Music funding platform beatBread has just closed a $100 million institutional fund with asset manager Variant Investments to do so, MBW reports. Launched in November 2020, the company has made over 500 advances to artists and labels, ranging from $1,000 to as much as $2 million per artist for a limited share of revenues on catalog, and, if the artist chooses, on new unreleased music. These advances are repaid from a share of an artist’s streaming and airplay revenues, over a period of the artist’s choosing.

Metallica have announced their new album, titled '72 Seasons', which will come out on April 14th, and will be their first in seven years, Blabbermouth reports. Its first single, 'Lux Æterna' is a light trash song with a focus on melodic vocals. Band's frontman James Hetfield explained the album’s idea - “72 seasons. The first 18 years of our lives that form our true or false selves. The concept that we were told ‘who we are’ by our parents... Much of our adult experience is reenactment or reaction to these childhood experiences. Prisoners of childhood or breaking free of those bondages we carry”. Metallica have also unveiled dates for a massive 2023-2024 world tour that will see the band play two dates (with unique sets) in each city, and feature such opening bands as Pantera, Mammoth WVH, Five Finger Death Punch, Ice Nine Kills, and Architects.

Canadian-Chinese pop singer Kris Wu has been sentenced to 13 years in prison by a Beijing court for charges that include the rape of three women, The Associated Press reports. The Chaoyang District court ruled that Wu, as well as others implicated in the case, supplied three women with alcohol in 2020 and raped them when they could no longer consent. He also received one year and 10 months for a 2018 event where he “assembled a crowd” and assaulted two women they got drunk. Singer and actor was fined 600 million yuan (€79.5 million/$83.7 million) for evading taxes. Hu will be deported after completing his sentence,

"A brilliant, innovative early ‘70s singer-songwriter who was the first artist signed to David Geffen’s Asylum Records... Her music fit early ‘70s Southern California vibe of her label and milieu, but it was stranger, with deep classical influences, wildly unusual structures and voicings and often dark subject matter" - Variety presents Judee Still, the forgotten California musician. Andy Brown and Brian Lindstrom directed the new documentary ‘Lost Angel: The Genius of Judee Sill’ - "a masterful job of making the most of what little there was, enlivening the narrative with contemporary interviews, photos and voiceovers, as well as drawings and passages read by a voice actor culled from her voluminous journals".

When it comes to musical tastes, people tend to favor songs with lyrics that correspond to their attachment style - researchers in the psychology department of the University of Toronto have found in a study that involved asking 570 people about their favourite songs. The participants were asked a series of questions about their relationship histories. The analysis of more than 7,000 songs revealed that people tended to like song lyrics that related to their attachment style in intimate relationships. This means most people tend to like songs that spell out what they are going through in a relationship. Vice reports about the study.

Yolŋu rapper Baker Boy has dominated the 2022 Arias, taking home a total of five awards for his album 'Gela', including the top gong for album of the year, as well as best solo artist and best hip-hop release, ABC reports. Amyl and the Sniffers took home Best group, and Best rock release (for their 2021 album 'Comfort to Me'). Tones and I took home the fan-voted best song award for 'Cloudy Day'.

"One of the most dramatic impacts that streaming has had on the record industry is been the democratization of listening" - Music Business Worldwide underlined a phenomenon that has happened in pop music in the streaming decade. The outgoing CEO of Warner Music Group, Steve Cooper puts it clearly, in numbers: “A decade ago, our Top 5 artists generated over 15% of our recorded music physical and digital revenue. In 2022, they generated just over 5%”. It's not just a decline in share of revenue; it’s a decline in actual revenue generated - Warner Music Group’s Top 5 recorded music artists in FY2012 look likely to have cumulatively generated a larger sum of annual digital and physical royalties (≈$274.5m) than WMG’s equivalent Top 5 artists generated in FY2022 (≈$193.4m). WMG’s overall recorded music royalties more than doubled in that period - $1.83bn in FY2012 vs. $3.87bn in FY2022. "As a result, in any given year, an ever-greater share of total streams is drifting away from the Top 10 biggest hits, and towards a much wider array of ‘middle class’ artists with significant, but not necessarily chart-bursting, fanbases" - MBW points out.

A group of prominent musicans are among the signers of an open letter calling for the European Union to adopt a new law cracking down on deforestation, as part of its efforts to tackle the climate emergency. Coldplay, Brian Eno, Sting, Robyn, Barbra Streisand, Bryan Adams and David Gilmour, are among the musical signatures, next to veteran climate campaigners, as well as actors, directors and activists. ClientEarth

The best music books this year kept it personal" - Pitchfork points out introducing the best 15 books of 2022. Among them are "affable, conversational, and always funny, with surprising insights and ear-catching phrasings gliding in from every direction" book 'The Number Ones' by Tom Breihan about American No. 1 pop hits, as well as "an astoundingly intimate book-length conversation on art and grief" with Nick Cave by Sean O'Hagan. and 'Queer Country' by Shana Goldin-Perschbacher who draws "a vivid portrait of a movement at a point of breakthrough".

The global recording industry association IFPI, released 'Engaging with Music 2022', the largest music study on how people around the world enjoy and engage with music. It is based on the responses of more than 44,000 people in 22 countries. Highlights of the 2022 report include:

• Music fans are listening to more music today than ever before, spending on average 20.1 hours listening to music weekly - up from 18.4 hours in 2021.
• 46% of respondents use subscription audio streaming services, which offer uninterrupted and on-demand access to millions of licensed tracks.
• 69% of people say music is important to their mental health, 68% say that music is important when they exercise.