Random music news for Thursday, February 7, 2019

Back on this day in 1962, the US banned Cuban cigars. They’re still banned, right? Moving to music news for February 7, 2019…

1. This woman was a victim in the Bataclan massacre. She’s had 25 surgeries.
2. Ozzy has been admitted to hospital suffering from complications of the flu.
3. We have new details on the upcoming AC/DC album.
4. Poll: People seem to love the idea of Spotify’s “mute artist” feature.
5. Angela Ahrendts, the woman who came over from Burberry to run Apple’s retail operations five years ago, will leave the company in April.
6. Had he lived Bob Marley would have turned 74 yesterday. Here’s a remembrance.
7. Danish radio has banned all R Kelly songs.
8. There’s no love between Ariana Grande and the producers of the Grammys. She won’t be appearing.
9. TV not big enough? Samsung has a new 292-inch display.
10. Maroon 5 did see a sales boost from appearing during the Super Bowl halftime show. Downloads by the six Maroon songs featured during those 13 minutes showed a 587% increase. But don’t get too excited. Total sales or some from all performers were just 25,000. Meh.
11. Spotify has purchased two podcast networks. They’re serious about the medium–and about diversifying away from being just about music. There are more acquisitions coming, too.
12. Meanwhile, Spotify has not only set a new high for paying subscribers but also turned a profit for the first time.
13. A silly Brexit dance. I wonder what Pulp thinks about this?
14. There are now 5 billion mobile phones in use globally with 2.5 billion of them being of the smartphone variety.
15. More Canadians are buying smart speakers. About 20% of adults have one a Google Home unit. More than one-third of Canadian owners use theirs to listen to AM/FM radio. More details here.
16. Smart speakers continue to grow in the US with 66 million now in use. Most of them are powered by Alexa.
17. This is a new location-based music sharing app. Interesting. It’s Canadian, too.
18. The US State Department just spent $84,375 on a sculpture by Bob Dylan.
19. Bored at work? Try this game.
20. This dude broke into Taylor Swift’s house. He’s going to jail.
21. There are new emojis for 2019 because we need more emojis.