Next Big Sound

This Week in Music

Fri, 10 May 2013 13:40:05 -0400

Morning guys and gals,

What a week it has been. Between hackdays, beer tastings and goodbyes, it has been busy at Next Big Sound. I have to say I was super impressed by what everyone built this year, it is incredibly inspiring to work at a company where people are talented enough to explore and create whatever it is they set their mind to.

So on our end this week. This post for Forbes ended being my most popular post yet (and by a mile). This of course makes me happy, but also somewhat sad as this is simply because I combined the words Kanye and Twitter in a headline.

Also on the blog, a look at a few of the artists that appeared on the Next Big Sound chart this week:

http://blog.nextbigsound.com/post/50085040830/movers-and-shakers-on-the-next-big-sound-chart

Our very own Kris Schroder explaining how we put YouTube’s Analytics API to good use. Nice one Kris!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3m_weExKhA

And if you haven’t had a chance to check out the complete version of the Data Journalist Playbook, here it is:

http://www.iaventures.com/data-journalist-playbook-part-4

In other news this week, YouTube launched their subscription channels:

Syd’s former agency (that she so kindly explained to us in her stellar Ace series last Friday) scored a big time coup in securing JT”s bidniz.

http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/legal-and-management/1560784/justin-timberlakes-acting-agency-wme-locks-down-all

For all you Rdio fans out there, good news for them on expanding their partnership with Shazam.

http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/09/rdio-and-shazam-expand-full-music-track-streaming-partnership-to-uk-canada-australia-brazil-and-mexico/?

Pandora put a cap on mobile listening, and unsurprisingly, this caused a drop in hours. I am envisioning an enlightening network graph coming our way from senor Zopf fairly soon.

http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/1560736/pandoras-cap-on-mobile-listening-causes-drop-in-streams

And a revolution in RIAA certifications. On-demand streams now count toward awards. Goodie for Lana Del Rey.

http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/1560846/exclusive-on-demand-streams-now-count-toward-riaa-gold-platinum

And also, check out these thoughts on the state of digital music from Bill Wilson, a good friend of ours over at NARM:

http://thenextweb.com/media/2013/05/04/narm-vp-bill-wilson-on-the-state-of-the-digital-music-industry-automotive-metadata-and-contextual-discovery/

As for interesting graphs this week, check out the upward trajectory in awareness for Vampire Weekend, who are about to release a long-awaited new album next week. Who else is excited?

And for videos this week, I find it hard to top the booty-bumpin puppy that Jesse posted in hip chat yesterday, but this one is pretty funny too. Not exactly music-related, but involves puns - nuf said:

http://gawker.com/guys-wife-gets-drunk-tells-him-a-joke-he-animates-th-488907526

Also, Downtown Festival is happening this weekend at a whole bunch of venues in the LES. Line-up is pretty cool and if you want to go, buy tix here:

http://www.thedowntownfestival.com/new-york-city/buy-tickets/

Otherwise, have a splendid weekend folks.

Liv Buli is the resident data journalist for music analytics company Next Big Sound. Buli is a graduate of New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and her work has appeared in Newsweek Daily Beast, The New York Times Local East Village, Hypebot and more.

Movers and Shakers on the Next Big Sound chart

Fri, 10 May 2013 08:26:35 -0400

Some hip hop, a good chunk of indie pop and of course a bit of cultural commentary on the chart this week.

You might think that Public Service Broadcasting is a somewhat strange name for a band, but that is exactly what this UK duo is serving up. This week marked the release of their debut album Inform - Educate - Entertain, a refined blend of samples from old public information films, archive footage and propaganda materials, all to the beat of a drum. The result is a unique and noteworthy (not to mention informative) sound.

It looks as though their efforts have been well received, with numbers up across the board. The number of visits to their Wikipedia page is up close to 600 percent in the past two weeks, they passed 7,500 Facebook page likes the day after releasing the album, and saw more than a 100 percent increase in both new Twitter and SoundCloud followers in this week compared to the prior.

Landing at number five this week, is a hip hop/pop project out of California. Producer Ricky Reed has been making music under the moniker Wallpaper. for several years now, but has seen some real traction in his stats in the past few months. Particularly the release of the video for his latest track, which between the heavy usage of autotune and almost symphonic buildup brings top pop band fun. to mind.

Good 4 It has caused a spike in streaming, with around 240,000 views on both YouTube and Vevo in the past three weeks. This is a 632 percent increase on YouTube and brings his total on the latter to more than 1 million. SoundCloud plays are also up more than 75 percent in that time frame.

Also blasting on to the Next Big Sound chart this week is Australian indie pop singer Betty Who, who brings to the table an 80s synth-pop vibe and strong vocals. Who released her debut EP The Movement last month and has seen a sharp boost in plays, views and fans since. In the week following release her SoundCloud plays jumped an impressive 4640 percent (the full EP is available here). While her fan base is still relatively small, she also added heavily to this, with more than a 500 percent increase in both her new Twitter followers and number of Facebook page likes.

So there you have it. These are just a few of the up-and-coming artists that are making the music that has has people talking, sharing and listening. Stay tuned for more from our weekly Next Big Sound chart!

Photo Credit: Screen grab from Publicservicebroadcasting.net

Why Kanye Doesn't Even Need To Tweet

Mon, 06 May 2013 09:03:39 -0400

Kanye’s back on Twitter. Did anyone even notice he was gone?

This past Thursday, daddy-to-be and king of gaffes Kanye West published a tweet. No biggie, you say? Since clearing the stream of hilarious content littering his feed late last year, West has been sparing with his tweets, posting only a handful since January. There is speculation that the poignant post, citing simply “June Eighteen,” is a clue to the release date for his upcoming album. Whether or not this is true remains to be seen, but what is interesting is that despite West’s absence from the platform in recent months, this hasn’t stopped fans from flocking to him.

West, who currently counts a Twitter following close to 10 million, continued to see a steady stream of new followers over the past few months. In the past three months, he attracted another quarter million, and while this is down 38% from the previous three month period, it is still a number that aspiring artists could only dream of.

Kanye West attracted more than a quarter million folllowers on Twitter in the past three months.

Without tweeting a peep, West ranked in the top 99th percentile of mentions and new followers last week, and perhaps even more amazingly, in the top 98th percentile of retweets. And when he does tweet, the crowd goes wild. The latest has already attracted near 35,000 retweets, and looking at the numbers for the past few months, it seems every morsel thrown to his fans is gobbled up and heavily retweeted.

The few tweets West has posted this year have caused immense spikes in his retweet activity.

This raises the question of why people choose to follow artists on Twitter. Are they interested in the content of an artist’s feed and what they have to say, or is it simply a way to express their admiration? And do some artists reach a level of notoriety that relieves them of their duty to actively engage with followers?

West isn’t the only one with this kind of clout. Despite only a single tweet posted to their official account in 2010, French electronica duo Daft Punk have more than 40,000 followers. I wish my tweets were that popular.

This article originally appeared on Forbes.com. Liv Buli is the resident data journalist for music analytics company Next Big Sound. Buli is a graduate of New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and her work has appeared in Newsweek Daily Beast, The New York Times Local East Village, Hypebot and more.

Ready? Get Set. Hack!

Wed, 01 May 2013 09:34:00 -0400

It’s that time of year again. Buds are springing, the sun is shining, and the Next Big Sound team is itching to build, build, build.

Next week marks the third hack day for the company. This time around we will dedicate two full days, May 7th and 8th, to splitting up in to teams, siphoning through the best ideas, and giving up sleep in order to build the finest hacks this side of music and data.

Last year’s projects ranged from ranking artist by social score, to Twitter topics, to a lab illustrating touring relationships between artists. And with even more time on our hands, we plan to take it to the next level. This means even less sleep, even more pizza, and even sweeter hacks.

So what would you like to see the Next Big Sound team build on hack day? We are open to ideas, and would appreciate your input. Feel free to submit any and all suggestions in the comment section.

If you are looking for a little inspiration for what to suggest, here is one of the coolest hacks we’ve ever seen, when the Green Building at MIT was turned into a giant, playable Tetris game. Now, while we doubt we’ll be replicating this in Manhattan’s Flatiron district, it seems the sky is the limit with one highly talented team of engineers, and 48 hours of hacking ahead.

Bring it on!

Does Twitter's #Music Launch Mean Big Business or Big Blip?

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 10:33:00 -0400

Twitter #Music has now been live to the public for one full week. It’s no question that the social network is attempting to solidify a niche as the number one network for the music industry. The question is, is it working?

The new standalone music discovery service, available as both an iPhone app as well as on the web, tracks activity on the site and allows users to see the songs and artists that everyone in the “Twitterverse” is talking about (basically a revamped version of recently acquired internet startup We Are Hunted), thus aiding with the discovery of new music. The launch certainly created a heavy amount of buzz, the internet is rife with expressed opinions on #Music, but what does the data indicate about the purpose and longevity of this service?

Now in its seventh year, Twitter has long been on the rise in terms of growing importance as a social network for musicians. In the month of January 2011 the average artist added 1040 new followers. Fast-forward to March 2013 and that number near quadruples, rising to 3935. The number of artist profiles tracked by Next Big Sound on Twitter has also risen, by close to 260 percent from early 2011 to now. Overall, the number of new followers for artists increased by 140 percent from 2011 to 2012. (Can you say character-limit coincidence?)

The biggest artists in terms of following on Twitter are well-known, Justin Bieber recently dethroned the queen of social media monsters Lady Gaga and now counts more than 38 million followers. Katy Perry and Rihanna are not far behind. One has to wonder whether it is a coincidence that of the more than 20 million mentions of artist handles that occurred last week, the six artists that attracted the highest number (all told more than 30 percent of the total), include names such as Liam Payne of One Direction, Ariana Grande, Demi Lovato and Austin Mahone - the common thread being that they all have a fan base predominantly made up of young females.

If Twitter is establishing itself as the key social network for artists, then what was the reaction to the launch of #Music? It certainly had somewhat of an impact, setting off alerts in our system for an inordinate number of spikes in new followers for artists, more than threefold the norm. The ones that saw the highest increases in comparison to what they would typically see, were bands such as Arcade Fire, M83 and Sum 41. These are not new artists, but are also not the ones that rank at the top in terms of Twitter activity. What is interesting to note is that in several of these cases, the launch date increase seems to be a one-off, with the number of new followers going back down the following day.

And Twitter might have competition in this endeavor, they are not a lone-wolf social network in making moves involving music. While it involved a more quiet rollout, Facebook introduced a new feature the same day, allowing users to indicate what music they are listening to in a status update. The impact of this on social graph search and music discovery is yet unknown.

Whether the long-term impact for artists is incremental or great, is not necessarily what Twitter is looking for. At the end of the day, the purpose of #Music has to be an increase in user engagement for tweeters, as well as adding more users to the fold, and the numbers certainly support moving in the direction of this industry. Creating a service that makes it even more imperative for artists to stay put or join seems a natural progression on what was already a growing trend for the company.

This article originally appeared on Forbes.com. Liv Buli is the resident data journalist for music analytics company Next Big Sound. Buli is a graduate of New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and her work has appeared in Newsweek Daily Beast, The New York Times Local East Village, Hypebot and more.

Movers and Shakers: Talented Young Ladies

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 17:08:45 -0400

This week’s Next Big Sound chart is chock-full of talented young women on a rapid rise to the top, all within different genres.

Singer-songwriter Jillette Johnson is set to drop her debut album Water in a Whale this summer, which will include the five tracks off of her previously released EP Whiskey & Frosting. Johnson, a talented pianist whose fan base predominantly consists of young females, saw a massive lift in her online numbers once the deeply emotional video for “Pauvre Coeur” went live on VEVO.

She saw close to 20,000 views in the two weeks following release, an increase of 4379 percent compared to the fortnight before. In that same time, she saw a boost in awareness with her Wikipedia page views spiking by more than 130 percent, as well as growth in the number of fans she is reaching. Her number of new Twitter followers went up by 91 percent, bringing her total above 4500. Johnson, who is based out of New York, signed with Wind-up Records in 2012, and also works as a songwriter with BMI.

Also appearing on the chart this week is Valerie June, whose sound is aptly described as “organic moonshine roots music” - a mix of blues, folk, gospel and more. June, who has previously recorded a collaboration with bluegrass veterans Old Crow Medicine Show, and may have gotten a leg up due to her performance with Eric Church at the ACM awards, has seen an increase across the board in the past two weeks.

Her number of new Twitter followers is up by more than 260 percent, she saw close 3,500 plays on SoundCloud, and added another 665 new page likes on Facebook bringing her total closer to 8000. According to the demographics of her Twitter mentions, more than 60 percent of her fan base is located in the UK and France, and her upcoming album Pushing Against A Stone will be released in Europe in early May. It won’t make its way across the pond until the end of summer, though two singles, “Workin’ Woman Blues,” and “You Can’t Be Told” are available for streaming on her SoundCloud profile.

The video for Kat Dahlia’s gritty track “Gangsta” has already garnered more than 2.5 million views on VEVO, half a million of which came in the last week alone. Miami-native Dahlia has been writing songs since she was 15, made the move to New York at 18 to focus on her music career, waited tables to afford expensive studio time, and is finally starting to see all the hard work pay off.

Her fan base is rapidly blowing up. With more than 4000 new Twitter followers in a week her total has now reached more than 20,000. She reached the same benchmark on Facebook a few weeks ago, and 6000 new followers on Instagram is more than a 500 percent increase from what she gained the week before.

Looks as though it is going to be a summer full of up-and-coming talented females making a lot of noise, with new albums, tours and more. Stay tuned to our weekly Next Big Sound chart to find out who else to look out for.

The Value of Data For Artist Managers

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 12:46:30 -0400

Today, an endless sea of bands are proudly branding themselves “DIY Artists,” and are quick to talk badly of record labels or any other “gatekeeper.” However, our current musical landscape comes engrained with a dense sense of responsibility and strategy that few artists acknowledge. As a manager, this responsibility includes examining perpetual concepts like transparency, exclusivity, community, and discovery, while still prioritizing the minutia. New channels pop up every day, while merchandise, publishing, touring, and recording still need to progress. With so many moving pieces, managers often crave a single thread that can tie it all together.

Enter data.

The beauty of data for artist managers is that it serves as a strategic compass, both on and offline. It informs your day-to-day decisions, allowing you to strategically penetrate a focused goal, rather than achieving random acts of improvement.

Tour routing is a great example. Every artist can, right this second, pull up a list of the top 10 cities where their fans/listeners/viewers are located on Facebook, Soundcloud and YouTube. With these reports in front of you, you will surely begin to see patterns. These patterns should guide your routing. Although it may require a bit more effort, it sure beats saying “well, it’s a rock band, so let’s tour the South.”

But touring is just one piece of an artist’s career. Digital marketing firms use radio spin data every day. If an emerging artist, for instance, begins getting radio play in select cities, marketers garner this information and execute geo-targeted campaigns to propagate these same communities. Also, in the land of the free (download), collecting fan data is critical. As a manager, a highly populated mailing list is not just a bunch of email addresses and zip codes; it is a report telling you who and where your fans are. Website traffic, merch sales, ticketing reports, live show draw, and your quantitative social media footprint are other forms of valuable data for a manager.

With all that said, the most important “metric” is still trust. Trust, in its most genuine form, cannot be measured, and that’s what makes it so special. It cannot be bought; only nurtured. Developing trust with your fan community is critical, and can only be done through repetition and consistency. As trust develops, so does your story and your influence.

With great tools like Next Big Sound, and free insights from your social channels, it is easier than ever before to identify your fan base. Touring, radio, web and merch reports, combined with an obsessive focus on trust, consistency and community is a winning formula.

Without data, it would be easy to wander aimlessly through the evolving music industry. But with data as your guide, the entire process becomes much simpler.

Ethan Schiff is an artist manager, music industry blogger, and consultant for independent artists. He can be found online via Twitter @ethanschiff or through his blog.

Psy Take Two - Has He Done It Again?

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 09:42:00 -0400

If you thought your galloping days were over, you might just be right. A new dance is in town.

This past week, South Korean YouTube sensation Psy released the follow up track to his smash hit “Gangnam Style,” and it seems the madness has begun anew. The question of whether Psy would be able to repeat the success has been buzzing around the industry for months, and now the first numbers are trickling in.

Psy isn’t straying too far from the magic formula that propelled him on to the international music scene last summer, a similar hypnotic rhythm underlies the new track, as well as an intriguing mix of Korean and unintelligible English to sing along to, including the catch phrase “Mother, Father, Gentleman.” The new music video is a tad more racy than the last, with a swaying hip gesture described as the “arrogant dance” replacing the familiar gallop.

Whether or not “Gentleman” will have the same longevity as “Gangnam Style” (which now has more than 1.5 billion views and is still appearing on iTunes charts around the world close to a year after the initial craze) remains to be seen. But the early indicators seem positive, at least in terms of plays. The more than 48 million YouTube views tracked on his official channel on Sunday alone, is close to ten times what he saw just two days before. The video itself has been watched more than 145 million times already, and while the number of daily views dipped slightly on Monday, it was still the most watched video on YouTube everywhere from Argentina, to Ireland, to Taiwan over the weekend.

Psy ranked number one of all artists in the number of new YouTube views last week, and if you figured he must have tapped out his pool of potential fans by now, close to 260,000 people clicked the subscribe button in the last seven days, a 720% increase from the week before. What is more, “Gentleman” entered the UK Official Singles Chart at number 61, the same spot that “Gangnam Style” debuted at, and crawled up to number nine on the iTunes chart of Top Songs in the US.

It might be too early too tell whether the initial spike in numbers is just a piggyback off the media frenzy around the release, or a sign that Psy has really done it again, but his overall number of views is staggering.

Get ready for another summer of K-Pop.

Photo Credit: Screen grab from Official Video for Gentleman.

Movers and Shakers: Nico Vega On Top

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 09:11:00 -0400

Touring, a sneak peek EP and an upcoming album have catapulted alt rock band Nico Vega to the top of the Next Big Sound chart.

The band, based in Los Angeles, is not new to the music scene - singer Aja Volkman, guitarist Rich Koehler and drummer Mike Peña formed the band in 2005. Peña later left the band and was replaced by drummer Dan Epand, and they are currently joined by bassist Jamila Weaver. Early on Nico Vega self-released a few EPs and dropped their first full-length with Myspace Records in 2009, and have since been working on their upcoming album We Are The Art. They decided to release the EP Fury Oh Fury with Five Seven Music in early February, to give fans a taste of what was to come.

While Nico Vega has steadily been building their core fan base over the years, they are now exploding on to the scene. Looking at their data from the past three months, they have added more than 8000 new Facebook page likes, close to 35 percent of their total, and 3,400 followers on Twitter, which is 464 percent increase from the previous three month period. There is also a massive spike in their Vevo video views following the release of a new video for the song “Beast,” the anthem track off the band’s first album. Around 450,000 views on their channel makes up an increase in new views by more than 2,300 percent.

And their numbers are still on the rise. In the two weeks leading up to their chart placement, the band saw more than 180,000 views on YouTube, 125,000 on VEVO, and more than 6,000 spins on Rdio, a boost of 187 percent compared to the fortnight before.

With Volkman’s infant daughter in tow, Nico Vega have been on an extensive tour to promote the new EP and upcoming album, billed alongside indie rock band Imagine Dragons (Volkman’s hubby is frontman Dan Reynolds) and Australian upstart Atlas Genius. They rocked a private concert at the Pandora offices in San Francisco this past Tuesday and have several more tour dates scheduled, including a stop at the famous Red Rocks Amphitheater.

Considering everything that is going on, Nico Vega is certainly making a stir in the industry, and look as though they are here to stay. Who else is excited for the album this summer?

Photo Credit: Screengrab from official music video for “Beast” on VEVO.

This article originally appeared on the MTV O Music Awards blog. Liv Buli is the resident data journalist for music analytics company Next Big Sound. Buli is a graduate of New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and her work has appeared in Newsweek Daily Beast, The New York Times Local East Village, Hypebot and more.

Lemaitre: The Business Of A Band Today

Thu, 11 Apr 2013 18:55:27 -0400

An abandoned three-story brick building in the middle of a former brewery is a pretty sweet spot to make music. In a sprawling, though somewhat disheveled studio, the two young gentleman that have adopted the moniker Lemaitre, play and produce until the wee hours of the night, creating the funk-inspired electronica that is catapulting them from the small town of Oslo, Norway, to worldwide renown. But beneath it all – lies a keen sense of business savvy.

With a music industry still adjusting to the current state of the marketplace, many argue that it is near impossible for the typical musician to make money these days. The rise and fall of Napster, the dawn of digital, and the ubiquity of high-standard equipment that allows artists to produce without relying on an established (and expensive) recording studio or major label backing, have led to a revolution in the industry in just a few short decades. Social streaming services such as SoundCloud, which near tripled in activity last year, have many industry veterans up in arms about the concept of releasing music for free, claiming that it devalues the work in the eyes of fans. But Ketil Jansen and Ulrik Denizou Lund have a very different perspective, and are making it work to their advantage.

Jansen & Lund, both 22, have been making music together for the past two years. The pair have been friends since junior high, and decided to focus on their craft full-time after high school. Both band members write and produce. Lund, who also does vocals, has a background in hip hop, Jansen in house, and their influences range from the greats within their genre such as Daft Punk, to classical music and jazz. “We really wanted to have the ability to do different tempos and experiment with it.”

The boys record their own samples for their music. “A coincidence,” Lund says, “We didn’t know how to clear samples, so we started making our own.” But this gives them freedom to create whatever they please.

Lemaitre has started to make a substantial amount of noise on the music scene. In December 2012 they appeared on the Next Big Sound chart, and during the last week of March they ranked third of all artists in number of new followers on SoundCloud (second only to Azealia Banks and Macklemore). Their videos are getting substantial play on YouTube, having reached four million total views on their official channel.

“With each release it has grown more and more,” says Lund, adding that they keep themselves relevant by putting out quality music and videos on a regular basis. “It has grown exponentially after we released Relativity 3.” Looking at their data, a significant growth in their fan base around the time of their latest release is indeed evident. In the past three months, they saw close to 10,000 new Facebook fans, more than 25% of their total, and 1,800 new Twitter followers, a 256% increase from the previous period.

Lemaitre have seen a massive boost in fan base since their latest release, particularly on SoundCloud, where they have added an average of more than 32,000 new followers each week in the past month.

An online presence has been imperative to the story of Lemaitre. “It’s not like we have social media hour on Fridays,” Jansen jests, “If you see something funny you tweet about it.” However they have established a presence across all of the major online channels to ensure that they and their music are accessible to potential and existing fans, and cite SoundCloud and YouTube as their biggest platforms. “It makes it easier for people to get in to the music, and listen to the music,” says Lund, adding that the easier it is to get hold of, the more likely it is that fans will share.

Lemaitre cite SoundCloud and YouTube as their biggest online platforms.

Lemaitre releases all of their music for free, with the option to purchase. “We grew up with Napster. We were the first generation to just download everything,” Lund says, explaining that people would be able get it without paying no matter what, but if the music is good enough a significant portion of listeners will be willing to pay for the privilege. And the approach is seemingly successful. As is they make enough of a profit from syncs, sales, streams and gigs, about half of their income came from touring in 2012. “We still earn money on streaming and selling our music, and we’re not the biggest band in the world,” says Lund. “So if we can make money, I don’t see a reason to complain.”

As for handling their affairs, Lemaitre has been working with manager Christopher Wareing of MADE Management since the fall of 2011. Wareing runs their label Substellar Records, they are signed to SONY Music in Norway and Sweden, recently cut a deal with OneLove Records in Australia, and have more talks underway. Lund explains how they are very happy they didn’t take the first and best deal that came their way, because frankly best had nothing to do with it. Instead they built a solid following and used this as leverage in negotiations. “We did everything by ourselves through the internet,” says Lund. “Then it spread, got quite big, and we started getting proper offers.”

Their approach comes from understanding and adapting to a changing market place. “Large companies don’t want to change their ways, because it is expensive and impractical,” says Jansen, “but you can’t change the market to fit the strategy either. So you sort of have to adapt.”

Change is in store for Lemaitre. The former office villa that houses their studio will be completely renovated and transformed into apartments at the end of summer, and this interview has been slotted in between a tight schedule of meetings with members of the Australian press. Lund mentions a desire to take their studio across the Atlantic, but the options are open. Regardless they plan to continue making the keen business decisions that is helping them make a solid living as a band.

“Even though we are a lot bigger now than we were two years ago,” says Jansen, “I still feel like this is the tip of the iceberg.”

This article previously appeared on Forbes.com. Liv Buli is the resident data journalist for music analytics company Next Big Sound. Buli is a graduate of New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and her work has appeared in Newsweek Daily Beast, The New York Times Local East Village, Hypebot and more.

Northwestern Alumni Take Over Brooklyn Bowl

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 11:07:00 -0400

Where will you be next Tuesday? Next Big Sound will be at Brooklyn Bowl.

Northwestern University’s Eastern Alliance has teamed up with the crew at Brooklyn Bowl to host a Collegiate Bowl on April 16th. The event will feature performances from two talented alums, Morgan Karr and Janelle Kroll - both young artists on the rise.

Kroll, who has recently relocated to New York from Chicago, started writing music when she was still at school, sang in bands, did acoustic shows and even passed up an offer with an independent label that later went defunct. She released a self-titled EP in the beginning of her senior year, but it is her new music that she is thrilled to share. “Fast forward a few years and I feel like I have finally found my own sound.”

Kroll, who is about to release a second EP produced by Vince Lawrence of Slang Musicgroup, describes her music as a blend of R&B and Electronica. She’ll take the stage alongside a keyboardist and a DJ, and while the majority of her music is rhythmic, she plans to throw in an acoustic track or two, admitting that the singer/songwriter in her still “loves a killer ballad.”

Kroll considers the Brooklyn Bowl performance her New York debut, and couldn’t be more excited to gauge the reaction to her new music “I think the biggest challenge and opportunity in this crazy pursuit is finding the right collaborators,” Kroll says, adding that she finally feels as though all the years of hard work are starting to pay off.

Originally from Nashville, Karr made the move to Los Angeles more than a year ago after five years in New York, but is thrilled to return for Tuesday night’s show. A Theater major at Northwestern, he auditioned in an open call and landed a role in the Broadway hit musical Spring Awakening. Karr says it was on his free time he found his true passion, playing concerts around the city and delving into songwriting. He stepped out of his comfort zone, moved across the country, and started focusing on music full time.

Karr has been writing a lot in LA, both for himself and for others, and released his second EP entitled Yellow Skies in early March. He thinks of his music as an opportunity to create a community with fans. “I think it is a slow, organic process,” says Karr. “My goal with this EP is really to get the word out. Whether you buy it or get it for free, I want people to have it so that they know I am here.”

Karr and Kroll are old friends, having met through a summer theater program when still in high school, and singing in an A Capella group during their time at Northwestern. They both admit that they are a bit nervous, yet very excited to play the 600-capacity venue next week, and are happy they will be there to have each other’s backs.

So if you are free this coming Tuesday, join the Next Big Sound crew and a whole bunch of Northwestern alumni for what is bound to be a great night of music and fun!

New YouTube Sources in Next Big Sound

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 16:36:00 -0400

Next Big Sound users now have the ability to view data from two new YouTube sources in their accounts: YouTube Analytics and YouTube Detections.

What’s the difference between these two new sources, what data can you see, and what do you have to do in order to see them in Next Big Sound?

YouTube Analytics, similar to Facebook Insights, is an authorized source that grants you access to more granular data and a variety of additional metrics. If you are the administrator of a YouTube Channel then you are just a few steps away from viewing this data in Next Big Sound. For full instructions head to our help section: Connecting YouTube Analytics

Use Case: Monitoring Artist/Management posting their own videos/content

YouTube Detections allows you to monitor user-generated content (UGC) detected by YouTube’s Content ID technology. There are no extra steps to take in order to view this data in our platform. Next Big Sound is one of only two companies authorized by YouTube to access this data feed and we are making it available to you! For more information on YouTube Content ID follow this link to their help center: YouTube Content ID

Use Case: Tracking YouTube users posting “Harlem Shake” videos

Here are some helpful definitions to help you understand the data from these two new sources.

YouTube Analytics

Video Views - Counted when a user watches a video.
Comments - Counted when a user comments on a video.
Video Favorites - Counted when a user favorites a video uploaded by the artist’s channel.
Likes - Counted when a user clicks the “thumbs up” icon beneath the video.
Shares - Counted each time a user shares a video by using the Share button.
Subscribers - The net number of times that users subscribed to, or unsubscribed from, a channel (or for a specific video).
Unique Views - The number of unique viewers that watched a video.
Minutes Watched - The number of minutes that users watched the specified channel or video.
Avg View Duration - The average length, in seconds, of video views for the specified video.
Avg View Percentage - The average amount of a video that a user views, shown as percentage of total.
Viewer Percentage - Demographic representation of video views weighted by the total number of views on that day.

YouTube Detections

Video Views - Counted when a user watches a detected video. The data for this metric is US Only.
Videos - The number of videos where the song was detected. The data for this metric is US Only.

Looking for work in music and data? Opportunities galore.

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 14:11:00 -0400

Here at Next Big Sound, we work at the intersection of music and data, are excited to do so, and would encourage others to join the club. With that in mind, we have collected a list of available jobs within the industry that have an emphasis on data analysis.

Warner Music Group is currently hiring a manager for their analytics operations department. This role would entail oversight of direct-to-consumer digital marketing strategies, as well as improvement of tracking solution, in order to facilitate deep analysis of consumer behavior.

Other available opportunities at WMG:

Universal Group Music Distribution are looking for someone with a solid understanding of market & consumer analytics to join their Artist Analysis & Research team. This managerial role involves the analysis of available data in support of customer acquisition, engagement, loyalty and retention.

Other available opportunities at UMG:

RCA is in the market for an A&R Administration Analyst, who will help execute the recording process. From overseeing recording budgets, to ensuring deadlines are met, this role will also involve maintaining the asset metadata.

Viacom is hiring a Senior Research Analyst to help track and understand their audience. In this position, you would be expected to gather, interpret and analyze available data from a variety of resources, and put together one-sheets, reports and presentations on a regular basis.

Other available opportunities at Viacom:

BMI (Broadcast Music, Inc.) will be taking on a Lead Data Analyst within their Performing Rights Group. The analyst will have to define data reporting needs and develop a schedule for distribution, as well as interpret data in support of various projects.

Spotify is seeking a Director of Global Customer Service Resource Planning and Analytics. The director will implement staffing and scheduling strategies, as well as take the lead on customer service analytics and building communication channels for relevant data reporting.

Other available opportunities at Spotify:

As Gracenote puts it, they “create, consume, and analyze billions of data points every day.” And what is more, “We have fun doing it.” They are looking to add more software engineers to their Development Team within several fields. This is an opportunity for college graduates majoring in computer science or computer engineering, and involves assignments that range from database programming to building mobile apps.

Clear Channel has several open positions, among them a Data Architect who will be responsible for designing solutions for projects that involve both the database as well as applications. The role would include taking the lead on technical issues that arise, as well as ensuring that all projects adhere to established data warehousing standards.

Other available positions at Clear Channel:

So happy hunting fellow data + music lovers! We look forward to working with you in the future.

Counting Up Country: The ACM Awards

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 09:49:00 -0400

Who’s your bet for Sunday night??

This coming weekend will see the biggest names in Country take to the stage during the 48th annual Academy of Country Music Awards in Las Vegas. Two categories are open for public voting, Entertainer of the Year and New Artist of the Year. From Taylor Swift to Florida Georgia Line, what can the numbers tell us about who is most likely to win?

There are five nominees for Entertainer of the Year, including the two co-hosts Luke Bryan and Blake Shelton, powerhouse Miranda Lambert, superstar Taylor Swift and heartthrob Jason Aldean.

In this category it can be difficult to ascertain who fans of the genre are most likely to vote for. Swift has without a shadow of a doubt the largest fan base, counting more than 40 million Facebook page likes. Compare that to Jason Aldean who comes the closest at 6.8 million, it seems her co-nominees are a long way off. Then again it could be argued that Swift stands out in this crowd as an artist who falls in the grey area between Country music and Pop, and that a good chunk of her fans are not necessarily going to vote for this event.

Looking at fan engagement in terms of Twitter mentions, Swift once again finds herself in a different league. Blake Shelton saw the second highest number of mentions in the past three months at more than 600,000, but the question is whether this is partially due to his role as a coach on televised singing competition The Voice. Miranda Lambert, who gave a stellar performance at the Grammy Awards this February, saw a massive spike in mentions that evening, beating out hubby Shelton by about 25%. She still saw a lower number of mentions than Luke Bryan overall, despite having a substantially higher number of followers.

However, looking at the most recent buzz, it is interesting to note that a lot of people are sharing stories about Miranda Lambert on Facebook. In the past week her Facebook Talking About numbers were above 300,000, a 71% increase from the week before, and second only to Swift at about half a million. Given the comparative size of followings, this is a pretty impressive number.

The three nominees for New Artist of the Year are Florida Georgia Line, Brantley Gilbert and Jana Kramer. Gilbert and Kramer have around the same size following on Twitter at more than 260,000, with Florida Georgia Line lagging behind by about 100,000. However, the latter has seen a lot more activity in terms of mentions in the past month. The duo, comprised of Brian Kelley and Tyler Hubbard, saw close to 50,000 mentions, almost five-fold that of both Kramer and Gilbert.

When it comes to Facebook, Gilbert has a clear lead when it comes to the size of his fan base, 1.5 million page likes blows both Kramer and Florida Georgia Line out of the water. But like Swift, Gilbert is another artist that straddles the line between genres, in his case Rock, and may not see his entire fan base come out and vote. Looking at who is discussing the newcomers on Facebook in the most recent week, Gilbert once again comes out on top, more than 70,000 stories have been shared about his page. However, Florida Georgia Line saw about half that and considering that their total fan base is little more than 10 percent of Gilbert’s, this is again an impressive number.

Fans can vote every day up until the show and both categories are tough to call depending on how you read the numbers. The obvious candidates are those with the largest fan base, but this data journalist is going out on a limb and putting her money on Miranda Lambert and Florida Georgia Line, given the ratios between their total followings and engagement metrics. Tune in Sunday for the final results.

Movers and Shakers: Top Of The Next Big Sound Chart

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 10:07:00 -0400

If you’re a fan of indie pop and folk rock, you are about to get real excited about Hunter Hunted.

Dan Chang and Michael Hunter make up the LA-based duo that landed the top of the chart in Billboard this week. Together they have crafted a soothing, yet upbeat sound that grabs a listener from the first strum.

The band has more than a lot going on, having just completed a month-long residency at Bootleg Bar in LA, recently dropping their eponymous debut EP, and performing on Conan O’Brien in the end of February. Now they are about to set out on a US tour with Fitz and The Tantrums.

The stars are aligning for Hunter Hunted, who in the past month have seen more than 11,000 video views on YouTube, up 172% from the month before. Though still relatively small, their fan base is rapidly growing. They doubled their total number of Facebook page likes in the last month, and saw close to a 400% increase in new Twitter followers.

Their upward trajectory is likely to continue given the upcoming tour. The association with popular acts can often be a factor in the rapid rise of new artists. Earlier this month Mike Deleasa popped up on the charts while on a Latin American tour with the Jonas Brothers, and just last week August Alsina, who released a track featuring Trinidad Jame$ in January, also made the list.

So keep an eye - or better yet ear - out for Hunter Hunted, who are likely to be making a lot of noise in the coming year.

Why Conan Is The Musician's Best Bet On Late Night Television

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 12:59:00 -0400

Last March, jazz-funk jam band Galactic took to Conan O’Brien’s stage and performed the track “Hey Na Na” off their recently released album Carnivale Electricos. Joined by R&B vocalist Corey Glover and brass ensemble The Soul Rebels, they brought “a little bit of New Orleans to the stage,” as Conan himself put it. Over the next 24 hours, Galactic saw a 335 percent increase in daily traffic to their Wikipedia page.

Comparing the immediate impact across online/social metrics for artists that have appeared on major late night television shows like Saturday Night Live, Conan, Late Show with David Letterman, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel Live! and Last Call with Carson Daly - all of which are broadcast nationwide - proves that not only do these appearances have a measurable impact for artists, but that certain shows can result in greater reactions from audiences than others.

Included in the study are late-night performances as far back as 2009; the number of bands depends on the individual show. For most of the shows that air during the week, we looked at data for about 300 acts, however for Leno as many as 400 were included, for Daly about 200, and only about 50 in the case of SNL given that it airs on a less frequent basis.

For all of the above, Wikipedia is the most reactive metric. This suggests that late night show appearances do in fact increase the awareness around a band, and that a viewer’s first reaction will often be searching for the act online. Artists performing on Saturday Night Live saw an average increase in views to their Wikipedia page of 300 percent, a 175 percent increase for performing on Conan, and more than 130 percent on Letterman. Another interesting tidbit - late night shows that air their musical performances later in the evening, like Fallon, Daly, and Kimmel (the latter only recently switched to the 11:35ET timeslot), all gave a lower increase, with Carson Daly trailing at around 30 percent Wikipedia page view increases for music acts who performed.

Late night performances also help artists grow their fan bases on social platforms like Facebook and Twitter, although the impact on these metrics is significantly smaller than what you see from Wikipedia. Artists appearing on Saturday Night Live saw the highest average increase in new Facebook page likes, but only by about a 63 percent in daily likes acquired. In the case of Twitter increases, performers on Fallon showed close to an 80 percent increase in daily followers, second only to Conan at 95 percent. Once again, Carson Daly shores up the rear with no significant change.

The impact on daily YouTube video views for artists on any of the shows was surprisingly low. The immediate impact for artists performing on Conan, Letterman and Saturday Night Live are the highest across all late night shows, but the increases are barely significant. One explanation could be that videos of the performances are typically published the following day, but can be found on the official channels for the shows as opposed to those of the performers (Next Big Sound only counts video plays towards an artist if the video falls under their official channel.)

Perhaps more importantly, a significant reaction does register in iTunes sales data, both on the album and track level. Only artists that appeared on SNL saw more than a 100 percent increase in track sales on average, but those on Letterman, Conan and Fallon saw increases above 40 percent.

The band that stood out as having the biggest overall boost from a late night television appearance is folk-rockers The Spring Standards, who appeared on Conan on June 18th of last year. The following day, the New York-based trio saw a 5480% increase in Wikipedia page views, an 868% increase in new Facebook page likes, and an 1844% increase in new Twitter followers. While this staggering impact was immediate, it also seemed to translate to a fairly significant long-term impact at least in terms of awareness. Their Wikipedia page views more than doubled in month following the performance, versus the month leading up to it.

On the value of an appearance, band manager Jonny Kaps of +1 Music says, “A television performance is a tremendous opportunity for a band to get people talking. It is often the first time that many fans get to experience the band live.” Kaps looks for both the immediate and long-term impact, and not just in terms of sales. “The goal is to grow an artist’s preferred social networks steadily, with moments like television performances or other great content releases hopefully increasing activity. For my artists, their fans that follow and interact on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram is their core fan base that lives and breathes with them on a daily level.”

Kaps still recalls when The Heavy, one of the bands signed to their associated record label +1 Records, had their television debut on Letterman. They performed ‘How You Like Me Now?’ and killed it. “Dave wound up demanding an encore of their performance for the first time in the show’s history.” It catapulted their career. At the time of the performance they had sold about 1400 albums in the US in 3 months. The following week they sold more than 2,200 albums, and went on to sell more than 1500 albums a week for the next six months.

Looking at the full picture, Conan emerges as the late night show that lends the biggest boost following an appearance, with Letterman trailing close behind. Artists appearing on the charismatic redhead’s stage on average see a 50 percent increase in iTunes album sales and Facebook fans, and a 40 percent increase in traffic to their website. What makes the impact from Conan even more impressive is that although the show starts 35 minutes earlier than Letterman, Leno and Kimmel, it airs on basic cable as opposed to network television. According to Nielsen estimates, his ratings are generally much lower.

If a bigger boost was identified for Saturday Night Live across several of the metrics, one might wonder why the argument here is that Conan comes out on top. First and foremost is format. The comedy skit show stands apart from the rest not only because it is a cast of comedians versus a single talk show host, but also because it airs live only once a week, meaning there are less opportunities for artists to score an appearance. In addition, those slated to play here have generally reached a much higher level of popularity prior to their appearance. The typical number of daily Wikipedia page views for an artist on Saturday Night Live lies above 10,000. Artists on weeknight shows more often fall within the range of 80-500.

If you are an established artist it may very well be that performing on Carson Daly is more beneficial for Daly’s ratings than it is for you. On the other hand, if you are up-and-coming, any exposure should be considered good exposure. But if you had to pick, Conan appears to be your best bet for overall impact.

This post originally appeared on Forbes.com. Liv Buli is the resident data journalist for music analytics company Next Big Sound. Buli is a graduate of New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and her work has appeared in Newsweek Daily Beast, The New York Times Local East Village, Hypebot and more.

Research contributed by Adam Hajari, data scientist at music analytics company Next Big Sound. Hajari received his Doctorate in Physics from Washington University in Saint Louis and has a part-time career playing the banjo.

Soaring Out Of SXSW

Fri, 22 Mar 2013 09:53:00 -0400

Spring came to Texas and 6th street was overrun with hoards of SXSW festival attendees running around like headless chickens wishing they could be in more than one place at a time.

As it is every year, SXSW is where artists play to be discovered, and it can be hard to stand out among the thousands of acts. A ranking of the all artists that appeared in official showcases during the 2013 festival reveals who made the biggest splash in Texas, and that no one genre dominated. Here is a list of the top ten, recognize any names?

Snagging the top spot is singer/songwriter Tori Kelly, who performed at several showcases, including one secret show and a session at the bright green Spotify house. Of all the artists, Kelly got the biggest boost in terms of new online plays, views and fans. Awareness around the 20-year-old songstress was up heavily – more than 18,000 Wikipedia page views in the past two weeks is a 250% increase. Kelly regularly engages with fans on both Facebook and Twitter, and has a larger following on latter. She gained more than 12,000 new followers during her time at SXSW.

Also high up on the list are EDM trio Krewella. They performed at an outrageous AM Only showcase at La Zona Rosa, complete with neon lights, glow sticks and a wildly enthusiastic audience. Krewella appeared on the Next Big Sound chart in June of last year, and have been on a steady rise ever since. During SXSW they were literally “Killin’ It” and have seen a sharp increase in online plays. They saw more than 2 million video views on Vevo during the week of the festival, which is a 600% percent increase from the prior, as well as close to 200,000 plays on SoundCloud, bringing their total to 5 million.

Established acts like Green Day, Paramore and Snoop Dogg also got a big boost from the hype around the festival, proving that this is a festival for acts of any size. Sunday saw SXSW come to a close, and a much calmer city has been handed back over to the residents of Austin. But not for long - the hullabaloo of booking hotels, proposing panels and picking performers will start again before you know it. See you next year Austin!

Using Data To Find The Next Gotye

Mon, 18 Mar 2013 16:56:00 -0400

One second you had no idea who he was, the next you couldn’t get the haunting wail of “Somebody that I Used to Know” out of your head. Could the data have told you that Gotye was all of a sudden going to be the biggest thing since sliced bread?

Talk to anyone who works in Artist & Repertoire and they will tell you – it’s all about what you hear and what you see. There is no substitute for the trained ear and the feeling you get from watching live performances when it comes to determining whether an artist is solid or not. And that may very well be true. However, with an ever growing amount of information about what people are listening to and sharing online, the question arises of whether this data can be used to help pinpoint the next big smash hit. Given the ease with which artists can now record, produce, and publish music on their own the pool of potentials is overwhelming, and at the very least we should be able to use this data to narrow the search.

In July 2011, when Belgian-Australian indie artist Gotye released the track that would soon become a global sensation, he had already been an established musician for a decade and had two independent releases under his belt. Almost immediately after the single dropped, his numbers started blowing up, including being the fastest accelerating artist on social streaming service SoundCloud, yet he wasn’t signed to a US label for another three months.

The first step is to tackle the question of when artists get signed. Are there certain heat zones or thresholds that we can define? Looking at a group of successful artists and their signing dates, we found that 50 percent of them were signed to a record label before reaching 20,000 Facebook fans and 5,000 Twitter followers. This would indicate that artists are often picked up fairly early in their social trajectory. At the same time it highlights that a significant number of artists – the “Gotyes” of the world – are several years into their career before landing a record deal.

As mentioned, the growth of D.I.Y. recording and publishing means that there is more music out there today than ever before, ranging from absolutely amazing to the worst of the worst. With that in mind, how can we use social media data to determine whether someone is actually going to be a success? The momentum an act sees during the early stages of their career can serve as a powerful indicator of exactly this. The amount of time it takes for the average artist to go from 20,000 to 50,000 Facebook page likes is 257 days, but for those who later reach one million, joining the likes of Faith No More, Colbie Callait and James Morrison, the average is less than half that, at only 117 days. What is more, the typical artist has less than a five percent chance of reaching this benchmark, but those who speed through this early stage in 60 days or less, see that percentage chance increase near five-fold.

While there may never be a true substitute for the human aspect and art of A&R, these findings demonstrate the value of applying social media data to the process of uncovering new talent. With this in mind, we applied a statistical model based on the social trajectory of artists that have been successful in the past to the Next Big Sound database. If you are looking to find who is really going to blow up in 2013, acts such as Atlas Genius, HAIM, Jessie Ware and Trinidad James come highly recommended. Or at least that is what the numbers say.

Photo Credit: By Brennan Schnell/Eastscene.com via Wikimedia Commons

Research contributed by Victor Hu, data scientist with music analytics company Next Big Sound. Hu is a graduate of Harvard University and has previously worked uncovering insights for the New York Yankees and the U.S. Department of Defense.

Music Kicks Off: SXSW So Far

Wed, 13 Mar 2013 15:18:00 -0400

The sun is shining in Texas everybody! We’ve had a great few days at SXSW already, a veritable marathon of panels, parties and performances, and with music kicking off it can only get better.

The Next Big Sound crew is rolling deep at SX this year. During interactive, Software engineer and analytics mastermind Alec Zopf presented a sweet Future15 on Neural Interfaces for Musicians. Alec has built his very own prototype glove and sleeve allowing him to control and create music with a wave of his fingers and a flick of the wrist.

The following day, yours truly had opportunity to participate in a panel on the future of journalism and the role of data in driving news. While solid reporting and writing abilities are still the cornerstone of the field, the increased volume and velocity of information that we define as big data means journalists today need to learn additional skills in order to uncover great stories. Journalists are becoming coders and vice versa.

Coming up are two additional panels that include our CEO Alex White. Thursday afternoon, stop by the Austin Convention Center to learn more about Big Data: The New Oil or the New Snake Oil, a discussion on mobile technologies, the data that is being gathered, and what this means for the music industry. On Friday, he will also be part of a session entitled Man v Machine: Data Science and the Future of A&R. Alex and Zanab Hussain, Data Scientist at Simple Reach, will be exploring how data and algorithms can have a role in music discovery and predicting the success of artists.

For those who want to learn more about what we are doing at Next Big Sound, our Director of Client Services Syd Cohen is camping out in the lobby of the Marriott hotel, a stones throw from the convention center. Stop by any time between 11 am and 4 pm, or shoot us an email at sxsw@nextbigsound.com to schedule a chat.

Join us tonight at the Empire Control Room for the #MEGABLAAG Music/Tech happy hour. From 6 pm we’ll be hobnobbing with stellar companies like Topspin, Mobile Roadie, Exfm, Songkick and Squarespace, with a showcase featuring acts like the High Highs, Diana and Alpine later in the evening. Drinks, great music and an awesome location should make for a great time - even Pitchfork says so.

Enjoy the rest of SXSW and we hope to see you around Austin!

This Week in Music: Streaming, SXSW and More

Fri, 08 Mar 2013 17:46:45 -0500

It’s Friday everyone, and I imagine you all woke up bright and early this morning, with smiles on your faces, just filled with anticipation about the day ahead and a weekly round up soon to arrive. Well, it’s here, back and better than ever. Well not necessarily better than ever. But here all the same.

On the blog this week as per usual, a run down of the Next Big Sound chart - with a little SXSW action baked in:

http://blog.nextbigsound.com/post/44657369778/movers-and-shakers-week-9-the-next-big-sound-chart

The second piece this week is on using data for A&R, based on the research that our data scientist Victor Hu has been doing as of late. This is the very first post for our brand new Forbes blog (yay!).

http://www.forbes.com/sites/livbuli/

(p.s. do not make fun of me for my corny bio. As a journalist I try really hard to never write about myself, hence I am not particularly great at it. Thank you in advance,)

In other news - a lot going on with streaming this week.

Formerly MOG, renamed Daisy (or maybe Beats Music, who knows) when purchased by Beats Electronics, and rebranded as the new global streaming service all about data transparency, has just landed a good chunk of funding. The investment group behind it also owns WMG:

http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/1550711/warner-musics-blavatnik-leads-60-million-funding-of

Here’s Zack O’Malley Greenburg from Forbes’s take on it.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/zackomalleygreenburg/2013/03/06/blavatniks-investment-in-beats-music-service-signals-major-change/

More from Warner this week, they just signed a licensing deal with Google around their proposed streaming service. The result of talks with other labels to come.

http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/1550631/warner-music-inks-deal-with-google-for-music-subscription-services

Facebook is launching the redesign of their News Feed this week, which of course means a whole lot of fuss and muss about Zuck is up to this time.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/07/technology/facebooks-redesign-hopes-to-keep-users-engaged.html?ref=business&_r=3&

Here is a breakdown from Hypebot on what this will mean for artists:

http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2013/03/music-on-facebooks-new-music-news-feeds.html

And of course another glowing article about the charms of Chris Brown, who just continues to overwhelm me with his graceful manner, infinite patience, and allround splendor.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/

Which brings me to graph of the week. Check out this trend in Rihanna’s Twitter. Here is the graph of her new followers in the time frame since rumors started circulating that she and Brown were hooking up again. Note the massive drop in late September that she never really recovers from - this coincides with Rihanna telling Oprah she still loved Brown and defending his actions, and the two of them making out at the VMAs. I guess people don’t like that, huh?

I came across this week’s video while curating the Next Big Sound chart this week. If you haven’t heard of Fifth Harmony before, these girls have been on Xfactor and this is their cover of Frank Ocean’s Thinking Bout You. Not bad, huh?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0q4jWZh9avQ

That’s all folks. Happy Friday! I’ll b heading down to Austin tomorrow for SXSW, so next week you can expect some stories from what is sure to be an amazing music festival.