The Tune Up Vol. 4

Your curated lineup of the latest music industry podcasts, articles, research, and news worth knowing.

These sources are what we’ve found interesting this month:

The price of creativity (Read on NPR here)

"I love when my life outside of music collides with my work inside of music, and this podcast did that for me. In this TED Radio Hour episode, Yancey Strickler (Co-Founder of Kickstarter) and Manoush (Host) discuss the value of creativity and creative fields in our society. I found this episode incredibly informative and inspiring as both an entrepreneur and a supporter of creators and other creative entrepreneurs, as it presents a new legal structure type called the Artist Corporation or A Corp. The A Corp has many similarities to that of an LLC or S Corp (the current most common structures for creative businesses), but it would allow the company to issue shares of their intellectual property as an investment for outside interests. This could create another route of funding and support for artists' creative ventures, which is often the biggest hurdle in growing an artist's business. For a quick rundown of the A Corp, head to 18:42 (but you should listen to the whole episode)!” - Kelsy

The realities of being a pop star. (Read on Substack here)

"Because I'm tired of talking about AI regulations in the music industry (for this week at least), I wanted to share something that actually made me excited and optimistic: Charli XCX has a Substack. And beyond this being delightfully weird and different and awesome, I'm obsessed with what this signals culturally….blogs are BACK, baby. So when you see Kelzana answering the hard-hitting music business questions in essay form, know it's because of a cultural shift in how we consume content. And personally? Reading and writing is a much healthier and sustainable form of storytelling than the endless scrolling on an app literally designed to keep you trapped there.” - Tori

Olivia Dean Calls Out Ticketing Companies Over High Resale Prices (Read on Billboard here)

“I’ve disliked the way Ticketmaster does their business for a long time, so seeing any well-known artist comment on the issue is always admirable. I saw her post about this on her Instagram story, but I didn’t know about Ticketmaster’s response. Since this article was posted, Ticketmaster has even given fans who bought resale tickets above face value refunds. I think ticketing companies need to understand where the buyer frustration is coming from, and do what they can do minimize the stress of the “Ticketmaster wars” that happen every presale. I encourage other artists to speak up about this, so that these companies can be held more accountable. Sincerely, a traumatized veteran of many Ticketmaster presales” - Danica