In SXSW keynote, industry veteran Lyor Cohen predicts “golden era” for music industry, remembers “sheer terror” on his first job

Music industry veteran Lyor Cohen, now head of music at YouTube, regaled the audience with a mix of anecdotes and predictions during his keynote speech at South By Southwest (SXSW).

One was his belief that the music industry is entering a “golden era” that he’s “excited to be a part of,” powered by innovations in technology and distribution as well as art.

But he warned that the consolidation of distribution between Spotify and Apple could end up a “two horse race” and also lamented a lack of “impresarios” in the market.

To avoid the two horse race, “We’ll do that by adding subscriptions”.

He returned to the topic: “The industry is going to return and grow by ads and subscription.

“There are plenty of leaned in listeners that are willing to pay and we are going to convert them to paid subscribers.

“I made a promise to this industry. A place where more money goes back to the artists and labels, that's my promise. And I'm sticking to it.”

Cohen’s speech was essentially a chronology of his illustrious 40-year career, punctuated with tracks from each part, played by DJ D-Nice from hip-hop group Boogie Down Productions, whom Cohen road-managed in the 1980s.

Among other subjects touched over the hour on were:

* YouTube’s upcoming Remix subscription service: “We know we’re late to the party, but we are making an enormous investment to launch a product that you will be proud of.

“It combines the best of Google Play’s context server and the breadth and depth of YouTube’s catalogue.

“We are going to collaborate and work closely with our label partners to understand their priorities and help them promote and break artists.

“Breaking artists is still my drug and I get to do it here at Google and YouTube on a massive scale around the world.

“This is a huge and powerful tool and platform for artists and labels.”

* Among the acts that YouTube broke: “Dua Lipa, Camila Cabello and Ozuna,”

* His first job: road managing a young Run DMC At the start of their first European tour, at a sold-out London show, the band realised that their DJ, the late Jam Master Jay, had forgotten to pack his records for the trip.

“I met sheer terror when I was 22-years-old,” he recounted of that night.

But he came up with an idea. Still terrified he walked out on stage and said that Run DMC would sign autographs.

“But we’re going to prioritize those that brought the records.”

* Sexual allegations against Russell Simmons, with whom he founded Def Jam and Rush Communications: “We were roommates and we’ve stayed friends and partners ever since.

“I never saw him aggressive or violent with any women. It’s not the RusselI I know.

“I’m deeply troubled with all the allegations, and there’s absolutely no room for this type of behaviour.”

* His controversial exit from Warner Music Group in 2012: “a board room coup. It was without question the best thing that ever happened to me.

“The higher I rose, the farther away I got from my true love - signing and breaking artists.”

* Changes in the music industry: “Thirty odd years ago some crazy person could rent a warehouse, buy a load of records and stick a name on that building.

“You can’t do that now, you have to have an enormous amount of resources, engineers and a global footprint.

“I wanted YouTube and Google to be successful in the music business in order to bring diversification to distribution.

“I realised this was an opportunity for me to help Google and YouTube work in harmony with an industry that I love and build a healthy business together.”

* YouTube’s biggest strength: “Spotify and Apple are pure retailers, Snapchat and Instagram are simply social.

“The most powerful aspect of YouTube is our ability to let the artists, managers, publishers, songwriters and labels engage with their fans with no hoops to jump through.

“The only place in the industry you can play in both commerce and D2C is YouTube.”