Jem Aswad-Senior: Last News

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorAs the omicron variant continues to delay the return to normal, Las Vegas is becoming a half-step along the way back to live entertainment — and a day after the Grammy Awards announced their move to Vegas for 2022, Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak’s Silk Sonic are the latest act to unveil a residency in the city.The duo announce in the wee hours of Wednesday that they will launch a residency beginning on Feb. 25 at Dolby Live as part of “An Evening With Silk Sonic” — and look at that, the run concludes the night before the Grammys, which makes it seem likely the group will at the very least attend the show, where they’re up for Record of the Year and Best R&B Performance.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorHipgnosis Song Management has acquired 80% of Kenny Chesney’s recorded music royalties, the company announced, covering his discography from his 1994 debut “In My Wildest Dreams” through 2017’s “Live in No Shoes Nation.” The catalog includes 22 albums, 15 of which are certified platinum. The deal is the first acquisition made by Hipgnosis Song Management since its recently announced partnership with Blackstone to acquire music rights and manage catalogs.Terms of the deal were not announced.Chesney is one of the top-selling country performers — and one of the top-grossing live artists — of the past 25 years, with more than 30 million albums sold worldwide.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorLanre Gaba has been promoted to co-president of Black music for Atlantic Records, the company announced on Tuesday. Gaba, who celebrates her 20 th anniversary with the label this year, was most recently Atlantic’s GM/executive VP of Black music A&R, and in her new post she will work alongside fellow co-president Mike Kyser and report jointly to chairman-CEO Craig Kallman and chairman-COO Julie Greenwald. “Lanre’s growth over the past two decades has been a wonderful thing to witness,” said Kallman and Greenwald.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorAlong with her “Caprisongs” mixtape on Friday came the news that FKA Twigs has “partnered with Atlantic Records for this next exciting phase of her art,” according to the announcement. In the U.K., she will continue to release music via the Young label (formerly Young Turks) through Beggars Group.“FKA twigs is the kind of artist you dream of signing — one with truly original vision, voice, and presence,” said Atlantic chairman-COO Julie Greenwald.  “She’s among the most compelling talents, always pushing her creative envelope to deliver emotionally honest music that’s both intensely personal and universal. We’re thrilled that she’s chosen Atlantic to be her home as she continues on her fantastic musical adventure.” “The progression of FKA twigs’ music over the past decade has been extraordinary,” said chairman-CEO Craig Kallman. “She’s never content to stay in one place – constantly crossing musical boundaries, embracing fresh sounds, telling new stories, and exploring what’s next.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorMelissa Goodwin, a former executive vice president and general manager of the T.J. Martell Foundation, one of the music industry’s biggest and longest-running charities, has been charged with wire fraud in a scheme to defraud the organization out of $3.7 million, according to an announcement from the Department of Justice.The DOJ alleged that Goodwin, 55, used the foundation’s money to purchase expensive and rare alcohols, plane tickets, hotel stays and as part of a multimillion dollar ticketing scheme.The T.J.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorThe Grammy Awards will take place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas on April 3, the Recording Academy has confirmed. The CMT Awards, originally scheduled for that day at the venue, will be moved to a later date.Trevor Noah, long-running host of “The Daily Show” and host of the 2021 Grammys, will return as master of ceremonies.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorHot on the heels of the David Bowie estate’s $250 million-plus deal with Warner Chappell Music publishing, Peloton has announced that it struck a deal for the artist’s entire catalog as well as various remixes for its cycling, strength, yoga and running classes, beginning Wednesday. The deal comes during the “Bowie 75” celebrations around what would have been the singer’s 75 th birthday on January 8, which has been observed with reissues, pop-up stores in New York and London, and more.Along with his greatest hits, three new and exclusive remixes are part of the deal: from St. Vincent, TokiMonsta and Honey Dijon.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorBritney Spears continues to use Instagram as her connection to her fans, teasing that a “new song [is] in the works” and posting a video of herself doing some wailing vocal runs on Wednesday.“I just realized this today guys,” she wrote in the caption before referencing the recent end of the 13-year conservatorship under her father, Jamie Spears.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorIt’s the holiday season, and Mariah Carey’s perennial “All I Want for Christmas Is You” is not only No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 yet again — it’s made history: It is now the first song in the chart’s history to have led in three distinct runs on the ranking.While the song was first released on Carey’s “Merry Christmas” album in 1994, its popularity has actually grown as the years have gone by: It reached the Hot 100’s top 10 for the first time in December 2017; No.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorEver since the July 2020 incident in which Tory Lanez allegedly shot Megan Thee Stallion in the foot after an argument, the two have used social media, songs and even (in Lanez’s case) a full album to air their differing sides of the story.That also has been the case in the hours after Lanez’s preliminary hearing on Tuesday, in which a judge upheld the two assault charges against the rapper and ordered him to return to court on Jan.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorA 56-year-old acetate recording of a previously unreleased and relatively unknown song featuring David Bowie is expected to draw thousands of pounds at an auction in England on Thursday.The song, titled “I Want Your Love” and recorded in 1965 by a teenaged Bowie and his early group the Lower Third, was written by John Dee and Jack Tarr and produced by top ‘60s producer Shel Talmy — who also produced a string of classics for the Kinks and the Who, including “You Really Got Me,” “Sunny Afternoon,” “My Generation,” “I Can’t Explain” and two early singles for Bowie, who was still going by his original surname in Davy Jones and the Lower Third.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorThe Weeknd’s “Save Your Tears” was the most-played video, both globally and in the U.S., on the major video network Vevo, the company announced Monday as part of its annual year-end look back on music video viewership.“Save Your Tears” topped the list with 615 million views globally, and 102.9M views in the U.S. Released at the top of the year, “Save Your Tears” popularity was fueled by the Weeknd’s successful Super Bowl halftime performance and the multiple awards it has won.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorGreg Tate, an American music and culture writer and musician, has died, a rep for Tate’s publisher Duke University Press confirmed to Variety. He was 64; a cause of death was not provided.While his writing touched on many aspects of  African-American culture, he is probably best known as a vital early hip-hop writer, particularly in his many years at the Village Voice.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorSince his career as a hitmaker first took off with Kelly Clarkson’s 2004 smash “Since U Been Gone,” Lukasz Gottwald — a.k.a. Dr. Luke, Tyler Trax and others — has reigned as one of the world’s top hitmakers via songs with Miley Cyrus’ “Wrecking Ball,” Katy Perry’s “California Gurls,” Britney Spears’ “Hold It Against Me,” Pink’s “U + Ur Hand” and many more, and his Prescription Songs proves he’s no slouch as a publisher, either.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorAdele has announced an exclusive residency in the Colosseum of Las Vegas’ famed Caesars Palace Hotel beginning Friday January 21, 2022. Titled “Weekends With Adele,” the singer will perform two shows each weekend through Saturday April 16, 2022 (see full list of dates below) for a total of 12 weeks.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorInterscope Geffen A&M has announced the promotion of Matt Morris to the position of senior vice president of A&R at the label. He will continue to sign and develop artists for the label as well as oversee the company’s A&R Research department.According to the announcement, Morris is credited with signing 2021’s breakout star Olivia Rodrigo to Geffen Records, along with his A&R colleagues Sam Riback and Emerson Redd.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorAmong the many musicians paying tribute to the top designer Virgil Abloh, who died on Sunday at the age of just 41 after a battle with cancer, Frank Ocean took to Instagram to make a rare statement about his friend, who founded the Off-White line and was Louis Vuitton Menswear’s artistic director.“In 2018 I believe it was I called V and asked him how it was possible to play hundreds of shows a year and do numerous fashion collections a year and be a father and a husband and return EVERYONE’s texts with enthusiasm and emojis and encouragement and seemingly..

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorBritain’s Wet Leg, one of the most buzzed-about indie groups to emerge in years via their singles “Chaise Longue” and “Wet Dream,” have dropped two new songs and unveiled the release date for their forthcoming debut album and a big pile of tour dates in the U.S. and the U.K.Hailing from the unlikely locale of the Isle of Wight in southern England, the group’s core members — Rhian Teasdale and Hester Chambers — have released two new songs, “Too Late Now” and “Oh No.” As Teasdale notes in the the announcement, “Too Late Now” is “about sleepwalking into adulthood.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorFor the most part, David Bowie’s career can be divided into eras by decade — the ‘60s, when he tried almost anything to make it (Mod-pop, Buddhism, folksinging) and mostly failed; the ‘70s, when he released some of the most exciting and innovative albums in music history; the ‘80s, when he got a taste of platinum success with “Let’s Dance” and lost his muse; and the period encapsulated in the latest career-spanning boxed set, “Brilliant Adventure: 1992-2001” — when he got at least some of it back.It’s likely that even Bowie would agree that he spent the latter half of the ‘80s flailing in search of inspiration, bounding from the garish pop excess of “Never Let Me Down” to his bizarre, Pixies-inspired take on an

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorTo the surprise of absolutely no one, Adele’s “30” is now the top-selling album of 2021 — and it achieved that feat in just three days.According to initial reports to MRC Data via Billboard, the album, which was released at 12 a.m. ET on Friday, passed the half-million mark on Sunday — topping the total sales of any album released over the past 11 months combined in three days.It squashed the year’s previous top-seller, Taylor Swift’s “Evermore,” which has 462,000 copies sold through the week ending Nov.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorHBO has released a new trailer for the forthcoming documentary, “DMX: Don’t Try to Understand,” focusing on a year in the life of the late rapper. The doc, which was directed by Christopher Frierson and executive produced by The Ringer’s Bill Simmons (HBO’s “Andre The Giant,” “Showbiz Kids”), follows Earl “DMX” Simmons as he is released from prison in early 2019 and attempts to rebuild his career in the music industry and reconnect with family and fans.The doc debuts on HBO/HBO Max on Nov.