CDJ News: SiriusXM Price Increases Coming in March

Well, satellite radio lovers, we have good news and bad news. The good news is that the positive stipulations to the Sirius XM merger deal will finally begin to bear fruit and a variety of new programming packages will be available. The bad news is that many current subscribers will see their fees increased. First and foremost, the basic subscription fee for the current programming package will not budge - as the providers stated during the merger battle, the core subscription will stay fixed at $12.95 per month with lump sum discounts intact. The primary change is one that will affect subscribers with multiple radios, as additional subscriptions will jump from $6.99 per month to $8.99 per month. The variety of new packages and a la carte plans revealed during the merger deal will be available as well however, ranging in price from $6.99 per month to $16.99 per month. Let’s have a look at all of the offerings:

• Sirius Everything (basic subscription): $12.95
• Best of Both (Sirius Everything plus Best of XM): $16.99
• A La Carte (50 Sirius channels a la carte): $6.99
• A La Carte Gold (100 Sirius and/or XM channels a la carte): $14.99
• Mostly Music: $9.99
• News, Sports and Talk: $9.99
• Family-Friendly: $11.95
• Family-Friendly plus Best of XM: $14.99

Plans that combine Sirius and XM programming will of course require a new radio. The other big change is the removal of the free internet streaming option. Currently, paying subscribers can enjoy free low-quality streaming over the internet or pay $2.99 for a high-quality 128k stream. The former will now be removed and all subscribers must pay $2.99 to enjoy programming via the internet. Of course that’s not a bad deal at all; a year of streaming will run $35.88 which is comparable to both Pandora and Last.fm ($36 each), and 25% cheaper than Slacker. These changes will take place on March 11 and users are invited to prepay for service prior to that date in order to be locked in at the current pricing for up to three more years. What say you satellite radio subscribers - happy, sad or indifferent?

 

Posted By: DJ KidRelly

 

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College DJ News: Jermaine Dupri Out As Head Of Island Records Urban Division

 

By Tai Saint-Louis

Atlanta-based producer Jermaine Dupri’s tenure as President of Island Records Urban Music has come to an end. A formal announcement of his departure from the position, which he has held for nearly two years, may come as early as Thursday (Jan 8).

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a source close to the situation confirmed to AllHipHop.com that Dupri has in fact been terminated effective immediately.

The Island Records Urban Division was created within the Island Def Jam Music Group a short time prior to Dupri’s hiring in February 2007. In the position, he oversaw the label’s entire urban music operations, reporting directly to label Chairman Antonio “L.A.” Reid and Steve Bartells, President of Island Music and COO of the Island Def Jam Music Group.

 

Having enjoyed tremendous success with Island Records songbird Mariah Carey on The Emancipation of Mimi, Dupri’s duties also included providing production for the Music Group’s entire roster.

In April 2008, Island/Def Jam announced the creation of TAG Records, a new venture with Procter & Gamble’s TAG brand to be helmed by Dupri. The partnership created a new marketing module that allowed for new talent, like So So Def/TAG artist Q, to be cross-promoted in conjunction with TAG body sprays through print, television, radio, and digital advertising.

No word on how Dupri’s departure will affect TAG Records, nor the roster of artists on So So Def, which has been distributed through Island Urban since 2007.

The Mixtape Portable DJ Mixer

And there goes another blow to soon to be extinct art of DJing…. We feel your pain Vinyl enthusiast! Now a first glance this apparent throwback cassette looks like your run of the mill tape that’s been 24-karat gold plated of course, but looks can be deceiving. The tape is actually a pocket-sized audio mixer for combining your favorite joints and jams from a pair of audio devices… That’s right, you can get the party cracking anywhere now. The Mix Tape Portable DJ Mixer lets you mash up tracks from any two iPods or any arbitrary portable music devices, and it’s duo 3.5mm stereo inputs and a single stereo output let you fade between two sources like that of an professional DJ mixer. You can find this exclusively from Urban Outfitters for just bucks, and you can also catch a better look at the gadget in the gallery after the cut
…dp

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Killahbeez.com: Arts, Beats, Fashion and Lifestyle

I recently had a quick e-terview with our friends at www.killahbeez.com. David Thai filled me in on the origins of the site: Killahbeez.com

David Thai:

"The summer of 2007 gave birth to Killahbeez.com. We felt that there were a lot of street culture blogs out there that were fairly one-dimensional, specializing in just music, fitteds, clothes or art and gearing specifically to one gender. We wanted to bring all of those offerings under one house and cater to everyone and talk about everything that influences the streets and vice versa.

Our Killahbeez.com family consists of members located out on the East Coast and the West Coast of North America. This helps gives us a diversified look at the culture and all that encompasses it.

We've conducted interviews with Bloc Party, Dave1 from Chromeo, Black Kids, Lykke Li, Clinton Sparks, Boys Noize, DJ Mehdi and fashion designer Erin Magee to name a few.

We also do concert reviews: http://www.killahbeez.com/category/music/concert-reviews/

But overall we generally write about stuff we genuinely like. Unlike other blogs that blog about every piece that comes out or song that comes out, we try to blog about stuff we like and provide some actual content to the writing. Definitely look up to magazines like Format Mag."

Make sure you check in with them from time to time, the site has cool stuff every dj should keep up with.......-dp


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DJ Kid Relly's - Basics of Music Promotion

DJ Kid Relly's - Basics of Music

Music promotion is all about hard work and consistency, if you want your music out there you are going to have to work long hours and dedicate time and money to do it right. If you can master the few basics of music promotion below you can be making money in the music industry for years to come as a musician or sitting behind a desk.

Radio

For a full rundown of information about radio promotions check out our article on radio promotions. Radio is a very important part of established artists who have a large or little fan base. You need to make sure you have a great song, a budget of at least ,000, and a manager or consultant who knows the basics of radio promotion, or if you have experience with radio it is always still a smart thing to hire an assistant to call stations and help with contests and requests because this is a very time consuming thing for musicians on the road -playing a lot of gigs.

Street Teams/Tastemakers (www.collegedj.net)

This is a great way to get the word out about an album or new single hitting the radio. This is also very cheap if you have a few fans who want to help out in return for free t-shirts, CD’s, and other products. This is a cheap yet effective way to gain a larger fanbase and exposure.

A very important part of your success is your fan base in your home town. You need to work on creating a large fan base in your region, this will create a constant stream of money coming in through CD sales and shows. To do this you can use a street team, put on free shows at local venues, talk with local press such as your newspaper to get featured in their music section if they have one, .....and just about anything that happens in the community you should be volunteering you services of music to venues such as local festivals and homecomings. Many artists who sign to major labels spend thousands on grassroots marketing once they are signed to make sure their album sells. There is nothing that beats hometown fans, they are usually more loyal and take pride in your career.

Internet Networking

The internet is becoming the fastest growing way for musicians to get their material out there. I have known three artists personally who have been signed to major labels with large deals just off of an A&R hearing their Myspace and seeing that they had a following. One artist sent a message to check out his music and he ended up getting a deal with one of the largest labels, Sony BMG. The internet is a great tool for getting the word out about you as well as shows, albums, and more. And the best part of this is that it is very cost effective, most promotion such as Myspace and promoting on message boards is free. With the internet it has become easier and easier for garage bands to become overnight stars.

Checkout this tutorial about getting traffic to your page! It’s not fun but the content is very good……

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