Music Top 25

Irreverent music zine Blender has published its list of the 25 Most Important People in the music business. Unsurprisingly, Steve Jobs is Number One. What is striking is how few ‘traditional’ music business people are included. Only Universal Music head Doug Morris (Number 4) and Mitch Bainwol of the RIAA (Number 12) qualify. Everyone else is either a Tech or Web person. You could argue that diatribist/music critic Bob Lefsetz is traditional, but his reputation rests on an acerbic blog.

It could also be argued that other names should be in there, but running through a mental list of movers and shakers keeps bringing up people like Rob Wells of Universal or Pete Downton of Warner Music, both heavily involved in digital strategies and execution. It’s hard to think of a non-digital person – perhaps John Kennedy, Chairman of IFPI, and a small number of people at indie labels and organisations.

It’s a sign of how fast the industry is moving into being a new business.

The list in full:

25. Pete Wentz: net-obsessed star of Fall Out Boy
24. Bob Leftsetz: The Leftsetz Letter (music business blog)
23. Eric Garland: BigChampagne (online music research firm)
22. Brett Woitunski: PureVolume (indie-punk community site)
21. Matthew Perpetua: Fluxblog (mp3 blog)
20. David Pakman: EMusic (online music retailer)
19. Bram Cohen and Ashwin Navin: BitTorrent (file-sharing service)
18. Jason Tate: AbsolutePunk (indie-punk news and community)
17. “Oinkylicious” Alan: Oink’s Pink Palace (invite-only file sharing site)
16. Vadim Mamotin: AllOfMp3 (discount retailer)
15. Tim Quirk: Rhapsody (subscription music service)
14. Anthony Volodkin: The Hype Machine (mp3 blog aggregation)
13. Perez Hilton: PerezHilton (gossip blog)
12. Mitch Bainwol: RIAA (music business trade group)
11. Scott Lapatine: Stereogum (indie-rock blog)
10. Coran Capshaw: MusicToday (online ticketer and merchandiser)
9. Christian Schmid: RapidShare (file-hosting service)
8. Greg Bildson: LimeWire (file-sharing program)
7. Martin Stinksel and Felix Miller: Last.FM (music community site)
6. Ian Rogers: Yahoo! Music (music portal)
5. Ryan Schreiber: Pitchfork (indie-rock magazine)
4. Doug Morris: Universal Music Group (recording company)
3. Chad Hurley and Steve Chen: YouTube (video-sharing site)
2. Tom Anderson and Chris Dewolfe: MySpace (social-networking site)
1. Steve Jobs: Apple (Technology corporation)