• ABC Entertainment, Lilith Fair Announce Partnership
• Pops Year In Sex
• The Edge Warns Of A Future Without Record Labels
  
• Bob Seger Tops Decade’s Best Seller Catalogue Chart
• Abba Now Re-Defined As A Rock Act
• Ottawa Record Store Owner Pleads Guilty In Bootlet Bust
• Stardust Records, A Record Store In A Vinyl Warp
• Rob Lanni Joins FACTOR Board
• Chantal Desjardins Jumps On-Air Shifts
• Shore-FM Switches Dial Position
• SparkNet, Canada’s New Radio Syndication Firm
• Larry Tanz, Vuguru’s New Digital Chief
• PPMs Shatter Consumer Listening Myths
• Kobo Turns New Chapter For Indigo Books
• Vanishing Life Of In-Dash Radios
• What Was Said: A Morning Radio Listener’s Rant
  

THE 2010 LILITH FAIR and ABC Entertainment have jointly announced a multi-platform media partnership. Lilith and ABC Entertainment will creatively collaborate across ABC’s programming and online in the months leading up to and during next summer’s tour, including ABC’s physical presence at each tour date.

This multi-platform, strategic partnership with a music festival is the first of any kind for ABC Entertainment. EVP, Marketing, ABC Entertainment Group, Michael Benson said, “We’re excited to be partnering with Lilith since music is an important key to our brand, and are happy to show our support to both the new and established artists that will be showcased throughout the tour. We also admire the philanthropic side of Lilith which contributes to charities on both a local and national level.”

The 2010 Lilith Tour will be strongly represented across ABC television shows and online at ABC.com via the ABC Music Lounge. This includes but is not limited to Lilith artists and the touring festival itself being worked into various ABC programs, as well as the ABC Music Lounge physically joining the tour for the long haul, bringing exclusive coverage and behind-the-scenes action to viewers across the country at ABC.com.

Paradigm East Coast Head of Music and Lilith Partner, Marty Diamond says, “I’m very excited that my colleagues and I were able to help put this unprecedented partnership together. The scope of it will not only benefit both Lilith and ABC Entertainment, but will also provide a variety of platforms and access for all of the artists to tap into. ABC’s commitment to music and its ongoing Music Lounge efforts are truly something special.” Diamond adds, “We couldn’t have a better partnership as both the Lilith and ABC audiences are so closely aligned demographically.”

Last week, the first set of artists confirmed to join the 2010 Lilith Tour were announced. They include: A Fine Frenzy, Ann Atomic, Ash Koley, Brandi Carlile, Butterfly Boucher, Chairlift, Chantal Kreviazuk, Colbie Caillat, Corinne Bailey Rae, Donna De Lory, Emmylou Harris, Erykah Badu, Grace Potter And The Nocturnals, Ima, Indigo Girls, Ingrid Michaelson, Janelle Monae, Jennifer Knapp, Jill Hennessy, Jill Scott, Katzenjammer, Ke$ha, Mary J. Blige, Meaghan Smith, Metric, Miranda Lambert, Nneka, Sara Bareilles, Sarah McLachla! n, Serena Ryder, Sheryl Crow, The Submarines, Sugarland, Susan Justice, Tara MacLean, Tegan And Sara, Vedera, The Weepies, Vita Chambers, Ximena Sarinana, and Zee Avi.

POP’S YEAR IN SEX brought us robotic threesomes, bilingual come-ons, and one guileless double entendre that unite a former touring member of 2 Live Crew with one of the most flamboyant drag queens of 1980s New Wave (in sample heaven, anyway). Flo Rida’s Dr. Luke-produced “Right Round,” with its schoolyard-level wordplay, Nordic bleeps and beats, and dancehall-in-the-parking lot bounce, demonstrates the kind of fission Carl’s identifying, on the crassest, most commercial level. It’s a dumb song—but I’m heartened by the fact that its high-school hooku sensuality includes a female voice expressing pleasure, too.

The voice belongs to Kesha, the latest self-styled girl-gone-wild to smear her lip gloss all over the subject of female empowerment in this (note my quotes) “post-feminist” age. Kesha is the anti-Taylor Swift, applying sass and a sense of self-determination to the bad girl stereotype, just as country-pop’s prime mover does to the princess role. Ann Powers, Slate

THE EDGE: Reflecting on the impact of the internet on the music industry, the U2 guitarist sounds a grim warning. “There aren’t going to be any record labels in a few years if things carry on the way they are, because CDs – that industry is pretty much all over,” he says. “And because there’s no replacement right now that’s viable, it just means no one’s going to invest in music, which just means no-one is going to get tour support, record deals, publishing deals, all the rest, which is how every band since The Beatles have managed to get going initially. That feels like that this sort of parasitical medium will basically kill the host, which would not be good.”

Asked about illegal downloading, The Edge tells Hot Press, “You’re never going to stamp it out totally, and in some ways I don’t think anyone cares as long as the majority of transactions on the internet involve some sort of a fair payment to the people who have put their life into the work, and the companies that support them… It’s not even that important, relatively, for us, but for bands that are coming up.”

Asked about the view that the telecoms have “gotten away with murder”, Edge agrees. “I think they have. I think that they are distanced enough that they can hold up their hands and say, ‘It’s not us. We’re not doing anything’. But in the end, people are buying broadband access in order to get ‘stuff’, content of some sort… I think that the people who have been making it their life’s work to create that content have got a reason to be upset… for young groups, it’s important that this gets resolved.”

In a lengthy interview with the Irish rock bible, Edge also reveals to Hot Press that the Spiderman musical is ready to go. “We’re waiting for the word that our director, Julie Taymor, can start putting the show together. We’re told it could be any day. We’ve got new producers involved: Michael Cohl is coming in, to become an additional producer. So they’re busy working on raising finance and getting all that stuff in order.”

When the legendary U2 guitarist is asked “Did you see Jedward at all?” he replies “No. Who’s Jedward?”

For the full interview, see the Hot Press Christmas Annual out Friday, December 18.

BRIEFLY NOTED

BOB SEGER’s Greatest Hits is officially the decade’s best-selling catalog album in the U.S., it has been confirmedby Nielsen Soundscan. Since its 1994 debut, SEGER’s Greatest Hits has sold close to nine million copies and enjoyed an unbroken two-year streak on the Billboard Top 200 before moving to the upper reaches of the Catalog Albums chart for 660 weeks.

ABBA’s announced induction into the 2010 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame blurs the distinction between blues-based urban angst and harmonic pop. Purists will huff and puff, but the fact is the gender-balanced quartet remain one of the best selling acts of all time. Other inductees announced are Genesis, Jimmy Cliff, The Hollies and The Stooges. Also being inducted as individual recipients of the Ahmet Ertegun Award will be David Geffen and songwriters Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil, Elle Greenwich, Jeff Barry, Jesse Stone, Mort Shuman and Otis Blackwell. The ceremony will take place on March 15, 2010 at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City.

RON SEXSMITH has been added to Saturday’s The Christmas Show line-up at Toronto’s Rivoli this weekend.

DIGITAL SKY Technologies, the Russian firm that invested more than $200 million in Facebook, is leading a group that is buying a $180 million stake in Zygna, a creator of online games.

OTTAWA RECORD STORE OWNER David Nolan pleaded guilty to a single charge under the Canadian Copyright Act this week, and admitting to possessing 100 bootleg CDs discovered in an RCMP raid on the Wellington St. shop in April of this year.

SHARON SMITH operates Stardust Records, a vintage vinyl record and CD shop in Ottawa that specialises in tunes of the 1950s and ’60s. CD sales are her bread and butter, but she still sold one vinyl record for every two CDs. It’s a reflection of the North American trend to buy vintage, she says. According to U.S. numbers released by Nielsen SoundScan, 1.88 million LP albums were sold in 2008 — an 89% increase over the 990,000 sold in 2007. Smith says it helps that manufacturers are pumping out turntables which are being sold in stores like Zellers or Wal-Mart for about $100. Hamilton Spectator

APPOINTMENTS/CHANGES

FACTOR is pleased to announce the addition of a new director to the Board. Effective immediately, Rob Lanni will represent the Music Managers Forum of Canada on the FACTOR Board of Directors. The seat was previously held by Brian Hetherman. Lanni Rob is co-Founder and co-President of Coalition Entertainment.

GLOBAL NEWS VP and anchorman Tony Parsons will retire after 35 years from the country’s top-rated supper hour newscast months earlier than expected. Parsons was expected to remain on the air as a part time anchor for News Hour through the end of February and the 2010 Olympic Games. Insiders suggest the iconic anchor will re-surface at CHEK TV in Victoria in the new year.

NEWS 1130 CKWX AM Vancouver p.m. drive news anchor Karen Thompson is moving over to Team CFTE AM 1410 as morning co-host with Joe Leary effective in the new year. She has been with News1130 since 2006.

CHANTAL DESJARDINS leaves Virgin Radio’s The Rush drive home show next week and replaces Kim Rossi with “Bad Pete” Marier and Ted Bird on the CHOM FM morning show in Montreal. Rossi is off to Hamilton. That leaves interim program director Mark Bergman flying solo again and seeking a successor at Virgin … The latest BBM PPM ratings for local radio were released last week. CJAD remains the king, with an overall share of 25.8% of the anglo listening audience. The big surprise was CBC Radio One (88.5 FM) which had an 11.7% share.

SUZANNE REBER joins NPR from the CBC, where she led the news investigative unit since 2003. She will lead NPR’s new investigative program as Deputy Managing Editor, Investigations.

VUGURU, the new media production studio for the Internet and emerging digital platforms, has appointed Larry Tanz as President, company founder and Chairman Michael Eisner announced. Tanz comes to Vuguru after co-founding and serving as President of Agility Studios, which develops, finances, and produces entertainment-oriented digital programming. Vuguru was previously an Eisner company but became a standalone recently with an investment and strategic partnership with Rogers Media.

TECHNOLOGY/MARKETING/MEDIA

CASCADE RADIO Group announced that Bellingham’s KAFE-FM will be switching from 104.3 to 104.1 on the FM dial to cooperate with CHHR-FM’s approval for increased power. CHHR-FM (“Shore FM”) in Vancouver conversely will be switching its dial position from 104.1 to 104.3. The two stations have agreed to make the coordinated switch at approximately 7:30 a.m. on Jan. 14, 2010.

SPARKNET COMMUNICATIONS reports it is forming a new syndication company focused on the Canadian radio industry but did not name any brands or products tied to its launch in January. The Vancouver operation of the US based firm is helmed by Pat Bohn, president of communications consultancy firm Bohn & Associates.

SparkNetworks says it will unveil operational details including distribution, along with sales partnerships and the companies it will represent in the new year.

“We see opportunities to offer Canadian radio an innovative approach to programs and services in the digital world,” Pat Bohn, co-president of SparkNet Communications,” said in a release. “In doing so, we will define a new level of custom performance.”

Bohn has been program director of several successful radio stations, including CHED in Edmonton and has longstanding ties with the Rogers group of radio stations. He has been a regional representative of the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, a consultant to the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ FM Radio Policy Committee and more recently, an advisor to a number of successful applications for new radio and television licences.

In 2002, Bohn trademarked the JACK-FM brand and helped Rogers with the launch of the first JACK-FM brand, in Vancouver, which led to the expansion of JACK-FM throughout North America. JACK FM is now in over 60 US markets and in Canada (Victoria and Vancouver, BC; Calgary, AB; Regina, SK; and Ottawa/Smith Falls, ON) the UK, Austria, Germany, Russia, and on The American Armed Forces Network.

SparkNet is the owner of the JACK-FM and “Playing What We Want” brands.

PPM SURVEYS SHATTER MYTHS: American men have a naughty little secret. Sometimes, they like to relax with a little Céline Dion. Professed classical music fans have one, too: as it turns out, they don’t tune into classical radio nearly as much as they claim. These are two of many findings shaking up the radio industry as it converts from measuring ratings through surveys to monitoring listeners electronically using so-called Portable People Meters. New York Times

KOBO SPINS OFF FROM INDIGO: Newly-launched Kobo has spun off from parent company Indigo Books & Music; the Canadian book retailer first launched the mobile-based eBook service under the Shortcovers name in February. The eBook apps caught on quickly—racking up a million downloads—attracting interest from a group of international investors, including Borders, Hong Kong-based Cheung Kong (Holdings) and Australia-based REDgroup Retail.

Kobo has raised $16 million in its first institutional round; Indigo Books & Music invested $5 million for majority stakeholder status, the other three companies put up the remainder. The international influence gives Kobo an instant global distribution footprint; the company says its library already has over two million books for sale, with an additional 1.8 million free titles available. The handset-agnostic platform means that BlackBerry, iPhone, and Android users can all access the eBooks; some titles are transferrable to Adobe Digital Editions-compatible eReaders. Paid Content Org.

VANISHING CAR RADIOS: Broadcasters should be concerned about the changes ahead next year in what used to be called the car radio.

Today, it’s the entertainment system – the one in the center console that formerly was a monopoly for radio broadcasters that is now shared with increasingly popular hard drives for downloading personal music libraries, satellite radio, the usual CD or tape port and soon WiFi-enabled vehicles that will allow the occupants to access an almost infinite number of Internet stations.

This is either a false alarm or a wake-up call. I’m saying it’s too late to stop the changes that are already in motion or prevent additional competition in that center console. Jerry Del Colliano, Inside Music Media

NIELSEN CO. has struck a deal to combine its TV ratings and online-audience measurement data with Catalina Marketing’s loyalty-card purchase data in a joint venture they claim can increase efficiency of the package-goods industry’s $20 billion in media outlays by at least 10%. Nielsen Catalina Ventures, which expects to begin selling data by mid-2010, is the latest in a long line of efforts to create a single-source database that measures sales impact of media spending. Ad Age

TOSCA, 1ST BROADCAST: On January 12, 1910, Acts II & III of Tosca were sent by a transmitter at the Met, via an antenna strung between two masts on the roof, to a handful of receiving stations in the New York area. Oscar Hammerstein, whose Manhattan Opera House competed with the Met, installed a wireless station in his new London Opera House the next year. But it wasn’t for broadcasting; it was for selling tickets to “passengers in the great liners 500 miles out at sea,” according to The Times. Source: The Metropolitan Opera

WHAT WAS SAID – A Langley, BC radio listener rants on about morning radio

Langley Advance

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Dear Editor,

During my working life I never listened to the radio in the morning. In fact, I didn’t partake of radio or TV much at all. Within the last few years, however, I now turn on the radio and watch TV once in a while; I’m older now!

What pops into my head almost every time I do is: “are they serious?” Is the morning radio garbage what people want or expect? The broadcasting is drivel, and the advertising is less than drivel. Are there no thinkers and/or writers who should be able to present something of merit?

Maybe morning listeners who are heading to stressful jobs want their brains assaulted by nonsensical talk and forced laughter on their morning drive; there must be some explanation for it. One Vancouver radio station that is 65 years old and purports itself to be one of the best should have a call sign of “CKNdrivelU” instead of whatever it is now.

The CBC, our over-(tax)-funded radio sloth, isn’t much better, with the morning filled with “thank you” throughout

the hours. Has it been determined at Radio Central Toronto that all of Canada will be wonderfully entertained by the host of the show thanking the road report lady or the news reader or anyone else other than themselves every five minutes?

Speaking of the CBC, I wonder who thought up the idea that, if they use the catch phrase of “sounds like Canada,”we, the listener, will be convinced and committed to their brand of mediocrity, and it will be more palatable.

Being a westerner I’m not automatically entertained by what originates in Toronto, so my brain automatically corrects that down east CBC slogan to “Sounds Like Toronto.”

The morning paper, an alternative for some of us, will be gone soon, so I guess there will be more walking.

James Charles, Langley

Four-time Academy Award nominee Jeff Bridges stars as the richly comic, semi-tragic romantic anti-hero Bad Blake in the debut feature film “Crazy Heart” from writer-director Scott Cooper. Bad Blake is a broken-down, hard-living country music singer who’s had way too many marriages, far too many years on the road and one too many drinks way too many times. And yet, Bad can’t help but reach for salvation with the help of Jean (Maggie Gyllenhaal), ajournalist who discovers the real man behind the musician. As he struggles down the road of redemption, Bad learns the hard way just how tough life can be on one man’s crazy heart.