Generative AI is becoming a new force in the music industry, often posing a threat to artists, music labels and trade organizations.

In light of this, SOCAN has launched a national campaign, urging the Canadian government to eliminate copyright exceptions that permit free and unauthorized use of copyright-protected works for AI training — prioritizing human-created music.

Artists and organizations have signed in support, including Sarah McLachlan, Barenaked Ladies’ Ed Robertson, Elisapie, Dan Mangan, Mac DeMarco, Leith Ross and more. BMG Music Publishing and Nettwerk Music Group are signatories, too.

“This is a defining moment for Canada. AI companies are taking copy-protected works without consent, and the impact is being felt across the music industry,” Jennifer Brown, CEO of SOCAN, tells Billboard Canada. “Music creators cannot compete in a system that devalues human expression while AI companies profit from the unlicensed use of their work.”

“Every day, global streaming platforms are flooded with tens of thousands of AI-generated outputs by tools trained on copyright-protected works without consent, without credit and without compensation,” SOCAN’s campaign claims, noting that “generative AI is reshaping the music and cultural sectors at an unprecedented pace.”

Outside of the industry, local music fans are not receptive to AI-generated work. Last November, a SOCAN report found that 87% of Canadians said they wanted to listen to music created by humans, with 65% saying it’s “very important” to them.

“Canadians have been clear: they value human creativity and expect their government to protect it,” Brown says. “The decisions made now will determine whether music creation remains a viable profession and a vital part of our cultural identity.”

In addition to protecting the country’s creative integrity, the campaign addresses policymakers directly, “at a critical moment,” demanding that the government protect human expression, require transparency from AI companies and ensure clear labelling of AI-generated outputs.

“Canada has long championed cultural sovereignty and the value of human creative expression,” the statement reads, noting that if the government lacks a clear policy direction, the country will lose its “legacy of Canadian storytelling,” the value of human expression and the economic benefits of a strong music industry.

“This is the moment to defend human-made music and ensure it remains valued and protected in Canada,” the letter reads.

Read more here. — Heather Taylor-Singh

The Guess Who Return with Randy Bachman and Burton Cummings, But Two Former Members File a New Lawsuit

The classic Randy Bachman-Burton Cummings lineup of The Guess Who has returned to the live stage after more than two decades, but their ongoing legal saga continues.

The Canadian rock stars are back on the road with the band’s legendary principal members, with their first date on an extensive North American at Fallsview Casino in Niagara Falls on Saturday night (Jan. 31) reportedly proceeding without a hitch.

Just a few days later, however, members of a controversial former lineup of The Guess Who filed another lawsuit. Rolling Stone has reported that on Feb. 3, Guess Who founding drummer Garry Peterson and founding bassist James Kale filed a complaint in federal court against U.S. performing rights management firm BMI.

“Peterson and Kale claim they suffered millions of dollars in losses when lead singer and songwriter Burton Cummings – who owns the publishing rights to the Guess Who’s biggest hits, including ‘American Woman,’ ‘These Eyes,’ and ‘No Time’ – went nuclear two years ago and terminated his entire performing rights agreement with BMI,” the magazine reports.

“Cummings took the extraordinary step of yanking the Guess Who’s songs from the BMI licensing catalog covering concert venues because he wanted to stop Peterson and Kale from staging what he called ‘fake bullshit shows,’ using a different singer and guitarist.”

BMI’s move in April 2024 prompted the Peterson/Kale version of the Guess Who and booking company BiCoastal Productions to immediately cancel a tour they had scheduled, losing millions in the process.

In the new lawsuit, the pair now claim that BMI misinterpreted the termination’s effective date and that a notice period that had not yet expired, meaning their concerts did not need to be cancelled.

The lawsuit accuses BMI of breach of fiduciary duty, negligent misrepresentation, intentional interference with contractual relations and fraud. It seeks compensatory damages estimated at several million dollars, to be determined at trial, as well as punitive damages based on what it describes as BMI’s “willful, oppressive, fraudulent, and malicious” conduct.

““There is no merit to this lawsuit,” a spokesperson for BMI tells Billboard Canada in a statement. “BMI responded accurately and in accordance with the information provided to us by SOCAN, the foreign society that represents the copyright holders. We stand by our response.”

This is just the latest legal twist and turn in a saga that dates back decades and fuelled serious discontent between different members of the Guess Who over who had the rights to the band’s name.

Read more here. — Kerry Doole

Justin Bieber, Karan Aujla Among Spotify’s Most-Streamed Music from Canadian Artists to End 2025

Canadian artists are connecting with fans beyond their home country.

Spotify has revealed its newest Canadian Global Impact List, which highlights homegrown acts whose songs were in heavy rotation among listeners across the globe. This list covers the second half of 2025.

Justin Bieber is at the top of the list, while the ranking also highlights songs by Tate McRae, Daniel Caesar, Punjabi stars Karan Aujla and his longtime collaborator Ikky and popular independent rapper bbno$.

Spotify’s Global Impact List for Canada

Read more on the list here. — HTS

Taylor Swift is ready to see the Olympic athletes shine like opalite on the slopes and skating rinks, with the pop superstar making a cameo during the Opening Ceremony on Friday (Feb. 6) to deliver a special message to them.

During the first 20 minutes of the program — which began streaming live on NBC and Peacock at 1:40 p.m. ET before the official ceremony’s kickoff at 2 p.m. — the pop star’s Billboard Hot 100-topping “The Fate of Ophelia” started playing as clips of stars such as Usher and Jeff Goldblum made their entrances in Milan to watch the beginning of the Winter Games. Then, Swift herself popped up on screen in a pre-taped video, wearing a sweatshirt with a teddy bear on it.

“This is a message to all the athletes,” she told the camera. “Getting to learn your stories, and seeing everything you sacrificed and all your determination and hard work and passion … it’s just really inspiring.”

“I am very grateful for everything you’ve done to get to this point in your life and grateful that you’ve brought all of us along on this journey,” Swift continued. “Wishing you all the best of luck and a safe journey, and I hope this is an experience you cherish for the rest of your life.”

Andrea Bocelli and Mariah Carey were slated to perform later in the ceremony. The program will also feature the lighting of the Olympic cauldron following a torch relay — in which ENHYPEN’s SUNGHOON took part.

The Winter Olympics will last from from Feb. 6 to 22, featuring competitions in skiing, skating and more. The 2026 Games aren’t the first the 14-time Grammy winner has taken part in, with Swift narrating a Team USA commercial in the summer of 2024.

Fridays’ ceremony came the same day Swift dropped a music video for her The Life of a Showgirl single “Opalite,” featuring cameos from Domhall Gleeson, Graham Norton, Greta Lee and more. The visual is available to watch only on Apple Music and Spotify until Feb. 8, when it’ll arrive on YouTube.

“I had more fun than I ever imagined — Made new friends, metaphors and fashion choices,” Swift wrote on Instagram after the video’s release. “It was an absolute thrill to create this story and these characters.”

Pandora wants a judge to end a lawsuit filed by the Mechanical Licensing Collective over streaming royalties, accusing the group of “abusing” its position with an unconstitutional case. But the MLC says the streamer is just trying to ignore the reality of its “unlawful underpayment.”

The MLC sued Pandora (a unit of SiriusXM) two years ago, claiming it had misclassified its services to avoid paying the kind of higher royalties owed by “interactive” platforms like Spotify. The case has now reached the make-or-break moment, where each side asks the judge to rule in their favor.

In a strongly-worded motion on Thursday, Pandora says the case is a “gross overreach” aimed at forcing the company to “pay vast sums” for rights that it “does not need” – all filed by a private entity that’s “exploiting” and “abusing” its limited powers.

“The brazen nature of the MLC’s efforts here cannot be overstated,” Pandora’s lawyers write, asking the judge to end the case without a trial. “Allowing a private, unaccountable, non-rightsholder entity like the MLC to serve as a roving enforcer of the Copyright Act, with no oversight or supervision from any entity of the federal government, is ‘delegation in its most obnoxious form,’ and clearly unconstitutional.”

MLC fired back in its own motion on Thursday, asking the judge to instead hold Pandora liable for its “unlawful underpayment of royalties.” It said Pandora was attacking the MLC’s authority to distract from a “mountain” of evidence and “inescapable” conclusion that must pay up.

“Pandora has poured resources into litigating a refusal to accept the obvious, ignoring its many admissions and instead offering semantic defenses and red herrings to obscure the undisputed truths,” the group’s lawyers write. “The MLC…brings this motion to cut through the obfuscation and hold Pandora to the plain language of the statute and the simple reality of its own service.”

MLC, a group created by the Music Modernization Act in 2018 to collect mechanical royalties from streaming services, filed its case against Pandora in February 2024, essentially claiming the company was using bookkeeping trickery to reduce its payments to songwriters and publishers.

At the heart of the lawsuit was distinction between “interactive” platforms like Spotify or Apple Music, which allow users to pick their songs on demand, and “noninteractive” platforms like Pandora that provide an experience more like radio. It’s a key dividing line, since interactive and noninteractive services pay very different royalties under different systems.

Though Pandora pays such interactive royalties for its premium tier with on-demand functionality, it has long treated Pandora Free — the core radio-like product that fueled the company’s rise in the late 2000s — as a noninteractive service, since it largely serves users a mix of songs based on their preferences.

But in its lawsuit, the MLC argued Pandora Free had crossed the line into “interactive” status by offering so-called “Sponsored Premium Access” sessions, which allow users to briefly play specific songs in return for watching ads. As a result, the MLC argued that Pandora owed the same kind of royalties for Pandora Free as services like YouTube or Spotify pay: “Pandora provides even greater interactive access,” MLC wrote at the time.

After two years of litigation, including a lengthy discovery process, both sides are now filing their motions for “summary judgment,” asking the judge to rule on the case without the need for a jury trial.

In its filing, Pandora argues that even if MLC has the authority to sue, the group’s demand for more royalties was “plainly and unmistakably wrong.” It says the law is clear: That companies offering both radio and on-demand functions should only pay higher royalties for the latter, and that its “Sponsored” sessions do not change the calculus.

“The MLC seeks to use civil litigation to overturn two decades of industry practice and force upon Pandora a novel and incorrect interpretation of the Copyright Act,” the company writes. “These sessions, which comprise a miniscule percentage of listening by free Pandora users, do not come close to transforming Pandora’s internet radio service into the statutory equivalent of an on-demand streaming service like Spotify or Apple Music.”

In its own motion, MLC says Pandora’s free users can search for specific songs and “have access to unlimited skips and replays.” And it says the streamer has bragged about the disputed features, including by telling users they can “search and play your favorite songs on-demand for free.”

“Pandora intentionally developed, marketed and provided each of these features to Pandora Free users, and then boasted of them to its investors,” MLC writes. “Pandora’s defense in this action thus asks the Court to ignore not just the reality of the product’s operation, but also years of Pandora’s own representations about its service.”

If the judge denies the motions, a jury trial is scheduled for June 30. A spokesperson for Pandora did not immediately return a request for comment. In a statement, MLC said it had “repeatedly” tried to resolve the dispute without litigation, but that Pandora had “refused” to address the problem: “We have now moved for summary judgment because the undisputed evidence proves our claims.” 

Kings of Leon top Billboard’s Adult Alternative Airplay chart for a fifth time, and for the first time in nearly five years as “To Space” crowns the survey dated Feb. 14.

The song follows the reign of “The Bandit,” which logged six weeks at No. 1 beginning in February 2021. In between the two leaders, Kings of Leon reached Adult Alternative Airplay four times, paced by the No. 3-peaking “Mustang” in 2024.

The Followills first led in 2009 with “Use Somebody,” then with “Radioactive” in 2010 and “Waste a Moment” in 2016-17. The lattermost title reigned for 15 weeks, the second-longest rule in the Adult Alternative Airplay chart’s 30-year history alongside Coldplay’s “Clocks” (2003). Both trail U2’s 16-week command with “Beautiful Day” (2000-01).

Concurrently, “To Space” rises 33-30 on the all-rock-format, audience-based Rock & Alternative Airplay chart thanks to 1.2 million audience impressions, a weekly boost of 13%, according to Luminate. It’s the band’s first top 30 rank since “Mustang” (No. 10).

“To Space” is one of four songs on Kings of Leon’s EP #2, released in November. The band’s first EP, Holy Roller Novocaine, arrived in 2003. Its most recent full-length is Can We Please Have Fun, which debuted at its No. 4 best on the Top Alternative Albums chart in 2024 and has earned 66,000 equivalent album units to date.

Kings of Leon kick off a brief U.S. tour in April in Louisville, Ky., with multiple dates set for Europe this summer.

All Billboard charts dated Feb. 14 will update on Billboard.com Tuesday, Feb. 10.

The musical collective formerly known as New Power Generation (NPG) that served as Prince’s backing band from 1990 to 2013 and has long been affiliated with the iconic artist is changing its name to the Minneapolis Sound All Star Band.

The switch is happening because NPG’s ability to use the trademarked name has expired and Global Music Rights, the performing rights organization that handles administration of Prince’s songs, no longer permits tribute acts to perform sets of his material (though NPG considers itself a “legacy group”).  But the group sees the change as an opportunity to focus on new music, which they plan to release this year. 

“This allows us to evolve and expand,” says NPG’s keyboardist Morris Hayes, who also served as Prince’s musical director. “It feels like the floodgates opened and there are endless possibilities in front of us. The name change was definitely overdue. It feels very liberating.”

Following Prince’s death in 2016, the members of the collective acquired a five-year license in 2017 to continue using the name from Bremer Bank, which had initially handled the Prince estate. The band tried to extend the license with Comerica Bank, which then managed the estate, and with the current administrators, but “the new estate owners also conveyed to the band that the estate would no longer be licensing the trademarked name once the current agreement’s term expired,”  says Jill Willis, who manages the LLC that includes several members of the former New Power Generation, including Hayes, rapper /rhythm guitarist Tony Mosley and bassist Sonny Thompson and had the license to use the trademarked name. Willis also worked with Prince, including managing him from 1990-1993. 

Since 2022, the Prince estate has been controlled evenly by two companies: Prince Legacy LLC, which is owned by three of Prince’s half-siblings alongside advisors L. Londell McMillan and Charles Spicer; and Prince Oat Holdings LLC, which is owned by music publishing firm Primary Wave, which acquired the interests of Prince’s other three half-siblings. Neither responded to a request for comment.

The band ceased using the trademarked name in 2022 but did continue to perform Prince’s music and frequently billed itself as The Music of Prince, featuring former members of the New Power Generation. 

Additionally, NPG had continued to use the name with the permission of the Prince estate when it performed in conjunction with or for the estate, such as Paisley Park’s annual four-day celebration or at a Minnesota Timberwolves game in December. 

Coming up with a new name was “somewhat daunting,” Hayes says, “considering what we call ourselves that connects us to Prince, the city and the sound that he and others created in the 80’s. Our manager had been swirling this name around off and on for a couple of years and we all came together on it in the end. We knew we wanted something that perfectly describes our sound and who [and] what we are. We are a definite part of the musical tapestry created by Prince and we want to be a part of the soul of the sound of the Twin Cities.” 

Willis says the Minneapolis Sound All Star Band can still perform a handful of Prince songs in its sets, but those songs will not be the focus, given that the band members, separately and together, has been writing new music for the last few years. The new music includes a song based on “the tragic events happening recently in Minneapolis,” Hayes adds, referring to the ICE killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

This is not the first circumstance where artists long associated with Prince have had concerns using names affiliated with their tenure with the artist. In 2022, the estate, still controlled by Comerica, sent a threat letter to Morris Day telling him he could not register a trademark for Morris Day and the Time, the name of the Prince-affiliated band he led for years. However, the new estate stewards did not file an opposition with the federal trademark office after Day applied for a trademark at the end of 2022. 

In August 2025, Prince protégé Apollonia filed a lawsuit alleging that the current estate is trying to “steal” her name, even though she has used it for more than 40 years, by registering ownership of the name with the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. The estate had allegedly claimed that she signed over her rights in the 1980s to the name as part of the Purple Rain movie contract. In September, the estate asked that Apollonia’s lawsuit be dismissed, saying it has no intention of stopping her from using her stage name, but that it needed for her trademark to end so the estate could register a trademark for Apollonia 6. The motion to dismiss is still pending.

Additional reporting by Bill Donahue and Rachel Scharf.