Musonomics

Super Bowl 50 is this weekend, and on this episode of Musonomics, NYU Steinhardt Professor Larry Miller examines music's relationship to the NFL's biggest day. We'll take a look back at some classic ads to see how and why the Super Bowl became so important to advertisers, and Josh Rabinowitz of Grey Advertising sheds light on how music works in Super Bowl ads. Then it's on to the halftime show and...

2015 was a year of change and unexpected record breaking. In our final episode of the year Larry Miller of NYU Steinhardt talks with Neil Shah of the Wall Street Journal about the three biggest and most important music industry stories of 2015: Adele and the unbelievable success of 25; the multitude of streaming services that launched this year, and a call for revision of arcane music licensing la...

Recording studios used to be the place where music was written and produced, but since the '90s their role in the production has seen a dramatic decrease. In this episode of Musonomics, we take a look at the state of the modern recording studio. We talk to producers and studio veterans from both coasts about the technological advances, changes in production methods, and ever-shifting musical style...

Season 2 of The Musonomics Podcast kicks off with episode 8, "YouTube is the Big Red Elephant in the Music Industry's Room." We've talked on previous shows about the streaming wars; Spotify vs Tidal vs Apple Music vs Deezer vs an ever-growing list of new faces -- but there's one streaming service with user numbers that dwarf the competition, and it isn't any of those names. In just 10 years, YouTu...

In this episode of Musonomics, Larry Miller looks at the lack of information transparency in the music industry. Why do artists still get indecipherable paper reports from labels and music services in the digital age, and how do we know those reports are accurate? Why is it so hard to get easy answers to simple questions about royalty rates and royalty payments? Grammy Award-winning composer and b...

Bonnaroo and EDM are the focus of the second half of our two-part series on the state of the summer music festival. In this episode, Larry Miller talks with Jonathan Mayers of Superfly Productions and Jonathan Azu of Red Light Management about the inception and astounding growth of Bonnaroo. Billboard's Ray Waddell gives us some analysis on opportunities for growth in the saturated festival space,...

In part one of our two-part series on the business evolution of summer music festivals, Larry Miller interviews George Wein, founder of the Newport Jazz and Folk Festivals. On the 50th anniversary of when Bob Dylan "went electric" and the 60th anniversary of Miles Davis' debut, 90-year old impresario George Wein shares vivid memories and important insights on the people, musical moments and the bu...

In preparation and celebration of the launch of Apple Music, we take a look back at Apple's prosperous relationship with music from the first iPod ad through to last month's WWDC keynote and launch announcement. We've got a ton of great guests. Josh Friedlander of the RIAA chats with us about the emergence of the streaming industry, and artist manager Emily White gives us insight into Apple's rela...

What even is a mixtape anymore? To figure it out, we take a look back at how the mixtape was born and what it has evolved into. Then, Alyse Howard of The Urban Coin brings us a special report about Nipsey Hussle, the Wu-Tang Clan and artificial scarcity. And Billboard Senior Editor Gail Mitchell, chats with Larry Miller about what it means to make and distribute a mixtape in the current hip-hop la...

In our second episode we take a look at Tidal, Jay-Z's newest headline grabber, and the state of the industry segment that Tidal is trying to conquer. Tom Silverman of Tommy Boy talks about how we'll get to a $100 billion music business. Larry Rosin of Edison Research explains how music streaming consumption is actually evolving. And we learn about the music licensing value gap with YouTube from A...

This week we will take a close look at the vinyl resurgence and music's newest quasi-holiday, Record Store Day, which falls this year on Saturday, April 18. You'll hear from James Donio of the Music Business Association about how the vinyl resurgence came about. Michael Kurtz, the founder of Record Store Day, will talk with us about how Record Store Day got started, how it affects the vinyl pressi...