Which pub was Olivia Rodrigo drinking Guinness in? Can AIs run a record label? Taylor Swift trademarks her speaking voice; AND... Heavy metal dinosaurs.

0:02Steve:Hello and welcome to the price of music brought to you by music ally the show that both looks at the finances of the music industry while also bringing you stories and comment from the past week in the pop business. He's Stuart Dredge. I'm Steve Lemaac. Let's start with a financial fact as we always do something which you might be able to impress friends or colleagues with. this is something which actually came up in last week's lock-in but it's Stuart's big number for

0:29Stu:this week as well which is it's a number to horrify your friends actually in the pub um 75 000 which is a number of fully ai generated tracks that are uploaded to Deezer every single

0:42Steve:day now this is something as I say which we mentioned last week uh in the lock-in which is the extra bit of the program for super fans on patreon but as I say it's worth coming back to because as a headline figure, 75 ,000 tracks a day sounds very ominous, although as a percentage of the total amount of music available on Deezer, maybe less so.

1:04Stu:Slightly less, yeah. I mean, it's now, of all the songs uploaded to Deezer, and because this is Deezer announcing these stats, but you can kind of assume it probably applies to the bigger streaming services too. It's now 44 % of all the daily uploads are entirely added, which has gone up. So I think the first time they released Figures was January last year. So what's that, 14 months ago now? And back then it was 10 ,000 AI tracks a day, and they were 10 % of all the uploads. So that's now grown by sevenfold the number of tracks in its form. So it's kind of creeping towards half. A lot of the headlines are with nearly half of Deezer's tracks.

1:39Stu:And I always come back to this, don't I? Like kind of the sky's not falling in number, which is that when it comes to us actually being played on Deezer, what music has been streamed, between 1 % and 3 % of its total streams are AI music, and 85 % of those streams are fraudulent, which basically means it's detected them as being played by bots to try and earn money illegally, and they're not earning any royalties because it's caught them. So really, 15 % of up to 3 % of its total streams are AI music, but they're 44 % of everything. So basically, it's not stealing money from artists just yet, any kind of scale, and Deezer is keeping those tracks out of its recommendations and its algorithms so you people won't get played them um so very few humans are listening to it but it's just this mountain of slop is building up on these servers

2:28Steve:yeah well that's but that's surely the thing isn't it because surely it becomes more and more expensive to house all this music much of which is just a generated which nobody no no real people are actually listening to so it's just clogging up the system it's true and you know every year

2:47Stu:we talk about there's that report that comes out in sort of January about how many songs got zero plays in the previous year. And we always talk about that and we say, oh, isn't this sad all these human artists not getting played? But I think as time goes on, a big chunk of those are AI music and no human artist is sitting there feeling sad at home. So yeah, but I think it's a cost for the streaming services. It's an environmental cost when running servers. I mean, the cost of having all this AI music on Deezer's servers pales next to the cost of everyone using chat to you with tea to know what to cook for dinner, for example.

3:20Stu:So, you know, in the scheme of things, it's not, but there is a cost and it's an issue. But really, the reason they put these stats out is to say there is a lot of music, it's not being listened to, and we're cracking down on the fraud. So don't all panic just yet.

3:33Steve:Also, I mean, there's no way of knowing this, Adele, but I'd be interested to find out if this represents new people who are jumping on board the AI bandwagon, where it's people who are starting to make AI music for the first time, or whether it's existing AI writers or creators who are just so good at it now that they can multiply the amount of music that they're making each day. So instead of just posting three new tracks, now I reckon I can get about 20 new songs done today if I see it long enough.

4:08Stu:So people who are onto the difficult 8 ,000-second album.

4:12Steve:Yeah. stage okay here's three stories we thought we'd share with you this week i mean in truth it's been a relatively quiet week this week but we'll lead with this which was announced yesterday i think uh spotify and its ongoing drive to lure new subscribers and launch more new initiatives now spotify wants to help you get fit what is what is going on here close to both of our hearts

4:40Stu:yeah well fitness yeah so spotter just added more than more than 1400 workout classes and stuff like ready for like yoga and meditation to weight training and cardio exercising and this is when you basically watch a video of an instructor telling you what to do and you do it at home in your living room um and it's actually i don't know were you aware of peloton during the covid lockdowns did you ever kind of catch on to that trend i mean i'm sure you can guess the answer Well, did you see it happening?

5:11Steve:I mean, I was aware it was happening, I think.

5:15Stu:For those who don't know, Peloton was a company that would sell you an exercise bike, but then would also sell you the subscription to do workouts on it. And a lot of people got a Peloton bike during lockdown and were doing these classes. So this is who's doing it with Spotify. Spotify's partner is Peloton. So these workout classes have been created for that. You can only get them on Spotify if you're a paid subscriber. So it's another kind of incentive for people to upgrade. We'll get this stuff. Although they're going to have, and this is something that I'm sure you're going to love, there's going to be, for the free tier, there'll be lots of fitness playlists and other videos from fitness influencers.

5:47Stu:So kind of TikTokers and Instagrammers who do fitness stuff. So that's part of this too for people who don't pay for Spotify.

5:54Steve:Right. I think that's all we need to say on that. Moving on, the UK's voluntary£1 contribution on ticket sales at concerts over 5 ,000 capacity is starting to pay off for the grassroots live scene. The Music Venue Trust and the Featured Artist Coalition both had some news on that last week. I mean, I know a lot of you know this already, but in case you are one of our newer followers, I have to declare an interest here being chair of Live, which is the Live Music Industry trade body, which goes back to the one pound contribution. And I'm also a trustee of the Live Trust, which is the organisation which distributes money from the fund to organisations like MBT and FAC.

6:37Steve:But as such, obviously, I'm very proud what everyone's achieved so far in, you know, in the course of, you know, 18 months, two years, launching the live trust, getting the industry to look at very seriously what the£1 contribution could provide in the way of support to the grassroots scene. And then, yes, off the back of that, the bringing together the trustees, launching the live trust and the first round of funding from this pot of money which has been raised by contributions of a quid from a load of big gigs first round of funding was agreed earlier this year seven organizations received money for a number of projects across the uk amongst them as mentioned music venue trust and ucat which is the uk artist touring fund which is run by the FAC, the MMF Music Managers Forum and the Musicians Union and both of these organizations reported in last week didn't they both both and you know reassuring both have been very quick to put this money to use.

7:44Stu:I think that's the thing and I don't want to sort of make this weird but me telling you what you've just done because that kind of but like um yeah it was the emphasis on both was like yeah we've got this money and here's what we're using it on and I think the Music Venue Trust put this really interesting report out, didn't they? Which was saying, I think they got£200 ,000 from the UK Life Trust. And what this report said was, right at the beginning, we are no longer just reactive. And we've spent a long time fighting closures and challenging unfair policies and firefighting. And now we've got this money, we're going to spend it.

8:16Stu:And it's going to be spent on something like upgrading the sound and the lighting and the production systems, the helping venues reduce energy costs, the improving artist accommodation which was actually a surprise i didn't realize that artist accommodation was a venue thing i assume that was in the premier inn but do they mean changing rooms and backstage

8:33Steve:stuff no actual accommodation and i think one of the first venues uh to benefit from this is voodoo daddies in norwich i think um but the idea is yeah with with touring being so expensive can you reduce some of the costs by not having to pay for the premier inn other low budget hotels are available for bands on tour. But if you take that away, and, you know, there are some of the buildings which house a venue do have spaces in them which you could turn into accommodation. But obviously that, venues, they don't have a profit margin to take a load of money and do it probably for themselves without some financial support.

9:15Steve:But it makes sense, you know, for everyone, particularly venues in places which are off-putting to bands and their agents, it's a long way to go. And then we'll have to put, because we won't be able to drive from there. We won't be able to get home after doing that gig, or we won't be able to drive from that gig to the next venue. So we're going to have to stay over. So that increases the price. Well, actually, no, you can stay upstairs. Yeah, and not just sleeping back on the floor.

9:41Stu:Well, that's good, then. So this whole report was about, and it was about this change of emphasis, saying we're still fighting all those fights. We are still fighting the agents. as we always leave that. But this is about future-proofing these venues and helping them develop, which I thought was great. And then the Featured Artist Coalition was the other side. So this was the UK Artist Touring Fund, isn't it? So this is where the money goes to actually artists who are touring who would lose money on the tour and need help. And I think, and you can tell me if I'm wrong here, it's$125 ,000 I think they had in the first tranche of their fund.

10:11Steve:Yeah, that's, yeah, yeah. I think that's, yeah, which comes in a couple of payments, I think. But again, they've been very quick to respond because they had to build a whole system where people could apply and get all the applications in. And I'm sure they were overwhelmed with artists saying, you know, can you give us some money? But the idea, yeah, well, yeah. I mean, I don't know what the figures were in terms of the amount of people who applied.

10:36Stu:So more than 250 applied and 26 artists were successful. And that's not that long. Yeah, I'm not, like, there's no criticism implied here of the FAC or anything. It's just that shows how oversubscribed it was. They can only do 26 this time around. But that means, I think it's 211 shows. So they're going to get up to£7 ,000 each artist to kind of cover. And it's like, I was looking down a list, like it's Duke Special, one of them. Holly Cook, Gwilym Gold. It's artists who are on the radio, have got momentum, got careers, but would be losing money from their tours. And this is going to help them do those shows.

11:14Steve:Yeah, in a lot of cases. I mean, it's about not just funding the artist. I mean, there's quite a spread, isn't there? There's some newish, quite new acts. There's some names on there, which I didn't recognise, right up to, as you say, bands who are on the radar of the alternative music scene. I think Man, Woman, Chainsaw might have got some money. This is not just about, but we have to emphasise, it's not just about paying the artist. this is so those bands can perform to the best of their ability for some and that works all the way up the chain so if you're a man woman chainsaw who now people are turning up to see and you expect a certain level don't you when your records have been on you know bbc radio and you've played a few gigs and people know you are you don't expect them to be humping all their gear in themselves and asking you know a mate of theirs for no money to come and do their sound what they need is to be able to maybe take a member of a crew on or they need to pay the tour manager rather than the guitarist having to do all the driving if they're to perform to the best of their ability and put on the best gig that they can for the audience who have turned up to see them who like them so it's plugging a lot of gaps in the financing of a tour really from you know everything from the practical side of petrol place to stay um can we get a guitar tech it would really help or a you know a live a sound engineer um so there'll be different money in you know going in being used in different ways by different bands depending where they are i think yeah and it's good i mean

12:49Stu:this is why you know awkward for you because i'm gonna be very nice about it but like i feel like whenever when when people are trying to convince for example promoters to say support this levy on tickets. When Music Van Interest is trying to get to an industry to donate to its campaigns, there's always a thing like, okay, what will this money be used for? Will it be used wisely? Like, you know, if I'm going to put money into something. And I think it's just really good that the people are saying, this is exactly what we're doing, this is who's getting the money, this is what we're going to do with it.

13:17Stu:It's very clear. And like you say, very quick, there's no kind of hanging around for a year with the money in the bank somewhere, not doing any good. They're getting it out the door quickly to people who need it. And I think it's just a really, positive moment. It's not that the problems have gone away, but these two announcers made me think, this is just so good that all this talk about what could be done is now turning into action.

13:41Steve:Can I just add briefly a slight addendum to that? There is, if you happen to be in London this bank holiday weekend, this coming Sunday, that's the 3rd I think of May, isn't it? The Music Venue Trust are holding an event at It's the V &A in London, Celebrating Grassroots Music Culture. There'll be some talks and short films, and there'll be some guests, including some of the MBT patrons will be there. As far as I know, it's free as well. Starts at 10 o 'clock, runs till 5 p.m. this coming Sunday, Celebrating Grassroots Music Culture. Right. Third talking point of the week. Now, nobody would mistake me for the actual Taylor Swift, but with AI deep fakes getting ever more convincing, Taylor has taken some action with some trademark filings so that I can't say, hey, it's Taylor Swift here.

14:37Steve:This is me. I'm Taylor Swift. Yeah. So what can you do in this fight against deep fakery? What has Taylor Swift done?

14:50Stu:Yeah, we've got a limited window to be able to say, hey, it's Taylor Swift and not get sued. Yeah. Possibly. So this is about a company called TAS Rights Management, which is of course Taylor Allison Swift, her initials. And she's filed for three trademarks. And one is a likeness trademark. It's for a visual image. And it's a picture of her in one of her outfits from the Ears tour. To describe it, it's like pink sparkly boots, pink guitar, and a silver bodysuit. Like one of the signature looks. People might be able to picture it in their heads because it was such a kind of key look in the tour.

15:20Stu:And then two are for her voice. So it's her saying, hey, it's Taylor Swift and hey, it's Taylor, which is kind of unusual. That's more unusual. Artists do have trademarks on things, but these are called sound marks, which they usually use for stuff like, you know, Netflix has this ta-dum noise. That would be a sound mark or any kind of brand, you know, like on a Windows startup tone. And what it is, it's an extra layer of legal protection if lawyers need to take action against deepfakes because you can say, okay, I have a trademark on this voice saying this and this is confusingly similar. She's actually the second celebrity to do it as far as we know.

15:54Stu:Because Matthew McConaughey, the actor did it in January, the same thing. He did some trademarks on him staring, smiling, and talking. And what he said was like, my team and I want to know when my voice or like this is ever used, it's because I approved and signed off on it. And registering a trademark gives you kind of that legal right to kind of police it. So So yeah, and Taylor Swift is probably one of the most deepfaked celebrities there is. I've written about three or four stories where I think there was one where there are a bunch of explicit images of her doing rounds on X and her fans had to mobilize to get them taken down.

16:31Stu:The US president posted a deepfake image of her giving him her vote around the last election or he shared a meme of it. So she's obviously the biggest pop star in the world. she's at the sharp end of this." And so now we're sort of seeing what her lawyers are thinking is the right strategy. So I suspect we'll see a bunch of other artists following soon. And then we might see some cases at some point where we'll see how this gets applied. If someone deepfakes you, can you go after them for trademark infringement? Which I think is just a case of getting things taken down quicker. It might be quicker if you have a trademark that you can say rather than...

17:06Stu:Otherwise you're saying, it's my personality rights and it depends on where you're doing it and what the law is there on kind of people's likenesses and voices. Okay.

17:16Steve:Any other business? What is this? I don't really understand this. Going back to Spotify, Spotify have an exclusive on the new Olivia Rodrigo music video, but then doesn't Apple Music have an exclusive? I can't work this out apart from it's another spat between two big companies trying to claim the limelight with a round, a big new release.

17:45Stu:Well, it's like the music video equivalent of Oprah Winfrey going, you have an exclusive and you have an exclusive and you have one. So there's a song out, Drop Dead, which is the Olivia Readerie. It's not a comeback single. She hasn't gone away, but it's like the lead single off her new album. It's on YouTube. 23 million people have watched it so far. But there's one on Spotify called Drop Dead Brackets, Taken That Euro Star to France, which is a reference to a line in the lyrics of the song. But I don't know if you saw the screenshot I sent you in preparation for this, but the video starts with having a pint of Guinness in a London pub with a bunch of NME covers on the wall.

18:20Stu:And I was like, if anyone knows what that pub is, it must be, Steve.

18:23Steve:The only pub which I've been to recently which has framed NME covers on the wall. I mean, basically, when you send us a photo saying, can you name the London pub? There's a lot of pubs in London. from one picture, one inside picture, one picture taken inside a pub. Can you name the pub? The only place I've been to which has NME covers on the wall is the Elephant's Head in Camden.

18:50Stu:Okay. Well, maybe Olivia Ruggigo was in there down in Guinness recently. Yeah. So that's the Spotify one. But Apple Music has got another version called Drop Dead Stalked You on the Internet, which is not a lyric. Less pubby. Less pubby than that one. And it's essentially what's happened is two different videos have been shot and given out to these two big streaming services. Very festive. So each of them has got an exclusive Olivia Rodrigo music video for the same song, which is, I think it's quite clever. Obviously, she's got an Olivia Rodrigo-sized marketing budget to do this. Like it's not something that every band can do.

19:22Stu:Or maybe you can. I feel like when I talk to smaller artists, they're getting quite good at saying, well, we filmed something and use it in 27 different ways on social media and different platforms. So it's kind of that writ large. But I wonder if we see this more often, because I think there was a time, I'm trying to think when it was, it was when Apple Music launched, so probably about sort of 50, 10 years ago now, there was competition for exclusives on actual music, and Apple Music might say, we've got this album and no one else has got it. And that died out because people didn't like it, I think.