This week? Heavy Hitters. As you may (or may not) have heard, journalist/Daniel Ek tormenter/friend-of-the-pod Liz Pelly is making waves with her wonderful new book “Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist.” It’s easily the best thing yet written about the company at the center of modern music, insightfully reconstructing how Spotify’s shifting interests and policies have remade how we listen, who we listen to, and what they get paid.

To get a deeper perspective on both the book and the histories it emerges from, we also called up David Turner—of the late (lamented) Penny Fractions—pulling him out of retirement for one last big music + capitalism score. Together Liz, David, and Sam dive into everything from the economics of ghost artists and the aesthetics of vibes-based listening to the intentional destruction of cultural context in the streaming age. It’s a conversation that helps clarify the singularity of Spotify culture—and allows us to better detach its operations from the meaning of digital music. Come for the playlists. Stay for what they’ve done to you.

Buy Liz Pelly's book "Mood Machine"

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Look. Times are dark. So this week, we decided to tackle a somewhat lighter topic and look into Drake’s remarkably tone-deaf lawsuit against Universal Music Group—the label to which both he and (beef opponent) Kendrick Lamar are signed. In essence, Drake alleges that UMG used all their influence to make Kendrick’s Grammy-winning diss track “Not Like Us” a viral mega-hit. Which, like…yeah. Of course they did. They are in the business of producing viral mega-hits.

While the context of the lawsuit—namely, multiple violent attacks on Drake’s house—is quite serious, it’s hard not to find the whole thing ridiculous. After over a decade of industry machinations, Aubrey really had the nerve to sue UMG for…hurting his feelings? [Yes, it’s actually for defamation of character, but in the court of public opinion, those two are pretty much synonymous] Despite this, the actual content of the legal filing is fascinating—offering readers a guided tour of exactly what UMG is doing out there, hosted by someone who really knows how the sausage gets made. Payola? Selective copyright enforcement? Contract negotiation hardball? You betcha. THEN: Saxon and Sam get a little loose and take a jog through the Grammys. Album Of The Year? Sure. But also…who did you have for Immersive Audio?

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The second Trump administration will impact pretty much everything, but we decided to take some time and focus on the specific conjecture of industry + culture + technology that is AI. After all, when Biden came to office, LLMs were just really starting to get going—while the last 12 months have seen a mind-bending set of developments, both in terms of corporate activity and technical possibility. Given the rate of both change and adoption, the next 4 years will almost certainly be crucial, potentially locking us into a long-term pathway with both these machines AND the companies that make them.

So…what might happen? And how will it impact music, given the massive copyright lawsuits currently working their way through the courts? Saxon and Sam put on their tinfoil hats, got out their crystal ball, and…did their best. The resulting conversation moves from big (contradictory impulses between protectionism and libertarianism within the Trump coalition?) to bigger issues (War? Stock market crash?) to the generally intangible (shifting relationships between Americans and the ideologies of cultural authority?) Come for a connect-the-dots conversation that links Elon Musk and AGI to the possibility of earning a living by making art. Stay because at least we’re all doomed together.

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For more background, check our our episode on AI + Copyright Lawsuits in Music.