Can the more-or-less industry-wide unity that produced the MUSIC MODERNIZATION ACT in 2018 hold for another year or two, or will it be more like DUKE basketball phenom ZION WILLIAMSON—one and done? There are signs of cracks in India, where SPOTIFY and WARNER MUSIC GROUP can't even agree on what a court said Tuesday about the latter's request for an injunction against the former's launch, and where Spotify went ahead and launched anyway this morning. And there are opportunities for cracks ahead in the US, where the WALL STREET JOURNAL (paywall) reports the JUSTICE DEPARTMENT is reviewing the longstanding consent decrees that govern ASCAP and BMI. The two performance-rights societies, and their writers and publishers, would welcome further, um, modernization in the name of freedom and flexibility on the creators' side. Broadcast companies and streaming services, not so much. Are there compromises that can please all sides? Can music prove to America, once again, that aisles are meant to be crossed, not feared?... In other negotiating news, it’s unclear where this fissure between DE LA SOUL and TOMMY BOY is heading but let's hope it shrinks before one of the major gaps in digital music gets filled in... Time for artists and songwriters to start thinking about search engine optimization, according to DIGITAL MUSIC NEWS' account of LUCIAN GRAINGE's remarks at the MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS in Barcelona. In short: If you want fans to be able to ask smart speakers to play your songs, "you need to have something as basic as the song title... in the chorus.“ Congratulations, RIHANNA. You've passed SEO 101. I have no doubt ALEXA would understand my request for that one. On the other hand: Titles matter. They're part of an artist's art. They're not metadata. I should be able to tell Alexa to play that long, operatic classic rock song with the funny-sounding words in the middle without either me knowing the title or FREDDIE MERCURY having to rise from the dead and change the title to "SCARAMOUCHE SCARAMOUCHE." According to every engineer and product manager I've heard talk about the subject, Alexa and everyone like her will soon be able to do that and a whole lot more. Let's let that happen, instead of telling GRETA VAN FLEET what to call its songs (this one, e.g., fails the SEO test). For the entirety of my childhood, I had no idea what this LED ZEPPELIN song was called, and I still have no idea how to pronounce it, which means I still don't know how to ask my smart speakers to summon it. And yet radio stations kept playing it and listeners kept requesting it. Why bend the creative for the benefit of the computer? Why not do the opposite? Also: What is APHEX TWIN supposed to call his songs? ... The death of TALK TALK's MARK HOLLIS, at age 64, was confirmed Tuesday morning, and it soon became clear how much he meant to a wide swath of musicians and fans, in case any doubt remained. It's tempting to describe the man who led Talk Talk toward '80s synth-pop stardom and then immediately away from it as a mystery wrapped in a musical riddle. But he was really just a talented, curious musician dedicated to following his own muse—and one of the most quietly influential musicians of the '80s and '90s. MusicSET: "Post-Pop: Talk Talk's Mark Hollis Turned On, Tuned In, Dropped Out"... RIP ANDY ANDERSON.