Bowie Vinyl, is Heaven Sent

Jeeni Blog

Helping the next generation of talent to build a global fanbase

Bowie Vinyl, is Heaven Sent

New David Bowie vinyl is heaven sent, for fans and collectors alike. We all have phones and computers bulging with playlists or demand 'Alexa' instantly plays a chosen track. However, the buzz around vinyl is real, after years of being cast off to the world of the geeky collector. If you have never sat next to a deck and placed a needle on a record, you've missed one of the joys of life. Record labels are now taking vinyl more seriously than they have probably done for 30 years and production is now seen as key to any new release.

January 8th 2021 would have been David Bowie's 74th birthday. To mark this occasion, Parlophone/ISO are offering two previously unreleased cover versions, pressed onto a limited edition, double-sided 7" single. This heaven sent vinyl offers the tracks, 'Mother' by John Lennon and Bob Dylan’s 'Tryin' to Get to Heaven'.

The 7” single is limited to 8147 (Bowie's birth date) numbered copies, 1000 of which will be on cream coloured vinyl, available only from the official David Bowie store and Warner Music’s Dig! store (the remainder will be black). Both tracks will be available to stream and download.

Bowie's version of 'Mother' was produced by Tony Visconti in 1998 for a Lennon tribute, that never materialised. It was originally recorded by Lennon for his 1970 album John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. Bob Dylan’s original 'Tryin' to Get to Heaven' was released on his 1997 'Album of the Year' GRAMMY winning 'Time Out Of Mind'. David’s version was recorded in February 1998 during the mixing sessions for the ‘LiveAndWell.com’ album.

As if this wasn't enough for the die-hard Bowie fans and vinyl collectors, Parlophone are also marking the 45th Anniversary of Bowie's 10th studio Album, 'Station To Station' with a limited edition pressing in red and white vinyl, to be released 22 January 2021.

David Bowie - 'Station to Station' anniversary release

Originally released 23rd January 1976, it has remained a classic among fans and critics alike. The album was unusual as it contained just six tracks, but still offered at a little over 38-minutes of music.

'Station to Station', was the first David Bowie album to become a bigger commercial success in the USA, than in the UK. It reached #3 on the Billboard 200 and #5 on the official UK album chart.

Four of the 'Station To Station' tracks were released as commercial A-sides by RCA, with 'Golden Years' being the pre-album hit on both sides of the Atlantic. The song scored Bowie yet another top ten just in time for the Christmas UK chart in 1975, where it remained right up to the release of the album in January 1976.

45 years on from its release, 'Station To Station' is now seen as a musical bridge between the ‘plastic soul’ of 1975’s 'Young Americans' and the start of Bowie’s Berlin era with 1977’s 'Low'.

For more information go to: www.davidbowie.com

BACK

04
Apr

Zeeteah Massiah on Music, Performing and Life during 2020

Zeeteah Massiah is a Number One Billboard Dance Chart star who specialises in Reggae, Jazz and house music. Like many artists, the last year has provided many challenges for Zeeteah, but also a host of new opportunities and ventures that would have never otherwise have been possible. We asked her to tell us about her experiences over the last year whilst we count down to Jeeni's online JAM festival. It’s been the craziest year ever, but we’ve made it through thirteen months in and out of lockdown. At the beginning of 2020, I unveiled a brand-new sound and a wicked new band, and I was full of high hopes for the year. I was excited and ready to go. And then Covid hit. It took me three weeks into the first lockdown to come to terms with the fact that I wouldn’t be going on stage again for a long time. I was in a fog for weeks and then I thought: just because I can’t be on stage doesn’t mean I can’t make music. I suddenly had an impulse to record a new version of an old song that I’ve always loved – United We Stand by Brotherhood of Man. It seemed so right for that moment. Paul, my husband and musical partner, understood immediately the sound I was looking for, and we set to work in our studio. Three of my favourite musicians played on the track – remotely, of course – and family and friends in London, Germany and the Caribbean filmed lovely cameos for the video. It was such fun to do, and it got a wonderful response. You can check it out on Jeeni. And then a man called George Floyd died in Minnesota, and we were all plunged into a very different mood. I didn’t realise how painful many of my feelings about race were, and how deeply they were buried, until I started telling Paul, with tears in my eyes, about growing up in London as a young black girl from Barbados. I was constantly made to feel a certain way simply because of the colour of my skin. Here we are in 2021 and, sadly, many things are still the same. At one point I blurted out to Paul, “You don’t know how it feels to be Black”. He took those words and turned them into a song called You Don’t Know. We recorded it and made the video in July. It’s one of the most heartfelt things I’ve done, and I’ve been amazed by the incredible response it’s had and so grateful for the wonderful feedback. I did manage to squeeze in three London gigs in the gaps between the lockdowns: a reggae gig in Chelsea, and jazz gigs in Hampstead and in the West End. Better than nothing – and in fact, they were all lovely events. When it became clear that there weren’t going to be any more gigs, I decided to start doing live sessions at home with some of my favourite musicians and sharing them on YouTube. And so, the Massiah Sessions were born. We’ve released nine videos so far, in a variety of styles, and there are more to come. I was also invited to add vocals to a new rock album by a dear friend in Germany. Thanks, Günther – it was a blast. In February, I did a livestream with guitarist Marcin Bobkowski for a charity called Educ’aid Africa, run by Isa Bell, which is helping to provide music education to schools in Benin. A recent DNA test revealed that many of my ancestors were from Benin, and so the project had a special meaning for me. It was my first livestream, and I loved it. I’m going to be doing another one on 10 April, and hopefully regularly after that – join us at zeestream.live if you can! And so now here we are, approaching the end of what we pray will be the final lockdown. And soon I’ll be back on stage in front of a live audience doing what I love best. My first live gig of 2021 will be on Thursday 27 May at Crazy Coqs in London’s West End. Maybe see you there? In the meantime, I wish you all the best for what will, hopefully, end up being a much better year. Zeeteah will also be performing in the JAM festival which is a collaboration between Jeeni, AmplifyX and MultiView Media and will be held at 12 noon Los Angeles time, 8pm London time on Saturday April 10th 2021. To find out more about the JAM Festival check out our events on Facebook. https://fb.me/e/1etPauFMV

31
Jul

NEW OPERA ACHIEVES ROCK STAR STATUS

It's the sort of statistic that music promoters dream of. An audience of ten thousand in less than one hour, and for a first-time performance. But this massive audience didn't turn up to watch a new boy band or the latest rap sensation, they came to the opera! A brand new opera called Spring Street is set in Manhattan, and it mixes classical arias, string quartets, jazz, blues and even acid rock. The opera was streamed on Jeeni, the self-styled "ethical alternative" to the big streaming giants, and opera composer Pete Wyer is ecstatic about Jeeni’s methodology and success. “I’m really thrilled. My expectation was we’d get to the magic 10,000 mark in a month, but this is quite incredible - especially when I compare it to operas I’ve had performed on stage! Without Jeeni’s help my piece might be languishing with a few hundred hits.” Wyer is being modest. An award-winning composer for the English National Ballet and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, his biggest audience before the Jeeni event was when 60,000 people enjoyed his celebration Liverpool waterfront concert, and the performance and publicity costs for that were considerable. By contrast, the Jeeni audience for his new event has already topped 66,000 and the costs have been zero. Everything has been achieved by the publicity and marketing systems built in to the Jeeni platform, which makes it unique when compared with the likes of Spotify or Netflix. Pete Wyer continues, "I looked at the Jeeni platform doing really good work for independent artists, and the more I learned the more I liked. It's been a very happy experience." The opera stars the soprano and triple-GRAMMY award-winner Maren Montalbano, who says, "Power is shifting from large organisations to the individual, and platforms like Jeeni are on the rise because they give artists the opportunity to lift themselves up and lift each other up." Her co-star, the bass-baritone and Netflix superhero Heday Inoue adds, "Jeeni is allowing us to have more exposure. I think it's amazing, and I'm really, really happy to be part of it." What is even more amazing is the fact that the cast and musicians have never actually met except on the Jeeni platform. Everything was composed, rehearsed and performed remotely in lockdown. Jeeni founder Shena Mitchell says, “When we first launched Jeeni a few months ago, it took days to hit audience figures of ten thousand for an online concert or festival, and I was delighted with that. But here we are, achieving the same thing in under an hour, and for an unknown opera. Imagine what we can do next. We already have more than two thousand artist showcases and an audience outreach of over two million." Now Jeeni.com needs to scale up to meet the technical demands for handling more artists and bigger audiences, so they have turned to crowdfunding. Shena Mitchell says, "Everybody knows that the big streaming companies rip artists off. We don't do that. Our artists keep 100% of everything they earn with us. Now we are allowing the public to invest as little as £10 to buy a part of us, and own a stake in what could be the ethical future of entertainment.” More information: shena@jeeni.comjeeni.com/investjeeni.com/springstreet *Capital at Risk

05
Jun

Global Online Music Streaming Grew 32% to over 350 Million Subscriptions in 2019

By Abhilash Kumar Spotify continues to be the market leader and recorded a 23% YoY growth in total revenue during CY 2019.Music streamers are focusing on creating exclusive content with podcasts continuing to feature strongly in 2020. Seoul, Hong Kong, New Delhi, Beijing, London, Buenos Aires, San Diego – 3rd April 2020 Global online music streaming subscriptions grew 32% year-on-year (YoY) reaching 358 million subscriptions in CY 2019, according to the latest findings from Counterpoint Research. This is driven by the availability of exclusive content like podcasts, originals which attracted people towards the platform and eventually turned them as subscribers. Also, promotional activities like price cuts in subscriptions in emerging markets, bundled offers from telcos added to the growth. We expect that online music streaming subscriptions to grow more than 25% YoY to exceed 450 million subscriptions by the end of 2020. Commenting on the overall market, Research Analyst, Abhilash Kumar, said, “Paid subscriptions grew 32% YoY compared to 23% YoY growth of total MAUs. This suggests people are ready to pay for music streaming for a hassle-free experience. However, this is not completely user-driven. Music streaming platforms are following a two-step approach to gain subscribers, first registering them to their platform as free users by means of excellent advertising campaigns and secondly pitching them with attractive offers to transfer them to become paying subscribers.” Spotify topped CY 2019 grabbing a 31% share of the total revenue and a 35% share of the total paid subscriptions. The runner up, Apple Music, follows with a 24% share of total revenues in the industry and a 19% share of the total paid subscriptions. Due to Apple’s high focus on its services segment which includes Apple Music, its subscription base grew 36% YoY in CY 2019. Amazon Music subscriptions reached a 15% share in 2019 compared to 10% in 2018. Talking about the top performers, Kumar added, “Spotify maintained its top spot with the help of promotional activities like free Spotify Premium for three months, price cuts, customized campaigns like Spotify and a focus on exclusive content. Tech giants like Amazon, Apple, Google have started focusing on music streaming and have sufficient cash at their disposal to give stiff competition to Spotify. Apple Music is making improvements in its app like the introduction of night mode, curated playlists to target a group, etc. Similarly, Amazon Music has been trying lossless music and is creating its own niche where it competes with Tidal.” Despite global players strongly pushing their music streaming platforms, regional players stand strong in their respective regions, primarily because of regional exposure and high focus on local content. Gaana continues to be the no.1 player in the Indian market, Yandex Music is leading in Russia. Similarly, Anghami leads the Arab world. Tencent Music Group leads the China market with the help of its apps QQ Music, Kugou and Kuwo. Discussing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the OTT industry, Kumar added, “We expect the OTT sector will experience an uptick as people stay at home actively tracking the latest updates. During this outbreak, audio OTT consumption has switched from music streaming to the radio. People in highly affected areas are worried about the outbreak and are therefore continuously tuned to news on TV/radio for updates. The traction of news channels and podcasts saw an upswing while that for music streaming dropped.” What’s common is that both the regional and global players are focusing a lot on building exclusive content. Acquiring podcast companies and creating their own channels are all being undertaken. It’s often exclusive content that drives paid subscription growth. More than 80% of music streaming revenue came from paid subscriptions. The rest came from advertisements and partnerships with brands and telcos. Therefore, increasing paid subscriptions is of prime importance for music streaming platforms. The comprehensive and in-depth chain of reports on Global Online Music Streaming Market for Q4 2019 is available to help track the market in terms of MAUs by region, paid subscriptions by region, revenues, and ARPU. To view the global report in terms of users, revenues and ARPU, click here. For regional analysis on MAUs and paid subscriptions, click here. Please contact press(at)counterpointresearch.com for further questions regarding our in-depth research, insights or other press inquiries. Background: Counterpoint Technology Market Research is a global research firm specializing in Technology products in the TMT industry. It services major technology firms and financial firms with a mix of monthly reports, customized projects and detailed analysis of the mobile and technology markets. Its key analysts are experts in the industry with an average tenure of 13 years in the high-tech industry. Click HERE to visit or return to jeeni.com

Jeeni Blog