If, like me, you write about the music business every day, for years now you’ve been speculating about the future of the British major music company EMI and about the prospect of Google launching an iTunes-competing download store. And this week both stories sort of reached a conclusion.

As you no doubt saw, last weekend the current owners of EMI – the bank Citigroup – announced it was selling the music firm. This announcement had been a long time coming, Citigroup repossessed the music major off its previous owners at the start of the year and admitted almost straight away that it would look to sell the company on at some point, and it had been talking to possible buyers for several months. As expected, Citi split the company into two in order to sell it, selling the bit of EMI that makes and sells records to Universal Music, and the bit that manages and monetises the copyrights in songs to a consortium led by Sony.

The split, and the fact both sides were bought by existing major players in music, while not a surprise, is important, because it means EMI basically ceases to exist as soon as these deals go though. The EMI name might still be used, but there will not be an EMI company. At eighty years young, and with an earlier history that went as far back as the 19th Century, I can’t be the only one who finds that a little sad. Even more so for a British music fan like myself – because while EMI was actually created by Americans working in London, and for its final year was owned by an American bank, it always felt like the British record company, with its heart in London and its most famous signings coming from the UK.

So, the end of an era indeed. Another era – albeit a much shorter one – also ended this week when Google launched their own download store. The arrival of ‘gTunes’ has been rumoured on and off for years, and there have been a number of big announcements from Google in the past that we expected would announce a Google MP3 platform, but until yesterday we were always left disappointed.

To be honest, there was a little disappointment too when Google finally did launch its big music service, because while it looks pretty slick, it doesn’t really do anything you can’t get from another music platform. Having waited this long, I think we all thought something really special would be announced. Though the Artist Hub, which allows self-releasing artists to capitalise on the new venture is interesting, and will definitely be worth checking out if you’re an artist doing the DIY thing.

So two eras at an end for music business journalists like me. Though another era seems to have only just begun. There has been increased chatter among some artists and smaller labels of late about Spotify-style services, to the effect that artists who put their music on such streaming platforms are seeing their iTunes-style download sales decline, and that the money they receive from Spotify et al is nominal, and goes nowhere near covering the loss in other digital revenue.

It started off with a few isolated artist blog posts. Then a few indie labels started withdrawing their content from the streaming channels. Then big artists like Coldplay and Tom Waits chose not to put their new albums on Spotify, and it was speculated that was to protect other download sales. And then this week a British dance music distributor announced over 200 of its labels would be boycotting the streaming platforms moving forward, kicking off all kinds of online debate in both the US and Europe.

I won’t get into this actual debate just now – except to say their are arguments on both sides – but with tweets and blog posts appearing on this issue all the time, there’s certainly plenty for us music business writers to report on still, even if the big “what will happen to EMI?” and “when will Google launch a music service” sagas are at an end.

I think it’s just a fact of life that if you’re hugely popular with one half of the population, the other half are going to hate you, and some of them will really hate you.

That’s nothing new, though in the internet age the hatred – when it happens – is much more obvious, because the haters have a ready made platform to air their rage, and to connect with other haters to rage together. And for the public figure generating all that love and hate, they are only one sneaky Google search away from seeing it all laid out on one screen. I suspect that, even for the most self-confident thick-skinned celebrity, the hate stands out.

I remember a story a friend of mine who DJed on a prominent radio station once told me. She had been working at the station for about a year, but had never checked the message boards on the station’s website. The day she did, in among the compliments about her presenting style, there was quite a bit of negativity. This upset her. And then the fact she had got upset infuriated her – after all, she was clever enough to realise hate comes with love, and if her bosses were happy and her show was getting good ratings, why did a few ranting haters on the station message board matter. Why was she upset?

Initially she feared that getting upset about such things was a sign of inexperience, perhaps she wasn’t cut out for a job in the public eye. But then a colleague told her how one evening, a few years earlier, he had been helping out on a show hosted by one of the biggest DJs at the station (and in the city for that matter), a very experienced presenter. As he arrived at the studio, where the show was already on the air, that big name DJ threw a CD at the wall, hard, and then burst into tears. Why? Because someone had just said something particularly hurtful about him on the station’s website. It really can happen to everyone.

So, once you are a famous DJ, musician or artist, you’ll have to live with the hate, but there’s nothing wrong with you if, on occasion, you get a little upset about it. All of which makes me feel a bit sorry for Chad Kroeger this week. I’m sure he can look after himself, and his band Nickelback have sold well over 35 million records to date so clearly there’s a lot of love for the guy.

But there’s an awful lot of hate too, which this week became very apparent when there was a rumor – and only a rumor – that Nickelback may be playing at the Detroit Lions’ Thanksgiving Day game later this month. Within hours of the rumor beginning, a local student had set up an online petition calling on the NFL to ensure Kroeger was not booked for the game, and within a couple of days 37,300 people had signed it.

Petitioner Dennis Guttman wrote: “This game is nationally televised, do we really want the rest of the US to associate Detroit with Nickelback? Detroit is home to so many great musicians and they chose Nickelback?!?!?! Does anyone even like Nickelback? Is this some sort of ploy to get people to leave their seats during half-time to spend money on alcoholic beverages and concessions?”

Ouch. Now, I’m not much of a fan of Nickelback’s music, but remember, everyone gets a little hurt by the hate sometimes. Couldn’t a Kroeger fan out there launch the “NFL should book Nickelback” petition to ensure some harmony? Just a thought!

While one very big allegation regarding a certain Justin Bieber has led on the gossip sites in the last 48 hours, another interesting claim was made about the teen star recently.

And that second claim relates to an interesting development in online copyright, which possibly makes it more appropriate to discuss here. Plus, while I’ve no idea whether the paternity allegations made this week are in any way credible (though, for what’s it’s worth, I’m very dubious), I know for certain the other claim made is simply not true.

The other claim relates to an online campaign called Free Bieber. It’s been set up by a group called Fight The Future who, among other things, oppose a new bit of copyright law going through Congress. The law will make it a felony to run a website that streams content without the permission of the content owners. Those found guilty of the new law, if it’s passed, could face five years in jail.

As part of their efforts to oppose the proposed law, Fight The Future have launched the Free Bieber campaign. The logic is that Bieber first came to wider attention by posting videos of himself onto YouTube singing other people’s songs. As he didn’t have explicit permission from the people who had written those songs before he uploaded his cover versions, Fight The Future argue Bieber could have been imprisoned for five years under the proposed new law.

But, and I can tell you this with some certainty, that’s just not true. Even if this law is passed, and the next day the Justin Bieber of the future uploads songs of him or herself onto YouTube singing someone else’s songs (possibly Justin’s), they will not be committing a felony and heading to jail. First, the new law targets those who run the copyright infringing video streaming websites, and not the people who upload content to them. And second, YouYube is licensed by the songwriting collecting societies which pass on a royalty to the original writers, so, actually, Justin and the Justins of the future do have, indirectly, the permission of the people who wrote the songs they sing.

So, whatever you think about the new copyright law, and there are arguments for and against it, what is certain is that it won’t result in the jailing of Bieber or any future Biebers (by which I mean future teen pop phenomenons, and not any alleged children Justin may or may not have fathered!).

Justin’s people know this and recently sent a ‘cease and desist’ letter to Fight The Future demanding they stop using the pop star in their campaign, possibly because they don’t want their guy fronting a misleading message, or possibly because Bieber’s record company, who are lobbying in favour of the new law, don’t like their biggest star used against them.

That said, the Free Bieber campaign continues, and Fight The Future are arguing that under current trademark and copyright laws they are not obligated to have the pop star’s permission to use his name and image. Which, if true, might result in Bieber and his people having to lobby for a whole new bit of copyright law. And so the cycle begins anew!

So, what’s in a name? A lot of bother sometimes.

A girl group competing on the UK version of ‘X-Factor’ was this week forced to change their name after an online campaign.  The name they had chosen, Rhythmix, was the same as that of a British charity which works with disadvantaged young people on music-based projects.

Bosses at the charity feared that if the ‘X-Factor’ group, which had been created by judges on the show, used their name, people may become confused and it would become harder to find out about their work online. ‘X-Factor’ producers also wanted to register the trademark in the name in the music sector (Rhythmix the charity already owning it in the educational space) which, charity chiefs said, might hinder their fundraising work, where they stage events and sell merchandise using the Rhythmix name.

When the charity first reached out to ‘X-Factor’ producers with their concerns, the TV bosses weren’t very helpful, simply saying that the law was on the girl group’s side. This left the charity with the prospect of having to shell out thousands in legal fees to fight the TV show’s trademark application.

But the good news is, common sense prevailed. Various UK media picked up on the story, an online campaign calling on the ‘X’ group to pick a new name followed, and the charity’s CEO made a personal appeal to Simon Cowell via Facebook. Yesterday ‘X’ producers announced the girl group would be choosing a new moniker.

It’s not the only band name dispute going on in the UK at the moment between a big entertainment company and a little guy, though in the other case it’s the little guy who’s the band. As you may have seen, gaming company Ubisoft recently launched a new music-based game called Rocksmith, which is a bit like ‘Guitar Hero’ except you use a real guitar. Its European release has been delayed, very possibly because an unsigned British band also called Rocksmith is opposing the game’s company’s attempts to nick their name!

Now, I’m not really here to comment on the rights and wrongs of either of this disputes (though I happen to think the team at ‘X-Factor’ were very right to change their new girl group’s name to ensure they don’t hinder the work of an excellent charity), but I think this all demonstrates the challenges new bands face when trying to decide on a name these days.

Not only do they need a name they like, one that is Google friendly, and one where a suitable dot com domain and social media tags are available, they need to check no one in the world is currently using that name, and maybe even that there are no conflicting trademarks in any key countries (unlike copyright, when you register a trademark you only get protection in the country where the registry is based). Which sounds like a lot of work just for a name!

Though, that said, while lawyers will gladly take a lot of money off you to check out your name, new bands on more modest budgets – ie all bands – can do some checking themselves for free. Check on Google, Wikipedia and Amazon for possible conflicts, use a domain registration site to check if other people are using your name online, and even trademark registries are can be accessed online for free. It might be a couple of hours bother, but if it saves you the hassle of finding out you’re hindering the work of a children’s charity later, it’s got to be worth it.

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There has been a lot of talk in recent years about the future of the album format – in fact we spoke about it right here back in June, when Drake was complaining about his record label stopping him from leaking tracks from his in development new long player, most probably because he’s an impatient sort who wants to share his new songs with his fans as soon as they are ready, without having to wait for his record company to get round to formally releasing them.

We noted that for some artists, in touch with their fans 365 days a year via the web, the old fashioned approach of only releasing new songs in bulk every two or three years didn’t necessarily make sense anymore. After all, the album system came about because it just wasn’t financially viable to manufacture and distribute records, later CDs, any more frequently. But in the digital age that’s no longer the case.

It’s with this in mind that some people have suggested in the past that the album format might ultimately die. And when iTunes first began the download revolution, and single track sales dominated completely, it seemed that might already be happening. Some artists began to explore the creative potential of writing and recording new songs every few weeks or so, rather than every few years, and then making songs available online as and when they were completed, rather than waiting until ten new tracks were in the bag and releasing them as an album. So, long player RIP?

Possibly not. While some artists have enjoyed the experience, some others are returning to the old method. Because – while the album model may have been originally set up because of the logistics of distributing vinyl records – it also works well for those artists who like to throw themselves into their music making 100% – ie spend three months dedicated exclusively to making a record, then three months promoting it, then two years touring on the back of it, and then repeat.

Artists with mainstream appeal may also find that the old system works for their fans also. While successful musicians will always have a dedicated fanbase who tune in 24/7 via Twitter and Facebook, and who will lap up every new song, those artists selling millions of records will also have many fans who enjoy getting excited about their new music for a few weeks at a time, but who will quickly tire if said artist is totally in their face selling their wares all year round. In the same way we quickly get bored of TV shows and internet phenomena we initially loved, the same would happen with artists. For that reason, it’s actually quite clever that in music, the big name artists are everywhere for a couple of months every other year, when they have a new album to sell, but then they disappear, touring the world. It sort of works.

So perhaps it’s more a case of long live the album format. We can’t be sure I suppose, but I did note with interest this week that Irish indie band Ash – one of the artists who pledged to never record an album again, and instead released a single a fortnight for a year in an A-Z project – were among those backtracking. Front man Tim Wheeler told the BBC this week that the year long singles campaign had been “quite challenging” and that he is now of the opinion albums are “the best and most economic medium” for artists. So perhaps, in this brave new world of digital music, not everything will change.

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Aspiring artists are always being told these days that they need to branch out from just making music, to turn themselves into a ‘brand’ so that they can make money in new and exciting ways as the dollars to be made from selling records decline. But, of course, if you turn your whole being – your body and your mind – into the brand, well, that could put a lot of limits on your life. Unless, of course, you just get on with things and let your business partners sort out the mess you leave behind.

Take Justin Bieber’s haircut, for example, and one of my favorite music news stories of the week. The CEO of the Florida toy company that makes the official Bieber dolls has admitted that the teen pop star’s decision – seemingly on a whim during a video shoot earlier this year – to cut his hair, resulting in a totally different style, cost his company something in the region of $100,000. I think we’ve all had some pretty disastrous haircuts in our lives, but the rest of us can sleep soundly at night knowing nothing we do with the hair on our heads will ever lose someone a hundred grand.

Of course the haircut originally donned by the Bieber when he first rose to fame and fortune became part and parcel of the teen star’s ‘brand’. And what would every dedicated fan want for Christmas, well a Bieber doll incorporating the cut, of course. But with a few snips of the scissors, those already in production dolls became redundant.

Bridge Direct boss Jay Foreman spoke to reporters this week about the moment Bieber tweeted photos of his new haircut earlier this year. “First off, I had no idea what he did”, Foreman says, “[but] I heard a lot of shrieks around me, and people running in and out of their offices. I got everyone into a conference room and we looked at some images. We weren’t sure what he had done. Then it became obvious that his trademark was gone”.

Production on the new Bieber doll, set to hit the shops in time for this year’s holiday season, was halted, and new designs commissioned, all at a cost of about $100,000. So, was Bieber in trouble with his business partner, the company transforming his brand into the must-have Christmas gift for fans? To be honest, no. As the dolls have so far brought in about $100 million in revenues I don’t suppose Foreman felt he could complain.

So there you go – turning yourself into a brand can be risky, but if your brand is as big as Bieber’s, you can still do whatever you like, providing you don’t mind having a pack of panicking brand partners following your every move.

Your average computer industry guy could never expect that the great and good of music would line up to pay tribute on their death, but then again Steve Jobs was no average computer industry guy. Though it’s interesting that he really became one of the most important people in music by accident.

When Jobs first kicked the panicking luddites who, unfortunately, ruled at the big music companies ten years ago, convincing them that the internet was a bigger opportunity than it was threat, and that his iTunes music store was the best way to capitalise on that opportunity, he did so not because he wanted to be the biggest music retailer in the world, but because he needed some content to fill the iPods he was trying to persuade people to buy. But in doing so he changed the entire music industry, as well as setting in motion a chain of events that would make Apple the biggest technology company, and the biggest digital music seller, in the world.

Jobs wasn’t the first person to make an MP3 player. And he wasn’t the first to set up a store that could sell MP3s. But, by employing skills he demonstrated throughout his career – the ability to charm decision makers, to understand consumers, and to speak in a way that everyone would listen – he launched the best MP3 player and the best MP3 store.

That Jobs was able to include that little bit of digital rights management in the early version of iTunes that won over the label chiefs, but at the same time managed to create a service that was incredibly user-friendly – not something most other DRM systems achieved – is a testament to just how clever Jobs and his Apple team were.

True, the service initially locked users to the Apple store and the Apple device, but nevertheless the combination of iTunes and the iPod was game changing. And without Jobs’ vision and perseverance, how much longer would it have taken for the music business to grasp the potential of the internet? How much more devastating would the impact of digital have been had the labels procrastinated a few years more?

So, the music industry is right to mourn, and pay tribute, to the guy from San Francisco who just wanted to make computers, but whose vision for the potential of computing meant he impacted on pretty much every other bit of life too. And, of course, his legacy is felt by those who make music as well as those who sell it. As British dance producer Ewan Pearson blogged this morning: “Our affection for the objects we use to make things ought sometimes to be directed at the people who in turn made them; the likes of Bob Moog, Leo Fender, Dave Smith and Steve Jobs. Blessed are the tool-makers, the dreamers of our dreams”.

Steve Jobs, thank you for dreaming.

Read by Steve Jobs obit for CMU here.

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So, it’s been fun if a little confusing following the goings on with British indie rock band Bloc Party this week. As it is, we think frontman Kele Okereke is still in the band, though we can’t be sure!

This all began when Kele gave an interview to UK music magazine NME. He said he’d been in a cafe in New York recently and, while looking out the window, saw his bandmate Russell Lissack walk on by. Having not seen his bandmate in a while – Bloc Party have been on hiatus since 2008 album ‘Intimacy’ – he chased after the guitarist, but before he could catch up with him he spied Russell meeting up with the other two members of the band, and all three of them going into a rehearsal studio together. The frontman said he wasn’t sure if that meant he was being kicked out of Bloc Party, adding that he had been too afraid to ask the rest of the band.

While we initially suspected Kele of making the story up, to give his interviewer something interesting to write about, Lissack then gave his own interview in which he confirmed the rest of the band had indeed been working together on their own music while Okereke spent time promoting his new EP ‘The Hunter’. He added that while they’d original thought they’d do something instrumental, they were now thinking of working with another singer. He never actually said that new music, with that new singer, would be released as Bloc Party, but many took it as confirmation Kele had been sacked. Including, it seems, Kele, who took to his blog to express even more confusion over his status with the band.

But, it seems everything is fine. Or at least that’s what Kele’s manager Si White says, and as he’s also co-manager of Bloc Party you’d think he would know. He issued a statement saying “For those that keep asking, Bloc Party’s membership consists of the same four people it has consisted of since 2003″. So that’s alright then.

Though you do have to wonder why Kele has been publicly pondering over whether or not he is still in the band, rather than phoning up, or getting White to phone up, his bandmates. Unless, of course, we were right first time, and this has all been an elaborate ruse to get us talking about him just as he has an EP to sell. If so, well done Kele, your masterplan worked!

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So, REM are no more. I’m assuming you all know that already. Michael Stipe et all confirmed they were splitting yesterday.

It provided an interesting challenge for some music journalists. Many of us think REM were one of the greatest college rock bands to come out of the 1980s, and while some reckon the best records predated their crossover into the mainstream with ‘Out Of Time’ in 1991, some of us liked the fact the band achieved commercial success in the 1990s, and equally enjoyed the albums they released during that era.

But I think many of us started to lose patience with the band in the latter years of that decade, I can’t be alone in thinking 1996′s ‘New Adventures In Hi-fi’ was the last album that truly impressed. As each subsequent release came along we got used to being disappointed, and eventually we stopped even listening. Some wondered if we’d ever see a creative return to form, but the rest of us wondered why they didn’t just call it a day and stop tarnishing their legacy with more mediocre new work.

Though part of me wonders whether that is fair. Is it right for us, as music fans, journalists and/or consumers, to make statements to the effect of “why won’t this band just stop”. Most bands peak creatively and commercially at some point, which means that any band that enjoys a long career will eventually get to a point where they are singing new songs to a dwindling audience, most of whom are there to hear the classics. Sometimes that creative return to form comes along causing a second peak. But not often.

But even so, if the band are still enjoying the process of making new music, and performing it, and if there are enough people buying the records and going to gigs to make it viable – even if half the gig goers are really there for the classics – does it matter? Are bands who record one good album and then tour off the back of it for the rest of their lives, cashing in on the nostalgia circuit, really any better? And if not, are we telling bands that – to be artistically credible – they have to quit and get proper jobs the minute they sense they are making a weaker album (or, perhaps more likely, music critics start to declare their new material weak)? And are we warning them that, if they fail to do this, we’ll reinterpret the value of their first ten albums because their subsequent five were a bit rubbish.

It hardly seems fair to do that. Though – that said – it didn’t stop me, like many journalists, responding to yesterday’s news about REM by saying: “What a great band, and what a shame they didn’t split fifteen years ago”.

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Texas-based indie duo Beck & Cauthen, aka David Beck and Paul Cauthen, have changed their band’s name after getting an email from representatives from that other Beck. By which I mean Beck Hansen aka Beck. They feared, presumably, that people would think the Beck of Beck & Cauthen was Beck, rather than David Beck. Though given Beck & Cauthen is pretty obviously two surnames, you’d think Jeff Beck might have a better case for complaining about possibly confusion.

As the duo noted when announcing their new band name, Sons Of Fathers. They wrote: “To our surprise, we got a letter last week from representatives of Beck, who asked us to change [our name]. We don’t want to create confusion with Beck, or for that matter Jeff Beck, Glenn Beck, Beck’s beer, or any other Beck”.

For new bands these days choosing your moniker is a bit of a nightmare. Finding a totally unique name that hasn’t been used by another band at some point in the past – but which is at the same time catchy and won’t seem dated in five years time – can be a tricky task. Especially now that the internet means you’re probably looking for a name that is unique not just in your home country, but globally too.

It used to be that if a band had a unique name at home, but then discovered another group with the same moniker if and when they started touring in another country, they’d just adopt a different name when abroad. So two Britpop bands from the UK in the 1990s – Suede and The Charlatans – became London Suede and The Charlatans UK when they came to America, because there were already bands in the US using those names. But they remained as Suede and The Charlatans back home. The difference didn’t matter, because the fans and media in each country knew which names to use. But as bands increasingly talk directly to their fans on a global basis, via their websites, Facebook profiles and Twitter feeds, having different names in different countries becomes a chore.

And, of course, the internet throws other challenges into the mix too. Once you have picked a band name, even if it’s unique worldwide, then there’s the question – what domain names are available? Is your Facebook address available? Is your Twitter name available? And how will your name work on Google? There used to be a British band called The The back in the 80s. That would be a very foolish name indeed in an age when most people, when first hearing about you, will immediately go to Google to try and find out more information. And once you have your band name you don’t really want to change it, do you? So it’s something you should try and get right first time.

Though, don’t worry too much about Beck & Cauthen. The two musicians admitted that their name was already becoming a problem, because since launching as a duo they’ve recruited other bandmates who would probably grow to resent the fact the group’s name implies David and Paul are the senior members. So, Sons Of Fathers it is then. Though I’m not sure I especially like it. Still, if it keeps Beck happy, that’s a start!

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