henson will host and produce the six-part series, which includes interviews and “extensive music from UMG’s catalogue”. That raises an interesting question: the extent to which a podcast co-produced by a major label about a famous music scene will prioritise its own artists over those signed to rivals. Hopefully not though.
It’s not the only new music podcast this week either: Amazon has taken the wrappers off ‘The First One’, its original show with DJ Khaled. The podcast is premiering on Amazon Music in the UK, US, Germany and Japan, with a new episode to drop every Thursday.
Khaled will be interviewing a variety of guests, starting with Lil Wayne, with the likes of Big Sean, Kelly Rowland, Rick Ross, Jon Bon Jovi and J Balvin to come. It’s part of Amazon Music’s recently-announced push into podcasts, which for now is focused on the four countries listed above.
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