Music Week is delighted to reveal the incredible Arlo Parks as the cover star of our latest issue.
And her upcoming second album brings cause for celebration, not just because a bona fide UK breakthrough success is about to return, but because she does so with a plan to make the industry a better place for artists. With her candid new record My Soft Machine on the horizon, Music Week joins the Mercury Prize-winning indie star to talk mental health, breaking big and making a difference. On top of that, we also get insight from her manager, Ali Raymond of Beatnik Creative and Transgressive Records co-founder Toby L. This is the behind the scenes story of one of the most important records of the year.
When it comes to The Music Week Interview, meanwhile, we have something very big lined up as co-presidents Ed Howard and Briony Turner head up an Atlantic Records UK special. Howard and Turner are on a hot streak, as proven by their label winning Record Company Of The Year at the Music Week Awards in 2022. Just over three years into their tenure, Music Week meets the long-serving Warner pair to discuss their artist-first revolution, the state of UK talent and why, for these two executives, life at the top of a major label will never, ever be boring. As if that wasn’t enough, we also speak to Atlantic’s EVP Austin Daboh, GM Liz Goodwin and MD/president of promotions Damian Christian for an all-encompassing look at the label.
Also in the features section, it’s almost a year since Pete Black left the major label plugging world behind to join Ben Cooper’s radio revolution at Bauer Media Audio, and the company’s new director of music is loving life on the other side of the fence. Music Week meets the executive to talk breaking talent, delivering what the industry wants and ringing the changes.
Plus! Earache Records may have started 2023 with notable chart success, but the label has been firmly on the up for a while now, bucking industry trends to penetrate the mainstream with heavy alternative music. UK label head Tim Bailey tells Music Week how he and the team have done it and talks rock, risk taking and rewards...
Finally in this month's features section, we deliver a special report on the thriving neighbouring rights sector. It may not be the flashiest part of the music industry, but it stakes a bold claim as one of its most important and to prove just that, we gather a selection of the key players to debate the fall-out from the 2020s NR boom, talk international expansion and look ahead to the future of a sector that just won’t stand still...
This month’s edition of Hitmakers sees Cat Burns look back on the making of her viral smash Go. Meanwhile, the new edition of Mentor Me – a collaboration between Music Week and Girls I Rate – sees Kamille reveal her top career tips for entering the world of songwriting.
Nick Stewart stars in The Aftershow as the A&R who signed U2 to Island in 1980 – who is now CEO of anti-piracy business TCAT – reminisces about Bono, Irving Azoff , Chris Blackwell and more…
In this month's Big Story, we dig deep into the return of Record Store Day, looking at the new developments taking place in 2023. Also in Frontline, RCA and BBC Radio 1 execs open up about the ongoing campaign for the US R&B star SZA’s gold-certified album, SOS, which has become a global phenomenon. In our Spotlight Q&A, meanwhile, Sacha Lord, co-founder of Parklife & Warehouse Project, talks tickets, sustainability and backing the North.
This month’s On The Radar star is Libianca – a name which is reverberating around the world right now, thanks to her seismic viral smash People. Music Week meets the Minnesota-based singer to talk stardom, mental health and healing while Incoming sees Billie Marten tee up the release of her new album Drop Cherries. On top of that, Making Waves features rising Since ’93/Sony Music dance act Mette, plus our sync story profiles Parlophone-signed Gabriels’ hook up with Tanqueray.
Rising Star profiles Rob Harrison, the founder of Listen Generously who was responsible for pulling together the award-winning Island act FLO. Elsewhere, our start-up of the month is rights management platform Interstellar Music Services while our featured podcast is Emily White’s How To Build A Sustainable Music Career project.
In her new digital discourse column, Deviate Digital founder Sammy Andrews interrogates the perceived decline of social media networks while, in his new Centre Stage piece, Music Venue Trust CEO Mark Davyd argues why no more arenas should open to host live music events in the UK until we, as an industry, can guarantee they have a reliable and sustainable future talent pipeline that warrants them being opened.
And as ever, the expanded Archive section sees us flick through the pages of Music Week of yesteryear.
There’s all of this and our expanded monthly charts section, in which we present the Top 75 Singles and Albums of the previous month, accompanied by revamped analysis pages, plus a host of new listings. These include specialist genre Top 20s for Americana, Classical, Hip-Hop & R&B, Jazz, Country, Dance, Folk and Rock & Metal. The issue is also home to streaming, compilations and vinyl charts.
The new issue of Music Week is available from March 14.
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Cover photo: Koury Angelo
