Vevo capitalises on ad industry's YouTube backlash
Your good mates over there are the Vevos last week took advantage of the recent ad industry backlash against Google by telling brands that if they are seeking guarantees about the kinds of video content their online adverts appear alongside, they should buy their pre-rolls from the music industry's biggest online video guardian.

Those of you with the better memories may remember that a key motivation for Universal Music and Sony Music when they came together to create Vevo back in the day was to try to boost the ad income generated around music videos on YouTube, by telling advertisers that official music industry content was better than all that 'user generated content' nonsense.

At the time the music industry had the Google video site listed under the "must try harder" column, rather than its current categorisation of "fucking anti-christ, must be killed". As YouTube first gained momentum, and after the majors had agreed licensing deals with the site, the labels initially saw great potential for the ad-funded service, but felt Google was under-selling the advertising that surrounded their content.

Google allowed Vevo to sell the ads that appeared on the official music channels it managed on YouTube, in much the same way the multi-channel networks do for the superstar YouTubers. The pitch to brands was that this content should command a premium over that blurry video of a cat on a skateboard. Some brands bought that pitch, though others might point out that the world seems to be somewhat more excited about the cat.

However, in recent weeks a flurry of brands have announced that they are pulling their ads off YouTube over concerns their pre-rolls and banners are appearing alongside videos posted by political extremists and groups promoting hate crimes and terrorism. Ad agencies seemingly woke up to that problem - the result of Google's automated ad serving system - following a recent investigation by The Times.

AT&T was among the American brands to follow the lead of European advertisers in bailing on YouTube. A spokesperson told reporters last month: "We are deeply concerned that our ads may have appeared alongside YouTube content promoting terrorism and hate. Until Google can ensure this won't happen again, we are removing our ads from Google's non-search platforms".

Needless to say, Google is busy trying to find a way to reassure advertisers that its machines can do a better job of keeping big brands away from extremist material, or - indeed - just remove said content from its platform entirely. Though, as with Facebook and the fake news phenomenon, the web giant might find that a tricky task without investing in an expensive team of human editors.

Either way, Google's woes - even if only short lived - are an opportunity for those companies selling ads on specific managed channels on YouTube, where random content from random people can't randomly appear. You know, like Vevo.

"YouTube is an incredible open platform that's grown rapidly, democratised video, and created opportunities to reach a seemingly unlimited audience", Vevo's Chief Sales Officer Kevin McGurn wrote in a blog post last week. But, he added, "like all opportunities, it can come with risks, and is central to the current industry conversation around brand safety".

He continued: "With hundreds of millions of hours of content created and consumed on YouTube daily, some brands have found themselves in the unenviable position of being associated with highly objectionable content. I believe YouTube will take steps to address these issues. That said, we believe there is a safer way for brands to maximise their reach today, with the confidence of knowing who and what they're aligned with".

That safe way, of course, is the Vevo way. Which sounds like an opportunity for a stats brag. Writes McGurn: "Vevo makes up less than 0.5% of all videos on YouTube, yet according to data from comScore, 43% of YouTube's monthly audience is watching Vevo content. With Vevo content, a brand can more effectively target where, when, and what it associates with in reaching an audience on YouTube".

He goes on: "Vevo's content is not UGC, it's premium, licensed, and professionally produced, with an enormous and unique global reach. The content is vetted through multiple layers of quality control to ensure the safest environment possible for advertisers including automatic categorisation if the word 'explicit' is in the title or content tags, and
manual categorisation if the content includes any of the following: vulgar language, violence and disturbing imagery, nudity and sexually suggestive content, or portrayal of harmful or dangerous activities".

McGurn concludes: "What this categorisation process does is give brands greater transparency into where and how their campaigns run, and the ability to customise how they target. We believe our clients are better served in the safer environment that Vevo offers on YouTube and other platforms. This approach allows them to maximise reach and minimise risk as they tap into the enormous audience consuming music videos online".

So brands, roll up, roll up with your pre-rolls and get yourself some Vevo ads in the bag. No cats, but no Nazis either.

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BMG settles with US net firm RCN
BMG has reached an out-of-court agreement with US internet service provider RCN in another legal dispute that could have tested the safe harbours of American copyright law, and the obligations of net firms to deal with repeat infringers among their customer bases.

RCN went legal last year in the wake of BMG's landmark win against Cox Communications, the ISP that was deemed liable for the copyright infringement of its customers - despite the safe harbour - because it was shown to have only paid lip service to its own anti-piracy policies, deliberately turning a blind eye to repeat infringers on its network so as not to lose their custom.

RCN asked the court for a declaratory judgment - so a judicial clarification of the law - to confirm its liabilities over any infringement committed by its users. Basically the ISP wanted a judge to confirm it had safe harbour protection and couldn't be sued by BMG, which had seemingly been sending increasingly stern letters to the internet company, in part via its anti-piracy agent RightsCorp, about repeat infringers on its network.

BMG argued that RCN's case should be dismissed, because it hadn't actually made a legal claim against the ISP, so there wasn't currently a formal dispute. It also argued that the issue in Cox wasn't whether or not ISPs get safe harbour protection - they do - but whether the net company was fulfilling its obligations under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act in order to qualify for protection. Doing that for any individual ISP would require a full trial rather than a simple declaratory judgment.

Both sides bounced back claims and counterclaims in the latter months of last year, but behind the scenes negotiations were also ongoing to reach a settlement. And last month they wrote to the judge overseeing the case to say that they had "reached an agreement in principle to settle this matter without court intervention and are in the process of executing the same. We expect a dismissal with prejudice of this matter to be filed shortly".

According to Torrentfreak, that dismissal with prejudice - the latter bit preventing the case from being re-filed in the future - came last week. Terms of the settlement have not been revealed, so we don't know if RCN have agreed to ramp up their anti-piracy measures as a result of the arrangement.

Certainly, even though Cox continues to appeal the ruling in its dispute with BMG, the precedent set at first instance - and subsequent judicial comments during a squabble over legal costs - might make American ISPs nervous of going to battle in the courts with music rights owners just now.

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Cardiff's Clwb Ifor Bach under threat from new development
Cardiff's Clwb Ifor Bach and a number of other music venues on the city's Womanby Street are potentially under threat due to various plans for redevelopment in the area. To that end, campaigners are now calling on local government to recognise the street's cultural significance and therefore provide it with certain protections.

Following planning permission for a new hotel on the street being granted, a new planning application has now been submitted to turn the building adjacent to Clwb Ifor Bach into flats. The concern, of course, is that subsequent noise complaints against the venues in the street from new residents could ultimately lead to their closure, a problem that has occurred for venues elsewhere in the UK.

The UK government earlier this year proposed amendments to the National Planning Policy Framework to avoid such situations in England. Under the changes, the agent of change principal would be boosted, putting the onus on developers to combat noise from existing businesses when building new properties or redeveloping existing sites.

Following a meeting with local councillors on Friday, members of the Save Womanby Street campaign said that they had formally decided to oppose the proposed new residential development, and to work to change local and wider Welsh planning law to provide protections for live music venues.

Local MPs Kevin Brennan and Jo Stevens have also pledged support to the campaign, Brennan telling the BBC: "Festivals like Swn are the place where many bands from Wales and beyond have cut their teeth. I would hate to see opportunities like this squandered away to placate the residential developers looking for a quick buck in Cardiff city centre".

Stevens added: "To see the quality and variety of live music compromised due to unnecessary and inappropriate development would be disastrous for Cardiff's live music scene and reputation. I want to see a change to planning laws that will enable us to retain this very special place in the city and keep live music in Cardiff".

Cardiff Council has said that the new hotel development was told that it would have to install appropriate soundproofing when it granted planning permission. The Welsh government has also said that it is considering adding provisions to recognise the cultural significance of music venues in planning law, and has met with the Music Venues Trust to discuss this.

Commenting on the news of the proposals for the new residential development, the Music Venues Trust wrote: "We have no problem at all with sensible, thoughtful, cleverly designed residential spaces coming into our towns and cities ... What you can't do, with any chance of it ending well, is drop a poorly conceived and inadequately designed set of luxury flats right in the middle of one of the most important live music streets in the country and hope for the best".

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Glastonbury staying where it bloody well is for the next seventeen years
Emily Eavis has announced that Glastonbury Festival's future at its current site is assured for at least the next seventeen years, after a deal was signed with a neighbouring farmer whose land the event uses. So you can probably expect Michael Eavis to announce that the festival is moving to a badger sanctuary in about 20 minutes.

As previously reported, over the last year or so Michael Eavis has said a number of times that the Glastonbury Festival could be forced to move to a new site at some point, due to issues with the land it occupies being working farmland. These comments are generally followed by an interview with Emily Eavis saying that Glastonbury will never move from Worthy Farm, but the team behind the festival are planning to set up a new event, called the Variety Bazaar, elsewhere in the country.

Speaking to 6 Music on Friday, Emily said: "Glastonbury will always be here at Worthy Farm. We have just signed a seventeen year contract with one of our neighbouring farmers, so it's very much as solid as it can be here".

"We are going to do another festival at some point called the Variety Bazaar which is going to be something different", she added. "It's the same team, but a different idea, a smaller thing, maybe. It's still in discussion. But Glastonbury Festival will always be here and hopefully we can keep it going. We've managed to keep it going for this long so hopefully we can keep it going a bit longer".

Ah, it was all going so well, then that last sentence made it sound like Glastonbury's on it's last legs. They should just shut it down and let us off this rollercoaster. Yeah? Who's with me? Not BBC Music I reckon, because it has just signed a deal to film at the farm until 2022. Having a weekend's worth of footage of cows each June might look a bit odd. Though it would make a nice change.

"This partnership confirms our ongoing commitment to placing music centre stage on the BBC, and presenting our programmes to a global audience via radio, online, television and BBC Red Button", said BBC radio and music boss Bob Shennan. "As Glastonbury is one of the world's leading musical celebrations, I'm delighted that the BBC will be its broadcast home until 2022, the BBC's 100th anniversary year, bringing the magical joy of Worthy Farm to everyone, whether at home or on the move".

He means whether the viewer is on the move, not the festival. Let's not start all that again.

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Roland founder Ikutaro Kakehashi dies
The founder of the Roland electronic musical instrument company, Ikutaro Kakehashi, has died, aged 87.

Under his direction, the company had a massive influence on electronic music through equipment such as the TR-808 drum machine and TB-303 bass synthesiser. Kakehashi was also the first person to propose the standardisation of protocols between electronic instruments, which became MIDI.

In a post on Facebook, Japan-based musician and former advisor to Roland, Tommy Snyder, said: "Ikutaro Kakehashi, founder of Roland, father of the TR-909, TR-808, godfather of MIDI, and someone who I have collaborated with for 38 years, and also considered as my second father, passed away at the age of 87. He was a super funny, wonderful and gifted human being, and his contributions to the musical instrument world, and music, touched millions of people worldwide".

Numerous musicians have paid tribute since the news of Kakehashi's death broke. Among them, Marc Almond said: "A man who changed music, Ikutaro Kakehashi, the man behind the Roland Synth, 808 and more has sadly passed. Thanks for the electro sounds".

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New Kasabian video criticised by mental health campaigners
Mental health charity Time To Change has criticised Kasabian and their video for new single 'You're In Love With A Psycho' for pushing "unhelpful, damaging and disappointing" stereotypes.

Set in a psychiatric hospital, the video, which also features Noel Fielding and Stephen Graham, references 'One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest' and The Three Stooges' 'Duck Soup'. Overall though, it mainly presents mental health in-patients as dehumanised people dressed in shapeless gowns. It also contains a fart gag.

Time To Change director Sue Baker said in a statement: "As so many musicians have recently talked openly about their experiences of mental health problems it is disappointing to see this video. The use of the word 'Psycho' in a song and accompanying music video featuring people pretending to be psychiatric inpatients is unhelpful, damaging and disappointing when society is moving on from this sad and tired stereotype. We are sure the insult and harm was unintentional, or misjudged irony, but we are raising it as we know it will only serve to fuel stigma".

She continues: "If fans think it is OK to call people with mental health problems who have been psychiatric inpatients 'psychos', then we are turning back the tide of progress on public attitudes that are more respectful and less judgemental of people living with mental health problems. We are keen to work with the band and the music industry to help shift outdated stereotypes and stigma".

The band have not yet responded to the criticism, although their Facebook page has also been swamped with fans unhappy at the content of the video.

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Goldie releases new single
Goldie has released a new track off his forthcoming new album, 'The Journey Man'. Titled 'Prism', it follows 'I Adore You', which came out in February.

"This is one of my favourite drum n bass tracks on the album", says Goldie of 'Prism'. "I wanted to reach back into the 1980s to capture that feeling when you melt gold in a crucible. When it's at its hottest point, to create something precious from the raw materials - drum breaks, basslines. But the most important element for me is the melody".

'The Journey Man' will be released on 16 Jun. Here's 'Prism'.

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The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach releases new solo album
Dan Auerbach off of The Black Keys is going to release a solo album, his second, called 'Waiting On A Song' on 2 Jun. Consider yourself informed of this fact.

For said album, the follow-up to 2009's 'Keep It Hid', he worked with some Nashville bigwig songwriters, having moved to the city back in 2010. Some of those bigwigs include John Prine, Duane Eddy, Jerry Douglas, Pat McLaughlin, and Bobby Wood and Gene Chrisman of the Memphis Boys. Also Mark Knopfler, who is a bigwig, but not a Nashville one.

"Living in Nashville has definitely changed the way I think about music and the way that I record it", are some words that Auerbach has said. "I didn't have all of these resources before. I am working with some of the greatest musicians that ever lived".

More words that he said follow: "They'd come over, and we'd be in a little room in my house with the door closed, and we'd just write. Monday through Wednesday we'd write, and then Thursday through Sunday we'd record, every week".

You may now watch the video for first single 'Shine On Me', which has that Mark Knopfler guy on it.

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Spotify, Kendrick Lamar, Saint Etienne, more

Other notable announcements and developments today...

• Jack Stephens is now Creator Partnerships Manager at Spotify, so he better start partnering with some creators. Paul Smith has also joined the streaming service as Head Of International Licensing, so he better start licensing some internationals.

• Kendrick Lamar has released new single 'Humble', taken from his still to be properly announced (although possibly out this week) new album.

• Saint Etienne have announced that they will release a new album, 'Home Counties', on 2 Jun. From it, this is 'Heather'.

• Broken Social Scene have just released 'Halfway Home', their first song since 2010. Lazy bastards.

• Will Joseph Cook has released new track 'Plastic', and I think it's a bit rude of you not to have listened to it yet.

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Bob Dylan picks up his Nobel Prize
Bob Dylan now has in his possession a Nobel Prize. So you can stop worrying about it all. He'll probably get the prize money at some point to, so that's just great.

As previously reported, at the beginning of last week Dylan hadn't been in touch with the Swedish Academy, which hands out the Nobel Prize In Literature, to arrange collection of his certificate, despite us all knowing he'd be in Stockholm for some gigs at the weekend. But then he gave them a ring to say they could come and give it to him before one of the shows. No press would be allowed in to see though.

The reporting was therefore done by the Swedish Academy's Sara Danius, who wrote in a blog post on Saturday: "Earlier today the Swedish Academy met with Bob Dylan for a private ceremony in Stockholm, during which Dylan received his gold medal and diploma. Twelve members of the Academy were present. Spirits were high. Champagne was had".

Dylan still has until 10 Jun to provide a lecture relevant to his win in order to take home his $900,000 prize money. He's expected to deliver that in pre-recorded form at some point, though I don't think any of us would be surprised if he doesn't.

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