“Fuck no,” Kenny Beats says with a chuckle. He’s sitting behind a drum kit at his home studio in Los Angeles, and he’s just been asked whether he ever aspired to be a teacher. “I have a lot to learn, is how I’ve always felt, and I still feel that …
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This story appears in Rolling Stone‘s 2021 Future of Music issue, a special project delving into the next era of the multibillion-dollar hitmaking business. Read the other stories here. LJ Gutierrez’s head is full of Pokémon, frozen pizza, and Legos. At Universal’s branding division, her 35-person team obsesses over musical …
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It’s been nearly three years since XXXTentacion was shot to death in Florida at the age of 20 — but his team is keen to keep his legacy alive. Next week, the controversial rapper’s estate will release a series of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) containing tracks that have never been commercially …
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Bertelsmann-owned label and publisher BMG and investment firm KKR announced a partnership on Wednesday to fund acquisitions of major recorded music and publishing catalogs, establishing yet another player in the gold rush for music’s biggest song collections. BMG and KKR aren’t buying a stake in one another — and how …
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The Small Business Administration announced that it would start accepting applications for Shuttered Venue Operators Grants on Thursday, April 8th. The announcement comes nearly three months after the SVOG — which was borne out of the Save Our Stages Act — passed as part of last December’s Covid-19 relief bill. …
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Pale Waves’ tour bus crashed about a year ago, overturning and sliding off a road into the snow between Stockholm and Berlin while the band was on their way to a gig supporting Halsey in an arena run. Drummer Ciara Doran said everyone on board thought they were going to …
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In his memoir Testimony, Robbie Robertson recalls the first time he played a new song called “The Weight” for Bob Dylan. “This is fantastic — who wrote that?” Dylan said. When Robertson replied that he had, Dylan “shook his head, slapped me on the arm and said, ‘Damn! You wrote …
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The music industry seems near-unanimous in its delight over Joe Biden’s ascension to president-elect and Kamala Harris’ rise to vice president-elect. Rolling Stone recently heralded Biden and Harris as offering “progressive solutions to every major problem facing the country”. It appears a majority of music’s most successful superstars agree. (No, …
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LoveRenaissance, also known as LVRN, only has 10 acts on its roster. The tight-knit, black-owned music company — run by first-generation immigrants from Ghana, Nigeria, Trinidad, and Jamaica — dedicates time to a small group of rising artists instead of going after superstars. “It’s just more fun that way,” says …
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The first half of 2020 was an intense whirlwind, but one that “clarified and in some ways accelerated cultural trends that Gen Zs and millennials have been shaping for years,” Dawn Ostroff, Spotify‘s Chief Content & Advertising Business Officer, says. Ostroff and the audio-streaming platform released “Culture Next” this morning, …
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