Innholdsfortegnelse for August 17, 2013 i Billboard Magazine

A lawsuit filed by the Turtles seeking artist performance royalties from SiriusXM is just the tip of the iceberg of a long-running feud between the satellite radio service and record labels and artists over pre-1972 copyrights. ¶ Since a U.S. copyright was created for master recordings beginning with those issued after Feb. 15, 1972, SiriusXM has taken the stance that it doesn’t have to pay for pre-1972 recordings since no federal copyright existed before then. ¶ In general, SiriusXM relies on a compulsory blanket license that allows it to play any commercially available music, and in turn it pays a statutory rate set by the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB)—currently at 9% of revenue. ¶ Since talk radio and other programming consists of about 50% of the service’s airtime, the 9%…

Spotify Bundles With Vodafone U.K. Vodafone customers will receive Spotify Premium bundled with fourth-generation cellphone service thanks to a partnership between the two companies that launches Aug. 29. Vodafone customers who sign up for 4G will receive two years of Spotify Premium (Sky Sports Mobile TV will be offered as an alternative). The partnership is a coup for Spotify, which will enjoy access to Vodafone’s millions of subscribers as well as integration into its monthly phone bill. Billboard Argentina Billboard Argentina launches this week, marking the magazine’s first Spanishlanguage edition and fifth international property after Russia, South Korea, Japan and Brazil. The Argentine version of the magazine is published by Sociedad de Editores ABC 1 and printed a first run of 20,000 copies. Sociedad partners Jorge Arias and Hernan Simo…

Nearly a decade after the mixtape wars of the mid-2000s, the format still resides in an awkward limbo for retailers, distributors, artists and labels. Many retailers stopped carrying mixtapes after the RIAA proved litigious against the sale of unofficial releases, leading police raids on several retailers in 2005 and on the offices of DJ Drama in 2007. But mixtapes remain a critical promotional tool in the industry, particularly among hip-hop artists, where they often rival official albums. Outside the purview of the major-label system, sales of the format have persisted. Last month, a mixtape album by unsigned artist Chance the Rapper available as a free download landed at No. 63 on Billboard’s Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart, having sold 1,000 copies in the week ending July 7, according to Nielsen SoundScan.…

WHAT: Having purchased the Forum for $23 million, Madison Square Garden Co. is sinking another $75 million or so into refurbishing the 46-year-old Inglewood, Calif., arena. The 17,500-seat venue, which can be scaled down to 8,000, will reopen Jan. 15 with the frist of three concerts by the Eagles. Gone are scoreboards and any signs of athletic teams as the building becomes strictly a concert and live entertainment hall. WHY: Having successfully refurbished Radio City Music Hall and the Beacon Theatre, MSG executive chairman Jim Dolan, a former Live Nation board member, saw an opportunity to expand on the West Coast after the Live Nation board rejected former chairman/CEO Irving Azof’s proposal to acquire the Forum about three years ago. “We’re confident there is a void in the Southern California…

Raised in a poor household by a single mother of four, Sammy Hagar spent his childhood summers picking fruit and vegetables so he could afford to buy clothes for school. “My mom was always half on welfare or food stamps and would get in line during Thanksgiving or Christmas when people were giving away free turkeys,” says Hagar, whose alcoholic father abandoned his family. “I grew up like that, and remembered how it made a big difference in our life.” This summer, during his North American Four Decades of Rock tour, Hagar is giving about $2,500 to local food banks in each city he visits. The Red Rocker has partnered with food banks during past tours and has seen fristhand the positive impact they have on those in need. “Food…

Nielsen SoundScan’s frist-half streaming numbers clearly reveal that three things happened during the frist six months of 2013: Track sales have fallen into negative territory, digital album sales hadn’t fallen into negative territory, and streaming activity experienced very strong growth. But a number of articles about sales and streaming numbers got the story wrong because too little attention was given to historical data. The few data points that Nielsen provided in its press release simply don’t offer enough information to properly understand digital trends in the United States. There are a number of reasons for the misunderstandings. People have overlooked the fact that digital growth rates have been slowing through the years. They often confuse growth rate (in percentage terms) with growth (in units). They often don’t understand the small…

As home to labels, media companies and ad agencies, Midtown Manhattan may be the business-lunch capital of the world. Here, power brokers reveal the do’s, don’ts and go-to’s for an effective lunch meeting in New York’s busiest neighborhood. POWER SPOTS Lunch is a great chance to go to a place that’s hopping at night but not quite so hopping during the day, like Nobu 57 [noburestaurants.com/f fty-seven]. —Lori Feldman, senior VP of brand partnerships and music licensing, Warner Bros. Records The Lamb’s Club [thelambsclub.com] is a great spot. It’s near Vevo, the labels and a lot of media companies, but outside of the Times Square craziness. And they have the best tuna niçoise. —Jennifer Press, senior director of marketing and publicity, Vevo Bar Americain [baramericain.com] and Ma Peche [momofuku.com/new-york/ma-peche]—both delicious…

PatchWerk Recording Studios is housed in a light gray concrete bunker tucked behind a busy McDonald’s on a tight corner on Atlanta’s Westside. On a hot Friday in early June, Mike Williams, who produces under the moniker Mike Will Made It and is known to pretty much everyone as simply Mike Will, is behind the wheel of his silver BMW X6 on the street outside PatchWerk, indulging in a quick nostalgia trip. “That’s where it all got started for me, over there,” he says, pointing to the studio. Will, 24, is wearing a red “Diamond Homegrown” shirt, long camouflage shorts, black Pumas and a gold chain. He was 16 when he began hanging around PatchWerk, working with the rapper Blaze, crafting beats and trying to force his way into the…

Most bands try to take a few months of between album cycles. But in the case of indie-tronic five-piece Grouplove, that break lasted about seven days. The band rang in 2013 with a headlining gig in downtown Washington, D.C., its last ofcial performance in support of 2011 breakout debut Never Trust a Happy Song—and entered a studio on Jan. 7 to begin work on Spreading Rumours, an even more rhythmic, eccentric follow-up due Sept. 17. “We had this momentum—being on the road for so long and developing such a good live show, we wanted to harness that energy while it was still right and got right into the studio and captured it,” lead singer/guitarist Christian Zucconi says. That no-sleep-for-the-weary approach is one that label founder Steve Ralbovsky seeks out for…

Clinton VanSciver, Los Angeles. Steve Aoki, Chris Lake & Tujamo, “Boneless” (Original Mix). This one is the kind of groover that Aoki is famous for. Huge drops, fat drums and a bouncy melody. Been loving it ever since I first heard it in Vegas. Tepr, “Minuit Jacuzzi” (DatA remix). Spastic and crazy but catchy as hell, this one is as Vyvanse & Whiskey as it gets. The original is a great tune, but the DatA remix has such an insane amount of energy. I literally never get sick of hearing this song. Felix Cartal, “young Love” (Original Mix). Love the vocal on this one, especially the lush harmonies. Mr. Cartal knows how to put together a catchy track for sure, and this one is no exception. It’s a great one…

“Don’t ask me why/Why there is sorrow,” Frankie Rose sighs on the opening line of “Sorrow.” The singer/songwriter may not have any answers in the lyrics of her new single, but the former Vivian Girls member decisively doubles down on the dream-pop of 2012 album Interstellar and strays even further away from the garage-rock sound of her previous musical outfit. “Sorrow” is lighter than even the airiest Interstellar tracks, with the chorus yielding a descending “Why-y-y” refrain that’s deceptively simple and wholly impossible to resist. The back half of the song also presents some unexpected sonic treats, including a string arrangement that bulks up the track’s emotional impact and a roaring outro that rewards patience. Along with all of its positive qualities, the frist single from Herein Wild mesmerizes due…

Eight months after fnishing fourth on season two of “The X Factor,” pop-rock trio Emblem3 guided debut album Nothing to Lose to a No. 7 bow on this week’s Billboard 200. Led by cheeky single “Chloe (You’re the One I Want),” which debuted at No. 98 on the Billboard Hot 100 on Aug. 10, the pop-rock collection sold 46,000 copies in its frist week, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Nothing to Lose marks the frist top 10 entry for an alum of the U.S. “X Factor,” and bests the No. 18 start of season-two champ Tate Stevens’ self-titled full-length. The Fox reality show may have finally unearthed its frist crossover stars in Huntington Beach, Calif., residents Wesley Stromberg, Drew Chadwick and Keaton Stromberg, who have turned the refrain “Chloe/I know your…

5 MONTHS AGO Aware that it had two albums’ worth of material as early as December, Five Finger Death Punch brought its vision to label Prospect Park and senior executive Ron Cerrito. “The challenge was to figure out how to help them realize the vision with a landscape of fans with short attention spans,” he says. That led Cerrito to think long term, with an artist-cycle mind-set as opposed to just an album cycle. His first promotional effort launched in February, with the album announcement made during a press conference for the Rockstar Energy Drinksponsored Mayhem tour and a snippet of a new track from Volume 2 to stir buzz for the albums’ material. 3 MONTHS AGO First single “Lift Me Up” was released digitally on May 14, alongside a…

Not Enough Heaven Five finger death Punch’s the Wrong Side of Heaven and the righteous Side of Hell: Volume 1 debuts at no. 2 on the Billboard 200 (see story, page 41). that gives the top two rungs of the chart the rare glimpse of the word “heaven” in a title. since the tally became an all-encompassing survey of both mono and stereo titles on aug. 17, 1963, no title using the word “heaven” (or a variation of) has reached the top two. Before that, from 1959 to 1963, Billboard had separate mono and stereo album charts. in the pre-combined-chart era, the last “heavenly” set in the top two was Johnny mathis’Heavenly, which was no. 1 on the mono album chart in late 1959 and spent its last week in…

Beats Music, while still under wraps, has been methodically building up its curation team during the past year, hiring genre experts and programmers, and giving clues to how the service plans to differentiate itself from the pack when it launches later this year. The team, according to sources, includes former Pitchfork Media editor in chief Scott Plagenhoef, former BET Digital executive editor Carl Chery, veteran Detroit radio music director Suzy Cole, Recording Academy music blogger Arjan Writes, former Rhino Records A&R director Mason Williams, Los Angeles hip-hop radio personality Fuzzy Fantabulous and country music writer Ken Tucker. The group is reporting to Julie Pilat, who joined Beats Music on Aug. 6 as head of music for curation and artist development. Pilat had been a top executive at Clear Channel Communications,…

Big cities like New York and Los Angeles have more music industry jobs, but you’re more likely to have a neighbor in the biz in Nashville. In today’s DIY music business, people can perform their jobs from just about anywhere. But as economist Richard Florida pointed out in 2009, the trend in music industry jobs has been increased concentration in a small number of cities. From 1970 to 2006, Nashville was the only city in the country with positive growth in music industry jobs using a location quotient, a measure of a particular industry’s share of the total employment in a given location. “In effect, it sucked up all the growth in the music industry,” Florida wrote. Nashville’s 27,000 music industry jobs are vital to the city. The jobs earn…

The white-hot business of reality TV has created a musical opportunity that units of Sony/ATV and composer Hans Zimmer’s company have quietly begun to take advantage of during the last 12 months. Now they plan to take the business by storm. Sony/ATV’s production music arm Extreme Music and Zimmer’s Remote Control have created joint venture Bleeding Fingers to provide custom scoring services using composers already involved with Remote Control and its studios in Santa Monica, Calif. “The thrust of what we’re doing is we’re creating a bespoke music library,” says Extreme Music’s Russell Emanuel, who’s taking on the role of Bleeding Fingers’ CEO. “We’re not scoring to picture, but we’re creating tones for the characters and cues for different areas—heartbreak, disappointment. We create a number of tracks specifically for that…

Madison Square Garden Co. The company has sunk nearly $1 billion into renovating its namesake building and now has 10 years to find a new New York home. Can the Forum become a cash cow quickly enough to help Jim Dolan finance a new arena or fight city hall to let it stay put? L.A. Live. Staples and Nokia benefit from a campus full of bars and restaurants. When it reopens, dining near the Forum is still pretty much drive-through, which could change if a retail/entertainment operation takes over the adjacent Hollywood Park that closes late this year. Spanish-language acts. In its scaled-down form, the Forum could well replace the soon-to-go Gibson and go up against the 7,100-seat Nokia, two venues that actively book Latin artists. Marc Anthony, for example,…

Watch virtually any music video today and it feels like you’re watching a mini commercial for a brand, locale or cause. After all, it’s no secret that labels and artists are always seeking underwriters to subsidize the cost of expensive videos. And while typically the task of finding sponsorships falls on the label or management, an increasingly visible number of video directors and media companies are functioning as a sort of one-stop shop that not only produces high-quality clips and other content but also finds brands and funding for that content. “We work with a lot of major artists and we bring them to the table. We locate an advertiser that is interested in that artist and we basically create content that integrates that artist,” says Ben De Jesus, chief…

1 Closer: Trent Reznor fronted a rejuvenated Nine Inch Nails for a triumphant headlining set on the first day of Lollapalooza, which was held Aug. 2-4 at Chicago’s Grant Park. 2 Lollapalooza co-founder Perry Farrell (left) thanked snowboarding star Shaun White, whose band Bad Things saved the day by filling in for no-shows Death Grips on Aug. 3. Farrell even joined White and crew onstage for a cover of the Stooges’ “Search and Destroy.” 3 California girls: The Haim sisters shared the love with tour manager Daniel Humphreys backstage at Lollapalooza. From left: Alana, Humphreys, Este and Danielle. 4 Melissa McNutt, head of experiential marketing for Samsung Mobile U.S. , held down the Samsung Mobile tent in the Artist’s Village. 5 Leo Burnett music director Gabe McDonough hosted a private…

Few people know lunch meetings better than Kevin Liles. After he moved on from his position as executive VP of Warner Music Group in 2009, Liles made the 35th-floor lobby restaurant and lounge at the Mandarin Oriental hotel (below), of New York’s Columbus Circle, his office. From a corner table overlooking Central Park, he held court with clients and execs daily as he launched his own venture, KWL Management. Liles has since moved on to permanent digs in the Flatiron District, but his lunch calendar has only gotten busier: At press time, he was booked through late August. Here, Liles shares his well-practiced tips on the art of power lunching. —Alex Gale Keep It Light Lunches are mostly for introductions and celebrations. You get the possibility of what a deal…

Like most of Juicy J’s best ideas, “Bandz A Make Her Dance” was hatched in the bathroom. While holed up in a Washington, D.C., hotel room in early 2012, the Memphis rapper was sifting through a collection of beats from rising Atlanta producer Mike Will Made It when he stumbled upon a track with an ominous bass thump and twinkling key line. At first, Juicy J thought it was the foundation of a love song. “The beat reminded me of some Quiet Storm shit . . . it starts so slow, and it’s really melodic,” he says. And then, in the hotel bathroom, he realized that the five-word hook that had been rolling around in his brain for a while might work on the track, if it was partnered with…

Alison Goldfrapp will be the frist to say 2010’s Head First wasn’t her band’s best work. A product of pressure from her label Mute’s then-parent EMI, the nine-track collection was a synth-coated ode to Olivia Newton-John-esque ’80s pop that failed to produce a hit as big as the singles from 2006 breakthrough Supernature. “It wasn’t something we were particularly proud of—in hindsight, we were so rushed, and it would’ve been nice to take more time with it,” Goldfrapp says on the phone from her home in England. Now that Mute is independent once again, Goldfrapp and production partner Will Gregory are prepping Tales of Us (Sept. 10), the band’s most conceptual record to date and the result of a two-year creative process. The project’s release will be accompanied by a…

“Who is he?!” That was the hook to the chorus of comments ricocheting around the Hollywood Bowl following Gregory Porter’s debut performance at the Playboy Jazz Festival. Later backstage that hot June afternoon, a reporter asked Porter if he’d been nervous about signing with a major—Blue Note (in a joint signing with Universal Music Classics & Jazz in France)— after the growing buzz sparked by two critically acclaimed indie albums. “There could have been some fear. Like, ‘What will they do, try to clean me up or something?’” Porter replied with a laugh. “But all the powers at Blue Note said, ‘Do what you do. Keep writing and be you.’” Porter’s Blue Note debut, Liquid Spirit, due Sept. 17, flows with his mix of jazz, blues, Southern soul and gospel—the…

Why stand outside your girlfriend’s window playing Peter Gabriel on a boom box when you can simply text her a self-portrait with “In Your Eyes” attached instead? The app makers behind MavenSay are banking on Generation Y’s love of all things text-related with their new music messaging app, Rithm. Launched July 24 and already dubbed “the Snapchat of music,” Rithm lets users send friends and potential love interests any of the 20 million songs in the iTunes, Spotify and Rdio libraries, accompanied by a brief text message, animation, photo or video. The free app is 15.7 megabytes and requires iOS 6.0, or higher-running operating systems on an iPhone 3GS, 4, 4S, 5, iPad or iPod Touch 3 and higher. Downloading the app and signing up using Facebook or Twitter is…

It’s a banner week for Robin Thicke, who tops both the Billboard 200 and the Billboard Hot 100—an uncommon feat (see story, page 39). His “Blurred Lines” single is still red hot and shows no signs of slowing down, as it surges past airplay and sales milestones. 219.8M “Blurred lines” leads Hot 100 Airplay for a fifth week and surges 6% to a record 219.8 million all-format audience impressions, according to nielsen BDS. it breaks the previous high, held by Mariah Carey’s “We Belong Together,” which peaked with 212.2 million on July 9, 2005. 10 The song also extends another airplay record, claiming the Hot 100’s Airplay Gainer honor for an unprecedented 10th week—all consecutively. (The track set the mark with eight Airplay Gainer trophies.) Seven songs had previously racked…

Don’t Panic! Thanks to a featured vocal turn on Panic! at the Disco’s new single, “Miss Jackson,” 25-year-old singer/actress Lolo (real name: Lauren Pritchard) has earned her first Billboard hit. (The Decaydance/Fueled by Ramen track rises 32-24 on Alternative this week.) The Tennessee native, however, isn’t technically a stranger to the charts: Lolo was part of the original Broadway cast of “Spring Awakening,” whose cast album appeared on the charts in 2007. ‘Bedroom’ Opens Classically trained pianist/producer/singer/songwriter Andre Mieux opens at No. 37 on Adult R&B with his first charting single, the sensual “Bedroom Lovers” (Mainstream/XLP). It was spun 73 times at the format in the week ending Aug. 4, with WAKB Augusta, Ga., leading the push (12 spins, according to Nielsen BDS). “Lovers” is the lead single from Mieux’s…

Hot 100 LEGEND Bullets indicate titles with greatest weekly gains. Album Charts Recording Industry Assn. of America (RIAA) certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 500,000 albums (Gold). RIAA certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 1 million units (Platinum). Numeral noted with Platinum symbol indicates album’s multiplatinum level. RIAA certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 10 million units (Diamond). Numeral noted with Diamond symbol indicates album’s multiplatinum level. Latin albums certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 50,000 units (Oro). Latin albums certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 100,000 units (Platino). Numeral noted with Platinum symbol indicates album’s multi-platinum level. Digital Songs Charts RIAA certification for 500,000 paid downloads (Gold). RIAA certification for 1 million paid downloads (Platinum). Numeral noted with platinum…

Spotify, Google, other rivals. None has found the perfect curation formula. Spotify recently introduced a “Browse” page that recommends playlists tailored to moods or occasions. Google Music, led by Tim Quirk, has leaned toward a combination of algorithmic and human guidance. Clear Channel, SiriusXM. Beats is taking a page from radio’s playbook, cultivating its own music personalities to surface content. It’s just another way in which digital streaming services are positioned to displace terrestrial and satellite radio market share.…

Co-CEO, Cornerstone As co-CEO of Cornerstone, Jon Cohen sits at the helm of a multipronged media empire that includes the eponymous full- service creative agency, the Fader magazine and Fader Label. Cohen shares the executive chair with Cornerstone founder Rob Stone and counts among his clients Converse, Mountain Dew and vitaminwater. 6.00 AM I’m a big runner. Running is absolutely what keeps me sane. It’s the perfect way to start the day and clear my head. 7.30 AM I do a lot of my reading through RSS feeds—RIP Google Reader. I check up on other music publications to get a feel for what’s out there and what we’re missing at the Fader. 10.30 AM Weekly staff meeting with our entire executive team where Rob and I will go through open…

Founder/CEO Newbury Comics What did you wake up thinking about this morning? “What’s the future of Newbury Comics?” The core of our business is extraordinarily challenged. It’s going through a violent transition. We’re now in our 35th year, and I’m planning to do this for another five years. I always thought that the market would force us out of business by now, and then six or seven years ago, I thought maybe we would be the last man standing, with maybe six or eight stores. Instead, our sales are now growing. Even our comparable-store sales are growing. This year will be as profitable as last year. It’s not amazing, but it’ll be our fourth or fifth best year in our history. We will do just over $80 million in revenue…

MEDIA What started of as a consulting job for Clear Channel’s iHeartRadio Music Festival in 2011 has turned into a full-time position for Kevin mackall, who has been named senior VP of visual branding at Clear Channel media and entertainment. Based in New York and reporting to national programming platforms president Tom Poleman, Mackall will oversee visual branding for Clear Channel’s 850 radio stations and its digital radio service, iHeartRadio. He will also manage station logos, TV commercials, outdoor advertising and brand packages for the iHeartRadio festival and other events. “It’s fascinating what’s going on at Clear Channel right now, because our entrance into this realm of video content and branding is relatively new,” Mackall says. “Yet it’s a massive company with an amazing footprint in the marketplace.” Mackall previously…

Taste profiles, most often used to serve up recommendations and connect listeners to other users with like-minded tastes, has the potential to serve another purpose—predicting which new customers will become high-value ones. According to a recent white paper by the Echo Nest, it’s now possible to separate the whales from the minnows, the big spenders from the indifferent tourists. The paper, titled “How Music Services Can Acquire, Engage and Monetize High-Value Listeners,” posits a method for predicting each user’s future value to a music service. The attractiveness of being able to zero in on high-value targets is obvious. Music services can devote more resources to understanding and tailoring products to this key group while also delivering more effective advertising and other messaging to a more engaged audience. And if a…

“Through all the good times and the hard times, Justin’s worked hard for all of you.” 1 Eyes on the prize: Justin Bieber rejoiced backstage at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J., on July 31 after manager Scooter Braun (right) presented him with a diamond award for “Baby,” which became the biggest certified single (at 12 million) when the RIAA began counting streams in May. 2 Teenage dream: Industry royalty filled Le Poisson Rouge in New York to welcome 16-year-old New Zealand chanteuse Lorde for her first stateside performance on Aug. 6. From left: Republic’s David Nathan, Lava Records president Jason Flom, Lorde, Republic president/COO Avery Lipman and chairman/CEO Monte Lipman, and Universal Music Group chairman/CEO of the East Coast Barry Weiss. 3 Lorde with WHTZ (Z100) PD Sharon Dastur…

To the unaware, Tree Sound Studios can sound like a musical fairy tale. There are stories of André 3000 running from room to room to record vocals and keys on OutKast’s 2003 hit “Hey Ya!”; tales of Drake and B.o.B meeting each other for the frist time there, or Yelawolf and Big K.R.I.T. doing the same and deciding to record a project together. Then there’s the time that Lil Wayne, Wiz Khalifa, Big Sean and Slaughterhouse were all recording there simultaneously, unaware that they were even in the same building. When rapper J. Cole heard about Tree Sound, he couldn’t quite believe it. “One night we filmed Yelawolf and K.R.I.T. interacting, and B.o.B and Killer Mike happened to be here too, and we posted it online,” says producer/engineer and Tree…

“elcome to Casa de Bambi!” Bonnie Mc Kee exclaims as she makes her way through her midcentury modern home in the Hollywood Hills, which she’s transformed into a retro-mod explosion she calls “my fantasy of the ‘Brady Bunch’ house.” Pop-culture iconography covers every spare inch—a framed “Lolita” poster and old magazines with Miss Piggy and Michael Jackson on the cover share space with a collection of vintage telephones and TVs in a variety of crazy colors and shapes. Casually shoved into a corner is a stack of framed BMI Citations of Achievement honoring McKee for her songwriting contributions to some of pop’s most recent (and biggest) hits: Taio Cruz’s “Dynamite,” Britney Spears’ “Hold It Against Me” and her quintet of smashes for Katy Perry, “California Gurls,” “Teenage Dream,” “Last Friday…

SERYN Seryn, a six-member folk/pop/rock group from Denton, Texas, that first came together in 2009, has gained fans through its jubilant live appearances at festivals like South by Southwest and Telluride Bluegrass. “Our live performances is where the heart of our band is,” member Chris Semmelbeck says. Seryn’s onstage spark also translates to its recorded music. The group’s first album, This Is Where We Are (2011), featured uplifting pop tracks and emotion-filled folk lullabies. New single “Ivory Black” is defined by clean harmonies backed by soft instrumentals that swell and dive. Comparisons to popular folk-rock groups like the Lumineers are inevitable, and perhaps this is why the band dove into some new sounds when recording its second album. “We’re really happy with our new material,” Semmelbeck says. The group hopes…

COLIN MELOY Colin Meloy—solo musician, children’s author and frontman of folk-rockers the Decemberists—will bring his folklore nationwide this November to support his first solo run in five years. “He just wanted to get out there and get back onstage, maybe play some new songs,” Paradigm agent Kevin French says. “Songs that may or may not be on the new Decemberists record. They’ll be recording soon.” Routing: French worked to nail down markets that drew in the past for both Meloy’s solo runs and the Decemberists. “Colin really wanted to get back to those diehard fans, so he chose the markets accordingly.” Meloy will play mostly 800- to 1,500-capacity theaters, hitting Town Hall in New York (Nov. 1), the Somerville (Ma.) Theatre (Nov. 4), Variety Playhouse in Atlanta (Nov. 8) and…

The key to Luke Bryan’s success isn’t much different from other top country singers: He finds some great songs he knows he can sing with unassailable authority and cuts them. Bryan certainly makes it sound efortless as he rolls through this amiably eclectic material that he performs more like an active participant than an observer. A little bit of lust has always served Bryan well, and that’s explicitly clear on funk-favored opener “That’s My Kind of Night” and gritty rocker “Out Like That.” But he doesn’t always get the girl (“Roller Coaster,” “I See You”), which adds some emotional depth and balance, as do sentimental anthems like “We Run This Town” and “Blood Brothers.” The title track, meanwhile, cloaks Bryan in majestic power-ballad orchestration that suits him as comfortably as…

Two weeks ago, regional Mexican singer Roberto Tapia garnered his second No. 1 debut on Billboard’s Top Latin Albums chart with Lo Mejor de Roberto Tapia (Fonovisa). Just a few days after achieving that feat, he made his last appearance as a coach on the finale of “La Voz Kids” (The Voice Kids), the Spanish-language version of the reality talent show that earned record ratings on Telemundo. It was, of course, no coincidence. In May, Tapia began his stint as a coach on the show—which featured contestants ages 7-14—alongside pop star Paulina Rubio and bachata heartthrob Prince Royce. Although Lo Mejor de Roberto Tapia is a greatest-hits album, it shot to No. 1, aided by Tapia’s 13-week stint on the show and a rising single, “Me Enamore,” which is No.…

Slightly more than 10 years after his debut album was released, Robin Thicke has scored his frist No. 1 album. Blurred Lines, his sixth studio efort, starts atop the Billboard 200 with 177,000 copies sold, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Led by its inescapable Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 title track, Thicke’s album also nets the singer his best sales week. It easily surpasses his previous largest frame, when 2008’s Something Else launched at No. 3 with 137,000. Blurred Lines actually performed stronger than initially forecast. Some industry prognosticators had pegged the set to launch with around 140,000. Still, with such a huge single, were some expecting his album to have started with a stronger figure? Maybe, maybe not. One has to consider that Thicke is a new artist to many…