Zack O'Malley Greenburg's Blog, page 20

Spotify Goes Public At $30 Billion; When Will Artists See Any Of That?

NEW YORK, USA – APRIL 3: A banner with the Spotify logo on it is seen as the company lists its stock on the New York Stock Exchange in New York, United States on April 3, 2018. (Photo by Mohammed Elshamy/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)

Spotify made its debut on the New York Stock Exchange today, opening at a price of $165.90 per share—giving the streaming service a market cap just under $30 billion, nearly four times the company’s valuation as of its last round of funding. The move has sent the...

A-Rod In Paradise: Swinging For Redemption Through Baseball And Business

Even as Alex Rodriguez sits contemplating a platter of raspberries at the Four Seasons in Austin, he is chasing something. The day before, in preparation for his new gig as an ESPN Sunday Night Baseball analyst, he visited three teams at spring training in Arizona. Today in Texas, he gave a keynote address at South by Southwest titled “Baseball, Business and Redemption” with CNBC chairman Mark Hoffman. And later he’ll jet home to Miami to spend time with his two daughters before heading to Ta...

Jay-Z’s Former Partner Kareem ‘Biggs’ Burke Plots An Empire Of His Own

Biggs’ Plans: Kareem Burke, the ‘silent partner’ who cofounded Roc-A-Fella Records with Jay-Z and Damon Dash, is carving a niche for himself with the help of the brands he helped create in the mid-1990s–via collaborations like the Nike Air Force 1s shown here.

Kareem Burke is sitting in the sky lobby of the W Hotel in Times Square, and he’s not happy with his Diet Coke. “This is disgusting,” he declares. “Super-flat. It’s … syrupy.”

Taste has always been a calling card for Burke, better known...

Why Jeff Sessions May Control The Fate Of Wu-Tang’s Secret Album

Album Sessions: Cilvaringz and RZA’s brainchild could end up with the U.S. Attorney General.

Jeff Sessions isn’t exactly what you’d call a fan of hip-hop. While rappers from Jay-Z to Common speak out against mass incarceration, the U.S. Attorney General has reversed Obama-era initiatives phasing out federal use of private prisons; even as Wiz Khalifa and Snoop Dogg advocate for full legalization of marijuana, Sessions has crusaded against cannabis. So it may come as a surprise that he might e...

More Than Big-Name Acts, Music Rights Took Center Stage At SXSW

Where’s Garth? Brooks appeared last year at South by Southwest, but in 2018 the focus was elsewhere. (Photo by Jack Plunkett/Invision/AP)

Last week, the music world descended on Austin, Texas, for the annual tech-and-entertainment fortnight known as South By Southwest. But unlike recent years, talk of music rights — not keynotes by A-list acts, like Garth Brooks last year — ended up at the forefront.

The industry has become transfixed by streaming, which has finally turned a corner with the...

Dr. Dre’s $3 Billion Monster: The Secret History Of Beats

Happier Times: (L-R) Mario Armstrong, Noel Lee, Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre attend Beats By Dr. Dre & Monster’s new product line unveiling at Best Buy Theater on September 29, 2010 in New York City. (Photo by Gilbert Carrasquillo/Getty Images)

This piece is an exclusive excerpt from Zack’s new book, 3 KINGS: Diddy, Dr. Dre, Jay-Z and Hip-Hop’s Multibillion-Dollar Rise, published earlier this week by Little, Brown. Order your copy here.

Noel Lee is a man who knows how to make an entrance. Accomp...

Can Genius Become The Next MTV By Doubling Down On Its Rap Roots?

Peggy Noland and her physical interpretation of Nicki Minaj’s lyrics — one of several such creations at the recent Genius-Dropbox collaboration in Los Angeles — are all part of a bid by the company formerly known as Rap Genius to double down on its musical DNA.

About a mile down Sunset Boulevard from Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, artist Peggy Noland sits in her ground floor studio on a furry couch shaped like a pair of lips, surrounded by a pastel panorama of equally wooly stuffed bears. Per...

Why Diddy And Justin Bieber Are Set To Cash In On Spotify’s IPO

Justin Bieber and Diddy: Whether or not the labels give artists any of their Spotify windfall, these two will get their cut.

Earlier this week, Spotify filed for an initial public offering — technically, a direct listing — on the New York Stock Exchange. The streaming giant released a list of all shareholders with a stake of more than 5% in the streaming giant in the process. Among the more interesting names: Sony, which negotiated a piece of the company many years ago.

Spotify’s filing revea...

The Forbes Five: Hip-Hop’s Wealthiest Artists 2018

Mogul Talk: Jay-Z and Diddy toast at the Roc Nation Grammy brunch atop One World Trade in New York. (Photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Roc Nation)

Last June, when Jay-Z and Beyoncé welcomed twins to their family, they did what many couples do in the wake of a new arrival–move to a bigger home–on quite an epic scale. Over the next few months, they shelled out $26 million for an East Hampton mansion and scooped up an $88 million Bel Air estate, adding 21,000 square feet per newborn. That’s...

Forbes Five Hip-Hop Rich List 2018: Preview And Contest

Picture This: Will Diddy be hip-hop’s wealth king once again? Tune in Thursday to find out. (Photo by Juan Ocampo/NBAE via Getty Images)

For a genre that’s constantly reinventing itself, the list of hip-hop’s wealthiest acts has stayed relatively static over the years–until 2017, when Sprint’s investment in Tidal pushed Jay-Z ahead of Dr. Dre and into the No. 2 spot at $810 million, just $10 million behind longtime king Diddy.

The 2018 ranking is almost upon us, and there’s sure to be more sh...