Forbes ranks world’s highest-paid DJs in 2014
Forbes has revealed its annual ranking of the world’s highest-paid DJs — Electronic Cash Kings, as they’re referred — and little comes as a surprise. Calvin Harris has found himself a home in more than a couple of Forbes lists, and his number one spot as the top-earning DJ of 2014 is justified at $66 million.
This year’s biggest earners follow as David Guetta at number two, Avicii and Tiësto tied at three — pulling in $30M and $28M, respectively. Steve Aoki, Afrojack, and Zedd round out those who’ve earned north of $20M, and Kaskade, Skrillex, and Deadmau5 complete the top 10 not too far behind.
Next in the fold, Hardwell makes the list at $13M, just ahead of a $12M tie between Armin van Buuren and Steve Angello.
Posted by Dylan Farella (Via Forbes)
Photo by Rukes
15 Questions with Bingo Players
1. How did you and paul come up with your name?
A friend of ours had “Bingo Players” as a screenname on MSN Messenger back in the day. We were looking for a name and thought it was pretty funny, so we took it from his old MSN Messenger name.
2. Favorite all time 90’s film?
Terminator 2, without a doubt! I’ve seen this movie over 50 times, if not more.
3. An artist out of left field you would like the chance to work with?
Stevie Nicks from Fleetwood Mac would be pretty awesome! I think she is a great writer and has an amazing voice.
4. Where do you think music programming in Vegas will be in 2 years?
I think it will expand more and more. It’s already crazy how many parties there are, but every year it seems to get bigger.
5. Who was your DJ role model or favorite DJ growing up?
When I was growing up, I wasn’t really into DJ’ing; I was fascinated by producing music and music technology. That being said, I have a lot of respect for guys like Laidback Luke and A-Trak who both have technical skills that are insane.
6. Your all time favorite record?
Stardust – Music Sounds Better With You
7. Your go to prime time set record right now?
The new Bassjackers track “Like That”
8. What is your favorite city to DJ in?
I really don’t have a favorite city to DJ in to be honest. Every city has it’s own special vibe and it’s hard to compare any one city to another. That is what makes travel so interesting.
9. Its a Sunday night you have no gigs, basically a free night, whats do you do?
Have a great dinner, some drinks, relax and have a good night sleep!
10. Most memorable, craziest, wild party you ever spun at
Most memorable was the first time Paul and I did Nocturnal Wonderland in 2010. We had never played for such a huge crowd at the time. When we saw the stage we were supposed to play on, we got nervous and excited. It was an insane show and we were talking about it for days after.
11. Worst memory you have from a gig?
When we just started DJ’ing, there was this club where the power cut out every 10-15 minutes, but the promoter wanted us to keep playing. It was a nightmare but we kept going and pushed through.
12. What was the turning point for your career?
I think we got our big break when we released “Cry Just A Little” back in 2011. The follow up single was “Rattle” and that is when things went really fast.
13. What are your favorite tools for music production?
Of course Ableton 9 with plugins like Nexus, Massive, Kontakt, Dune. I really like my Korg M3 Workstation too.
14. What’s next for BIngo Players?
There’s new music coming out really soon. Been working on 5 tracks at the same time, but now one of them is actually finished. Besides that, crazy touring this summer!
15. What advice would would you give a younger you?
Try to be unique when it comes to creativity and don’t worry too much about things!
Special thanks to Paul of Bingo Players for making time for us this past weekend.
Click play below to check out the full Knock You Out video.
Posted by Yung Jon Que
Photo by Brenton Ho
Benny Benassi meets System of a Down
Benny Benassi’s has teamed up with System of a Down’s lead singer, Serj Tankian to deliver a massive new tune. Tankian’s vocals add a fresh new sound to the song that is both unique and captivating. This new collaboration has the potential to stand alongside some of Benassi’s mega-hits such as ‘Satisfaction’ and ‘Cinema’ with the help of Tankian’s crisp vocals, which add a fresh new sound that’s not commonly found within the dance music realm.
The distinctive vocals build to an intense transition that brings in the classic Benny Benassi sound that we’ve all grown to love over the past several years. The 47 year old legend has been in the game since the 80′s and continues to stay relevant with each and every cutting edge releases. ‘Shooting Helicopters’ release date has yet to be released, but be sure to keep your eyes and ears peeled for this monstrous track via Ultra Music.
Posted by Billy Gadrow (Via EDMTunes)
SFX Revenues Rise, But Deepens Loss in Second Quarter
SFX, the young conglomerate built around EDM concert promotion, multiplied its revenue but experienced a deeper net loss in the second quarter. Revenue grew 199 percent, to $82 million, while net loss increased 77.6 percent, to $43.7 million.
“We’re on our way,” said Robert Sillerman, chairman and CEO, during the earnings call. “It’s an exciting period for us.” The results sent SFX shares up 6.8 percent to $6.93 Thursday morning. However, the share price is down about 42 percent since the company’s initial public offering in October.
Most of the revenue gain in the second quarter can be attributed to acquisitions that were not acquired or fully under SFX’s control in the second quarter of 2013. Pro forma revenue, which includes the revenue of those acquisitions, grew 17.9 percent to $82 million from $69.6 million. Put another way, if you assume acquisitions were included in SFX’s second quarter of 2013 revenue, year-over-year organic revenue growth was 17.9 percent.
But, while acquisitions accounted for much of its growth, SFX did increase same-store sales, so to speak. Attendance at existing festivals grew 33 percent, while both revenue and earnings (before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, or EBITDA) grew 39 percent.
Another factor that impacted the second quarter is the company’s seasonality. SFX has a highly seasonal business cycle that is heavily weighted toward the third and fourth quarters. Of this year’s 76 festivals, 50 will occur in the second half of the year, 9 occurred in the first quarter and 17 took place in the second quarter. Thus, the company’s business model won’t truly kick in until the second half of the year.
Pro-forma EBITDA of -$10.2 million included $4.8 million of investments in new festivals, a $4.1-million impact from the shift of concerts to the second half of the year (thus hurting the comps) and a $500,000 charge related to SFX’s share in Rock in Rio losses during the quarter and startup costs for SFX’s Rock in Rio concert in Las Vegas next year.
Losses are to be expected in the company’s early days. SFX is building a diversified company and following the template established by Live Nation: Draw fans to concerts, generate money through ticketing and leverage concerts and online properties to attract sponsorship dollars. It has a revenue share deal with viagogo for secondary ticket sales. And it has brought on board such brands as MasterCard, Anheuser-Busch InBev and T-Mobile.
To better disclose the impact of brand partnerships, SFX introduced to the earnings release a metric called Qualified Marketing Agreement, or QMA. A QMA is a contractually guaranteed agreement with a quantifiable value in the year of agreement. The QMAs in place are expected to contribute between $50 million to $60 million to EBITDA over the next 12 months starting with the third quarter. Those estimates exclude upside potential included in several of the brand partnerships as well as non-guaranteed payments. “As such, it can be considered a base figure,” said CFO Richard Rosenstein.
Posted by Glenn Peoples (via Billboard)
Facebook Is Banning “Like To Download”
Over the last few days, DJ-centric media has started latching to an upcoming change in Facebook’s Terms and Conditions for Pages. The change will effectively eliminate “Like To Download” applications that exchange download access to songs, remixes, soundpacks, etc. in return for a press of the Like button on a page. As much as many artists might to claim that “the sky is falling!”, it’s actually reflective of a continued downward spiral of the platform.
The truth is that Facebook likes have continually been decreasing in value for years, following a parallel trend in a lot of other engagement metrics on the social media giant. As advertising revenue has gone up, we’ve seen a marked decrease in organic page reach and an influx of bogus Likes from bots and click farms. We’ve seen all kinds of pages resorting to posting funny/stupid/shocking videos and other content to increase engagement at any cost (Read full length story @ DJTechTools.com).
Posted by David Miller
JD Live on Club Killers Radio
The last couple of weeks for us @ The Club Killers HQ have been crazy! It’s tough to keep up with podcast so you know we had to come back with a vengeance.
This week we bring you the sound of the Surrender / Encore Beach Club resident DJ JD Live!! We know you love his edits so we hope you’ll love his hard hitting new mix as well.
Click “continue reading” on the right here for full tracklist. Continue reading →
Serato Flip: Major New Expansion Pack Will Make Re-Editing Tracks Easy
Serato has today announced “Serato Flip”, a new expansion pack for Serato DJ software that allows DJs to make their own edits of tracks from within Serato DJ, and save up to six variations per track for instant playback whenever they like. The new “Flip” feature looks set to make it very simple to extend intros and breaks, remove whole verses and choruses, chop up beats, engage in tone play, make “clean” versions of tracks via the censor button and so on, and recall the results easily in future DJ performances.
Serato Flip works by recording cue point and censor actions, which can be saved and looped, ready to re-trigger and start whenever the DJ chooses. The “flips” can be easily named and recalled, just like cues and loops can. The “flips” are non-destructive as they’re simply collections of metadata, and once recorded, a flip doesn’t rely on the original cue points remaining in the track. Think of flips as pre-programmed sets of playback instructions for tracks, allowing the DJ to escape the “linear” start-to-finish playing of his or her music files and reimagine them in new ways.
“Flips” can not only be recalled for use as alternate edits of tracks within Serato DJ, but can also be recorded as audio files for further work (in a DAW for instance), turning Serato DJ effectively into a beats creation tool. Especially when combined with quantise, the feature looks set to make creating beat-perfect DJ edits, “clean” edits, dubs, radio edits, extended versions and so on a simple task for the DJ. The “flip” function works in offline mode too, meaning edits can be prepared away from your DJ equipment (for instance on a plane or in a hotel room right before a gig).
It’s important to reinforce that the “record” function within Serato Flip actually records actions – and by “actions”, Serato means specifically cue, loop and censor metadata – as opposed to levels, tempo, jogwheel movements etc. So Serato Flip remembers changes you make in the linear structure of a track rather than the speed, pitch, volume, EQ or anything else. Once you have an automated “re-edit” (“flip”), those other things remain under your manual control on subsequent playbacks. Think of the Flip feature as allowing you to make your own re-edits of tracks ahead of time, then DJ with those re-edits just as if they are simple finished tracks, even though the re-edited version doesn’t actually exist anywhere apart from as set of metadata in Serato DJ on your computer (unless you choose to play back your Flip then record the output, of course).
• Serato Flip will be a US$29 Expansion Pack for Serato DJ 1.7, which is due this coming September. Get more information on Serato Flip here.
Posted by Phil Morse (Via DigitalDJTips)
Jay Z & Beyonce’s On The Run Tour Tops $100 Million
Jay Z and Beyonce’s On The Run tour wraps in North America with two nights at AT&T Park in San Francisco, both tonight (August 5) and tomorrow night (August 6). The pair’s 19 North American shows will gross over $100 million in ticket sales and has sold at more than 90 percent capacity, according to Omar Al-Joulani, vp of North American touring for Live Nation, the promoter/producer of the tour. Attendance will top out at more than 850,000.
Al-Joulani declined to comment on press reports of rancor between the couple, adding that he hadn’t read it. Regarding such reports, and speculation that Live Nation might be losing money on the tour, Al-Joulani would only say, “everybody’s winning.” And regarding reports that the plug might be pulled on the tour, the promoter adds, “Production is loading-in in San Francisco as we speak.”
Some reports put the couple’s performance guarantee at $4 million per show, which is a reasonable figure, considering the tour’s nightly take is over $5.2 million from an average attendance of nearly 45,000 per show. As predicted by Billboard back in June — when inaccurate reports that the tour was struggling began to surface — sales for the tour finished strong, following a general market trend of tickets selling closer to show date. “These shows sold tremendously well at the end, so we were able to sell-up limited-view and clean up production holds or other holds,” says Al-Joulani. “It was a very successful tour, and we’re pleased to have that big gross number at the end.”
The Jay/Bey tour was conceived and launched fast compared to most stadium tours, which are often planned more than a year in advance. “It came together quite quickly, around mid-March,” says Al-Joulani. “By April, we had everything together, and once the routing was in place we had about three weeks until the tour was announced.”
Considering the quick ramp-up, the fact that both Jay and Beyonce had been on the road much of last year, and the available window was narrow, routing was a bit of a challenge. “We knew we needed a big ‘statement play’ in L.A., and we needed big statement in New York, so we started by figuring out the avails at the Rose Bowl [in Pasadena] and MetLife Stadium [in New York],” Al-Joulani explains, “and then from there it was just a matter of sorting it out.”
Given the “event” status of music’s reigning power couple and the fact that producers were on a tight schedule, “We threw all the usual rules out the window,” Al-Joulani says. “We didn’t worry about days of the week, as long as we were headed in the right direction. There is one beautiful thing about routing late: There’s no messing around, the building is either available or it’s not. You’re not holding for anybody, you’re not waiting for a football or baseball schedules, there was no room for ‘maybes.’ It was all, ‘is this building available?’ which makes your life a lot easier, because there are no variables. And [stadiums] wanted it, so we were able to pick and choose our way through it.”
Along with the “must-play” major markets, the tour routed into some secondary markets like Cincinnati, New Orleans and Seattle “that turned out to be wildly successful,” Al-Joulani says. Cincinatti sold out on the pre-sale, New Orleans was “massive,” and Seattle went completely clean. “We had the greatest time in those markets.”
Production was “epic,” as described by Al-Joulani, with three staging systems hop-scotching across the route. Elements included a moving high-def screen, pyro, hyrdraulic lifts, and a B stage extended well into the audience. “Knock on wood — we started production load-in in San Francisco at noon today — every show has gone up on time, with no production issues,” he says, adding that there were no weather issues or delays, either. The total production moved on 42 trucks, with about 150 crew.
Given the unique nature of these two artists, their fans, and the fact that they’ve both toured in the last 18 months, ticket scaling was tricky, but Al-Joulani says the goal was to be inclusive. The low end was $40, then prices went up the chain to P1s topping out at $275, and a wide array of premium packages. “Our strategy was to sell as best as we could on the primary system and to price tickets for what people were willing to pay for them, with a very dynamically priced model, so that wherever you were on that ticket chain, you… had an opportunity to attend the show,” the promoter explains. “We made sure we had affordable tickets as well as the higher-priced tickets that we know the market can bear. Pricing went right across the spectrum.”
Momentum was solid, from the couple’s sizzling Grammy performance in January, Beyonce’s new record carrying through until Q1, a hit in “Drunk In Love,” and the single “On The Run” from Jay Z’s record, as well as a dramatic tour trailer created by the two artists. “We had a lot of things that went into making this tour an event, and that was part of our success,” Al-Joulani says. “These events are driven by content and demand, and being dramatic and creative and putting out content people want to see. The two of them are as about creative as you can get, and it was pretty brilliant to watch them work. The show itself is spectacular.”
Chase handled the pre-sale as the tour’s credit card sponsor, and the financial services firm, “really embraced it and did a great job,” says Al-Joulani. Adding that deal was put together by the Roc Nation sponsorship team, led by Michael Yormark. “He delivered that and did a great job executing and bringing Chase to the relationship.”
After North America, Jay Z and Beyonce will take On The Run to Paris Sept 12-13, which is being shot for an HBO special. “We’re on track to sell out both shows,” says Al-Joulani.
Far from stressed out, Al-Joulani was upbeat and clearly happy with the tour’s success. “This has been a lot of work, but it has been the smoothest, most fun run that I’ve ever worked on,” he tells Billboard. “We have a great group of people on the road, the artists have been phenomenal, both management teams are engaged and available. It has been a ball, and I’m actually sad it’s ending. I wish we could be out for another two months.”
Posted by Ray Waddell (Via Billboard)
Drake Faces ‘Ultimate Test’ as a Business Mogul
Sure, Drake dropped the No. 2 rap album of 2013 (Nothing Was the Same) and earned high marks this year for hosting Saturday Night Live and the ESPY Awards. But the Toronto-born superstar, 26, is also an aspiring mogul now facing the ultimate test of his business muscle. Will he be Canada’s answer to Jay Z — who oversees a thriving record label, apparel business and sports agency — or the next Rick Ross, whose Maybach Music Group has seen middling results since its 2009 launch?
The first release from Drake’s label, OVO Sound, is off to a solid start. After just three days of sales in its first week, Majid Jordan’s Place Like This made its debut at No. 31 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. Then on July 29 came PartyNextDoor’s PartyNextDoor Two. Both acts are already being primed to follow in the footsteps of The Weeknd, the Toronto-based artist-producer whose early support from Drake led to a lucrative record deal with Republic and two projects that reached No. 1 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart.
Next up is this weekend’s OVO Fest (Aug. 3-4), the fifth annual music festival organized and hosted by Drake at the Molson Canadian Amphitheatre in Toronto. The event, which expands to a two-day concert for the first time, is headlined by Outkast, Drake himself and a sure-to-be A-list roster of surprise guests. Four days later, on Aug. 8, he will kick off the 31-city Drake vs. Lil Wayne Tour, featuring a first-of-its-kind integrated sponsorship from Capcom that will pit the two rappers against each other in a Street Fighter-like battle. Fans will declare the winner each night.
Drake’s other upcoming ventures include custom designs for Nike’s Air Jordans and Canadian clothier Roots and, according to sources, the extension through 2015 of a lucrative deal with Sprite that was initially inked in 2010.
The bottom line should be impressive: Sources say Drake’s 2014 earnings are on pace to far exceed the estimated $10.5 million he earned in 2013.
A return to acting may also be in the cards for Drake, who got his big break on the Canadian teen soap Degrassi: The Next Generation. “After SNL, obviously the phones were lighting up because it introduced him to a whole new demographic,” says OVO partner Oliver El-Khatib.
Future the Prince, who has co-managed Drake since the rapper’s split from the Blueprint Group in 2013, is taking a page from the playbook of manager Scooter Braun, who has helped diversify Justin Bieber’s business portfolio. “There are partnerships and ventures with companies that we haven’t even fully explored yet,” says Future the Prince.
Oh, and he’s already announced the title of his fourth album, Views From The 6, despite not having properly started the recording process. “He’s been trying to rebrand Toronto in the eyes of the youth, since two of the area codes have the number ‘6’ in it,” explains Noah “40” Shebib, Drake’s longtime producer and co-founder of OVO Sound. “When he started referring to Toronto as the ‘6,’ fans started tweeting out names and Drake had to be like, ‘Yo, yo, yo, I want to claim my stake on this before someone else does.’”
And although 40 himself isn’t a big fan of the traditional release-date rollout (“no one remembers the day an album was released — if it takes an extra two weeks, so what?”), don’t expect Drake to pull a Beyonce his next time out. “I know Drake, he likes promoting his dates and building anticipation around them. I just get sleepless nights to make sure we deliver the best product possible.”
Posted by Andrew Hampp (via Billboard)
SoundCloud hires former Warner Music Group VP as new VP of Business Development and Strategy
A company that has been dodging bullets around music headlines lately is further stapling the notion that indeed, change is coming. SoundCloud, the brand in question, is welcoming Stephen Bryan as their new Senior Vice President of Business Development and Strategy. Bryan joins the Berlin-based platform with 17 years of experience as Warner Music Group’s Executive Vice President of Digital Strategy and Business Development under his belt, along with obvious links to WMG’s own digital development.
Interestingly enough, it seems as though Bryan’s ties with WMG won’t be severed completely just yet, as SoundCloud prepares to exchange stake for licensing freedom with three major labels including Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, and Warner. In regards to his career change, Bryan told Billboard, “I’ve always felt a deep passion to navigate this incredible transition to digital platforms. I think that change will accelerate in the near future, and a company like SoundCloud enables me to continue that.”
Posted by Andrew Flanagan (Via: Billboard)
Deadmau5 Takes Toronto Mayor Rob Ford On Coffee Run
It’s finally happened: Canadian EDM star Deadmau5 has taken Toronto’s beleaguered mayor Rob Ford on a coffee run in his custom Ferrari as part of his regular web series.
During the 30-minute video the two talk CFL football, the Gumball Rally, and potholes, among other things. Just watch the whole awkward ordeal unfold below:
Posted by David Miller
Borgore declared “The Most Hated Man in EDM” by Buzzfeed
The tag of “most hated” gets a fair bit of use in dance music: in 2011 the Guardian asked whether the irrepressible Skrillex was the most hated man in dubstep, while Chuckie mask-wearing EDM-peddler DJ Bl3nd has accumulated his own share of detractors. Controversy-stirring Israeli brostep producer Borgore is the latest to attract the label, in a new long-form feature on Buzzfeed that unambiguously declares him “The Most Hated Man in EDM.”
The source of Buzzfeed’s contention is the overt misogyny and sexual objectification of women at the heart of Borgore’s brand, from the ‘Ratchet Pageants’ at his shows to the #bootyforborgore hashtag and, most conspicuously, his explicit and at times sexually violent lyrics. There’s no denying that Borgore’s lyrics swing from off-colour to wildly offensive, with the article quoting two tracks in particular, Act Like a Ho (“Girl, take example from these bitches/In bed, act like a ho but first, do the dishes!”) and Glory Hole (“Oh my god, it’s a whale/Wait, that’s your sister/Just take her to the glory hole/You wouldn’t have to kiss her/Nah, sea mammals are not on my fuck list/Man, it’s a glory hole, fuck if she’s obese”).
Bassnectar and BT have made no secret of their disdain for Borgore on Twitter (BT even accused him of being a crackhead as well as a misogynist), and Buzzfeed finds plenty of other dance music figureheads with a bone to pick with Borgore. “What a wanker. He’s an embarrassment,” declares underground house and techno star Nicole Moudaber. Kathryn Frazier, owner of dance music PR company Biz3, believes that, “Borgore is certainly a misogynist,” while dubstep pioneer Rusko says scathingly, “There’s not that much respect for him in the industry because [his lyrics] are kind of a gimmick, and gimmicks lack musical integrity. Though I don’t think he’s meant to be taken seriously.”
Dance music stalwart and spokesperson Tommie Sunshine had some more considered words, saying, “This music and culture doesn’t create an environment of misogyny. In fact, we really can hope and believe that it’s the one place where everyone can be themselves. When you dig a little deeper into it, yeah, there’s the economic consideration of people using misogyny to achieve commercial success, and then you have them using creative expression to justify any and all of their actions. That’s where it gets really hazy.”
For his part, Borgore vigorously denies that he denigrates women, insisting that his lyrics are intended as a joke. “I’m the only artist in EDM that goes and says crazy things, so it’s kind of easy to pick on me,” he tells the Buzzfeed interviewer. “If I don’t cause any reaction, there’s no point of what I’m doing.”
Australian EDM duo Nervo also speak in favour of Borgore, with Miriam Nervo saying, “I think he’s a woman lover, not a woman hater. He’s been nothing but a gent to us.” Head over to the full Buzzfeed feature to make up your own mind.
Posted by David Miller (Via In The Mix)