Global Markets
Today’s music industry is international at a fundamental level. Music Ally’s analysis – from our team located around the world – reflects this. Regular Country Profiles feature deep insight from people on the ground; and our news analysis thinks local and looks global.
QUICK LINKS
- Music Ally Japan
- Country Profiles
- India Insight
- Insight Report: International
GLOBAL NEWS BY REGION
- Latest Analysis: Europe
- Latest Analysis: North America
- Latest Analysis: Central & Latin America
- Latest Analysis: Middle East & North Africa
- Latest Analysis: Sub-Saharan Africa
- Latest Analysis: SE Asia & Australasia
- Latest Analysis: South Asia
LATEST GLOBAL news
Misheard ‘Doobie Scoot Canoe’ lyric fuels a big TikTok surge
Excuse me while I kiss this guy… All the lonely Starbucks lovers… Parrot, parrot, parrot eyes… and now Doobie Scoot Canoe.
Read more >>
MORE LATEST GLOBAL news
Misheard ‘Doobie Scoot Canoe’ lyric fuels a big TikTok surge
Excuse me while I kiss this guy… All the lonely Starbucks lovers… Parrot, parrot, parrot eyes… and now Doobie Scoot Canoe.
Read more >>
Impala outlines new five-step plan for the digital-music market
European independent-music body Impala is never shy about putting forward its views on how the music industry should develop.
Read more >>
Musician Dave Rowntree loses appeal in PRS for Music battle
Blur drummer Dave Rowntree has received another, seemingly-final setback in his battle against UK collecting society PRS for Music.
Read more >>
Understanding Latin America’s Music Market: Platforms, Fans, and Growth Opportunities
By Randi Zimmerman, Content Specialist, Symphonic Latin America was one of the fastest-growing recorded music regions in 2024, with revenue up 22.5%. Today, the region continues to shape global pop, hip-hop, dance, streaming culture, and the way music moves across borders. But LATAM’s influence isn’t just about Spanish-language hits reaching bigger audiences. Artists here are…
Read more >>
Lume to offer fans ‘the world of an album’ – and Lorde is on board
It’s a year since the release of Lorde’s fourth album, ‘Virgin’, and she celebrated the anniversary by dropping 49 demos.
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
SIGN UP NOW: FREE WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
The Knowledge: free, fun*, and every Friday!
It’s your weekly mix of news, analysis, strategies, and insider tips from Music Ally. (Plus all the weird links & odd music we find online.) Sign up & impress your friends/boss/dog!
*actual levels of fun may vary wildly
GLOBAL NEWS BY REGION – select a tab to filter:
Misheard ‘Doobie Scoot Canoe’ lyric fuels a big TikTok surge
Excuse me while I kiss this guy… All the lonely Starbucks lovers… Parrot, parrot, parrot eyes… and now Doobie Scoot Canoe.
Read more >>Impala outlines new five-step plan for the digital-music market
European independent-music body Impala is never shy about putting forward its views on how the music industry should develop.
Read more >>Musician Dave Rowntree loses appeal in PRS for Music battle
Blur drummer Dave Rowntree has received another, seemingly-final setback in his battle against UK collecting society PRS for Music.
Read more >>
Innovate UK launches £10m funding competition for ‘createch’ startups – music included
Innovate UK’s latest competition will see it invest up to £10m in ‘createch’ startups. The good news is that music is included.
Read more >>
Reactional Music wins €2.5 million EIC grant to scale gaming “music monetisation layer”
We’ve written about Stockholm-based Reactional Music a lot before, including a series of partnerships with industry rightsholders, and a $2m fundraising round. Their premise is a tantalising one: a platform that helps game developers not only add music to their games in a rights-compliant way, but to also make the game ‘react’ to that music in real-time.…
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
Understanding Latin America’s Music Market: Platforms, Fans, and Growth Opportunities
By Randi Zimmerman, Content Specialist, Symphonic Latin America was one of the fastest-growing recorded music regions in 2024, with revenue up 22.5%. Today, the region continues to shape global pop, hip-hop, dance, streaming culture, and the way music moves across borders. But LATAM’s influence isn’t just about Spanish-language hits reaching bigger audiences. Artists here are…
Read more >>
Music Ally Insight Report :: International Focus 2026
Welcome to our sixth annual Music Ally International Focus report – where we bring all of Music Ally’s Country Profiles published in the last 12 months into one place.
Read more >>
Canadian government rows back on ‘streaming tax’ for DSPs
Global streaming services are cheering after Canada’s government announced a u-turn for the country’s levy on the DSPs’ revenues in the country. The levy was part of Canada’s Online Streaming Act, and was swiftly dubbed ‘the streaming tax’ by the services as they fought against giving up 5% of their local revenues to support Canadian…
Read more >>
Canada’s levy on global video-streaming services has tripled to 15%
Music-streaming services have been campaigning hard in the last two years against a levy on their Canadian revenues by the country’s telecommunications regulator the CRTC, to fund local content and creators. The DSPs and their industry body DiMA were furious about what they called the ‘streaming tax’, which required them to make a “base contribution” of 5%…
Read more >>
Mexican corridos music has doubled its stream-share since 2020
Corridos is one of the most traditional music genres, going back through centuries of Mexican storytelling. But it’s now also a thoroughly-modern trend thanks to its streaming growth. A new report from Chartmetric and Duetti has more details on that, hailing corridos as “the third fastest-growing genre in the world by superstar growth rate” with almost…
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
MORE LATEST GLOBAL news
Understanding Latin America’s Music Market: Platforms, Fans, and Growth Opportunities
By Randi Zimmerman, Content Specialist, Symphonic Latin America was one of the fastest-growing recorded music regions in 2024, with revenue up 22.5%. Today, the region continues to shape global pop, hip-hop, dance, streaming culture, and the way music moves across borders. But LATAM’s influence isn’t just about Spanish-language hits reaching bigger audiences. Artists here are…
Read more >>
Music Ally Insight Report :: International Focus 2026
Welcome to our sixth annual Music Ally International Focus report – where we bring all of Music Ally’s Country Profiles published in the last 12 months into one place.
Read more >>
Grammy Awards add new categories including Asian Pop and Latin
The US Grammy Awards are getting new categories for 2027, including two that continue its expansion into international genres and scenes.
Read more >>
Music business ended 2025 with 921.6m paid streaming subscribers
By the end of this year, it’s quite possible that there will be more than one billion music subscribers globally.
Read more >>
Sua Música hails 5m first-week streams for Ronaldinho’s Tu Música label
Here’s a pop-quiz question to store in your memory banks: how many listeners does retired Brazilian football star Ronaldinho have on Spotify? The answer, right now, is 2.4 million. This is thanks to the recent launch of his Tu Música label, a partnership with Brazilian streaming service and distributor Sua Música. The latter has published some stats…
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
MORE LATEST GLOBAL news
Here’s looking at you, Def Jam… Label expands in Casablanca
Universal Music Group’s global expansion of its Def Jam label continues, following previous launches in South-East Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, India, Sweden and China. Where to next? Of all the markets, in all the towns, in all the world, it’s launched in Casablanca with Def Jam Recordings North Africa. Its focus will be on the wider Maghreb region – the western part of…
Read more >>
No Music For Genocide calls for Eurovision boycott over Israel
Earlier this week, we reported on an open letter pushing back on calls for Israel to be kicked out of the Eurovision Song Contest. We predicted (not that riskily, let’s be honest) at the time that “as Eurovision draws nearer, criticism of Israel’s participation, as well as defences of it, will only get louder.” That didn’t…
Read more >>
PopArabia adds distribution with acquisition of Viral Wave
PopArabia has made its name with publishing and label services across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, but now it is adding distribution too. The company is acquiring label and distributor Viral Wave, which is based in Egypt’s capital Cairo. Its senior commercial manager Rania Ibrahim will oversee the company in a role as…
Read more >>
Open letter pushes back on calls to ban Israel from Eurovision
Israel’s participation in the Eurovision Song Contest is one of the hottest music-political potatoes in the world right now, just under a month before the event in Austria. In December, Ireland, Spain, the Netherlands and Slovenia pulled out of this year’s contest in protest at Israel not being excluded because of the war in Gaza – and also…
Read more >>
Music Ally Connect keynotes: Kobalt, SoundExchange, AudioSalad and more
Our coverage from last week’s Music Ally Connect conference continues with this wrap of some of the keynote sessions from the two-day event.
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
MORE LATEST GLOBAL news
Music Ally Insight Report :: International Focus 2026
Welcome to our sixth annual Music Ally International Focus report – where we bring all of Music Ally’s Country Profiles published in the last 12 months into one place.
Read more >>
Korin AI is ’trained with African datasets, built by Africans’
The biggest AI-music startups are based in the US, while there are plenty of innovative firms launching out of Europe and Asia. But Africa, too, has an emerging AI ecosystem. Korin AI is a good example. While its website is currently in a holding pattern ahead of its ‘Korin 2.0’ upgrade launch next week, news site OkayAfrica has…
Read more >>
Why infrastructure is the key to Africa’s long-term music success: guest column
Guest column: Music Ally publishes guest columns voicing the opinions of notable authors, or advancing specific perspectives on important issues. These are chosen at the Editorial team’s discretion, are not paid-for, and do not necessarily reflect Music Ally’s own opinion. You can read our guest column policy here, and the guest column archive here. This…
Read more >>
Report explores ‘streaming paradox’ for artists in five countries
The latest study exploring musicians’ views on the music-streaming economy comes from the Oxford Internet Institute and researchers at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. They surveyed 1,200 musicians for a report that deliberately focused its attention beyond the US and UK. Instead, the responses came from artists in the Netherlands, Nigeria, South Korea,…
Read more >>
Uganda copyright bill aims to improve royalties for musicians
A lot has been written about copyright reform in the US, UK and other big western markets recently – largely focused on how these laws should be updated for the AI era. However, elsewhere in the world reform can still mean setting up the basics of protecting the rights of musicians, authors, filmmakers and other creators.…
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
MORE LATEST GLOBAL news
Japan creates public performance right for recorded music
The Japanese government has approved an amendment to the Japanese Copyright Act regarding music playback in public spaces. Performing artists and record companies will now be paid when their recorded music is played publicly. Previously, only songwriters and composers automatically received royalties. It also means that Japanese performers should now be paid equivalent royalties from abroad – because…
Read more >>Music Ally Insight Report :: International Focus 2026
Welcome to our sixth annual Music Ally International Focus report – where we bring all of Music Ally’s Country Profiles published in the last 12 months into one place.
Read more >>
South Korean government launches fund for smaller K-Pop firms
The K-Pop sector is dominated by the ‘big four’ companies: Hybe, SM Entertainment, JYP Entertainment and YG Entertainment. However, the South Korean government wants more competition in the market, and its new fund aims to give smaller K-Pop firms a launchpad for growth. The ‘Global Leap Forward Support’ fund will award up to KRW 300m…
Read more >>
WMG’s latest moves: Bengali-music deal and APAC accelerator
There is news of two expansions for Warner Music Group this morning, starting with a partnership in India with SVF Entertainment.
Read more >>Music business ended 2025 with 921.6m paid streaming subscribers
By the end of this year, it’s quite possible that there will be more than one billion music subscribers globally.
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
MORE LATEST GLOBAL news
Spotify India enters into “first-of-its-kind telco partnership” with Vi
Vi—which was created from the merger of the telecom companies Vodafone India and the Aditya Birla Group conglomerate’s Idea Cellular—has entered into a partnership with Spotify. Through the tie-up, Vi subscribers with either an individual or family plan who have not previously used Spotify, will get three months’ complimentary access to the DSP’s Premium Standard…
Read more >>
Sonu Nigam’s I Believe Your Music will bring other artists under his label
On his birthday—which falls on 30 July—in 2020, Sonu Nigam launched his own label I Believe Music. This year, the veteran Indian film playback and pop singer used another special occasion, Word Music Day—celebrated on 21 June—to start another initiative, I Believe Your Music (IBYM), which is “designed to discover, mentor, support, and elevate emerging…
Read more >>
(Another) AI Roundup: indie artists react to YouTube AI claims; Facebook; ErosMusic Worlds; and Modulate
We’re being flooded with AI news this week, so for the sake of our sanity, we’ve once again rounded it all up for you to digest in one crispy AI nugget: Earlier this month, Google and YouTube’s parent company Alphabet claimed that it has the right to use songs uploaded to YouTube to train its Lyria 3 AI-music model.…
Read more >>
UK-based Virtuoso Music expands into India
UK-based music company Virtuoso Music, which is “dedicated to empowering artists, amplifying creativity and creating experiences”, has announced its expansion into India. Like in the UK, the firm will work with independent artists, songwriters, producers and publishers as well as major labels across the south Asian nation, in the areas of music creation and distribution,…
Read more >>
Diljit Dosanjh breaks own record with North American leg of ‘Aura’ tour
Attendance and revenue figures for tours by Indian acts are hard to come by. Among the exceptions are the record-breaking runs by Diljit Dosanjh. The 15-date, 13-city North American leg of the Punjabi singer’s Aura World Tour, which was held between 23 April and 21 June, drew more than 225,000 attendees and grossed $32m, says…
Read more >>Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.