April was another crazy month for the entire world. TuneCore is doing our best to provide helpful, pragmatic, and hopeful content during this pandemic. While COVID-19 has no doubt impacted the music industry and artists alike, we’re continuing our monthly column of hand-picked articles across the web that you might have missed.
Tencent Eyes New African Markets for JOOX
This month, TuneCore announced its partnership with Tencent-owned streaming platform JOOX, allowing us to send artists’ music to new territories in Asia, as well as South Africa. Tencent has since announced it will be rolling out in new markets within the latter continent as digitalization grows. Read more here.
ASCAP’s Royalty Payment Delays Amid COVID-19
U.S.-based performance rights organization ASCAP announced this month that the recent pandemic had led to April’s writer royalty pay-outs to be on a three-week delay. CEO Beth Matthews explained the domino impact in payments, but for those TuneCore Artists who are signed up with ASCAP, this may alleviate any worries. Read more here.
BMI Follows Up in Light of Royalty Payout Concerns
Per the above, competing U.S.-based PRO BMI came out in April to predict a potential decline in royalty payouts (based on recent collections) coming in Q1 2021. In a response to their writers, the organization makes it clear that they “have the time and ability to plan for this outcome.” Read more here.
Apple Music Launches COVID Relief Advance Fund
In light of the pandemic that has crippled artists, labels and members all over the music and touring industries, Apple Music announced in April it’d be starting a $50 million COVID-19 ‘Advance Fund’ for independent labels. Labels will need to be hitting a certain revenue cap on the platform to qualify. Read more here.
Spotify Launches ‘Artist Fundraising Pick’ Feature
In the spirit of giving back and helping artists recover revenue, Spotify rolled out a new feature on its profile management platform, Spotify for Artists, called ‘Artist Fundraising Pick’. Much like its popular ‘Artist Pick’ (which allows artists to highlight songs in their profiles), this feature helps call to attention specific fundraising organizations or self-fundraising efforts. Read more here.
SoundExchange Celebrates Big Numbers
Since 2003, SoundExchange – the organization designated to collect digital royalties in the U.S. – has paid out $7 billions to rights holders. If that number has your attention as an independent artist, make sure you familiarize yourself with SoundExchange! Read more here.
Australian Music Market Sees Growth
Thanks to ARIA, Australia’s Recording Industry Association, we learned that the continent’s music market saw a growth 5.5% year over year. With much of this thanks to streaming (accounting for 80% of total market), the globalization of the digital music industry charts on. These figures represent the highest since 2004. Read more here.
Tidal Offers New Free Membership WIth Access to Video
If you’re a TuneCore Artist who focuses any bit of their marketing efforts across the platforms you’ve distributed to, Tidal’s video offerings are certainly appealing. This month, Tidal announced a new tier of free membership that’ll offer users ad-free access to the video content shared on their platform. Read more here.
TikTok Sees Boom in Viewership in March
Everybody’s favorite short form video app TikTok reportedly added 5.6 million U.S.-based users in March. Now, we should stipulate that there is a global pandemic occurring. That said, these numbers are massive, and MusicAlly has even more to share. Did we forget to mention that TuneCore distributes your music to TikTok? Read more here.
Tags: featuring music industry news