Drake blog by MIDiA Research

Blog: Drake

Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the digital entertainment world. Check out the latest from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage - games, video, music, audio, social, or critical developments.

‘Song of the summer’ may be dead, but 2024 was the summer of song

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Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

22 Aug 2024

fragmented fandom

Music Streaming

Over the past few years, MIDiA has often remarked at the lack of a “song of the summer” . There was once a singular undeniable hit each summer, one that everyone could agree on, like ‘One Dance’...

What Drake got wrong — and right — with 100 Gigs

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Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

15 Aug 2024

fragmented fandom

bifurcation theory

On August 6th , with no prior announcement, Drake unloaded 100 gigabytes’ worth of content, including songs and video clips, to a personal website and directed fans there via his Instagram burner account....

Another Fake Drake? AI is decoupling artists and their voices (and there’s no coming back)

Cover image for Another Fake Drake? AI is decoupling artists and their voices (and there’s no coming back)

Blog post by Hanna Kahlert

12 Jun 2024

heart on my sleeve

Drake has had perhaps one of the most publicly up-and-down relationships with generative AI. There was the AI Drake music generator, which he was dead set against. Then there was ‘Heart on My Sleeve’,...

Kendrick vs. Drake is a rare ‘mainstream’ moment — and streaming is on the sidelines

Cover image for Kendrick vs. Drake is a rare ‘mainstream’ moment — and streaming is on the sidelines

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

9 May 2024

bifurcation theory

Over the last week, it has been hard to go anywhere, or speak to anyone, without some mention of the epic diss track battle between Drake and Kendrick Lamar. When is the last time we could say that about...

A new era of music fluidity is here

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Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

23 May 2023

What do AI Drake, adaptive music, and TikTok open-verse challenges have in common? All reflect a major shift of music consumption from a passive, static, and uni-directional experience to an active, dynamic,...

The future of entertainment lies in collaborating with audiences themselves

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Blog post by Hanna Kahlert

26 Apr 2023

After two years of the Covid boom, the tide that buoyed tech and digital entertainment companies has begun to recede. The likes of Meta, Netflix, and even Apple and Alphabet have all seen stock dips, largely...

Why AI generation might be just what music needs

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Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

25 Apr 2023

artificial intelligence

Music Streaming

In her hit ‘Saoko’, Rosalía celebrates her multi-dimensionality, singing (translated from Spanish): “I contradict myself, I transform / I’m everything, I transform”. As artists navigate the...

AI will transform music; the question is how?

Cover image for AI will transform music; the question is how?

Blog post by Mark Mulligan

18 Apr 2023

Artifical Intelligence

Every new technology goes through a period of being overhyped before the dust settles, and that technology either fades or builds steadily thereafter. Think 3D printing, VR, NFTs. In my 20+ years as a...

Music is not a level playing field — it is a field of all levels

Cover image for Music is not a level playing field — it is a field of all levels

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

18 Aug 2022

Music Streaming

fragmented fandom

We have heard it (and said it) many times before: the music industry has never been as competitive as it is today. But the challenge is not just that today’s landscape is ultra-competitive, it is also...

Ellie Goulding and Billie Eilish Are Streaming’s New Normal

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Blog post by Mark Mulligan

3 Jan 2020

Christmas number one

Less than a week into the new decade and we already have the first indications that the streaming rulebook continues to be rewritten faster than the ink can dry on its last entry. Three separate articles,...

Seven Developments in Recorded Music in the 2010s (and the Songs that Defined them)

Blog post by Zach Fuller

6 Nov 2019

cultural insight

Decade retrospectives are almost doomed to fail. Assess the 60s in 1969 and you would have likely overweighed the influence of Grand Funk Railroad compared to The Velvet Underground. When it comes to the...

Songwriters Aren’t Getting Paid Enough and Here’s Why

Blog post by Mark Mulligan

10 Sep 2019

Music Business Worldwide recently ran a story on how Apple has proposed a standard streaming rate for songwriters, with Google and Spotify apparently resistant. Of course, Apple can afford to run Apple...

Culture Bubbles: Is Trap the Disco of the 2010s?

Blog post by Zach Fuller

27 Jul 2018

cultura bubbles

The tipping point in the 2015 film The Big Short, based on Michael Lewis’s book on the 2008 financial crisis, is when it dawns on Steve Carrell’s character upon traveling down from New York City to...

‘Nice for What?’ and the Slow Death of the Album

Blog post by Zach Fuller

10 Apr 2018

beggars banquet

death of the album

I write this week’s blog conflicted between the music fan who grew up on the album and the MIDiA analyst looking at the numbers (an eternal struggle). Alongside the feature-length film, the LP was one...

Do Not Assume We Have Arrived At Our Destination

Blog post by Mark Mulligan

15 Jun 2017

Forbes has released its annual Celebrity 100, its list of the top earning media stars. The healthy share of music artists hints at the continued ability to build highly successful music careers. The presence...

Drake's More Life is the New Normal in Streaming

Blog post by Zach Fuller

23 Mar 2017

Released over the weekend after much delay, Drake’s More Life project is setting records across the board on streaming platforms. The Canadian artist described More Life as ‘a body of work bridging...

Welcome To The Post-DIY Era

Blog post by Mark Mulligan

20 Mar 2017

I recently took part in the True Music Forum in Madrid, an event organized by Boiler Room. I was on a panel that explored whether DIY is now coming of age with a host of high profile artists, most of them...

Technology Roots: Why Hip-Hop and Dance Leaves Rock Behind in the Streaming Era

Blog post by Zach Fuller

19 Aug 2016

chance the rapper

The Tidal, Spotify and Apple Music exclusives Cold-War reveals something telling: from Drake, to Chance the Rapper, Frank Ocean and The Weeknd, the quest to garner exclusives has been done almost entirely...