Dr. Dre’s Beats Music Pulls Out The Big Bucks, Make Huge Power Move

Written By S. Samuel

Beats Music is making sure to do everything in its power to keep it a premium contender for streaming music content with the acquisition of a popular media company.

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According to reports, Beats Music chief executive Ian Rogers broke the news of the company taking over retail platform Topspin Media.

Rogers, who had left his position as CEO of Topspin a year ago to join Beats, announced the deal in a blog post, saying, “The acquisition brings a team of talented people who have spent years working on building and fine-tuning the artist-to-fan connection into the Beats Music experience. Topspin + Beats Music combines music discovery and direct relationships between artists and fans in a revolutionary way.” (Billboard Biz)

The Beats Music executive also stressed how much of a positive impact the move would have on musicians.

After a year of watching artists bash streaming music for not paying enough to musicians, Beats Music launched its service in January with an eye toward positioning itself as a service that is friendly to artists, a message that Rogers re-iterated in his blog. “We’re committed to establishing Beats Music as a conduit for the artist-fan relationship, a platform where artists have a voice, and a provider of useful data and analytics on how fans interact with artists and their music,” Rogers wrote. “This acquisition puts our money where our mouth is.” (Billboard Biz)

Back in January, the music streaming company held a launch party in Los Angeles.

In front of a very Hollywood-friendly crowd that included Paul McCartney, Selena Gomez, Drake, Macklemore, Universal’s Ron Meyer, John Singleton, Brian Grazer, Michael Rapaport and Pink, Beats principle (and Interscope chairman) Jimmy Iovine talked up the curatorial depth of the company’s new Spotify competitor, and used the night’s performance to demonstrate the concept, presenting a ’90s hip-hop Beats “playlist” allegedly curated by Eminem manager Paul Rosenberg, as performed live by the artists themselves. (Variety)

Music producer DJ Jazzy Jeff also showed up and kept the party going behind the turntable.

Granted, the “playlist” seemed to move in roughly chronological order through the decade, with each artist performing their signature hit, but the show still boasted an almost ludicrously packed bill, cycling through perfs from Beats founder Dr. Dre, Eminem, Ice Cube, Nas, Blackstreet, the Pharcyde, Cypress Hill, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony (whose five members’ rapid-fire rhymes proved a bit too much for even an audio company to mix properly), Souls of Mischief, Ma$e, Diddy, Method Man and Redman, the Geto Boys and Busta Rhymes at a rather dizzying pace. DJ Jazzy Jeff led a seven-piece band through each number, with Fab 5 Freddy serving as the night’s emcee. (Billboard)

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Written by S. Samuel

Steven Samuel is the co-founder of SOHH.com.

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