Label:Life

Veteran bands claim label giant isn’t giving them their fair share of digital-download revenue from stores such as iTunes.

The digital-download business is booming, but the Allman Brothers Band and Cheap Trick claim they aren’t getting their fair share of the pie.

The two veteran rock bands sued their label Sony Music today, charging the music giant with not paying them the required percentage of net licensing revenue it receives from Apple’s iTunes and other digital-download stores.

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Myspace/Fox can use ANYTHING of yours you post to your site [music, videos, photographs, art work, etc.]. This means they can alter it, edit it, sell it, etc. WITHOUT giving you credit

.... You can find the content that is quoted below by clicking “terms” on the myspace homepage and scrolling down a bit. I.e. its taken directly from the terms of use, it’s not some silly paranoid internet scare tactic. (more…)

A group of Baka Pygmies, are leaving their rainforest home to embark on their debut tour of the UK alongside the world-renowned band Baka Beyond. They arrive for the launch of their first album – the mezmerising ‘Gati Bongo’ – recorded under a giant tree on a mobile solar-powered studio and due to be released on 24th April.

Baka Gbine, a group of seven Baka musicians and dancers who have rarely been outside the Cameroonian rainforest before, have been a key influence in the music of Baka Beyond, a band which was formed in 1992 and are widely acclaimed for their high energy, multicultural live stage shows and world music recordings. This is a rare opportunity to catch these two incredible bands in a series of what promises to be unforgettable joint performances starting at Westonbirt Arboretum on 30th April (more…)

What do artists like Arctic Monkeys, Gnarls Barkley and Jono Mcleery have in common?

They are all part of the new music business model being championed by the British Music Week. The ‘future of music is online and online is the future’ would be the theme of the 2nd annual British Music Week event.

On September the 8th & 9th of 2006, British Music Week will bring together hundreds of National and independent music companies and affiliated associations for the second edition of the annual UK Music Convention @ The Mermaid Conference Centre in London. Launched for the first time in 2005 at the Wembley Conference Centre. The conference will offer a unique opportunity to assess the current position of independent labels in today’s marketplace, educate artists on new marketing models through conferences, seminars & workshops. An impressive line-up of industry heavyweights are already confirmed to participate in the summit and will be exchanging ideas and thoughts on the independent sector, and the important part it plays in the industry as a whole. (more…)

British Music Week is offering Label:Life readers 9 free delegate passes worth £243 for the fourthcoming event. Interested please, e-mail info@britishmusicweek.com quoting “Label Life Competetion”. 9 winners will be selected randomly as competition winners! Deadline : 19th of May 2006

Label:Life hasn’t had a pick of the week for a while now, but after “discovering” Lilly Allen we couldn’t help but tell you about her. Her lyrics are a subdued mix of issues affecting your average “yoot” in the UK, mixed in with a lovely somtimes dark comical slant, with her musical influences ranging from SKA, Shaggy, Blondie, 808 State to Bjork and Prince.

LabelLife thinks she sounds like a cross between The Streets and Amy Whitehouse with a touch of Madness. This girl is going to be huge, check her out at lillymusic although Label:Life’s favourite track has been pulled from the site, “Alfie” an ode to her little brother staying in bed and smoking spliffs all day, catchiest off the wall little tune we’ve heard in ages.

It’s one of the great Internet success stories of the modern era. With more than 73 million registered users and nearly one million music acts setting up free profiles on the site, MySpace.com has become a godsend for countless independent artists—including Relient K, My Chemical Romance, Arctic Monkeys, and Hawthorne Heights.

MySpace is now one of the top seven most popular web sites on the planet—right up there with Google, Yahoo and Ebay in total visitors and page views. (more…)

RockandRollDream.com New Singles “Liking This” and “Hallway Watching” Available for Mobile Download

Munch Music Delta, B.C. – April 26, 2006 – Munch Music, Inc. www.RockandRollDream.com and www.MyMunchMusic.com a digital recording studio and music centre has added new recording artists and MP3 downloads including new singles “Liking This” by Chelsea Patricia Ganeff and “Hallway Watching ” by Taylor Van Zant. These songs are also available for download to mobile phones. (more…)

Sony is to release new software that should make improvements to the handheld console’s network and media functions.

The company is due to release the updated operating system software in Japan tomorrow.

Users will see the most notable changes when they go online, as the new update enables the PSP to access far more websites.

This is because it enables support for Macromedia Flash sites.

Apple’s AAC music format is also enabled by the update, the main format of Apple’s hugely successful iTunes online music store.

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Experimentation and eventual deployments of high bandwidth mobile telecommunications networks are opening up new opportunities and challenges for recording labels, particularly as music becomes available
directly to mobile phone devices, according to an executive of records company EMI.

EMI Music senior vice president for Digital Development Ted Cohen said streaming music, especially in the mobile arena, already blurs the need for people to actually store downloaded music, which is readily available via data streaming.

Speaking during the Nokia Multimedia Workshop in Hong Kong, Cohen explained that future deployments of high-bandwidth mobile networks, especially 3G (third-generation networks), would already empower users to get music whenever and where they want. This could be coupled by the availability of mobile phones with music playback functions.

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