Music | MONEY AND MUSIC Sep 11, 2013

Tower Japan boss says biggest challenge facing record stores is attracting young customers

by Steve McClure

A few weeks ago I was preparing to do a guest slot on InterFM’s “The Selector” program, which features music mavens sharing their favorite tracks. While I had a few tunes from the not-so-recent past in mind, I needed some newer stuff to round ...

Music | MONEY AND MUSIC Jul 3, 2013

Japan's festival industry is stuck in a fine kettle of fish

by Steve McClure

Are summer festivals killing Japan’s live-music market? Weird question, right? Hundreds of thousands of people shell out gobs of yen every summer to see an amazing array of domestic and international acts rock out at festivals up and down the Japanese archipelago. (Organizers say ...

Music | MONEY AND MUSIC Jun 6, 2013

Been down so long, it looks like up

by Steve McClure

I’ve been to a lot of music-industry conferences over the years, and for the past decade I’ve listened to the same old song: How can the recording industry fight online piracy, which it blames for plunging music sales? So at this year’s Music Matters ...

Music | MONEY AND MUSIC May 2, 2013

Universal-EMI is the dinosaur in the room

by Steve McClure

Last September, the European Commission and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission approved Universal Music Group’s buyout of EMI. Since then, the two record companies have been merging their operations worldwide. In Japan, the combined Universal-EMI entity will have a market share of between 15 ...

Music | MONEY AND MUSIC Apr 4, 2013

Barakan wants InterFM to dial down the talk

by Steve McClure

While station-surfing on my car radio several years back, I chanced upon a program about Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page. The disc jockey said Page’s solo in “Stairway to Heaven” was among his best. The familiar strains of the Zep classic soon filled the air, ...