New Music Business Briefing: A “Cataclysmic Meltdown”, Prince Gives It Away For $1M, Net Radio Battles On and Much More

>>> The Economist takes a serious look at how higher royalty rates at net radio could seriously damage the music industry. (Economist) Labels seem to be getting pretty good at this self-destruction thing.

>>> And if that weren’t damming enough, one UK Manager says record labels are having a "cataclysmic meltdown"  and goes on to prove it. (Register UK)

>>> Prince got $1 million to give his new CD away with the Sunday Mail in the UK before its released anywhere else in the world. (Telegraph UK) Let retail howl. Its another brilliant marketing move for Prince.

>>> Victory has re-signed hard rockers Thursday.

>>> As part of a move to halt a slide in sales UK retailer HMV is opening an mp3 only download site with music from EMI and indies. (DMW)

>>> Late last week SoundExchange offered multi-channel net broadcaster a cap on advances and the Digital Music Association rejected it as a "stay if execution. And here is some YouTube video of the recent Congressional hearings on the higher royalty rates.(here)

>>> The death of album art: an interview with designers Invisible Creature. (IndieHQ)

>>> And because we don’t want you to miss anything…check out Hypebot’s New Music Business Week In Review.