Kobalt Music Group has added another marquee name to its roster with the signing of smoking-hot Australian artist Gotye to a worldwide music publishing deal. The new pact, inked by Kobalt Music Publishing Australia, does not cover Australia and New Zealand, where independent music firm Alberts represents the artist’s catalog.

The Concord Music Group/Hear Music catalog of Paul McCartney was ordered removed from subscription services, affecting some of his recent solo albums, as well as a slew of older releases by McCartney and Wings that were reissued in 2010.

While Bruno Mars has six nominations for this Sunday's Grammy Awards -- including one for album of the year for the worldwide best-seller "Doo-Wops and Hooligans -- it's also the Smeezingtons time to shine. The trio is nominated in the producer of the year category for their hits with Mars, but also Lil Wayne and the Far East Movement.

Vevo made headlines last week when the video service announced it had generated $150 million in revenue in 2011. A week later some independent music publishers are saying it’s time they got their share. Also, Flingo plans to use the $7 million it has raised in Series A funding from August Capital to build out the infrastructure for its automatic content recognition technology. And comedian Louis CK proves that young People will pay for content through his recent video offering.  

The top four publishing companies – EMI Music, Universal Music, Warner/Chappell and Sony/ATV — are reporting a healthy marketplace for synchs and placements at the Super Bowl, with each having at least six placements in ads.

Nine of EDM's most influential business creatives, from DJ/Producer Afrojack to HARD Events founder Gary Richards to Atom Empire co-founder Stephanie LaFera.

Drake's ex-girlfriend, Ericka Lee, has claimed she was the voice on the other end of the now-famous phone call in "Marvin's Room," and is now suing Drake for excluding her from sharing co-writer royalties

Universal Music Publishing Group executive VP of international Andrew Jenkins has been elected as chair of the International Confederation of Music Publishers at the organization’s general assembly annual meeting, held at MIDEM on Jan. 29, serving a two-year term. Elsewhere, Imagem signed two global publishing deals, and Reel Muzik Werks signed up La Toya Jackson and others.

The magazine will be pairing each of the 17 indie bands with a different model, will release new or previously unreleased tracks on SI.com, and will feature 10 of the bands at a two-day music festival at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas, headlined by the Black Lips.

Edgar Bronfman’s widely reported comments opposing Universal’s purchase of EMI’s recorded-music division are just baseball as usual, sources say, noting that opposition is usually made in private. Besides, the regulatory agencies will probably pay more attention to retailers, artists and indie labels and publishers …

Billy Ray Cyrus, country star and father of singer/actress Miley, signed with Amazon.com to publish his upcoming memoir "Hillbilly Heart," due out in the spring of 2013.

Colombia’s Authors and Composers Society (SAYCO) the country’s leading performance rights society, has been stripped of its duties for one month beginning Jan. 31 following a wide range of mismanagement accusations.

Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff are "honored" to have written and produced "TSOP (The Sound of Philadelphia)" -- aka the theme to "Soul Train," which has been playing throughout the world in the wake of host Don Cornelius' death on Wednesday. Gamble recalls the creation of that song.

Seven-time Grammy Award winner Willie Nelson has signed with Legacy Records in a deal that will allow him to personally curate a series of archival releases and put out five new albums, beginning this Spring.

Billboard's 2012 Grammy Awards hub.

Sony Corp. announced Wednesday that Kazuo Hirai, who leads the company's core consumer products business, will replace Howard Stringer as CEO and president as the electronics and entertainment company tries to turn around its fortunes.

Pitbull, a permanent force on the Billboard charts in the past 24 months, will be honored with BMI’s President’s Award at the 19th annual BMI Latin Music Awards taking place March 30 at the Encore Wynn Las Vegas.

On his last day as chairman of Warner Music Group, Edgar Bronfman Jr. promised that the company will fight Universal’s purchase of EMI “tooth and nail,” adding that it strikes him as “hubris particularly for Universal to think it's going to be easy to buy EMI, and frankly to think they can buy EMI at all."

The FBI’s spectacular raid of Megaupload in New Zealand for alleged copyright infringement has reenergized the online piracy debate in Europe, from government and media all the way down to online forums and blogs, radicalizing positions but also spurring calls for negotiations to find some kind of middle ground.

Kobalt Music Group and founder/CEO Willard Ahdritz hosted a party Monday night at the Carlton Hotel, where Kobalt clients Joss Stone and Paul van Dyk made appearances, as well as execs from Stromatolite, SENA, AWAL and Tommy Boy Records.