This story appears in Rolling Stone‘s 2021 Future of Music issue, a special project delving into the next era of the multibillion-dollar hitmaking business. Read the other stories here. Holograms aren’t a pipe dream anymore. If you ask Asad J. Malik, they’ll be soon one of the most important marketing …
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Unless they’re at the level of Drake or Ariana Grande, musicians aren’t making very much from streaming as it stands now. But earlier this month, SoundCloud surprised the music industry when it announced a major change: For select artists, instead of paying from a pro-rata model, the service will translate …
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Lush yet still head-rattling, simple but deceptively complex, horny and consensual: There are few songs in existence better than “Back That Azz Up.” Juvenile’s 1999 song has it all — the New Orleans rapper kindly requesting his paramour “back that ass up” instead of demanding it, a blistering Lil Wayne …
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Of the top ten grossing tours in the first half of 2019, just one hailed from hip-hop. But of the top ten songs, ranked by on-demand audio streams, eight were rap singles. That disparity between people’s concert interests and their home-listening preferences is partially the result of longstanding biases in …
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