Music News

The final of this year’s Eurovision Song Contest in Basel, Switzerland, was once again a vibrant mix of dance anthems, powerful ballads, and a quirky assortment of novelty pop from across Europe. As we approached the 2025 competition, I found myself without a clear favourite, which was a change from previous years. The final felt like an open playing field, where I sensed the strongest performance of the night would ultimately take home the prize. Thus eclipsing all the pre-event hype and bettin

Photo Credit: Creative Community for Peace More than 400 prominent leaders from the music and entertainment industries—including executives from YouTube Music, Warner Music Group (WMG), Universal Music Group (UMG), VEVO, Roc Nation, and the Recording Academy—have signed a powerful open letter denouncing anti-Israel extremism and antisemitism. The initiative, organized by the Creative Community for Peace (CCFP), marks a significant stand against the rising tide of hate speech and misinformation

Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr. speaks during Grammys on the Hill in support of the expanded No Fakes Act. Photo Credit: The Recording Academy Federal lawmakers have reintroduced the No Fakes Act, which is drawing strong support from in and well beyond the music industry. Senators and representatives from both sides of the aisle reintroduced the legislation today. We’ve covered the years-old bill (which, looking to tackle AI deepfakes, would establish bolstered voice and likeness prote

A federal lawmaker is criticizing the latest TikTok sale deadline extension. Photo Credit: Solen Feyissa Is the latest extension to the TikTok forced-sale deadline “a clear violation of the law”? At least one member of Congress believes so, and he’s expressing “deep reservations” as a result. Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) just recently voiced that pushback in an open letter to President Trump, who last week extended the cutoff for ByteDance to divest from TikTok in the U.S. Prior to this extens

Photo Credit: The Come Up Show / CC by 2.0 With the ugly Drake v. Universal Music defamation lawsuit – and the discovery process – moving forward, both sides have requested and received a protective order covering “highly confidential or proprietary business information.” The presiding judge signed off on that protective order this afternoon, on the heels of Universal Music’s firmly worded attempt to dismiss the amended complaint. By now, most are at least generally familiar with the high-sta

Fat Joe, who’s filed a defamation lawsuit against one of his former employees. Photo Credit: Mika-photography Drake isn’t the only rapper suing over allegedly false pedophilia claims. Now, Fat Joe says his former hype man defamed him with untrue allegations “of vile sexual misconduct, pedophilia, statutory rape, violence and stealing.” 54-year-old Fat Joe (real name Joseph Cartagena) just recently submitted the complaint to a federal court in his native New York. Aside from the mentioned hype

Josh Tillman chose celebration over cynicism on this grand London stage View the full article

Snoop Dogg, one of the defendants looking to dismiss a $107 million lawsuit filed by Lydia Harris. Photo Credit: Bruce Baker A federal court has officially ordered a stay in Lydia Harris’ $107 million lawsuit against Snoop Dogg, Universal Music, Death Row Records, and several others. Judge David Hittner just recently signed off on the defendants’ stay request pending the resolution of their respective dismissal pushes. We covered one of those pushes in late April, when Snoop Dogg and Death Row

Photo Credit: Tingey Law Firm A US federal district judge is questioning Meta’s ‘copyright fair use’ defense for materials used to train its AI. The judge is hearing arguments related to the case comedian Sarah Silverman and two other authors filed against Meta and OpenAI in 2023. Meta has argued in court that any copyrighted materials used to train its AI models fall under the fair use doctrine. But US federal district judge Vince Chhabria seems less than convinced by Meta’s attorney’s argume

Photo Credit: Fenway Park Two concerts at Fenway Park have been abruptly canceled. Fans eager to see Shakira tonight (May 29) and Jason Aldean and Brooks & Dunn (May 30) will now receive refunds. The Boston ballpark made the announcement on their Instagram. “Due to unforeseen circumstances, the Shakira and Jason Aldean and Brooks & Dunn performances originally scheduled for May 29 and May 30 respectively at Fenway Park have been canceled,” the announcement reads. “Refunds will be avail

Photo Credit: Fever Fever secures over $100 million in funding to further its position as a leader in live experiences, namely music and sports. Fever is on the rise with funding to further its continued growth as a leading platform for live experiences like music and sports. Fever has secured over $100 million in funding from L Catterton and Point72 Private Investors through the completion of an equity funding process, including existing investors. The technology platform—now operating in ov

Fired Copyright Office head Shira Perlmutter, who’s challenging her dismissal in a lawsuit. Photo Credit: USCO Axed Copyright Office head Shira Perlmutter is suing the Trump administration over her “blatantly unlawful” dismissal – and seeking, among other things, a court order allowing her to remain in the post. Perlmutter submitted that straightforward complaint yesterday, after she was fired as Register of Copyrights earlier in May. One component of a wider Library of Congress and Copyright

Snoop Dogg, who’s officially set to host a live New Year’s Eve special on NBC. Additionally, the Death Row owner is preparing to serve as a coach on the forthcoming 28th season of The Voice. Photo Credit: TechCrunch The Olympics, The Voice, and now New Year’s Eve: Snoop Dogg is officially set to cap off 2025 with a two-hour special from Miami. NBC formally announced that year-end programming, aptly entitled Snoop Dogg New Year’s Eve, in a brief release today. As things stand, concrete details

Her previous acting experience has included appearing in episodes of the hit AppleTV+ football comedy Ted Lasso.View the full article

Photo Credit: Flou For all the attention paid to missing music metadata, copyright infringement, and royalty battles, the music industry often overlooks a potentially bigger issue: chaotic music contracting. Enter Flou, whose CEO, Alexiomar Rodriguez, is helming one of the more promising missions in the music industry: to fix the chaos that surrounds music agreements. Here’s a breakdown of his vision for ‘Music Contracts 2.0’ — including a detailed white paper. What’s wrong with music contract

Photo Credit: Foreigner by Kamal Asar Foreigner announces a collaboration with Tilles Center for the Performing Arts to develop the world premiere production of the Foreigner musical. Legendary rock band Foreigner has announced a new collaboration with Tilles Center for the Performing Arts and Long Island University’s Post Theatre Company to develop and stage the world premiere production of “Feels Like The First Time: The Foreigner Musical.” Broadway luminary Adam Pascal (Rent, Aida, Cabaret

Photo Credit: Krishta Abruzzini Foreigner’s long-time vocalist Kelly Hansen has announced he’s stepping down from the position after the band’s summer tour concludes. Guitarist Luis Maldonado will step into the role. Hansen announced the news during a special appearance on the NBC reality show, ‘The Voice.’ “Being the voice of Foreigner has been one of the greatest honors of my life,” Hansen said about stepping down. “But it’s time to pass the mic. Luis has the voice, the energy, and the soul

Photo Credit: Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office / CC by 2.0 Former Meta executive Nick Clegg says that a law requiring tech companies to ask permission to train AI on copyrighted work would ‘kill’ the industry. Sir Nick Clegg, former deputy prime minister and Meta executive, believes making tech companies ask artists’ permission before using their copyrighted material to train AI will “basically kill the AI industry.” The reason? Because AI systems are already training on the vast

Photo Credit: Joshua Hoehne Cultural metaverse Fortnite is set to return to the U.S. iOS App Store next week following a ruling in the years-long legal battle between Epic Games and Apple. The decision comes after a California federal court found that Apple had “willfully violated” a previous injunction designed to open the App Store to greater competition and alternative payment methods. The dispute has been ongoing since 2020, when Apple removed the game from its App Store after Epic updated

Photo Credit: Smokey Robinson by Dwight McCann / CC by 2.5 Four anonymous women and former housekeepers of Smokey Robinson are suing the singer with allegations of sexual assault and rape. Motown singer-songwriter Smokey Robinson is being accused of sexual assault and rape, leading to a hostile work environment, in a lawsuit filed by four of his former housekeepers. All four women, listed anonymously as Jane Does, accuse Robinson of unwanted sexual behavior and abuse. His wife, Frances Gladney

Seated co-founders John Griffin (left) and David McKay, who’ve reacquired their company from Sofar Sounds. Photo Credit: Seated Four years and change after selling to Sofar Sounds, Seated has officially been reacquired by its founders. Seated co-founder and CEO David McKay, whose ticketing platform says it helps artists “gain fan insights and sell more” concert passes, announced the newly finalized deal in a brief blog post. According to that message, the repurchase arrived as Somerville, Ma

Photo Credit: Justin Bieber by Jakub Janecki / CC by 4.0 Justin Bieber’s camp denies allegations that he sold his catalog for $200 million because he was “on the verge of financial collapse.” Justin Bieber sold his catalog for $200 million to Hipgnosis back in December 2022—a strange move for such a young artist. According to a new documentary from TMZ, the 31-year-old R&B star made between $500 million and $1 billion during his ascension to fame, but poor financial decisions left him in d

Photo Credit: Ian Hutchinson The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued a formal warning to StubHub over the secondary ticket market’s slow rollout of all-in pricing. The FTC’s rule requiring ticket sellers to display the total price of tickets upfront went into effect on May 12. The regulation applies to all ticket sellers, both primary and secondary. Ticketmaster was compliant on the rollout date, while secondary market SeatGeek issued its update on May 9 ahead of the deadline. But StubHu

Photo Credit: Agustin Flores After sharing permits and stating the festival would go forward, Fyre Festival 2 organizers have postponed the festival and offered refunds for ticket buyers. A message sent to ticket holders this afternoon confirmed Fyre Festival 2 will not go forward as planned in Mexico from May 30 to June 2. “The event has been postponed and a new date will be announced. We have issued you a refund. Once the new date is announced, at that time, you can repurchase if it works fo

Photo Credit: Rajiv Perera Just says after Fyre Festival 2 was ‘postponed’ and all tickets refunded, the Fyre Festival name has been licensed to a media entrepreneur for a new streaming service. Fyre Music Streaming Ventures LLC was officially formed in the state of Ohio. The new company will be spearheaded by Shawn Rech, President & Co-Founder of Chris Hansen’s TruBlu Crime Network. Rech says he has spent years seeking the right partners and platform to bring a truly fan-curated music net