MySpace Music is about to get several hundred thousand more songs songs, as it has just made deals with Nettwerk Music Group, INgrooves, IRIS Distribution, and RoyaltyShare. Plus, the music catalog of Wind-up Records, the nation’s largest independently owned and operated record label, will be available via MySpace Music’s existing distribution deal with Sony Music Entertainment.
“These important new partnerships will allow the MySpace Music community to access even more of their favorite independent music while enabling monetization opportunities for the newly licensed artists,” said New MySpace Music President Courtney William Holt. “We are thrilled to have our new partners on board and will continue our aggressive content acquisition efforts.”
Nettwerk, who is responsible for managing artists like Sarah McLachlan and Barenaked Ladies, includesl over 250 artists such as: Old Crow Medicine Show, The Weepies and Ladytron. The INgrooves deal gives MySpace Music access to songs from labels and artists like VP Records, K-Tel International, Fat Possum, Metal Blade, Dolly Parton, J Dilla, Thievery Corporation, Tila Tequila, The Crystal Method, Cary Brothers, Tracy Lawrence, Lady Sovereign, Too $hort, Paul Oakenfold and John Digweed.
IRIS Distribution provides labels like Chemikal Underground, Duck Down, K Records, Ninja Tune, and artists like She Wants Revenge, Mogwai, KRS-One, Marvin Gaye, Lou Reed, Modest Mouse, and Deerhunter. Royaltyshare has a catalog including George Carlin, Tesla and New World Records. Wind-up features artists like Evanescence, Creed, Seether and Finger Eleven.
The expansion of the MySpace Music catalog can do nothing but help, but Facebook continuing to close in on MySpace’s marketshare is not going to do the network any favors. Now that Facebook is offering custom tags for its markup language, you can probably expect to see a lot more diverse music-related apps going up there too.
