• The FADER reported Warner Music's announcement that it has, for the first time ever, profited more from streaming sales than digital sales in the past quarter. According to FADER, "Revenue from services like Rdio, Spotify, and Youtube increased 33%, while the comparable number for digital sales only grew 7% during the same period."

In a statement to Re/code, Warner CEO Stephen Cooper said:

The rate of this growth has made it abundantly clear that in years to come, streaming will be the way that most people enjoy music. We’ll continue to collaborate with our streaming partners to expand their businesses, and more importantly, to ensure that copyright owners, artists and songwriters receive appropriate value for their work.

This information bolsters support for the pressure labels are currently applying to SoundCloud. What does this mean for us as listeners? We're being pushed into a corner where we'll need to pay up or be subjected to an increasing number of ads. (Incidentally, if you find this sort of conversation interesting, I highly encourage you to check out Marc Hogan's piece "How Much Is Music Really Worth?" where there's plenty of handy graphics that provide a monetary breakdown of shifts in music industry profits.)

• When I saw that Billy Corgan was going to be making an appearance on CNBC, I cringed and mentally prepared my eyes for their reflexive response to all things Corgan: heavy rolling. However, to my surprise, I didn't disagree with anything Corgan said about the current state of the music industry. Nor did I disagree the first 9,000 times I heard them said by other, less annoying people. Corgan told the CNBC anchors:

Music artists need to figure out their true value in a free market, which they have been slow to do because you have that old model of telling artists they are not worth anything, that they are disposable. Similar to the things you've seen in the sports leagues and you are going to see that evolution happen in the music business.

This evolution is well under way. It's why you see Rihanna working with Puma and Kendrick Lamar's name being used to market Sweetgreen Salads. It's why every commercial contained either a Vampire Weekend or Black Keys song back in 2011. It's why indie rock bands now consider themselves entrepreneurs. With all due respect to the leader of Smashing Pumpkins, artists have always been adept at finding ways to maximize their worth with or without the help of the music biz. Access to a saturated music marketplace might be a more critical problem for creators and fans alike. I suppose we can forgive Corgi in this instance, since he was breaking down these concepts for a bunch of clueless TV anchors. But the music industry has been, as he calls it, the Wild West since long before he stopped being in a position to make double albums and expect the world to line up for them.

• This morning, the Royal Trux announced a reunion show at the Berserktown II Festival in Los Angeles. Jennifer Herrema and Neil Hagerty will play on August 16 for at least one night, but have yet to clarify their intentions beyond this one show. Pitchfork was also quick to point out that during an interview back in 2012, the pair told Brandon Stousy they would never play a reunion show. But they've also always been a subversive band, so this could be a prank. Or a cop-out. Or maybe, like the time they signed to Virgin Records in 1995, a "fundraiser"?

Now let's watch Eddie Vedder sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." Happy Wednesday.