Rogers Media radio executive Rob Farina has left the company after calling for an industry boycott of the U.S. record label representing acts including Ariana Grande and The Weeknd.
In an email statement Thursday, Rogers spokesperson Michelle Lomack told Marketing: “I can confirm that Rob Farina is no longer with the company, and that the situation was resolved privately.”
According to a report on Billboard.com, Farina’s departure stems from a Nov. 6 letter Farina sent to executives at fellow radio broadcasters including Corus, Newcap and Cogeco urging them to boycott acts represented by Republic Records, whose roster includes Florence + The Machine, Lorde and Nicki Minaj.
The letter was in response to perceived favouritism given to Rogers’ competitor Bell Media following its hire of former Universal Music Canada president Randy Lennox as president of entertainment production and broadcasting last summer.
In the letter, Farina accused Republic Records of “unilaterally” choosing Bell Media for a private concert by The Weeknd, as well as another exclusive featuring Ariana Grande. He said the label sidestepped the established process in Canada and accused it of “arbitrarily handing over content opportunities” to Bell.
The neutral treatment traditionally afforded the radio industry by labels was being “obliterated,” as Bell used Lennox’s “U.S. label friends” to bypass Universal Music Canada, he wrote.
While the decisions impacted the contemporary hit radio format, it could eventually have implications for all formats and broadcasters competing against Bell Media, which operates 106 stations across Canada, he continued.
In the letter, Farina said Rogers would remove all artists directly signed by Republic Records from its playlists, and eliminate all promotion and exposure across the company’s radio, TV, print and digital assets.
He said Rogers would uphold the ban until Republic Records president Monte Lipman agreed to restitution for delivering the label’s biggest act (The Weeknd) exclusively to Bell Media; prevented his U.S. head of promotion Charlie Walk from interfering in Canadian broadcast matters; and until business returned to the way it was prior to Lennox’s arrival at Bell.
The situation never got that far, however, with Billboard reporting that the matter was resolved the next day.
The publication also quoted Bell Media Radio’s VP of programming David Corey saying everything in Farina’s letter was “completely incorrect and not the way things have gone down.”
Farina joined Rogers Media as vice-president of content in May after stints with other Canadian broadcast groups including Astral Media and CHUM Radio. He also co-founded and serves as chief operating officer of L.A.-based music consultancy Black Box.
