Pictured (L-R) standing: Allison Jones (BMLG), Matt Turner (Big Loud Shirt), Perry Howard (BMI), Mike Molinar (Big Machine Music), Hannah Williams (Sony/ATV), LeAnn Phelan (ASCAP), Ben Strain (Ole), John Zarling (BMLG), seated: Rodney Clawson, Justin Moore, Jeremy Stover

BMI and ASCAP co-hosted a celebration yesterday (March 18) at the Country Music Association in Nashville to commemorate the chart-topping success of Justin Moore’s “Lettin’ The Night Roll,” which was penned by Moore, along with Rodney Clawson and Jeremy Stover.

Publishers on the song include ole Songs of Countrywood, Sony/ATV Music Publishing, Amarillo Sky Songs, Big Machine Music, Big Red Toe Music, and Double Barrel Ace Music.

The song marks Moore’s fifth chart-topper as an artist, and third as a songwriter.

BMI writer Clawson first signed a publishing deal in 2000. In 2014, he had three No. 1 radio hits.

For the song’s producer/publisher Stover, “Lettin’ The Night Roll” is his fourth chart-topper as a writer and sixth as a producer. The ASCAP member is also behind Moore’s hits “Small Town USA” and “Til My Last Day.”

Moore thanked everyone involved with the song. “Getting a No. 1 was never in my vocabulary,” said Moore. “I moved to town in 2002, and just hoped to get a record deal. I didn’t even really care if I had a record, I just wanted to say I had a record deal. I got to make an album, and I thought, ‘If I can just have one hit, that would be pretty cool, that way my buddies back home wouldn’t tell me I failed.’ Then I had a hit, and I thought, ‘I don’t want to be a one-hit wonder.’ It’s like a drug, as a songwriter and artist, you’re always worried about that next one. It’s always fun to do something like this, especially with guys like Rodney and Jeremy and so many other folks. I want to thank you guys for coming out on the bus to write songs. We live in Arkansas. You guys had to spend time away from your families to come out on the road, and I appreciate that.”

Avenue Bank made a charitable donation on behalf of the song’s writers to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

Legendary singer/songwriter/entertainer Johnny Cash‘s critically acclaimed American Recordings series will soon be available as a vinyl box set. Universal Music Enterprises (UMe) will bring Cash’s complete American Recordings to vinyl, with a box set to release March 24.

Even during his career’s twilight years, Cash’s creative spirit and work ethic never tired. His work with producer Rick Rubin to create the American Recordings series in the 1990s-2000s cemented Cash’s creative legacy, and added a rewarding musical coda to a career that gave the world classics including “I Walk The Line,” “Ring of Fire,” and “Folsom Prison Blues.”

The box set includes all six albums in the series: American Recordings (1994), American Recordings II: Unchained (1996), American Recordings III: Solitary Man (2000), American Recordings IV: The Man Comes Around (2002), American Recordings V: A Hundred Highways (2006), and American Recordings VI: Ain’t No Grave (2010).

In 1994, Cash’s first American Recordings project earned him a Grammy award for Best Contemporary Folk album. In 1997, Unchained earned Cash the Best Country Album Grammy honor. Cash had teamed with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers for the project, which featured cover versions of Beck’s “Rowboat,” Soundgarden’s “Rusty Cage,” as well as “The Kneeling Drunkard’s Plea” written by June, Anita, Helen and Mother Maybelle Carter.

In 2000, Cash teamed again with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers for American III: Solitary Man. Cash’ rendition of  “Solitary Man” brought the singer another Grammy for Best Male Country Vocal Performance. 2002’s The Man Comes Around is the last album released by Cash before his death in 2003. The project earned a CMA Award for Album of the Year, while the project’s “Give My Love To Rose” earned a Grammy for Best Country Male Vocal Performance. It was Cash’s cover of Nine Inch Nails’ “Hurt,” along with its unvarnished, somber video, that stood as a defining snapshot of Cash’s later career and final months. “Hurt” earned a 2003 Grammy award for Best Short Form Video and 2003 Country Music Association for Single of the Year, and Music Video of the Year.

Cash died in 2003 from complications with diabetes.

American V: A Hundred Highways was released post-humously in 2006, with material recorded from 2002-2003. It featured Cash’s last original song, “Like the 309.” The last project in the series, 2010’s American VI: Ain’t No Grave, featured songs recorded during the American V: A Hundred Highways sessions. Among the tracks are “Redemption Day,” (penned by Sheryl Crow), and “Can’t Help But Wonder Where I’m Bound” by Tom Paxton.

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) posted a report analyzing key revenue and shipment data from 2014. Highlights from the March 18 document note wholesale revenues up 2 percent, retail revenues slightly declined at .5 percent and various streaming models worth nearly $2 billion.

Several charts and graphs further explain key data points from the desk of VP of Strategic Data Analysis, Josh Friedlander.

Read the four-page report here.

In conjunction, RIAA Chairman & CEO Cary Sherman released the following:

The data we provide – including the aggregate valuation of various streaming services — is the most meaningful barometer about the state of the U.S. music business.

It’s worth noting a few observations. First, the wholesale value of the American music business continues to grow – a 2% uptick this year. Modest, but the fourth straight year of such growth. The overall retail value of the business is basically flat – a small decline of .5%. This is the fifth straight year we’ve been essentially flat.

The music business continues to undergo a staggering transformation, one embraced by the music labels we represent. Record companies are now digital music firms, earning more than 2/3rd s of their revenues from a variety of digital formats. Streaming services collectively are generating meaningful revenue: nearly $2 billion in 2014, a 29% percent increase over 2013. You may notice that we continue to break out the revenues generated from the three major streaming categories. We believe the music community and the American public deserve to fully understand the revenues produced from each category, including the number of users of each particular type of service and the revenues generated by them.

Another observation: streaming music has been the subject of a healthy debate, which is appropriate. These are new models – how their value to the artist and label accrues is different than buying a CD or a download. But the reality is that the consumer has spoken and this is what fans want. It is the job of the entire music community to make these services work for our fans.

Especially as the business pivots to a streaming world, gaps in the law or decisions by some companies to deny compensation to certain categories of creators and labels is even more indefensible. That means, for example, that it’s long overdue for AM and FM radio stations to pay artists and labels for the use of their work. It’s time for this special interest exemption to end.

Similarly, it is inexcusable that digital radio companies like Pandora and Sirius XM take advantage of ambiguities in the law to refuse to pay musical icons of our past for recordings made before 1972. Yes, you read that right, too – two of the biggest digital music companies choose not to share any of their revenues with the artists and labels behind the musical treasures of the 50’s, 60’s and early 70’s, just because they’ve decided not to. And it’s time for Sirius XM to start paying royalties at fair market rates, rather than below-market rates. Recording artists and labels shouldn’t be forced to subsidize a multi-billion dollar behemoth like Sirius XM.

Our mantra is ‘fair market value for all creators, regardless of platform.’ That goes for the record labels too, who are the economic engines of the music business, investing billions of dollars to discover new artists, nurturing them as they refine their craft and helping them find an audience, all while paying a bigger share of their revenues to artists than ever.

The music business is not without its challenges, but the foundations of a continued comeback are strong. Just look at the Internet and social media, for example, where artists and music drive the conversation like nothing else. Music is more relevant to commerce and culture than ever before. It is fundamentals like these that continue to give us great hope. Here’s to a bright future for music and everyone who creates it.