Brian Penix Joins Vector Management

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Brian Penix

Brian Penix has joined Nashville-based Vector Management full-time as a manager, MusicRow has confirmed. Joining Penix at Vector are a stable of artists, including Amanda Shires, Andy McKee, Jerry Douglas, Earls of Leicester and Tommy Emmanuel.

Penix’s career has included time at AC Entertainment, Outback Concerts, and most recently, as a talent buyer for National Shows 2 (NS2).

“It was hard leaving the folks and NS2 and ABI behind,” Penix tells MusicRow. “I love and cherish them all, and they’ve all been very supportive throughout this transition. But I am very exciting to be working with Ken Levitan and all the fine folks at Vector. It’s the right environment for myself and my artists to continue to grow.”

Penix can be reached at brian@vectormgmt.com.

Tortuga Music Festival Owners File Lawsuit Against Ticketfly

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The Tortuga Music Festival owners filed suit against concert ticket company Ticketfly on Wednesday (Nov. 29) over a contract dispute, the Tennessean reports. The three-day festival takes place on the beach in Ft. Lauderdale over three days in April, and is set to be headlined in 2018 by Florida Georgia Line, Eric Church, and Keith Urban.

Ticketfly claims to be the contract holder for ticketing for the popular Florida country festival which attracted 100,000 fans earlier this year. Ticketfly threatened litigation, so the festival’s owner, TMF2013, preemptively sued in Nashville federal court. TMF2013 is owned by Rock the Ocean.

Rock the Ocean maintains in its filing that Ticketfly’s deal was with Huka, the production company behind the festival. There is no such contract between Ticketfly and Rock the Ocean. Ticketfly is a subsidiary of Eventbrite. The company, which is popular with independent promoters, was purchased earlier this year after previously being owned by Pandora. The lawsuit also claims that Huka and Ticketfly shared a common executive, Jeff Kreinik, who worked at Huka until 2014 and then at Ticketfly until 2016.

 

Exclusive: Centric Entertainment Launches Align Music Group With Abbey Adams

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Abbey Adams

Centric Entertainment has launched the publishing and recording group subsidiary, Align Music Group, led by former Sony/ATV Sr. Creative Director, A&R Abbey Adams.

The company is currently in the process of building out its artist/writer roster, with new signings to be announced in early 2018.

Adams, a 2016 MusicRow Rising Women on the Row honoree, says Align Music Group will have a strong focus on creating new, beneficial approaches to artist development and publishing.

“I want to create situations where I can do some extremely artist-friendly deals and I feel with being an independent company, we can do that,” Adams tells MusicRow.

Centric Entertainment is the latest venture from entrepreneur Larry Beckwith, who also co-founded Iconic Entertainment Group with Fletcher Foster.

“We’ve been fortunate to attract some of the best talent in the industry to lead within our companies,” Beckwith says. “Fletcher continues to do a phenomenal job at the helm of Iconic, and I’m confident that Abbey will do the same with Align.”

“At this level, we have to go into it with as low of a risk as we can, asking everyone involved, artists and producers, to take a risk on themselves as much as we are taking on them, and make it really affordable on the front end and give everybody more on the back end, to make it worth their time. We are trying to do deals that include publishing and masters—deals that allow us to do it in a low-risk way—but also to invest in different aspects of the artists. I want to look at it as an indie label, in as much as we have to do to get them—streaming, building social media following, getting them on the road to connect with fans, and really being intentional with their artist branding. It makes it a lot easier to present artists to the labels for those partnership opportunities or to upstream them to a major label when you can say, ‘This is the following they have created. It’s ready for you to take it to the next level.’”

Align Music Group currently operates from the WeWork co-working space located at One Nashville Place (150 4th Ave. N.).

Adams’ previous career roles include time at Sony/ATV and Blacktop Music Group. She is a graduate of Middle Tennessee State University.

For more information, contact info@alignmusicgroup.com.

‘Austin City Limits’ Sets Ticketing Deal With AXS

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AXS, a leading ticketing and digital media platform, has entered into an agreement to become the exclusive ticketing partner for television music series Austin City Limits. The show created and produced by KLRU-TV, Austin PBS, is the longest-running music program in television history. AXS will support ticketing for the live studio audience at KLRU-TV’s tapings of the show, which take place at ACL Live at The Moody Theater in downtown Austin.

AXS will be the sole ticketing software provider for live productions of the television series which presents 13 episodes each season that air on PBS. In addition, AXS will be a Production Underwriter for the 2017 Austin City Limits Hall of Fame Inductions & Celebration Special broadcast nationally on PBS on Dec. 31, 2017 (check local listings). KLRU will have full access to the AXS platform to manage every aspect of ticketing inventory and offers to their Friends of Austin City Limits members and donors from a single, powerful administrative control center. Access for Austin City Limits tapings remain complimentary as a thank you for station supporters and to the public as always and are distributed via an online giveaway.

“We are thrilled to be partnering with KLRU and Austin City Limits, one of the most iconic music brands in the world,” said Blaine LeGere, SVP of Business Development for AXS. “This new relationship showcases our ability to provide a well tailored solution to the specific non-profit requirements of KLRU.”

“This is a milestone year for Austin City Limits and the addition of AXS to our team makes the program even more powerful,” said Bill Stotesbery, CEO and General Manager of KLRU. “Our fans, donors and Friends of Austin City Limits are an important part of the show and we strive to provide them with the best live music experience possible, and now with the tools and services we now have through AXS we continue to move that mission forward.”

Austin City Limits is currently in its 43rd broadcast season with new episodes featuring a stellar slate of music’s finest, including Ed Sheeran, Miranda Lambert, Father John Misty, LCD Soundsystem and more. The show has been designated an Official Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Landmark and earned a Peabody Award for excellence in 2012. The program remains the only television series to be awarded the National Medal of Arts.

Crosshair Delivers Second Monthly List Identifying Their Top Influencer Playlists

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Nashville-based Crosshair Music has issued it’s second edition top 20 influencers from its Crosshair Elite, a program benefiting artists and influencer interaction from its back-end analytic system.

The influencers help artists from all genres—including country—gain the attention from global Spotify-sponsored playlists. The distribution list is a reward perk, thanking the influencers for their involvement in providing feedback to undiscovered music. Crosshair notes its influencers list are first movers and partners to independent music, regularly getting an artist’s song over 1,000 plays as well as get them on the radar of the editors at Spotify.

One country music influencer has been added to the top 20 list, making three influencer playlists in the genre.

Crosshair’s December 2017 Country Music Elite Influencers

New: Eric Lacey’s Spotify Playlist: Country Beer Drinking Songs (2,000+ followers)

Adam Denney’s Spotify Playlist: 2017 Country Music  (3,000+ followers)

Ashley Bowsher’s Spotify Playlist: Pop & Country (2,000+ followers)

ELIAS Opens Nashville Studio

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Creative agency ELIAS has opened a Nashville office led by Executive Creative Director Vincenzo LoRusso. The newly-launched location serves as a central hub between all ELIAS’ studios, allowing LoRusso greater flexibility to collaborate with his entire national team and growing roster of diverse musical talent in the Nashville area.

Relocating from ELIAS’ headquarters in Santa Monica, LoRusso will continue to oversee the music company’s entire slate of work out of its Santa Monica, New York and recently opened Chicago and Nashville offices. He re-joined ELIAS in 2010 and has been instrumental in growing its creative team to include talent with diverse backgrounds in composing, producing, engineering and sound design.

LoRusso boasts over two decades of experience as a Grammy nominated producer and mixer working with artists such as Debbi Harry, Perry Farrell, Alex Ebert, Johnny Cash, Joan Osborne, members of Cypress Hill and Guns & Roses, and others. As the former creative director and lead composer, he helped launch Massive Music’s West Coast office and led the production team that developed and launched the successful Elias Music Library. For over 30 years ELIAS has remained one of the world’s most esteemed custom music, audio branding and library production studios.

Blake Shelton, Florida Georgia Line, Dierks Bentley To Lead Country LakeShake

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Dierks Bentley, Florida Georgia Line and Blake Shelton are set to lead the 2018 Country LakeShake festival in Chicago, slated for June 22-24.

Also on the bill are Lee Brice, Billy Currington, Russell Dickerson, Jillian Jacqueline, Tracy Lawrence, Chris Lane, Jackie Lee, LOCASH, RaeLynn, Runaway June, Dylan Scott and Cole Swindell.

The three-day festival, which takes place at Huntington Bank Pavilion on Northerly Island, also features a second “Next From Nashville” stage highlighting up and coming artists whose lineup will be announced in the coming weeks.

Three-day and single-day passes for the Windy City festival will go on sale Friday, Dec. 8 at 10 a.m. CT at lakeshakefestival.com.

Mark Your Calendar—December 2017

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Album Releases

December 1
Chris Stapleton/From A Room: Volume 2/Mercury Records Nashville
Danielle Bradbery/I Don’t Believe We’ve Met/BMLG Records

December 8
Luke Bryan/What Makes You Country/Capitol Records Nashville
Walker Hayes/boom/Monument Records

Single Releases

December 4
Cam/Diane/Arista
Carly Pearce/Hide The Wine/Big Machine
CJ Solar/Airplane/Sea Gayle Records
Remington w/ Amy Jack/Dallas Until I Die/Amy Jack Music
Terry McBride/Boots Off/MV2 Production
Michael Tyler/Hey Mama/ Reviver Records
Brown & Gray/Top Down/NHMM

December 11
Chris Janson/Drunk Girl/Warner Bros. Records/Warner Music Nashville/WAR Radio & Streaming
Lindsay Ell/Criminal/Stoney Creek
Jerrod Niemann/I Got This/Curb

Industry Events

December 6
Final voting for the 2017 CMA Touring Awards closes

December 21
Grammy final ballot due

December 31
New Year’s Eve In Nashville: Keith Urban, Maren Morris, Cheap Trick, Carly Pearce

Weekly Chart Report 12/1/17

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Click here or above to access MusicRow‘s weekly CountryBreakout Report.

Taylor Swift’s ‘reputation’ Released To Streaming Platforms

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Taylor Swift‘s latest album reputation is finally up on Spotify, Apple Music, Google Play, Tidal, Amazon Music Unlimited, Pandora Premium and the other streaming platforms.

The project, her sixth studio album, racked up big numbers in early sales upon its Nov. 10 release, pulling in 1.238 million units in its first week alone in U.S. sales. The title debuted at No. 1 on Nielsen Soundscan’s all-genre albums chart, and echoes Swift’s first-week sales numbers for 2014’s 1989, which did 1.287 million in sales during its first week. Her album Red sold 1.208 million in its first week, while Speak Now pulled in 1.047 million.