US Senate passes Music Modernization Act
The US Senate has passed the Music Modernization Act after a last minute deal was reached that ensured the copyright reforms had the backing of satellite radio firm SiriusXM. The proposals were hotlined by the upper house of Congress, which means they went through after no senators voiced opposition to the current draft.

The MMA brings together a number of different copyright reforms. This includes fixing issues around the way mechanical royalties are paid in the US and confirming that pre-1972 recordings are due royalties from online and satellite radio services. It also changes the way America's Copyright Royalty Board and rate courts assess what royalty rates are fair when ruling on compulsory licences or licences issued by collecting societies ASCAP and BMI.

As a satellite radio service, SiriusXM is affected by the second of those measures, although it has already been paying royalties to artists and labels when it plays pre-1972 tracks as a result of past legal action by the artist and label community (the royalty obligation being ambiguous under existing laws). The media firm's late-in-the-day objections to the MMA, therefore, were more related to the third set of measures, reforming the way the CRB and rate courts will work.

Backers of the MMA were concerned that the last minute intervention by SiriusXM could scupper the whole package of copyright reforms, which the industry really needed to get voted through before the current Congressional session finishes at the end of the year. The option to 'hotline' the proposals was attractive, but it was thought that a couple of senators might object to the legislation while Sirius XM was still lobbying against it.

However, an agreement was reached in time. The main compromise was that the existing sound recording royalty rate for satellite radio would stay in place until 2027, five years longer than originally intended. With that commitment assured, the CEO of SiriusXM, Jim Meyer, told reporters: "SiriusXM is a platform that respects and actively supports artists and all music creators, and we are delighted to have reached this agreement to help pass this bill".

The satellite broadcaster and its parent company Liberty Media, which also has significant stakes in Pandora and Live Nation, will be hoping that, with a compromise reached and the MMA passed by Senate, it can now put behind it the last few weeks of bad press. Both artists and music industry leaders had been pretty scathing about SiriusXM's lobbying efforts.

Still, the MMA is not quite passed yet. The amendments made in Senate will have to go back to the House Of Representatives for approval, and then The Donald will have to put his signature at the bottom of the new laws. Assuming that all happens, the industry will then have to get on with implementing the new system for processing the mechanical royalties paid to songwriters and publishers by the streaming services.

For now though, everyone you could even begin to consider existing in the American music industry has issued a statement welcoming Senate's approval of what has been renamed the Orrin G Hatch Music Modernization Act, because it's not a proper act if it hasn't been rebranded to celebrate one of its backers. Here are a few of them for you all to enjoy. I wonder if anyone is THRILLED.

David Israelite, CEO of the National Music Publishers Association: "Today is a momentous day for songwriters, artists, composers, producers, engineers and the entire industry that revolves around them. The Senate vote marks a true step forward towards fairness for the people at the heart of music who have long been undervalued due to outdated laws. This was a long and complex process but ultimately the music industry has come out stronger and more united than ever. Now we anxiously await the House's final approval of the MMA and seeing it signed into law".

Mitch Glazier, President of the Recording Industry Association Of America: "As legendary band the Grateful Dead once said in an iconic pre-1972 song, 'what a long strange trip it's been'. It's been an epic odyssey, and we're THRILLED to almost be at our destination. For the modern US Senate to unanimously pass a 185-page bill is a herculean feat, only achievable because of the grit, determination and mobilisation of thousands of music creators across the nation. The result is a bill that moves us toward a modern music licensing landscape better founded on fair market rates and fair pay for all. At long last, a brighter tomorrow for both past and future generations of music creators is nearly upon us".

The bosses of the Association of Independent Music Publishers: "The AIMP applauds today's unanimous passage of the appropriately named Orrin G Hatch Music Modernization Act in the US Senate, clearing the path for its much-needed reforms to become law once ratified in the House and signed by the President. With support from both sides of the political aisle, along with unprecedented cooperation between the music and technology industry, the MMA will be a massive step forward for the independent publishing community and the music industry in general, which has been hamstrung by antiquated copyright laws for far too long".

Chris Harrison, CEO of the Digital Media Association: "This milestone for the MMA demonstrates that with bipartisan leadership and a united music industry looking to the future, consumers, creators and copyright owners can all benefit. The MMA is a groundbreaking piece of legislation that will streamline royalty payments and bring some much-needed transparency to the system".

The bosses of campaign groups the Content Creators Coalition and MusicAnswers: "[The MMA] is a great step forward towards a fairer music ecosystem that works better for music creators, services, and fans. Our organisations have been pleased to join in the efforts of the music creator community in support of this bill. We also are gratified that our two organisations, in collaboration and independent of other groups, were able to make meaningful contributions to the final legislation, including comprehensive and publicly available audits of the MMA's new mechanical licensing collective and ensuring that the collective uses best practices to find the owners of unclaimed royalties. We appreciate the receptivity of key legislators and their staffs to these fundamental notions of transparency and accountability".

Chris Israel, Executive Director of campaigning group musicFIRST: "After passing unanimously in the House Of Representatives earlier this year, the musicFIRST Coalition is THRILLED to see the Senate follow suit with unanimous passage of the Orrin G Hatch Music Modernization Act. [The MMA] will bring music licensing laws into the 21st Century and cement the framework for a just relationship between music creators and the technology companies that benefit from their work".

Paul Williams, President of collecting society ASCAP: "American songwriters work tirelessly behind the scenes to create the music that fans all over the world enjoy. Today, we made history by joining together and working for Senate passage of the Music Modernization Act, bringing us one step closer to a music licensing framework that reflects how people listen to music today. We urge the House of Representatives to swiftly pass the Senate bill, so the President can sign it into law and music creators can begin to see the benefits of this critical reform".

Michael Huppe, CEO of collecting society SoundExchange: "The future of the music industry got brighter today. Creators of music moved one step closer to getting paid more fairly. And industry forces that fought to maintain an unfair and harmful status quo were rebuffed. Now, SoundExchange's 170,000-member community has just one word for the House Of Representatives: Encore!"

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Spotify sued for gender discrimination by former US sales exec
Spotify is being sued in the US over claims of gender discrimination and that the company routinely pays women less than men.

Former Spotify sales exec Hong Perez is suing the streaming service's US company and its Head Of US Sales, Brian Berner. She claims that there is a culture of disrespect against women at the company, set by the leadership style of key senior staff. In particular she singles out her former boss Berner, who she says "engineered the termination of [her] employment on baseless grounds".

Among other things, she alleges that Berner organised networking trips to the Sundance Film Festival for sales staff in 2016 and 2017, referring to them as "boys' trips". Only male staff were selected to attend, despite there being more qualified women in the team. She adds that upon their return, men on the trip spoke of taking drugs while away, and one had become involved in a "physical altercation".

These violated Spotify's Code Of Conduct, she said, but Berner did not instigate any investigation or discipline against those involved.

On claims of pay discrimination, Perez says that her male counterpart was given a higher pay rise than her and another female colleague, despite her experience and performance surpassing the man in question.

She says that other men at the company were paid higher than female counterparts. Also, she claims, one male executive was promoted "after he had been the subject of a sexual harassment complaint and received multiple warnings from the company". This same man, she says, later arranged a men-only supposed business trip to visit strip clubs.

Then alleging that this discriminatory attitude runs throughout the company's hierarchy, Perez says in her lawsuit that "the Chief Financial Officer told a large audience of Spotify employees point blank at a company townhall Q&A session that he does not care about diversity at the company". She adds that an HR exec had also confided in her that he had "gone easy on a male employee found to have engaged in harassing conduct because the Head Of Human Resources had 'a soft spot for him'".

In terms of her dismissal from the company, she says that Berner used her as a scapegoat for his own improper actions in negotiating a deal. She also accuses him and Spotify of defamation, for an email he sent to staff following her dismissal. In it he is said to have told staff that she had "acted in ways that are against our code of conduct and guidelines for internal compliance".

For its part, Spotify denies Perez's clams. In a statement to Variety, a spokesperson said: "At Spotify, we do not tolerate discrimination of any kind at any level. While we cannot comment on the specific details of a pending litigation, these claims are without merit".

Perez is seeking damages to be determined at trial, including for loss of earnings and emotional distress. She is also requesting a jury trial.

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Perfume firm seeks access to Jay-Z's calendar
Plenty of superstar musicians are as much in the perfume business as anything else. With perfume being all about the brand - the often extortionate prices never being justified by the actual work involved in putting some smelly water in a bottle - pop stars are usually quids in whenever they enter into partnerships with perfume makers. A simple trademark licence and some nominal plugging, and the money just rolls on in.

Though please remember to do the nominal plugging. Fragrance company Parlux sued Jay-Z back in 2016 accusing the rapper of failing to meet his commitments to plug the smell in a bottle that it had launched under his brand.

The case continues to rumble through the system, and this week there was a somewhat tetchy hearing as lawyers for Parlux tried to force Jay-Z to hand over his calendar for the years 2013, 2014 and 2015, to prove that he really did have other commitments every time the perfume firm tried to get him to do some promo or to meet to discuss future marketing.

According to Law 360, Jay-Z's attorney argued that that was too big an ask, and that the calendars could also reveal information to Parlux about his client's other business ventures. The demand for the calendars was akin to having Jay-Z wear an "electronic bracelet", the legal man argued, or to making his client submit to something like the "Spanish Inquisition".

"My family went through the Spanish Inquisition", judge Charles Ramos responded to the lawyer's hyperbole, "[and] this is not the Spanish Inquisition". Nevertheless, Ramos did agree that Parlux's demands were a little OTT, even if it did have a right to an explanation for why every time it attempted to meet the rapper - including when it sent a team to Miami to see him - each meeting failed to materialise.

With all that in mind, the judge urged both parties to meet and seek a compromise, and report back to him in two weeks.

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Interviews, speed briefings and indie label discussions with CMU Insights at the Reeperbahn festival
The Reeperbahn showcase festival kicks off in Hamburg today, and CMU Insights will be there this week interviewing leading music business people, presenting a speed briefing as part of the event's training programme, and putting the spotlight on challenges and opportunities facing independent music companies in 2018.

CMU Insights MD Chris Cooke will lead three on-stage interviews as part of the event's conference programme. Tomorrow at 1pm he will talk to Spotify's MD of EMEA Michael Krause about the evolution of the streaming firm's playlisting operation and playlist brands, and about opportunities for the streaming sector in emerging markets in the Middle East and Africa.

Then later tomorrow, at 3.45pm, he will chat to the President of Warner Music's label services business ADA, Eliah Seton, about the evolution of label services, and how independent labels and artists go about choosing their business partners.

On Friday at 2.45pm he will chat with Jackie Wilgar, SVP Marketing International at Live Nation, about how the music industry's marketing toolkit continues to grow, and how artists, managers and promoters decide which of those tools to employ. Wilgar will also discuss how recent changes in data protection rules in Europe affect fan communications and how each of an artist's business partners can better work together to ensure better results.

In addition to the interviews, Cooke will also present one of the CMU Insights speed briefings on Saturday morning at 11am. Based on the 'Dissecting The Digital Dollar' report CMU Insights produced for the UK Music Managers Forum, this speed briefing explains how streaming services are licensed by record companies, music distributors, music publishers and collecting societies, and how royalties are calculated each month.

As well as that little lot, CMU Insights is also hosting an invite-only roundtable on Friday afternoon discussing challenges and opportunities facing the independent music sector, and how indie rights owners choose their distribution and marketing partners. The informal discussion will inform a CMU Trends article and CMU Insights research. Any indie label people at Reeperbahn interested in joining the conversation, email [email protected] for more information.

The Reeperbahn festival and conference runs through to Saturday - the full programme is online here.

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New ad campaign calls for more diversity at music industry awards and conferences
A series of adverts will appear in the music industry trade press in the coming weeks calling for music business events - including conferences and award shows - to do a better job of ensuring that they feature and celebrate a diverse mix of music people.

The campaign was instigated after the nominations were published for this year's Live UK Awards, in which the shortlists for a number of key categories - including agent, manager and independent promoter of the year - featured very few, if any, female nominees, despite there being hundreds of women working in these roles in the UK.

Organisers of the event subsequently acknowledged the "lamentable gender imbalance" in the shortlists, which are voted for by the readers of the Live UK magazine, and said that it would "work towards a more diverse result next year".

Ensuring that anyone who might vote next year is definitely aware of the many, many, many women successfully pursuing careers as agents, managers and promoters, the #WomenInMusic ads being run this month feature or link to crowdsourced lists of some of the female agents, managers and promoters working in the UK industry today.

The ad campaign has been put together by Sammy Andrews, founder and CEO of Deviate Digital, who previously compiled a database of female music industry executives who were happy to speak at music conferences, part of the push in the UK industry to ensure such events have much more diverse line-ups. Both campaigns also seek to ensure conferences and awards do a better job of representing BAME and LGBT people working in music.

The print ads being placed by the campaign state: "We believe it is the responsibility of every music industry conference, awards show and every trade publication to truly reflect and celebrate the increasing diversity in our industry. Time and time again incredible women are left out of nominations, not to mention successful BAME and LGBT people, and it's time this changed".

It goes on: "We call on and offer our support to all music industry conferences and awards to ensure they have a diverse and representative selection process in the future. As a sign of appreciation, recognition, gratitude and respect we list here just some of the amazing UK managers, co-managers, agents and promoters working in our industry that could and should have been nominated for such awards and hope you will join us in celebrating them and recognising them and their achievements going forward".

Those lists can also be accessed online here or by clicking on online versions of the ad, like the one featuring in today's CMU Daily.

Commenting on this latest initiative, Andrews says: "I would first of all like to thank the hundreds of people that collectively made this possible. These ads were funded by a combination of my own money and crowdfunding, along with donated ad space, and every name here was crowdsourced when I put a call out to the industry to name some of the amazing women they work with. The response was incredible and I received over 800 messages and emails backing the initiative from major label MDs and CEOs to artists, managers and beyond".

She adds: "Clearly this is an issue that many people believe needs addressing and, to some degree, I am delighted to say that this action has already worked as the awards in question have publicly pledged to do better next year. But I hope these ads will serve more widely as a reminder of just how many amazing women we have in the music business as well as a reminder of what transformative change can be achieved when people work together for the greater good".

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Rihanna calls for support in improving access to education for children
Rihanna has written a new article for The Guardian calling on politicians worldwide to improve access to education for children.

"Growing up in Barbados, I did not always love school. It can feel like a grind, especially when you'd rather be singing, playing sports or doing pretty much anything other than homework", she writes. "I realise now that I often took it for granted that I was even able to go to school. Education can be stolen from you in a second. As we've seen recently on an unprecedented scale, the Caribbean gets hit by natural disasters that wipe out schools, leaving thousands of children stranded".

She continues: "In other parts of the world, conflict, poverty, deeply ingrained sexism, and bad public policy keep more than a quarter of a billion children and teens from getting an education. Almost a quarter of these children are affected by conflict or crisis, and girls are more likely not to complete school. But that's just the surface of the problem".

"In 2012, I launched the Clara Lionel Foundation because I believe we each have an opportunity to help one person", she then says. "CLF is inspired by my passion for children, especially their health and education. We fund programmes that remove barriers to education by offering financial support to children and their communities. And following our time in Malawi, I am proud to say we are supporting thousands of girls there to move through secondary school".

Find out more by reading the full op-ed here.

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Kanye West, AC/DC, Lana Del Rey, more

Other notable announcements and developments today...

• Kanye West has posted that he'll be releasing something called 'Yandhi' at the end of the month. Along with the title and date, he posted an image of a MiniDisk in a clear plastic casing, looking similar to the CD pictured on the cover of his 'Yeezus' album. Could it be a sequel? Yes, sure. But more importantly, will it kick off the long-awaited MiniDisk revival?

• Speaking of Kanye West, he and Chance The Rapper have confirmed that they have recorded an album together, under the title 'Good Ass Job'. The pair were speaking at a high school in Chicago yesterday.

• Axl out? It appears that Brian Johnson and Phil Rudd are back in AC/DC.

• Just like she promised last week, Lana Del Rey has released a new track called 'Venice Bitch'. Here's the video. She also announced yesterday that her new album, due out next year, will be called 'Norman Fucking Rockwell'.

• Cat Power has released a cover of Rihanna's 'Stay'. The track will appear on her new album, 'Wanderer', out on 5 Oct. "I love the tradition of covering songs", she says. "I think it's one of the highest compliments you can pay another artist. It's one of the great traditions in American music and one of the true pleasures of music history".

• Paul McCartney has released the video for new single 'Back To Brazil'. It's filmed in Brazil. This seems like a clever songwriting ruse. I'm going to write a song called 'A Brand New Really Comfy Sofa'. Who wants to make the video?

• Christine And The Queens has released the video for 'La Marcheuse'. The song is taken from new album 'Chris', which is out on Friday.

• John Grant has released the video for recent single 'He's Got His Mother's Hips'.

• The Joy Formidable have released the video for new single 'The Better Me'. The band's new album, 'Aarth', is out at the end of the month.

• Farao has released new single 'Marry Me'. Her new album, 'Pure-O', is out on 19 Oct, and she'll play a show in London at the Sebright Arms on 17 Oct.

• The winner of this year's 'Canadian Mercury Prize' - that'll be the Polaris Prize - is Jeremy Dutcher for his album 'Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa', which is performed in the indigenous Wolastoq language.

• Check out our weekly Spotify playlist of new music featured in the CMU Daily - updated every Friday.

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Happy Mondays force Bargain Hunt reshoot
The ending of a special edition of BBC game show 'Bargain Hunt' had to be reshot after it emerged that The Happy Mondays had cheated.

For readers outside the UK and non-students, 'Bargain Hunt' is a TV show where contestants buy some old tat at an antique fair, and then try and fail to sell it for a higher price at auction. As part of this year's BBC Music Day festivities later this month, an edition was filmed pitting Pulp's Jarvis Cocker and Candida Doyle against Bez and Rowetta from the Happy Mondays.

Things got off to a shaky start after Cocker refused to wear the usual 'Bargain Hunt' polo shirt to signify his position on the red team. Everyone else played ball, but that Cocker just has to be different.

Anyway, once they'd finished filming, it emerged that Bez and Rowetta had employed some underhand tactics that are not allowed. Someone went back and checked apparently, because they weren't sure. And it turned out that, whatever it was they did, it was an illegal act. Within the laws of 'Bargain Hunt' anyway.

Exactly what happened the show's makers are refusing to say, so as not to spoil the drama in the unlikely event you actually watch the programme. "Suffice to say I had to refer to the 'Bargain Hunt' rulebook", presenter Charlie Ross tells the Radio Times. "I think it's the first time in history that we've had to look at it".

Producer Paul Tucker adds that during the show's eighteen year run "various things" have gone wrong, but whatever this was, it was a first. "We had to deliver this show quite quickly after we filmed it, and of course we weren't expecting to have to do the ending again", he says. "Although it wasn't expected, it certainly added an interesting twist and another layer to the show. I guess it's what you might expect from a bunch of rock n rollers".

The danger! The intrigue! I can only assume that what went wrong involved Bez and Rowetta actually making some money. That can't be allowed. Find out exactly what those scamps did on BBC One on BBC Music Day, 28 Sep, at 12.15pm. Or, you know, don't.

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