Atlantic Music Group bumped Dave Rocco up to Chief Creative Officer after he spent the past year running visual campaigns for acts like Cardi B, FKA twigs, and Don Toliver. The guy came over from Universal Music Group, where he handled creative stuff across multiple divisions, and before that he built out artist marketing programs at Spotify while launching initiatives like their Best New Artist Party series.
Rocco started grinding at age 14, answering phones at Z100 radio before bouncing through gigs at Epic Records and BBDO advertising. He picked up awards at Cannes Lions along the way and even served on GLAAD's board.
Atlantic CEO Elliot Grainge said the promotion recognizes how much Rocco contributed to revamping the label group...
Beatdapp dropped a trust and safety platform that goes way beyond its usual streaming fraud detection gig by bundling identity checks, AI music detection, bot spotting, and account hijacking prevention into one system. The Vancouver company raised $17 million earlier this year and is pitching the OS to gaming outfits, streaming services, and online marketplaces after building partnerships with players like Universal Music Group and Audiomack.
The platform links up with Arcarta, a UK firm that does verification work for luxury markets, to create what they call a reusable identity layer that platforms can share. Beatdapp claims it has crunched through over 6 trillion streams and 65 trillion data points since launching back in 2019, and...
Cher locked down her half of Sonny and Cher royalties after a judge ruled that her 1978 divorce settlement trumps copyright law termination rules. Mary Bono tried yanking the singer's cut by claiming heirs could reclaim rights under federal copyright provisions, but the court sided with Cher and awarded her over $187,000 in withheld publishing money from classic tracks, like I Got You Babe and The Beat Goes On.
The Bono estate scored one minor win when the judge said Mary gets final say on royalty administration, though Cher can still challenge fees and administrator qualifications. Mary's legal team plans to appeal the decision.
The ruling also clarified that royalties stay legally payable to Cher even after she sold her catalog...
Live Nation snagged Royal Arena from Realdania and Copenhagen City after running the 17,000-capacity Danish venue since it opened back in 2017. The concert giant plans to drop cash on upgrades like rooftop solar panels, full LED lighting conversion, and battery storage systems that should save over 800,000 kilowatt-hours annually once the deal closes next year.
The arena has pulled acts like Billie Eilish, Justin Timberlake, and Olivia Rodrigo since Metallica kicked things off at the opening show. Live Nation already operates venues across Europe and recently grabbed a New Zealand festival producer plus a bigger stake in Mexican promoter OCESA, but Belgian regulators are currently investigating the company's Pukkelpop festival...
Universal Music Benelux boss Kees van der Hoeven is bouncing after running the Dutch operation for over 25 years and handling the broader Benelux region since 2013. Frank Briegmann from Central Europe will take over the gig temporarily while the company figures out what comes next. Van der Hoeven helped blow up artists like Kensington and Tiësto, and he cut deals with local hip-hop labels during his run.
The retirement caps off a bunch of executive shuffling at UMG recently, with the company also bringing in a new CFO and watching activist investor Bill Ackman bail from the board. The music giant has been busy signing AI partnerships with companies it previously took to court over copyright stuff, and revenue jumped over 10 percent to...
Daddy Yankee dropped a massive lawsuit against his ex-wife, Mireddys González-Castellanos, and former manager Raphy Pina over what he claims was a 20-year hustle to steal his publishing money. The Puerto Rican rapper filed the complaint in federal court, alleging that Pina fraudulently added himself as a songwriter on 15 tracks he never actually wrote, then worked with González-Castellanos to doctor split sheets and funnel royalties into companies he controlled. The suit is asking for at least $3 million under RICO laws, plus orders to fix all the copyright records.
The whole thing apparently blew up after Daddy Yankee took back control of his labels and discovered his ex-wife had tried moving $100 million into personal accounts. His...
Bending Spoons is dropping around $500 million in cash to scoop up Eventbrite, which is pretty wild considering the San Francisco ticketing platform was valued at $1.8 billion before going public back in 2018. The Milan-based private equity outfit has a track record of buying tech brands that lost their shine, and shareholders are getting $4.50 per share, which is way better than what the stock was doing before the announcement dropped.
Eventbrite has been struggling hard with flat revenues hovering around $325 million and ticket sales sliding down by over 10 percent. Bending Spoons CEO Luca Ferrari says they want to add messaging features, throw some AI into event creation tools, and build out a secondary ticket marketplace to juice...
WME snagged Carín León for worldwide representation, with Kirk M. Sommer running point on pushing the Mexican artist into fresh markets beyond his Regional Mexican stronghold. The five-time Grammy winner crushed attendance records at RODEOHOUSTON earlier this year with over 70,000 people showing up, and he became the first Latin performer to hit both Coachella and Stagecoach during the same festival season. His manager, Jorge Juarez, says the agency partnership should help León blow up in territories where he hasn't made serious moves yet.
León landed a deal with Island Records and Virgin Music Group through his Socios Music label, and his latest drop, Boca Chueca Vol. 1, hit number five on Billboard's Regional Mexican chart while...
JioSaavn hit 500 million downloads on Google Play, making it the second-biggest entertainment app in India behind JioHotstar. The streaming platform holds around 100 million monthly users who access more than 100 million songs across 15 languages, though that user count has basically stayed the same since 2019. Both services run under the Jio umbrella owned by Reliance Industries.
The company credits its growth to dirt-cheap pricing and interface upgrades like personalized Daily Mixes and community playlists. JioSaavn Pro goes for about 10 cents during two-month promos and roughly $4.42 annually, while Spotify Premium costs $2.21 monthly in the same market. Premium streaming jumped 43.9% in India during the first half of 2025, pushing...
