Offset caught up with Billboard’s Kyle Denis at R&B / Hip-Hop Power Players 2024.
Travis Scott was fired up. “IM FCKING JUMPING THRU WALLS,” he wrote on Instagram. The reason: He planned to officially re-release Days Before Rodeo, his decade-old pre-stardom mixtape, on streaming services on August 23.
Sabrina Carpenter‘s Short n’ Sweet was slated to come out the same day, and before Scott’s announcement, it was expected to coast to the top of the Billboard 200 albums chart — an inevitable coronation after a string of high-flying singles. Instead, Carpenter’s release squeaked out a No. 1 finish, earning 362,000 units to Scott’s 361,000.
Short n’ Sweet out-streamed the rapper’s old mixtape by a wide margin, racking up 233 million official on-demand streams to Scott’s 40.6 million. But remarkably, he sold 300,000 digital downloads of Days Before Rodeo, according to Luminate. On the final day of the tracking week, Scott put out six different digital variations of his album — each of which included at least two extra tracks and cost just $4.99, the minimum price for chart eligibility — as part of a ferocious last-ditch attempt to snatch victory from Carpenter. She responded in kind, serving up three $4.99 digital variants of her own and ultimately selling 45,000 digital downloads. (All nine variants were available exclusively on the artists’ web stores.)
This tactic has been around for years: Release digital variants near the end of the week; sell them cheap; polish off a rival; tout the accomplishment. The technique is getting more attention lately because clashes between titans are being decided by digital variant release strategies. Scott was nearly able to erase Carpenter’s mile-wide streaming lead thanks in part to his blitz of variants. And these duels have spurred the latest round of music industry conversations about whether artists and labels are trying to game the charts — or take advantage of their most devoted followers.
“People are keeping that ammo in the chamber: ‘Let’s save these four variants that we know we’re going to have to drop at different times throughout this week,’” says one major-label A&R who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly. “Does it enhance the fan experience, or does it actually lessen it? I think it’s manipulative.”
When asked about this practice, another prominent manager would say only that “it’s ironic that the institution which is allowing the problem to exist is reaching out for a quote.” (“Billboard is always reviewing, in consultation with Luminate and the industry at large, what sales channels are included for chart eligibility, and has updated its policies when necessary based on market behavior,” Silvio Pietroluongo, Billboard‘s executive vp of charts and data partnerships, said in a statement.)
On the other hand, some label executives believe that digital variants help create eye-catching first-week totals and race-to-the-finish-line dramas that are good for the music industry, sort of like its version of Barbenheimer: Before Taylor Swift’s showdown with Billie Eilish in May and Carpenter vs. Scott more recently, it had been a whopping eight years since two albums cracked the 300,000-unit mark during the same week.
And the contest between Carpenter and Scott was a nail-biter until the end, as both camps released their final variant in the last two hours of the tracking week. Since January 2020, there have only been seven weeks when the gap between Nos. 1 and 2 was less than 1,000 units. (Representatives for Carpenter and Scott did not respond to requests for comment.)
Despite the prominence of digital albums in some recent release campaigns, digital album sales have plummeted from 103.3 million in 2015 to 18.3 million in 2023, according to Luminate’s annual reports. Within this category, Luminate also tracks an “others” grouping that reflects sales from artists’ direct-to-consumer web stores along with non-major digital retailers. So far this year, sales in “others” total just 1.7 million, which amounts to 0.23% of year-to-date total album consumption (730.45 million equivalent album units*).
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While this represents a tiny sliver of overall activity, it can make a difference in close chart races. Swift released additional digital variants when she went head to head with Eilish and against Ye and Ty Dolla $ign‘s Vultures 2 in August. (Eilish and Ye and Ty released their own as well, to no avail.) And Blink-182 used a digital variant of One More Time as part of a successful effort to scrape by Drake‘s For All the Dogs and nab No. 1 in October.
These face-offs also demonstrate how far labels and artists are willing to go to try to get that top spot. Getting a No. 1 demonstrates that labels “still have the ability to move the needle,” says industry veteran Ray Daniels. “That is a big reason why certain artists will go to certain labels.” And “ego is a lot of it,” adds Joey Arbagey, a former major-label A&R executive.
Most prominent artists want to top the chart as well, though they may be loath to admit it. “It’s a way of an artist on the rise saying they have arrived,” Daniels says. And scoring a No. 1 can then serve as a springboard, creating “a domino effect of other opportunities, whether that’s working with brands or getting significant press,” according to Nick Groff, an artist manager and former A&R.
In more recent years, artists and labels have used hyper-aggressive price discounting, bundling albums with tickets or merchandise, box sets, vinyl variants and other techniques to try to jack up an album’s chart position. (There are dissenters: “It’s crazy how much time and energy is wasted on shit like this,” says one former major label executive, practically eye-rolling through the phone, “instead of focusing on signing good artists and making good music.”) When chart rules change, so do the industry’s strategies for impacting them.
Some of these options disappeared in 2020 after Billboard stopped counting albums sold in merchandise bundles and ticket bundle offers. Label executives say selling digital variant downloads is one of the few maneuvers they have left to goose numbers late in a chart week. The other is putting a deluxe version of the album with additional tracks on streaming services, also an increasingly common tactic.
But adding an unreleased track or two onto the album and selling it exclusively through an artist’s web store is a more potent option. This can also be done quickly and at the last minute, as a Hail Mary when a chart race suddenly becomes competitive. Acts usually make these releases available for a limited time only, which both further juices fan interest and underscores that the artists are focusing on the all-important release week.
In many cases, this strategy is effectively a sale of a lone song masquerading as an album purchase — artists often just add one live track or unreleased loosie to the original project and make it available as a new variant. Some artists don’t even include a new song in a digital variant; they just change up the artwork, or digitally “sign” the album art.
“If there is exclusive music available in these variant releases, that can be a great strategy and a fun way to engage with your fan base,” says Greg Hirschhorn, founder of the distribution company Too Lost. “If there is only a change in the track list or a different album artwork, I feel like the only real goal or outcome is chart manipulation.”
Steeply discounted digital variants also threaten to snub the diehards who ordered an album ahead of time at full price. If a fan pays $9.99 for a pre-order on iTunes, they may feel like a sucker when they see the same album augmented with bonus material and made available for just $4.99 near the end of the tracking week. “It feels like people should wait until Thursday afternoon to buy the album” and get the best deal, the major-label A&R says.
But for now, any potential fan backlash to the rise of variants appears to be outweighed by their impact on the charts. “When you’re in it and you’re fighting so hard for No. 1, it can seem obnoxious [to people outside the industry], but that’s the only thing that matters,”Arbagey says. “They’re pulling out all the stops.”
“I’ve definitely been in one of those heated races,” Groff adds. “You figure out everything you can possibly do to boost the numbers.”
*Through the week ending Aug. 29, total U.S. album consumption in 2024, as represented by equivalent album units — excluding units caused by user generated content — equals 730.45 million, according to Luminate. Each equivalent album unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album.
The devil, or demons, have been referenced in a string of current and recent singles, including Jelly Roll’s “Halfway to Hell” and “I Am Not Okay,” Tyler Braden’s “Devil I Know,” Ashley McBryde’s “The Devil You Know” and Jackson Dean’s “Heavens to Betsy.” Mitchell Tenpenny’s “Demon or Ghost,” recorded with metal band Underoath, was released Aug. 9; Lee DeWyze issued “Devil in the Details” on Aug. 2; Stephen Wilson Jr.’s “The Devil” is the opening track on his debut project, Son of Dad; and Lainey Wilson’s just-released Whirlwind slips in “Devil Don’t Go There.”
A new Jon Pardi single – “Friday Night Heartbreaker,” released today (Sept. 6) – casts a stunning woman as a Medusa-like “hell raiser” and a “devil in disguise.”
It’s not like it’s an entirely new subject — The Louvin Brothers’ “Satan Is Real” ranks among classic country’s deepest discussions of the dark angel and his role in humanity — but the current volume of devil themes, and the weight of the songs they appear in, seems significant.
“We see more people confessing what they’re really feeling and being a little more open and honest,” says songwriter Ashley Gorley, who co-wrote “I Am Not Okay,” which references “the devil on my back and voices in my head.” “I think the devil is real, so I think it’s showing up in people’s writing.”
One obvious source for the topic lies in the pandemic. When COVID-19 forced creatives off the stage and into their houses, they had plenty of time for self-examination, questioning who they were, why they had made certain life choices and the meaning of the world around them.
“It’s very easy to look at the past few years and recall moments of dark, and I think that with the darkness comes the imagery,” DeWyze notes. “As far as the devil being in music now, it’s almost like it represents those things, whether it be the faith and redemption or the existential struggle, or, you know, a physical being literally at your door.”
Historically, the devil has represented temptation in country music. Marty Robbins’ “Devil Woman,” Alan Jackson’s “Between the Devil and Me,” Joe Nichols’ “Brokenheartsville” (in which “the devil drives a Coupe de Ville”) and Terri Gibbs’ “Somebody’s Knockin’ ” (depicting him with “blue eyes and blue jeans”) all place Satan in the equation as its characters grapple with sexual tension and betrayal.
“The devil is always, I hate saying it, but an interesting character to me,” confesses Academy of Country Music songwriter of the year Jessie Jo Dillon, who co-wrote “Halfway to Hell” and “Friday Night Heartbreaker.”
“It’s like this tempter or temptress always.”
The ultimate temptation comes when the devil persuades a victim to sell their soul for a short-term outcome. That’s at work in the movie Damn Yankees when a Washington Senators fan plots to bring down the New York baseball team. It’s at the heart of the legend behind blues icon Robert Johnson. And it’s the storyline in the The Charlie Daniels Band’sLuciferian country tale, “The Devil Went Down to Georgia.”
“It personifies the duality of dark and light, and the feeling of struggling with those demons,” Jelly Roll notes.
“My favorite devil song by far is ‘The Devil Went Down to Georgia,’” Pardi adds, “because the guy won. He won the fight.”
Beyond that song’s surface entertainment, though, is a much deeper concept that hints at the never-changing struggle between right and wrong. Cheaters and criminals, in general, earn their reputations by stealing short-term gain while ignoring potential long-term consequences. It’s a battle that plays out daily in politics, in finance, in barroom pickup lines and even in artistic decisions.
“My favorite songwriter ever, Bobby Braddock, told me, ‘Mitchell, are you writing music for a lunchtime or a lifetime?’ ” Tenpenny recalls. “I think there’s a lot of lunchtime music right now, and we need that lifetime music again. Can we make a quick buck to this? Yes, but it’s going to kill so many souls, and that’s where the devil gets involved, in my opinion, and why we keep using him as a metaphor.”
Musical trends in country have made it easier to chase the devil thematically. HARDY, Jelly Roll and Tenpenny are among the artists who have employed hard rock in varying degrees within country. Acts in that format have often toyed with Satanic imagery in songs, stage wear and graphics, and the infusion of power chords and death screams into country practically requires the devil to tag along.
“As far as the look and aesthetics, the devil and demons have always been in the rock’n’roll scene,” Tenpenny maintains. “T-shirts and metal, skeletons, skulls, that kind of thing has always been a part of it. I think that that definitely has an influence.”
But another musical development that may have paved the way for Satan’s ascent in country might well be Eric Church. Particularly notable is his track “Devil Devil” from The Outsiders, with a spoken-word “Princess of Darkness” prelude that links Music Row to hell: “The devil walks among us, folks, and Nashville is his bride.” Church even employed a 40-foot inflatable devil on his 2015 tour, nicknaming the blow-up doll “Lucy Fur.”
Church’s road guitarist Driver Williams co-wrote Dean’s “Heavens to Betsy,” alluding to demons in the opening verse and expressing surprise in the chorus that St. Peter would “ever let a sinner like me in” to heaven. That latter phrase is a direct homage to Church’s debut album, Sinners Like Me.
“Eric has a theme of good versus evil that kind of goes throughout his writing,” Williams observes. “I just can’t help it if that rubs off on me in the writing room a little bit just because I do look up to him so much as a songwriter.
“You look at all the major superstars right now, from Luke [Combs] to Morgan [Wallen] to Thomas Rhett, their idol is Eric — Jelly Roll, too. So I definitely see Eric’s handiwork rubbing off on all of these major superstars that are having moments right now.”
Satan, it turns out, may contribute to artists’ successes when he appears because he offers so much possibility for the protagonist.
“You immediately become the hero in the story,” DeWyze says, “when the devil is placed in it.”
Ultimately, the devil is having his moment because the world seems so tough. The pandemic may be behind us, but years of political turmoil and cultural negativity that predated COVID-19 still drag down the national conversation. That most certainly plays in the background as the devil takes the spotlight.
“Country music looks at that and it tries to give a positive at the end,” Pardi suggests. “We may be singing about darker times, but there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel in country music.”
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Teezo Touchdown accepted the Rookie of the Year award at Billboard‘s 2024 R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players event Thursday night (Sept. 5) at Times Square Edition in New York.
Senior R&B/Hip-Hop/Afrobeats writer Heran Mamo introduced the 31-year-old artist, describing him as someone who “embodies the emotional melodies of an R&B singer, the clever lyricism of a rapper and the instrumental intensity of a rockstar.” As his manager Amal Noor described in his Rookie of the Year feature, “Teezo is your favorite artist’s favorite artist. He respects these artists’ careers, and to know that they love him creatively is an amazing feeling.”
“Father God, I want to say thank you for my gift that has taken me from a small town in Beaumont, Texas, to corners of the world I couldn’t even imagine. I want to say thank you in a room full of people who I still study and admire to this day, just as I would right before I close my eyes at night and immediately after I open them in the morning,” he started his acceptance speech. “I want to say thank you to my team for tirelessly helping me scratch every single goal I have off my list and pushing me to write down more wilder than the last.”
“I want to say thank you in a room full of peers who understand that the satisfaction of seeing someone succeed is a feeling that will never get old, just as I would after a quick phone call or Zoom meeting. I want to say thank you to Billboard for this prestigious award, Rookie of the Year,” he continued. “I want to say thank you to every single veteran for being so kind and insightful for giving me a firsthand lesson of how to nurture and instill knowledge to the next person who’s coming in after you.
“Last but not least, I want to thank the future — future artists, future execs, the people who are on their way to change the world as we know it,” he concluded. “I want to say thank you in advance for the innovation you will bring to the art and your perspective that can potentially change the world. I want to say thank you in a room full of people rooting for you with open arms and are here if you ever need anything. Thank you.”
Teezo is Billboard‘s fourth R&B/Hip-Hop Rookie of the Year, following Baby Keem (2021), Blxst (2022) and Ice Spice (2023). He was also Billboard‘s R&B/Hip-Hop Rookie of the Month in November 2023.
Playboi Carti, Megan Thee Stallion, Joey Bada$$ and Victoria Monét‘s manager Rachelle Jean-Louis were also honored at R&B Hip-Hop Power Players.
Oasis officially announced its Oasis Live ’25 Tour across the United Kingdom and Ireland in August, marking the band’s first shows together in more than 15 years. It makes sense for the British group to kick things off overseas, but speculation has ramped up regarding a possible extension to North America – as the tour announcement included a hopeful statement of “plans are underway for (the tour) to go to other continents outside of Europe later next year.”
Looking back, how big of a touring act was Oasis during its original run, and what does that mean for a potential tour next year?
Oasis Live ’25 Tour is currently scheduled for 19 shows in stadiums across London, Dublin and the Gallagher brothers’ hometown of Manchester, England, and select other markets in the U.K., including two recently added shows at London’s Wembley Stadium due to “phenomenal public demand.” Next year’s stadium tour will be the band’s first stab at the outsized outdoor venues, but considering the activity surrounding the shows’ on-sale, it’s warranted. If the tour travels stateside, similar-sized shows would represent a major step up for the band.
The band’s last tour was the Dig Out Your Soul Tour in 2008-09, playing large theaters and scaled-down arenas in North America and Europe, with a mix of arenas and stadiums in Latin America. According to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore, that run averaged a career-best 12,108 tickets per show worldwide, up 37% from its previous tour, which itself marked a 15% increase from its previous high.
Oasis peaked as a touring act throughout the 2000s, despite making its biggest chart impact across its first three albums from 1994 to 1997. Those – Definitely Maybe, (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? and Be Here Now – combined for 125 weeks on the Billboard 200 albums chart and six top 10 hits on the Alternative Airplay chart. In the 21st century, the band has spent about one-fifth of that time on the former chart and hasn’t returned to the top 10 on the latter. Still, their touring business kept blossoming, growing by 60% in average attendance and multiplying by four in average revenue.
While Oasis hasn’t released a studio album since 2008’s Dig Out Your Soul, it’s likely that its concert fortunes have continued to grow exponentially. Time away from the spotlight and the natural nostalgia cycle positions them alongside Blink-182, Green Day and My Chemical Romance, all of which have yielded enormous Boxscore results from reunion and anniversary tours in the last 24 months. MCR averaged $1.6 million per show in 2022-23 after an 11-year touring hiatus, which is about 10 times its prior peak.
Oasis operated closer to Green Day in terms of ticket sales in the ‘90s and ‘00s. Also oscillating between theaters and arenas during its first 15 years, Green Day has launched its first solo-headline global stadium tour in 2024, averaging $3.4 million and 38,000 tickets per show in Europe.
Further, Oasis has a unique element adding fuel to its fire, as the long-simmering feud between Oasis’ leading brothers Liam and Noel Gallagher has helped to grow the band’s mythology, and therefore making the 2025 tour announcement feel like a once-in-a-lifetime event. Once hailed “The Next Beatles,” Oasis’ mid-2020s return to the stage adds to their singular legend.
And while Oasis has revealed only U.K. and Ireland dates so far, fans far and wide have reacted. Following the Aug. 27 announcement, “Don’t Look Back In Anger” and “Wonderwall” both debuted on the Billboard Global 200 (dated Sept. 7), up 138% and 72% in official worldwide streams in the week of Aug. 23-29, according to Luminate. On the Sept. 14-dated chart, both may post triple-digit-percentage increases.
In the United States specifically, Oasis’ entire catalog of songs yielded 13.5 million official on-demand streams, up by 148% in the week ending Aug. 29. With similarly massive gains in the U.S. as around the world, the possibility of a U.S. stadium tour would make Oasis one of 2025’s biggest global touring acts.
Dating back to the fall of 1994, Oasis has grossed $45.2 million and sold 1.1 million tickets across 150 reported shows. Given the band’s long-awaited and unexpected reunion, the endurance of its catalog, and the general explosion of concert ticketing, a world tour would easily out-gross and out-sell the band’s entire touring history.
By some measures, the recorded music business has never been better. U.S. sales grew 8% in 2023 to hit a record high $17.1 billion; streaming continues to grow around the world; and revenue and operating income are rising at the three major labels and many smaller companies as well. The subscription streaming model is appealingly predictable, and the explosion of other forms of online media, from video games to virtual exercise programs, is creating plenty of opportunities for growth.
By other measures, the industry is in a tough spot. The flood of new music pouring into streaming services — both legitimate and not — is diluting the royalty pool for professional musicians. (This, and some other things, might be good for some players, but it seems to be bad for the business.) Although comparisons are complicated, it seems harder than ever to break new acts. Underneath all of this is the part of the iceberg most people don’t see: The deals labels sign with acts are generally less advantageous, because artists have more leverage than ever.
The numbers say it’s the best of times. Layoffs at Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group say otherwise. And although the recorded music business isn’t in any real danger — the only question is how fast it’s going to grow — it’s hard to escape the idea that something just feels off.
Welcome to the music business version of the “vibecession” that’s affecting the U.S. economy as a whole. The term, coined in June 2022 by the financial analyst Kyla Scanlon, describes the apparent disconnect between positive economic indicators and negative public perceptions. In layman’s terms, if the numbers look so good, why do things feel so bad?
Outside the music business, most of the economic news is good, or at least good-ish by the standards of the dismal science. Inflation is down and the economy seems to be growing again. The problem, in industry terms, is that people just aren’t feeling it. One example: Job loss concerns are high at a time when the level of layoffs is low, according to Marketplace. The article compares the current situation to a doctor talking to a healthy patient who thinks he’s sick. There are explanations for this: Perhaps our minds are still adjusting to higher prices, which continue to rise even as the rate of inflation declines, or maybe troubling political news just makes more of an impression than economic indicators.
This could be more than a feeling, as a Boston economist might say, since people and companies that believe the economy will decline might cut back their spending and, inadvertently, contribute to making it happen. Although the music business is much harder to measure, the same thing could happen there. The pessimism that has already led to layoffs and restructuring means there will be fewer A&R executives signing fewer acts and then spending less money on marketing and promotion. That might be necessary. But it’s unlikely to help.
What’s killing the vibe in music? Partly, expectations have changed. The hypergrowth phase of streaming is ending, but big music companies, especially UMG and WMG, are under some pressure to grow faster than the overall business. Subscription streaming is going from the savior of the music business to another new format that boosts some kinds of music at the expense of others. There aren’t many new stars — one of the big hip-hop stories this year was the feud between Drake and Kendrick Lamar. (This is both the winter of our discontent and the season of diss content.) And new albums by established stars like Ariana Grande and Dua Lipa are off to a slow start (although it’s hard to know what that means in a streaming-driven business).
There may also be a sense, both in the music business and in the economy as a whole, that the foundation is not as solid as it seems. There’s more talk of quick fixes, both in the overall economy (Blockchain!) and in the music business (NFTs!). But there’s not much effort to get at the heart of the problems: The economy seems increasingly rigged toward finance and the pro-rata royalty distribution of streaming services prizes viral sensations in a way that may make it hard for different kinds of artists to build careers.
In the meantime, the numbers keep going up. The stock market has skyrocketed, undeterred by COVID, inflation and conflict in the Middle East — but that can’t last forever. The recorded music business keeps growing, too, and it will almost certainly continue to do so — just perhaps not in the ways we have come to expect. Over the past few years, labels have spent fortunes signing viral superstars who win big — but how many of them will be around in a decade? Meanwhile, popular tastes are harder than ever to predict. Two years ago, when it seemed like the future belonged to hip-hop, could anyone have predicted such a big country comeback? Giving people what they want is a fine strategy — but only if they keep wanting it.
It’s a good time to toast the good times — but it’s tempting to ask for a strong drink, too. Both the music industry and the broader economy keep climbing over problems to reach new peaks. And they’re great places to be — until you realize that it’s all downhill from there.
Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce were riding high after the Kansas City Chiefs’ big win Thursday night (Sept. 5).
The 2024-25 football season kicked off with the team defeating the Baltimore Ravens 27-20 at Arrowhead Stadium, where the 34-year-old pop star was present to cheer on her favorite tight end alongside his family and friends in a box suite. Immediately afterward, Swift filmed a video with Chariah Gordon — who is engaged to wide receiver Mecole Hardman — celebrating the reigning Super Bowl champions carrying over their winning streak from last season.
“Post-game interview with Chariah,” the 14-time Grammy winner tells the camera in the clip, which was posted on Women of The NFL’s Instagram Story. “I’m feeling fantastic.”
After Kelce changed out of his uniform, he and Swift exited the stadium holding hands and smiling at fans who cheered as the couple walked past. The “So High School” singer sported a denim crop top and shorts paired with red thigh-high boots, while the 34-year-old athlete wore a white-to-brown ombre shirt-and-pants set.
Fans were happy to see Swift back at Arrowhead seven months after she last cheered on the Chiefs at the Super Bowl in Las Vegas, laughing with Kelce’s parents and banging on the suite’s glass barrier with excitement. She’s currently on break from her global Eras Tour, on which the New Heights podcaster spent much of his offseason tagging along all over the world.
At one point, NFL cameras captured Swift celebrating one of Kelce’s plays by hugging his mom, Donna, and applauding with a big smile on her face.
The game came one day after Kelce’s reps slammed an “entirely false” media plan that circulated online this week, allegedly outlining the publicity strategy he has in place in case he and Swift ever break up. “We have engaged our legal team to initiate proceedings against the individuals or entities responsible for the unlawful and injurious forgery of documents,” one spokesperson continued in a statement to E! News, adding that the papers were “not created, issued, or authorized by this agency.”
Regardless, it doesn’t seem like a breakup is coming any time soon for the couple, as Kelce gushed about his significant other in a recent interview with CBS Mornings. “It’s the life I chose, I guess,” he said of being known as Swift’s arm candy. “I have fun with it. It comes with the territory of wanting to do fun activities like this.”
Watch clips of Swift and Kelce post-win below.
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Looking for something new to watch? The streaming service Hulu offers add-ons to premium networks, such as Starz. This is a good way to add more value to your Hulu subscription, while making it easier to access more hit movies and TV shows — such as the second half of Power Book II: Ghost season four, which drops on Friday (Sept. 6) — without leaping from app to app.
For just an additional $9.99 per month, you can add Starz to Hulu, so you can watch Starz originals, along side Hulu originals, in one and convenient app.
Starz has hit originals, including Power Book II: Ghost, Mary & George, Party Down, P-Valley, Outlander, Minx and more.
In addition, Hulu is the home to critically acclaimed originals such as The Bear, The Handmaid’s Tale, American Horror Stories, Only Murders in the Building, Solar Opposites, Shōgun and others.
Hulu prices start at $7.99 per month — or $79.99 per year for the commercial-supported plan — while you can go without commercials for $17.99 per month. The service also offers Hulu + Live TV, which lets you stream nearly 100 broadcast and cable networks starting at $76.99 per month.
Meanwhile, Starz on Hulu is compatible with all sorts of devices, such as smart TVs, Apple iPhone and Apple iPad, Android smartphones and tablets, web browsers, gaming consoles, Fire TV, select cable boxes and other web-based devices.
At an additional $9.99 per month, you can add Starz to your Hulu subscription — which starts at $7.99 per month — so you can watch the latest and greatest that the premium cable network has to offer. And along with the best and brightest on Hulu, you can stream Starz and Hulu originals all in one place.
Want more? For more product recommendations, check out our roundups of the best Xbox deals, studio headphones and Nintendo Switch accessories.
Welcome to another edition of Executive Turntable, Billboard’s comprehensive(ish) compendium of promotions, hirings, exits and firings — and all things in between — across music. While you’re here, check out Billboard’s fresh list of top R&B and Hip-Hop executives leading the genres forward, plus our weekly interview series spotlighting a single executive and a regularly updated gallery honoring many of the industry figures we’ve lost throughout the year.
Erika Savage has joined the entertainment department of top music law firm King, Holmes, Paterno & Soriano, Billboard can announce. A multi–year honoree in our annual list of influential women in music, Savage was most recently senior vp of global music operations at United Talent Agency, where she oversaw all operational elements of UTA’s global touring division. The bulk of Savage’s roughly 25-year career, however, was spent at Universal Music Group, where she rose to senior vp of strategic development at Interscope Records, developing integrated artist brand strategies across music, brand partnerships, merchandise and touring. “We are delighted to supplement our deep bench of entertainment attorneys with someone at the top of her game,” said managing partner Howard King. Here, Savage expands on her big move from agency life to KHPS:
Why join private practice at this point in your career? The idea of artist advocacy. Being an artist lawyer in the music industry is the greatest privilege because you are entrusted to protect your client’s rights and to bring value as a strategic advisor. After many incredible experiences gained working within a major label, building brands, and in global touring, I finally feel like I’m doing what I was meant to do – directly advocating for artists. I’m particularly inspired by the fact that more women artists, producers and songwriters are looking for women to be part of their team as lawyers, managers, agents and business managers. It’s exciting that our shared experiences as women in music will allow us to find ways to be entrepreneurial together.
What issue concerns you the most in music? When I started in business affairs at UMG, the major label deal was largely considered the path to superstar artist status. Now, while it’s great that there are fewer gate keepers and far more access points for artists to distribute their music, the legal landscape is far more complicated for developing artists. Navigating all these distributors and platforms can be really overwhelming for an artist just trying to break through. Being a TikTok artist is an incredible catalyst but career longevity requires a strategy beyond achieving 24 hours on the top of a For You page. We represent some incredible legacy artists. We want to make sure that our clients who are currently young and developing clients have similarly vibrant legacy careers in 20 years.
Meanwhile…
All My Friends, the event production company behind the floating dance festival FriendShip, hired industry veteran Randy Sosin as its first head of creative content. As AMF’s creative chief, Sosin will manage everything from ideation to delivery of all areas of creative branding and promotion for the company, founded by dance impresario Gary Richards. Sosin arrives to AMF following a six-year stretch as chief content officer at The X, a digital content agency not to be confused with the social network. He has also held senior roles at Insomniac Events, MTV, Gang of Fore and Interscope, where he spent the early aughts producing videos, short films and other visual goodies for artists including Eminem, 50 Cent, Enrique Iglesias and others. “I am so fortunate that I am able to come on board and help Gary and AMF grow and expand FriendShip (the greatest party in the world), but also be a part of an amazing team,” said Sosin. “Gary is an inspiration to me, and I look forward to helping show the world what I have known for years.”
Christoffer Lindh was promoted to head of A&R and Atena Banisaid to general manager of Sony Music Publishing Scandinavia. Both Stockholm-based execs will continue reporting to Johnny Tennander, managing director and svp of A&R international for SMPS. As his title implies, Lindh is now tasked with leading the company’s A&R-related endeavors across Scandinavia (Norway, Sweden and Denmark). In his 15 years at the publisher, Lindh has signed and/or worked with Yung Lean and Sad Boys, Scarlet Pleasure, Cashmere Cat and others. For Banisaid, her role as GM means growing the overall business and crafting forward-thinking initiatives. She’ll also continue lending a hand on Lindh’s A&R team, where she has worked with Benjamin Ingrosso, Giift and other artists. “It feels very good to elevate Christoffer and Atena to these key positions for Sony Music Publishing Scandinavia,” noted Tennander. “They have for a long time both proven to be incredibly important to our A&R team, but also to our wider team and company.”
Downtown Music promoted David Driessen to chief commercial officer, effective immediately. He’ll lead efforts to drive revenue across the company’s four divisions — publishing, distribution, artist/label services and financial services — and continue to report to CEO Pieter van Rijn. Driessen was previously CCO of FUGA, the Downtown-owned B2B music distributor, before sidling over to Downtown in early 2023 to become chief business officer.
PULSE Music Group promoted Tizita Makuria to senior vp of A&R for both PMG and PULSE Records. She’ll focus on signing and developing new talent, and then finding creative opportunities for them. Based in Los Angeles, Makuria holds bragging rights as the company’s first hire to PULSE Records, where she was part of the team that signed “Million Dollar Baby” phenom Tommy Richman to the PULSE/ISO Supremacy joint venture. Prior to joining PMG in 2022 as vp of A&R, Makuria held down the senior director of A&R role at Artist Publishing Group. “Tizita brings a positive energy to every meeting—she’s passionate about her writers and recording artists and she has a relentless drive to deliver good results for them,” said co-CEOs Scott Cutler and Josh Abraham, and president Ashley Calhoun. Earlier this summer, PMG upped Steven Gringer to svp of A&R.
Mike Harris announced his departure as executive vp and COO of Universal Music Group Nashville. According to Music Row, Harris is leaving the position at the end of the month for an as-yet unannounced opportunity. A source tells Billboard that a replacement will be announced soon. Harris joined UMGN in 2016 as COO following a three-year stint as evp/general manager of Caroline, UMG’s since-renamed label and artist services company. Harris’ previous work experience includes 15 years with EMI in a variety of roles, including evp/GM for label services, evp/finance director, global A&R operations for EMI’s new music division and evp/CFO for various labels and divisions within EMI.
NASHVILLE NOTES: The Core Entertainment added day-to-day managers Jackie Gomez and Brittani Johnson to the company’s artist management team in Nashville. Gomez most recently served as DtD manager of Charlie Puth while at Friends at Work, where she also A&R’d a number of up-and-coming artists. Johnson arrives from Big Loud, where as director of Southwest promotion she played a major role in boosting the signals of Morgan Wallen, HARDY, Ashley Cooke and others … Invasion Group expanded with the launch of a new Nashville office. Leading the Music City office is artist manager Courtney Oertel. Among the artists on Invasion Group’s roster are Ani DiFranco, John Driskell Hopkins, Rissi Palmer, The Righteous Babes, Blackstar Symphony and Ken Butler.
Jared Gibo was named CEO of specialty live entertainment company LiveCo’s new full-service, global faith-based promotion arm, TPR. TPR merges three promotion companies that LiveCo previously acquired—Transparent, Premier and Rush Concerts—into the newly-minted TPR. With the creation of TPR, Transparent Productions founder and CEO Tim Taber has been promoted to the LiveCo management team as chief strategy officer. Premier Productions CEO Michael Pugh was also promoted to LiveCo as chief operating officer. TPR works with artists including Anne Wilson, Cece Winans, Chris Tomlin, Forrest Frank, Gaither Vocal Band, Dude Perfect, Jeremy Camp, Josiah Queen, KB, MercyMe, Tauren Wells and more. –Jessica Nicholson
Music curation and licensing firm SoStereo elevated Lindsey Camerota to CEO, effective immediately. Camerota joined SoStereo in March, as chief marketing officer, following senior marketing roles at fintech startup Tomo, experiential tech company Superlogic, something called “Spotify” and fitness giant Equinox. Earlier in her career, Camerota served as a marketing manager at Republic Records. “Building a career in the music industry has been a lifelong dream,” she said. “I’m deeply grateful for the opportunity to advance SoStereo’s mission of making brand narratives powerful, memorable experiences with accessible, high-quality music.”
ALL IN THE FAMILY: Amanda Smith is promoted from president to chief executive officer of Fairchild Media Group, overseeing a portfolio of brands that includes Women’s Wear Daily, WWD Weekend, Beauty Inc, Footwear News, Sourcing Journal, Rivet and Fairchild Live Events. Like Billboard, FMG is a part of Penske Media Corporation. Prior to joining Fairchild in September 2020, Smith served in senior positions at print powerhouses including Fast Company, The New York Times, Vogue and The Wall Street Journal, among others. She is based in NYC and reports to Celine Perrot-Johnson, executive vp of operations and finance at PMC.
Kerri Kolen is the new vp of PAVE Publishing House, the independent print and audiobook division of PAVE Studios. Kerri was previously vp and head of audiobooks at Pushkin Industries and a creative executive at Audible, and has worked with notable authors and celebrities, including Kelly Osbourne, Carrie Fisher, Kate Winslet and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, among others.
ICYMI:
Recent executive of the week Jackie Winkler was promoted to senior vp and head of A&R at Island Records … Martijn Tel joined BMI as the performing rights organization’s new chief financial officer … Ultra Records veteran Eddie Spears joined Republic Records as its new evp of creative … and Rachelle Jean-Louis was named executive of the year in Billboard‘s 2024 R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players list.
Last Week’s Turntable: HYBE-Owned Label ADOR Replaces CEO
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When the Sony PlayStation 5 released in Nov. 2020, it came with only one free game that was pre-installed. That game was Astro’s Playroom, a short demo that showed new PS5 owners the power of the new console and the PS5 DualSense Wireless Controller. And but now, Sony just dropped the sequel.
Simply titled Astro Bot, the new game for PS5 is available for purchase starting on Friday (Sept. 6) for $59.99 at Target and other retailers.
And if you’re a Target Circle member, you can order now and get Astro Bot delivered straight to your home in two days (with orders over $35).
Not a member? Sign up for a free membership to take advantage of all that Target Circle has to offer, including access to “deal of the day” products, instant savings on select items, three months of Apple TV+ to watch hit originals, access to exclusive shopping events — such as Target’s Deal Days and early Black Friday deals — and other perks.
If you want to take it a step further, you can sign up for the Target Circle Card (with no annual fee), which offers an extra 5% discount on all purchases, two-day free shipping with no order minimums and more. Learn more about the Target Circle Card here.
In addition, Astro Bot is ready to buy at Walmart, Best Buy and Amazon.
As for the new sequel, Astro Bot is a platform adventure game with 80 new levels spread over six galaxies and 50 planets. You play as Astro Bot, Sony’s lead gaming mascot, and your mission is to save 300 other robots from the evil Space Bully Nebulax throughout the PlayStation universe.
Meanwhile, to celebrate the new game, Sony also released a new limited-edition Astro Bot-themed PS5 DualSense Wireless Controller. It retails for $79.99 and buyable at Best Buy.
Priced at $59.99 and available for purchase at Target, Walmart, Best Buy and Amazon, Astro Bot for PS5 is out now. In the meantime, watch the announcement trailer for the game, below:
Want more? For more product recommendations, check out our roundups of the best Xbox deals, studio headphones and Nintendo Switch accessories.
