The current system of payment for music streaming is threatening the future of music in the UK - Elbow’s Guy Garvey said in front of the UK parliament committee on the first day of an inquiry into the impact of streaming on the music industry. Garvey, and musicians such as O’Brien of Radiohead, Tom Gray of Gomez, and Nadine Shah have put forward equitable remuneration, increased transparency and user-centric streaming models as ways in which the industry could be reformed and made fairer for artists.

Craig Brown has won the Baillie Gifford prize, top British award for nonfiction, for his book 'One Two Three Four: The Beatles in Time', a mix of history, diaries, autobiography, fan letters, interviews, lists and charts, Daily Mail reports. BG judges say it is “a joyous, irreverent, insightful celebration of the Beatles, a highly original take on familiar territory... a profound book about success and failure which won the unanimous support of our judges. Craig Brown has reinvented the art of biography”.

For the first time since its inception in 2012, the nominees for best rock performance at this year's Grammys are all-female or female-fronted: Fiona Apple, Big Thief, Phoebe Bridgers, Haim, Brittany Howard, and Grace Potter. Women also dominated the best country album category - it is the first time it has had five albums helmed in whole or in part by women: Little Big Town, Ingrid Andress, Brandy Clark, Miranda Lambert, and Ashley McBryde, Variety reports. And yet another precedent - South Korean megastars BTS became the first K-pop act to receive a Grammy nomination. The boy band’s latest hit single, 'Dynamite', is competing in the best pop duo/group performance category, CNN reports.

Subversive Capital Acquisition company has acquired two California-based cannabis brands and named Jay-Z as the resulting holding company’s chief visionary officer, Marijuana Business Daily reports. Subversive Capital is acquiring the direct-to-consumer cannabis platform and brand Caliva as well as Left Coast Ventures, a cannabis and hemp producer, with investment from Roc Nation artists Rihanna, Yo Gotti, and Meek Mill. The deal makes Jay-Z the biggest music player in the California cannabis industry, worth $3 billion a year.

The Killers aren’t really hurt by not being nominated for Grammys (unlike The Weeknd who really took it to heart), they just make fun with it. Las Vegas boys let loose with a Trumpian tweet, in all caps, and all for laughs...

Illegal raves are now flourishing in the UK, with hundreds of events taking place over the last few weekends, Dazed reports from illegal British podiums. These raves started in rural Britain during the summer, and moved to urban areas when it became cold, into warehouses of companies closed due to Covid-19. VICE wrote there were three types of raves: established unlicensed parties, set up by an experienced crew and with safety measures in place; established free parties at which the community self-polices, including returning to clean up afterwards; ‘moneygrab’ parties advertised online with the aim of making money. The police are slapping them with £10,000 fines, while the locals from Welsh village of Banwen went viral for their laidback attitude, which saw them make cups of tea for the ravers.

Beyoncé scored nine nominations for the Grammys, including song and record of the year bids with 'Black Parade', as well as best R&B song and best R&B performance, CBS reports. Beyoncé's 'Black Is King' film that highlighted Black art, music, history and fashion is up for best music film while 'Brown Skin Girl', a song dedicated to dark- and brown-skinned women, is nominated for best music video. Taylor Swift, Dua Lipa and Roddy Ricch earned six nominations each. Check out the complete nominees list - here.

China’s two biggest streaming platform operators, Tencent Music Entertainment (TME) and NetEase Cloud Music, are battling for the DIY artist market. According to Music Business Worldwide, Tencent Music had paid 590 million yuan (over $84m) to date to indie artists using its ‘Tencent Musician’ program, as well as offered services such as music publishing, marketing, copyright management and professional training. Tencent's biggest rival in China, NetEase Cloud Music was, in October 2020, home to music from over 200,000 Chinese independent musicians – representing 100% year-on-year growth in volume terms. In similar news, several streaming platforms under the umbrella of Tencent - QQ Music, Kugou, and Kuwo, as well as WeSing, a karaoke application - are offering micropayments from fans to artists, which make a big difference; top creators on WeSing pocket more than $7,000 per month in tips alone, Slate reports.

SoundCloud has achieved its first ever profitable quarter in Q3 this year, Music Business Worldwide reports. Also, SoundCloud posted €147.6 million in revenues in calendar 2019, up 37% year-over-year, which made for annual operating losses in 2019 narrowing significantly - down 28% to €23.8m from €32.9m in 2018. Some more good news - Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube Music currently have circa 70 million tracks on each of their platforms, SoundCloud now plays host to over 250 million tracks.

The Recording Academy has called a halt to its annual 'Grammy Nominees' CD series after 25 years of featuring artists nominated for the American Academy award. Fifteen volumes in the annual series made the top 10 on the Billboard 200, with two volumes - in 2013 and 2014 - climbing as high as No. 2. The main franchise sold 9,8 million copies, with sales dwindling in recent years, Billboard reports.

A heart-warming story in the Pitchfork about Fiona Apple and her long-lost school friend Shameika Stepney, a theme in Apple's great album 'Fetch the Bolt-Cutters' with a reoccurring line "Shameika said I have potential". It goes back to when Apple was in third grade and trying to make friends with other children in her school, who in return rejected her. Shameika, then a fourth-grader, was passing by, saw something going on, and leaned down and said "Hey, why do you care about them? You have potential". Two women reunited this year for Shameika's song 'Shameika Said' featuring Fiona Apple.

Fender is expecting a record year this year as guitar sales have grown 17% during the pandemic and are expected to rise to $700 million, from $600 million last year, CNBC reports. Fender's CEO Andy Mooney attributes the rise in sales to housebound consumers looking for new hobbies. The company also offered Fender Play, the online video platform for learning guitar, bass and ukulele. Introduced in July 2017, it was free for 90 days to the first 100,000 subscribers. Fender hit that mark the very first day, reached a half million sign-ups the first week and settled at about 930,000 subscribers by June. In similar, yet less positive news, Guitar Center, the largest American retailer of musical instruments, has filed for bankruptcy, CNN reports.

Alfie Templeman, Pa Salieu, Baby Queen, Biig Piig, Bree Runway, Griff, Holly Humberstone, Ivorian Doll, JOESEF, Olivia Dean, Bklava and others were chosen UK Amazon Music Programming Team as destined for big things in 2021, Music Week reports. These 25 acts will receive support and promotion across the platform over the next 12 months. The list is rounded-up by Berwyn, Christy, Cleopatrick, Dan D’Lion, Dutchavelli, Eli Brown, George Moir, Girl In Red, India Jordan, Joesef, Kamal, Mysie, Olivia Dean, Sharna Bass, Tamera and Zoe Wees.

Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift, The Weeknd, and Dan + Shay were the top winners at the American Music Awards, winning three awards each, Variety reports. With three nods from last night, Taylor has now won 32 AMAs, the most awards in the show’s 47-year history (Michael Jackson has 24). Swift won artist of the year for the sixth time, extending her record in that category. She also won favorite female artist - pop/rock for the fifth time, setting a new record in that category; Taylor accepted her awards via video since she is busy re-recording her first six albums. Bieber won favorite male artist - pop/rock for the fourth time, a record. See the full list of all winners - here.

AC/DC are back at the top of Billboard of 200 with their latest album 'Power Up' starting with 117,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Nov. 19, Billboard reports. Physical album sales comprise the majority, 111,000 album units, of all sales. AC/DC also had the largest sales week of 2020 for a rock album. Other news from the top of Billboard 200 charts - Future and Lil Uzi Vert’s collab album 'Pluto x Baby Pluto' and Chris Stapleton’s 'Starting Over' bow at Nos. 2 and 3, Queen's 'Greatest Hits' reaches the top 10 for the first time and YoungBoy Never Broke Again logs his fourth top 10 of 2020 with 'Until I Return'.

UK sales of vinyl have gone up almost 10% this year, which puts it on track to break the £100 million mark by the end of 2020, making for the best year since 1990, the Guardian reports. Sales by volume are also set to beat last year’s 4.3 million figure. Cassette sales are also up 85% so far this year, putting total sales on course to hit £1 million for the first time since the format received renewed interest.

Album 'Double Fantasy' that John Lennon signed for his killer Mark David Chapman prior to his murder, is going up for auction, with a starting price set at $400,000. The record’s cover features Lennon’s signature and the year 1980 written on Ono’s neck, as well as various police markings on the front and back sides of the jacket, since the album was submitted as evidence during Lennon’s murder investigation. The record is an iconic artifact from one of the most significant tragedies in rock and roll history, being a symbol of obsessive fandom. On the morning of December 8th, 1980, Chapman approached Lennon outside of his New York apartment and asked him to sign the newly released 'Double Fantasy'. After signing, Lennon and Ono trekked off for a day at the studio, but when they returned five hours later, Chapman shot Lennon dead.

AC/DC have gone to No. 1 on charts in eight countries with their latest album 'Power Up', Loudwire reports. Their new album currently sits at No. 1 in Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Notching up 62,000 chart sales, the band have comfortably taken their place at the top of the 2020 leaderboard of fastest-selling albums in the UK this week, UK Official Charts reports.

A long-lost trove of Bob Dylan papers - privately held by the late American blues artist and a longtime Dylan friend and confidante Tony Glover - has sold at auction for a total of $495,000. Majority of the key pieces went to a bidder whose identity was not made public, Boston.com reports. The collection included transcripts of Glover’s 1971 interviews with Dylan and letters the pair exchanged. The interviews reveal that Dylan had anti-Semitism on his mind when he changed his name from Robert Zimmerman, and that he wrote 'Lay Lady Lay' for Barbra Streisand.

Speed Stick is a new supergroup featuring members of Polvo, Bat Fangs, and The Love Language, playing blues on 'Knot'; Eels released a funny new video for 'Are We Alright Again' starring Jon Hamm; God Is An Astronaut do their post-rock thing on 'Burial' after so many years, but they're just so good at it; Slowthai shared a new song 'NHS' announcing his new album.

Atlanta MCs Gucci Mane and Jeezy kicked off Season 2 of Verzuz battles on Thursday night with a hits-packed match. Staggering 1.8 million viewers - a new Verzuz record - tuned in through Instagram, as many more watched through Apple Music. Billboard breaks down the battle and declares a winner. CNN says that Gucci Mane-Jeezy Verzuz was, unlike previous live-streams, aggressive and actually more of a battle.

Tones And I’s 'Dance Monkey' is the most Shazamed song with more than 36 million Shazams since its release in May 2019, according to the music identifying platform, Variety reports. Rounding out the top three is Lilly Wood & The Prick & Robin Schulz’s 'Prayer In C' and Passenger’s 'Let Her Go'. Check out the Top 100 - here.

Music creators in the UK will lose 65% of their income in 2020 due to Covid-19, according to the new annual Music By Numbers report by UK Music. The effective shutdown of concerts and festivals will also cause live music revenues to fall by 85% this year. UK music industry contributed £5.8 billion to the UK economy in 2019, and employment in the industry hit an all-time high of 197,168, NME reports.

YouTube has just announced its milestone of reaching two billion music users on the platform, MusicAlly reports. In mid-2018 YouTube had one billion users, by the end of 2019 the number rose to 1,2 billion, and in the year of the lockdown it climbed sharply to today's two billion. Speaking in terms of money, Google is now the second largest global payer of music royalties, with $5.2 billion across free and paid as well as masters and publishing (Spotify takes the top spot). In 2019, YouTube generated $15.2 billion in ad revenue with $4 billion of that music related.

Beyonce, Eminem, Stevie Wonder, U2, and others have found a place on the former American president Barack Obama's playlist. The playlist features "some memorable songs from my administration", like Jay-Z's 'My First Song', Bob Dylan's 'The Times They Are a-Changin'', Sade's 'Cherish a Day'...

The European music sector supports two million jobs and contributes €81.9 billion gross value added annually to the GDPs of the 27 European Union member countries and the U.K., a new Oxford Economics study has found. It also found that the music sector exported €9.7 billion worth of goods and services to countries outside the EU and the U.K., Variety reports. Music sector generated €31 billion in tax receipts in the EU and U.K. in 2018, which is 19.4% of the entire EU budget in the same year.

Lil Nas X performed four virtual shows in two days in the video game Roblox, attracting 33 million views, The Verge reports. The identical shows starred a motion-captured incarnation of Lil Nas X, styled to fit in with a world that shifted to match each of the four songs he performed. It's big numbers for Lil Nas X, but a huge one for Roblox, getting into the same league with Fortnite - it hosted a performance from Travis Scott early this year that drew 45.8 million viewers across five shows.

Bandcamp Live will allow artists to set up ticketed live-stream performances, with the online shows integrated within the Bandcamp ecosystem, with a virtual “merch table”, and real-time chat. 80-85% of ticket sales will go directly to the artist, and the company has announced it will waive its fees on tickets until March 31, 2021, meaning 100% of ticket sales will go to artists until then, Bandcamp announced. Bandcamp live-streams have already begun with a gig by David Allred, and artists like Cloud Nothings, Liv.e, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, Madison McFerrin, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Hatchie, and Pedro the Lion have already confirmed future shows on Bandcamp Live.

Dolly Parton donated $1 million to biotechnology company Moderna based out of Cambridge, Massachusetts to help them fund research for Covid-19 vaccine, which they recently announced as finished, Guardian reports. Parton heard about the project last spring through her friend Dr. Naji Abumrad from Vanderbilt University who treated her after a car accident. Vanderbilt’s research subsequently played a key role in developing Moderna’s vaccine.

San Francisco toy company Super7 is producing an Ol' Dirty Bastard action figure, packaged on cardback featuring his welfare card art from 'Return to the 36 Chambers', and it's available for preorder now ($18). The Notorious B.I.G., Run-DMC, and Czarface ReAction figures are available to preorder (and scheduled to ship in January and December).