Los Angeles-headquartered music label, distribution and rights management company Cinq Music has acquired the catalog of the late producer and songwriter José Ángel Hernández, aka Flow La Movie.
The deal comes several months after Cinq Music raised $250 million from its parent company, GoDigital Media Group, for acquisitions primarily in the reggaeton, Música Mexicana, Afrobeats, and country genres.
Flow La Movie’s catalog falls within the reggaeton category, with tracks such as La Jeepeta, recorded by Nio Garcia, Brray and Juanka; Travesuras, by Nicky Jam; and Te Boté, by Nio García, Darell and Casper Mágico.
A remix of Te Boté, featuring Bad Bunny, Ozuna and Nicky Jam, is the top Latin RIAA-certified record in history, having spent 14 non-consecutive weeks at No. 1 and garnered more than 4 billion global streams.
With the acquisition, “Cinq continues its proven track record in Latin music, which has experienced tremendous growth in the past decade and shows no signs of slowing down,” the company said in a statement issued Tuesday (May 7).
Flow La Movie began his music-producing career in 2011, and developed a repertoire specifically with artists Nio Garcia and Casper Mágico.
He died at the age of 36 when a chartered private jet he was traveling in crashed in the Dominican Republic, in December 2021. His wife and four-year-old son also perished in the crash.
“We all mourned the loss of José, and we are honored to continue his legacy with the addition of his catalog to our storied portfolio,” said Barry Daffurn, Cinq Music President and Co-founder.
“Cinq is committed to honoring his life’s work and to preserving his remarkable legacy. We have tremendous respect and admiration for him and his family, and we are looking forward to continuing to build upon the special place that he occupies in the hearts of music fans everywhere.”
Daffurn added that “reggaeton has been a core element of our DNA since the founding of this company.”
Image via Cinq Music
“We all mourned the loss of José, and we are honored to continue his legacy with the addition of his catalog to our storied portfolio.”
Barry Daffurn, Cinq Music
The catalog sale was made possible by Flow La Movie’s estate, now administered by his daughter, Keigelyan Hernandez, with collaboration from label Glad Empire as well as Nio Garcia and Casper Mágico. The deal’s value was not disclosed.
Cinq Music boasts that its catalog has “won Grammy awards and dozens of Gold and Platinum RIAA certifications, and has held numerous number one chart positions across a variety of Billboard charts.”
The company’s roster includes prominent names in Latin Music such as Anuel AA, Arc Angel, Bad Bunny, Daddy Yankee, Fuerza Regida, and Natanael Cano, as well as English-language pop and hip-hop names such as Jason Derulo, Sean Kingston, T.I., and others.
The company’s $250-million raise from GoDigital earlier this year brings the total it has raised for music acquisitions to $410 million, principally from its parent company.
The company last year fortified its position in the regional Mexican genre with an investment into Street Mob Records. The first release under the new partnership was Chino Pacas’ Yo Preferi Chambear.
“Broadly, I feel the biggest growth opportunities are definitely outside the English-speaking countries, which have dominated the monetizable music market for so long,” Daffurn said in an interview with MBW earlier this year.
“You can see this in the recent strategies of almost every major record company out there announcing a more global approach.”
That fact was recently fortified by data from market monitor Luminate, which found that, among the top 10,000 most-streamed music tracks in 2023 (both audio and video), 54.9% were in the English language, down from 67.0% just two years earlier. Meanwhile, Spotify reported that more than half of the artists who earned at least $10,000 on its platform in 2023 were from countries where English isn’t the primary language. That’s triple the share they held in 2017.
“I feel the biggest growth opportunities are definitely outside the English-speaking countries, which have dominated the monetizable music market for so long.”
Barry Daffurn, Cinq Music
Daffurn said he’s watched reggaeton “go from a primarily US (including Puerto Rico) consumer base to a global phenomenon, and into countries where Spanish isn’t even the primary language.”
He added: “We’re seeing this to a certain extent with Musica Mexicana now. This music has always been very popular, but it was almost exclusively within the US/Mexico.
“Five years ago, we had 98% streaming consumption of Música Mexicana coming from the US/Mexico, and now that’s coming down to the low 90s. So, we’re talking years here, not months, but we’re watching the global expansion of this music in real-time, and that’s exciting to be a part of.”Music Business Worldwide
