“When we watch something or listen to something that undeniably does make us feel sad at some level, it’s not like we’re only seeking to feel sad” - Mary Beth Oliver, PhD, a professor of media studies at Penn State University Oliver told Elemental. “I think we’re trying to have a greater insight into the bigger questions — the purpose of life, or of human virtue” - sha added. Rather than “sad", she said she prefers terms like “meaningful” or “poignant” or “bittersweet”. “It’s absolutely possible to feel good about feeling sad sometimes,” she said. “Our emotions are much richer than some of these blunt terms we use”.

Ex-Rolling Stones tour manager and author Sam Cutler describes his friend Charlie Watts' funeral in a lovely Mirror article: "It's fitting to learn that Charlie Watts’ funeral – held last week in Devon, the place that he loved best – was modest and private. It perfectly reflects the man he was, and I completely understand the choice that was made. He would have hated a fuss and the commotion that involving the public would have meant". Cutler describes his friend's character further on - "Charlie, was in some senses, an anomaly. In the entertainment industry where bluster, fluster and muster are all, Charlie remained quietly confident, almost serene in his laid-back attitude, and possessed of an evergreen sense of humour". Cutler remembers a dinner with Watts: "As the meal progressed, I noticed a fan hovering nervously nearby with an autograph book and as he neared our table I rose to intercept him, asking him to come back after the meal was finished... Charlie intervened and happily signed the man’s book, and we regained our seats. He looked me kindly and said in that softly civilised voice of his, 'Sam, never forget, it’s the fans who pay for dinner'”.

"In the history of American orchestras, only one woman has risen to lead a top-tier ensemble: Marin Alsop, whose tenure as music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra ended last month. Her departure has ushered in an unsettling era for the country’s musical landscape. Among the 25 largest ensembles, there are now no women serving as music directors" - The New York Times (via Art Daily) takes out the ugly truth. But, change is (maybe) about to happen...

Rolling Stone goes into the new trend of rock stars tweeting as if they're still alive. This week George Harrison and John Lennon both tweeted through an online listening party celebrating the 50th anniversary of 'Imagine'. It's not only the Beatles breaking the space-time continuum - Tom Petty recently mourned the death of Charlie Watts.

"Interpolations have run rampant in the strange year of 2021. Just ask Olivia Rodrigo, Ava Max, Lorde and Doja Cat, who’ve all made charting or platinum records in the past year borrowing beats and melodies from older hits. As a musical concept, interpolations are a cousin to sampling, the art of sticking sound snippets of older songs into new projects that has defined so much of hip-hop. Rather than lifting or modifying a recorded track, though, an interpolation cribs only from a song’s written composition — whether that’s lyrics, a melody, a riff or a beat" - Rolling Stone goes into the story of interpolating old songs for new hits.

YouTube has surpassed the milestone of 50 million YouTube Music and Premium subscribers, growing its subscriber base by around 20 million in the past 11 months, or around 1.8m subscribers per month since October 2020, MBW reports on the music stat. YouTube's biggest rival Spotify's global Premium Subscriber base grew to 165 million in Q2 2021, which was up 20% year-on-year. Apple Music in June 2019 announced it had surpassed 60 million subscribers.

Input analyses Kanye West's career as it was mirrored in his fashion: "Kanye has curated his aesthetic universe to be one of the most recognizable in the music industry. His relationships with music and fashion have not only been symbiotic within his own life, but with the streetwear landscape around him. While the Yeezy label carves Kanye’s imprint within luxury fashion, he uses his merch as a creative playground, transforming each album into collectible garments. The lasting impact of Kanye’s merch has less to do with the artist himself, but more so with the creative ecosystem he creates around each project, and the aesthetic footprint it leaves behind". West's listening event for his still-unreleased album on August 5 proves the point - with 40,000 ticketed guests, it raked in $7 million from merch sales, breaking the record for highest-grossing U.S. tour.

Inspired by the strange case of naked child photo of Spencer Elden and Nirvana's 'Nevermind' cover art, Pitchfork looks back at the history of bands being sued by their cover art subjects. Apart from the grunge icons, Cardi B, Rolling Stones, Vampire Weekend, Dead Kennedys, and Dido have also gotten themselves into similar problems.

Olivia Rodrigo has added Paramore's singer Hayley Williams and ex-guitarist Josh Farro as co-writers of her hit single 'Good 4 U'. They were not credited when the song was originally released in May. Warner Chappell Music announced this week via Instagram that Williams and Farro were now credited 'Good 4 U' songwriters. "The fact WCM confirmed this fact during 'Good 4 U' fourteenth week in the Top 5 of the Billboard Hot 100 perhaps says something about the journey that was required to make it happen" - Music Business Worldwide writes. C

Salon's Bernadette Barton joins the discussion about Britney Spears "exploring the gender inequality trapping Britney.  In particular, I examine Britney Spears's story in light of the pornification of society over the past three decades. Pornification, the sexualization of culture also referred to as raunch culture, socializes women and girls to believe (and boys and men too) that a key element of female identity is looking 'hot' like a porn star or stripper. Pornification sells itself to girls and women using the rhetoric of sex positivity and empowerment. 'Look how free you are to express your inner porn star and be sexy.' This narrative falsely equates commodified sexualization with freedom, and devolves the language of sex positivity from an ecosystem of consent, pleasure, safety, and respect into the single expectation that women present themselves as sexual objects first and foremost".

"He was the anti-drummer. He wasn’t performative to let you know how hard he was fucking working. He gave you the basic foundation. What I really felt akin to, as far as Charlie’s and my drumming is concerned, was the fact that my reputation is as stoic as Charlie’s reputation — like, the serious face that he always had. I came to the world in a time where the temptation to show off was at a high, and it’s a mighty task to check your ego at the door when you’re a drummer, to not beg for attention or to do anything to distract from the team mentality" - Questlove looks back at the life and life's work of Rolling Stone Charlie Watts.

"Some of 2021's most hyped albums are from Pop Smoke, DMX and now, Aaliyah. So what's the difference between honouring a legacy and cashing in?" - The Face asks in its new article, inspired by the latest Anderson .Paak tattoo. "Putting out new records that are often assembled from scraps to sit in their discographies is an act of legacy trampling. It is the capitalist pursuit of squeezing a person’s commercial potential for every last bit of juice. Yet it’s not impossible to put out unreleased recordings in a way that feels appropriate, egalitarian even" - The Face insists.

Music industry journalist Eamonn Forde has put forward a new set of rules that could improve concerts for everyone; via Music Business Worldwide:

1) No guestlist tickets for at least a year

2) Anyone talking during the performance is immediately ejected and banned from every concert venues and festival for six months

3) Anyone taking photos or videos during the show will have their phone smashed with a lump hammer in front of their eyes

4) Buy as much merchandise as you can afford

5) The end of hidden booking and/or processing fees

6) Loyalty cards for regular concertgoers

7) No U2 shows until at least 2035

"Folks like Diddy, Jay Z, and Master P are in their 50s, healthy, and wealthy. Music was their gateway to other businesses... Kendrick is rarely mentioned among hip-hop's highest earners. Forbes once wrote an article about how Kendrick is not a cash king!... For years, Kendrick looked past most business partnerships and stayed focused on music. His love for hip-hop is admirable, but it's hard to ignore trends of older artists who focused on business early on and are still living well" - Trapital's Dan Runcie writes about the announcement that Kendrick Lamar is leaving the TDE label after his new album is released.

"The first songs to express personal emotions and individual aspirations appeared more than 3,000 years ago in Deir el-Medina, a village on the west bank of the Nile. By seeming coincidence this was also the location of the first successful labor protest in history, when artisans launched a sit-down strike that forced 'management' - Ramesses III in this instance - to increase grain rations. Is it just by chance that a major musical innovation and a historic expansion in human rights took place in the very same (and tiny) community?" - music writer Ted Gioia asks in his great article about the connection of art and activism.

At the first point, the debate about the new album by Deafheaven will be about the band's change from metal to post-punk/shoegaze. Ian Cohen shares his contribution to the debate in the Ringer: "I’m reflexively inclined to say that 'Infinite Granite' is the most polarizing metal album in recent memory, even though it hardly sounds like a metal album at all. Or, it’s the most polarizing metal album in recent memory because it hardly sounds like a metal album at all". That leaves us with the question of whether it's good music, be it metal or any other genre.

Consequence continues their punk week with a list of artists who "have succeeded in the genre despite the circumstances being stacked against them". The list includes several black, queer, and feminist artists that helped revolutionize punk at some point.

"It is impossible not to consider the entangled nature of race and drugs. Despite efforts to rectify the War on Drugs’ disproportionate harm to marginalised groups, the legal cannabis industry has become overwhelmingly white-controlled, while drug law enforcement still disproportionately hurts Black communities... Getting stoned no longer holds any countercultural bite when your weed comes from a SPAC owned by a vertically-integrated cannabis conglomerate, and legal ketamine clinics are a privilege reserved for the most wealthy" - gonzo journalist Michelle Lhooq writes in her new essay. She will try to answer three essential questions: "Is substance use still subversive and emancipatory? Do drugs have any place at protests or in organizing? How can we reimagine nightlife spaces for sober experiences?".

"Luxury world leader LVMH has acquired a stake in Virgil Abloh's Off-White LLC. It bought 50% of Jay-Z's Ace of Spades. A few months ago, Travis Scott collaborated with LVMH's Dior on its 2022 Men's collection. LVMH backed Fenty Beauty and launched the unsuccessful Fenty Maison. Beyonce and Jay Z were named brand ambassadors for Tiffany & Co. LVMH is a hip-hop company. LVMH may not position itself that way, but now it's too reliant on the culture not to be. European fashion houses looked down on the early 2000s hip-hop fashion brands like Enyce. Now hip-hop is the driving force behind European brands" - Trapital's Dan Runcie makes a relevant point about the European fashion powerhouse.

“We can’t afford to sit out shows, we have to vaccinate and mask up or everything we’ve worked our entire lives for will be gone. And it’s so upsetting to work so long on a craft and lose opportunities left and right, because people would rather believe vaccine conspiracy theories than at least try these precautions out” - Austin songwriter Cari Hutson says to Guardian about the need to vaccinate. The London paper is exploring differences within country music community about vaccinating - "exposing an age-old political divide".

Rave New World's Michelle Lhooq makes a great point in her latest newsletter about partying getting its long over-due recognition: "Suddenly, club culture was front-page news, rather than relegated to tabloid gossip or society pages; everyone poking out of their quarantine hovels now obsessed with knowing where the party’s at... Now, rave culture is going mainstream, Gen Z is arriving on the scene, and city officials are finally recognizing the economic value of nightlife—thanks in part to grassroots activism that kept beloved music venues afloat during pandemic shutdowns. Could all of this mainstream media attention finally destigmatize nightlife—a culture long associated with antisocial escapism and frivolous peacocking—and finally convince the gentry that partying is, in fact, an essential activity?".

Pitchfork goes into the sensitive issue of music ownership: "The reality that behind every young, female pop star exists a team eager to exploit that stardom by any means necessary has not exactly been obscure throughout pop history. The shadow of the svengali producer and manager, long solidified in the work of men like Phil Spector, Porter Wagoner, and Kim Fowley, lingers in the edges of the modern industry... But 2021 feels like a breaking point for a public understanding of industry control that stretches far beyond singular producer-artist dynamics or bad contracts. As high-profile artists like Britney Spears and estates like Aaliyah’s battle for control and fight off their respective leeches, they illustrate the ways in which a musician can be dehumanized to function as a kind of corporation, one through which a staff of bad actors can rotate, or be sold off in parts to the highest bidder".

Universal Music Group, Sony Music Group, and Warner Music Group have generated $5.60 billion in the three months to end of June, up by $1.53 billion (or +37.6%) on the same period of last year, Music Business Worldwide calculates. That $5.60 billion turnover equates to the three majors cumulatively generating $61.5 million per day in the year’s second quarter – or, in turn, $2.56 million every hour. In the first six months of 2020, the three major music companies generated $10.91 billion – putting them firmly on course for a cumulative $20 billion year.

"Concerts in real life have various constraints like budgets, the chance of accidents, space limitations, etc. But when it comes to a virtual world, there are none. If you have a crazy idea, you can get it implemented. And this widens the scope of how musical concerts can be done and how artists can interact with fans" - metaverse enthusiast E2Analyst writes in the Medium after seeing Ariana Grande perform in Fortnite.

"The 29-year-old rapper really stepped in it, and continued to smear it all over the place, when on July 25th during the Rolling Loud Miami music festival he made some truly vile comments about gay men and people living with HIV... After his clusterfuck of faux-pologies, DaBaby’s left those in the queer community no choice but to demand dollars... We don’t need apologies. We’re tired of apologies. To be Black and queer in this country is to constantly have to apologize for your own presence, to constantly assert your own value, and to constantly watch others dismiss you entirely. An apology ain’t doing shit for anybody. Instead, speak the only language that carries weight in this country: cold hard cash" - Rolling Stone gets to the bottom line with DaBaby.

The New Yorker writer likes the new Prince album, but still felt uncomfortable listening to it. This is why: "Prince didn’t have a will when he died. Every act performed with his music is done without his permission. Even the people who seemed to know him well speak of him as a mystery. Who, then, is qualified to say that they have any inkling of what he’d do with his songs? Recently, things got even more complicated: around the time that “Welcome 2 America” was released, news broke that many of Prince’s siblings had received buyouts from the independent music publisher and talent management company Primary Wave, giving it the largest stake in Prince’s estate. During his life, Prince was vocal about ownership, autonomy, and control. He did not want middlemen to take shares of his streaming revenue; he changed his name to a glyph partly in protest of what he saw as an onerous recording contract. The infrastructure profiting off Prince in death is the one he’s criticizing on 'Welcome 2 America'”.

Vulture Craig Jenkins looks beyond DaBaby being dropped from Lollapalooza after some public homophobic comments: "The connectivity the internet allows made it so people who grew up siloed in their like-minded communities now have to hear from the people on the margins, and the people on the margins got smart and organized and are starting to creep into positions of power and greater visibility, and the blowback for this has been unsubtle and retrograde and base and disgusting. A lot of people want things to stay the way they used to be and seem unable to grasp that the way things were required marginalized people to suck it up and live as second-class citizens in a country clearly built for someone else. There’s no going back to sucking it up. Here’s the thing: This ends one of two ways. We all die hating each other, or we start acting like other people exist and are deserving of the same respect and consideration that we demand for ourselves".

Last Thursday Kanye West had an album-release party, and the day after his 10th album 'Donda' was to be released. It didn't come out. Vice explores "how quickly could 'Donda' - or any other record, for that matter - actually hit streaming services after it’s finished? The answer depends on who you ask, and who you are".

"Last week, Kanye West hosted a 'Donda' album listening party for 40,000+ fans at the Mercedez-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. Kanye sold 40,000+ tickets for this event on three days' notice. Tickets were $20 or $50. He gave away around 5,000 seats, but still, he likely made at least $1 million from paid tickets. Plus merch sales. Plus the record-breaking Apple Music livestream. And all he did was press play and walk around the stadium. Only a handful of artists can pull this off" - Dan Runcie looks back at the release party of the album that wasn't released.

"What do musicians who blend fact and fiction owe their real life subjects?" - NPR's Ann Powers writes exploring "self-referential musicians making waves in 2021 not only because so many notable current songs tread this ethically shaky ground between self and other, true and imagined, but because that's what songwriters who perform their own work have been doing for at least a half-century... What unites these artworks is a thrilling immediacy that comes at the risk of their makers' dignity and their close companions' right to anonymity". A clever text about the sensitive issue.