Listen to acoustic soul singer Justin Nozuka, who recently signed to indie label Glassnote, even though he had majors from both coasts chasing after him. Check out the song After Tonight.

From The Netherlands comes the passion-filled rock of The [New] Shining. With vocals that can be described as nothing short of soaring, this trio has the voice and the musicianship to carry themselves to the top of the Dutch charts and even further. Check out Red Eyes and the new single Temptation.

• Patrons & Champions. If labels can’t help; who will?
• Video: Radio 1’s unique “Band In Your Hand” promo.

PLUS:

• RIAA is being forced to pay $108,000 in attorney fees to Tanya Andersen. (P2PNet)
• An in depth comparison of the legal download stores. (DigitalTrends)
• French ad supported music service Deezer gets the Universal catalog. (Billboard) UMG is the only major on board with Qtrax. Is Universal leading the ad-supported charge? Why no the other 3?
• Is major label diversification paying dividends? Paul at Digital Music News points out that in this week’s quarterly report, Universal credited increased publishing and merchandising revenues from its recent buyouts for a 6.8% quarterly revenue increase. Publishing has supported EMI for years.
• Adobe has improved music support for Flash (Wired)
• Amazon has added widgets that enable bloggers and webmasters to offer music sampling and a revenue share of purchases. (press release) But the samples are only 30 seconds…thanks to our friends at the labels.

More @ Hypebot.com

Hyped by gossip blogger Perez Hilton, and recently picked up by The Agency Group, this Montreal-based sixtet deserves your attention. Listen to their songs So Over You and The Age Of Pretending!

• Staff and budget cuts led to higher profits at Sony BMG. But are cuts the only way forward?
• imeem joins Google’s Open Social
• Fancorps and Gydget team for fan engagement
• This weeks CIMS indie store sales charts

PLUS -

• QTrax has signed its fourth major publisher Warner/Chappell. (Listening Post)
• SpiralFrog is expanding its sales team with the addition of industry vets Jesse Paynter as senior vice president of sales and Paul Rothkopf as senior vice president of sales strategy. (press release)
• Neal Diamond unseats Madonna to score his first Billboard #1 debut. (FMQB)
• Singer songwriter Josh Rouse has launched a membership only digital music store. (Glider)
• Double standard? UMG fights “excessive” infringement damages. (ars)

For more interviews click here!

Listen to All In by Canadian emo pop rockers Awake And Dreaming. The band is currently sitting in the Top10 of the Unsigned MySpace Charts Canada.

• Top 10 Issues Facing Music 2.0. Join the debate.
• The top music activity on the web is streaming and imeem has overtaken Yahoo as the top choice of listeners
• Dada adds DRM-free mp3’s from Sony BMG to its download store
• Google announced Friends Connect opening social networking across sites
• More reasons to distrust the music industry

PLUS:

• Zune has reached 2 million in sales.  Market share is coming from Creative rather than iTunes. (Engadget)
• Radiohead’s In Rainbows is now on eMusic.
• Limewire wants to give labels a share of ad revenue. (P2P Blog)
• RightsFlow, which provides licensing and royalty services, has announced a mechanical licensing agreement with The Harry Fox Agency. (press release)
• The Clear Channel Radio buyout deal is finally going through. (paidcontent)
• Here is a pdf of an NPD group study of physical formats for NARM. (pdf)

Check out Buffalo-based rap artist Edreys, who was recently featured in Billboard’s “Now Hear This” section. He is also gonna play four shows at this year’s Warped Tour. Listen to the song I Like It.