The Future of What

In an age where musicians are expected to meticulously audit their music data themselves to ensure money isn’t being left on the table, it is inevitable that something will get missed. Notes.FM is designed to lift this weight off of artists’ shoulders, having already found missing money for a total of 94% of their users – with the first artist that they claimed money for receiving $75,000 from The MLC. In this episode, Notes.FM founder Tim Luckow discusses his industry journey, goals for the platform, and more!

In an age where listeners can access any track at their fingertips, finding ways for artists to connect with superfans requires a creative approach – and Musicow has delivered exactly that. Originating in Korea, with the K-pop market already known for cultivating successful fan engagement strategies, the platform allows for fans to financially invest in the music they love. In this episode, Musicow US, IP CEO Marcus Sanchez explains the logistics behind the platform and how it differs from its Korean counterpart, plans for their “Fandom” project – which is already seeing success in its beta release of the track “Two Car Garage” by Jon Bellion and Swae Lee, and more!

Having noticed how difficult it was to obtain catalog info during his time at Hipgnosis Songs, Björn Lindvall set out to create a solution with MusicInfra, providing a scaled infrastructure that ensures works are accurately matched to recordings. Now, in an age where AI is generating more data than ever, such infrastructure has become even more crucial for rights management. In this episode, Björn speaks on the two products that the platform offers, how he is planning for this first generation of AI deals & new rights types, and more!

Music rights company Chordal has achieved a major licensing milestone, clearing 51,000 songs in the first six months of their InstantClear technology being live. In their TikTok’s commercial library integration alone, over 15% of those tracks already saw sync revenue. To achieve this success, they’ve leveraged the collaborative nature of the music industry to create a single environment where stakeholders can easily connect with one another through the songs they share rights on. In this conversation, Chordal Co-Founder & CEO Grayson Sanders explains how the platform works, the UGC issues that they are helping to mitigate through their TikTok partnership, and more!

Global artists and genres are no longer region-locked, having seen astronomical growth in recent years thanks to the age of digital connectivity. Recently, Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl appearance – combined with the rise of other Latin artists from all different regions such as Chris MJ and Groupo Frontera – have further bolstered the visibility of Latin genres. This special episode features interviews with Emilio Morales & Christopher Hernández of Bad Bunny’s publisher, Rimas Publishing, and Joaquín Fernández Esquivel of Latin marketing agency Chinelo Creative. Both conversations touch on specific examples of how culture & genre spread globally, advice for today's artists, marketing insights, and more! Link to the article by Kevin Kelly, cited by Joaquín: https://bit.ly/4lu7vxr

In celebration of Symphonic Distribution's 20th anniversary under the leadership of Jorge Brea & Janette Berrios, we bring you a special episode of The Future of What featuring the couple alongside our host Portia & her husband Slim Moon! The pairs discuss how they met their partners, as well as the origins of both Symphonic and Kill Rock Stars, touching on the opportunities & challenges of working in the same industry and workplace as your spouse. Jorge & Janette also speak on Symphonic's growth in the Latin market, the company’s emphasis on education, and keeping up with new technologies such as AI.

Songtradr was founded by artist & producer Paul Wiltshire as a solution for independent artists to upload their own tracks to be licensed all in one place, in response to him facing these struggles in his own career. Since then, the platform has expanded and tailored its strategy to the complexity of the music business by acquiring companies like 7digital, Big Sync, MassiveMusic and Bandcamp. In this episode, Songtradr CRO Paul Langworthy breaks down some of these industry complexities, touching on fragmentation, how connection doesn’t always require transparency, the looming threat of licensing infringement, and the importance of paying attention to new market players.

Music law is important for everyone in our industry to be familiar with, no matter your role or experience level. This episode features Matthew Wilson and Michelle Davis of Arnall Golden Gregory LLP, two entertainment lawyers who champion this belief by spreading their own wealth of knowledge to others via mentoring & education programs. The two discuss their respective backgrounds and involvement in academia, Music Biz’s #NEXTGEN_U Student Summit, the parallels between current & past legal proceedings in music copyright law, and more!

To keep pace with change, adapting to new technologies is essential. Good Boy Records has not only adapted, but created their own tech — an AI-powered legal platform called Clearnote. This platform was developed by Good Boy’s founders & their VP of Operations, Cameron Siasi, to meet the demand for a more streamlined legal process for industry attorneys, especially in an age where tens of thousands of songs generate legal paperwork on a weekly basis. In this interview, Cameron breaks down Clearnote’s contract creation & storing capabilities, and how the platform serves as an example of ways AI can improve efficiency in our industry.

After noticing artists spending more than they were getting at agencies, Danny Garcia developed SongTools to let music creators take control of their marketing campaigns via playlisting and ad tools. Though originally delivered primarily to artists themselves, SongTools has expanded to integrate within distribution platforms, producing success for partners like Symphonic where they drove a 70% client retention rate within 30 days. Here, Danny discusses the approach SongTools is taking to educate artists, how their playlisting ecosystem works & why it is important, along with how the platform navigates the influx of Gen AI music.

While traditional label models still dominated in 2014 when David Dann founded Mind of a Genius Records, the pendulum has swung in favor of artists and distribution deals in the digital era, setting the stage for the creation of Green Tea Distro. GTD provides support to artists at all stages and budgets, offering services from song development to monthly workshops to day-to-day A&R support. David joins us on the podcast to share his extensive artist development knowledge, including tips on audience building in an oversaturated market where we see before we hear, and the factors at play creating a youth-driven music industry.

After analyzing nearly 7 trillion streams and 70 trillion data points in the past 18 months, Beatdapp continues to advance the industry’s fraud protection efforts with their new Trust & Safety Operating System. Marking a milestone for Beatdapp, this platform is their first to provide for all sectors of the music industry while also being portable to gaming, creator platforms, streaming video, television and publishing. In this interview, Beatdapp’s Morgan Hayduk and Andrew Batey break down the five unique capabilities of the OS, the partnership behind their customer due diligence, the future of tracking AI, and how even the smallest of details – such as the version of an AI platform and device used to commit fraud – are pertinent in intervention.

Two years after the formation of the Music Fights Fraud Alliance (MFFA) and almost one year into Michael Lewan’s appointment as Executive Director, the organization has reached many milestones – including helping put together this year’s iteration of our annual Trust & Safety in Music Symposium! In this episode, Michael details the specific issues the MFFA tackles, what the alliance has accomplished since he joined last February, and discussion points he’s helped program for the symposium. He also touches on why it’s important for our industry to come together during a time when there is a high demand for anti-fraud measures across all sectors.

What began in 2007 as a hi-res music download store has grown into a vital platform for global music fans eager for a human-curated, high-quality listening experience. Qobuz has had a massive 2025, which saw them peak at #4 on the iOS App Store thanks in part to viral posts calling out their 24-bit hi-res streaming & download offerings and editorial team-led recommendations. This month, we talk to Qobuz’s Managing Director, Dan Mackta about the company’s history & recent success, how the Qobuz experience is akin to shopping for music at your local record store, the many ways it differentiates from the top DSPs of the day, and more!

Hopeless Records has passed its third decade in business since we last had label founder Louis Posen on the podcast, so we caught up with him once again to talk all things Hopeless and indie labels! In this episode, Louis walks us through the unique origin of Hopeless, its early ties with Fat Wreck Chords, and their strong commitment to charity – housing Sub City, Songs That Saved My Life and Hopeless Music Academy as a part of the Hopeless Foundation. He also dives into the importance of knowing both the creative and business side of the industry, the interesting place that indies sit in the music ecosystem today, and how the industry can better approach issues like supply & demand and AI.

The digital age has created a plethora of data resources for artists and their teams, but it has also highlighted the glaring disadvantages of unorganized, siloed workflows within our industry. As an event management, project management and business intelligence platform, Artist Growth is a testament to how more centralized information creates a better picture of exactly what is and isn’t working for an artist in real time. Hear from Artist Growth co-founder & CEO, Matt Urmy as he walks through the platform's history, examines parallels between data sharing practices during the emergence of both streaming and AI, and details two current marketplace pressures that are helping to break data siloes.

In this episode, we caught up with David Wolfe of The Vinyl Groove Records, Brian Burkert of The Sound Garden, and Mike Durham & Christina Wilson of Zia Records, who highlight the everlasting importance of physical music by diving into exciting happenings at each of their stores. Our guests discuss the impact of the recent Luminate + Street Pulse deal, how Black Friday serves as “Record Store Day Lite,” the resurgence of the CD, and the younger generation’s affinity for vinyl. They also touch on the role of record stores as hubs for community and music curation, trends affecting both their customer base and the products hitting the shelves, and much more!

The need for meaningful rights protection will always exist across both the video and audio content industries. Expanding their arm into the audio field with the acquisition of Pex, Vobile now provides solutions for both. We brought Vobile’s SVP of Sales, Larry Mills onto the podcast to discuss the robust sector of the music industry that is fighting against the mass scale of fraud occurring on a daily basis. Mills identifies the important differences between fraudulent assets and fraudulent behavior, along with improvements in fraud-fighting from distributors, and shares upcoming announcements from Vobile on how they’re ensuring ethical AI use!

Consideration of those in a caregiving role is often an afterthought in many industries, but creative industries add an extra layer of challenge due to inconsistent income and schedules. While looking for support in her journey of motherhood while maintaining a career in music, Mamas In Music co-founder Tiff Randol noticed a lack of community, and banded together with Mary Leay to create this support system. We connected with Tiff to discuss the events, partnerships and other initiatives Mamas In Music is looking to put forward, how we as an industry can collectively support mothers better, and much more!

Searching large catalogs via tags can be time-consuming, reinforce biases toward what we already know to save time, and leave a large portion of artist works unexplored. AIMS API looks to utilize AI as an assistive tool for objective and accurate full-catalog discovery via search options that include natural language prompts, similar audio matching, and lyric search to benefit clients working as editors, sound designers, music supervisors, and beyond. In this episode, AIMS CTO Einar Helde unpacks the company’s origins, how their search technologies work, and their upcoming search tool that has already become a sought-after product.