How the NFL Is Tapping Into the Cultural Power of Music and Sport with UnitedMasters
Last month, music distribution platform for independent artists, UnitedMasters, announced the extension of its existing agreement with the NFL. The new agreement, which follows an original three-year deal that began in 2023, will expand UnitedMasters’ existing track delivery through the end of the 2027 season. As a result, the NFL will be able to continue providing music to its fans via UnitedMasters’ fully cleared sync library.
As the NFL's extended deal with UnitedMasters expands opportunities for brands to integrate music into their campaigns, LBB’s April Summers sat down with John Rough, head of global growth, to dive into the evolving intersection of music, sports, and advertising. From the evolution of cross-industry collaborations to the growing influence of independent music in global sports media, John provides a roadmap for companies aiming to connect with fans in more meaningful, innovative ways. For brands looking to tap into the cultural power of music and sports, John outlines valuable insights on how to harness these trends for creative, authentic campaigns.
LBB> Music has always been a central part of sports media, especially with major events like the Super Bowl and other NFL content. How do you see the relationship between music, sports, and advertising evolving in the next few years, particularly in terms of collaborations like this?
John Rough> Music has never moved this fast before and it won’t be slowing down. This has caused the monetisation strategy of catalogue ownership to shift drastically. Additionally, advertisers in the sports space move incredibly fast to superserve their fandoms who are constantly plugged in and rapidly co-creating. These tensions are creating ecosystems that make the relationship between music, sports and advertising equal parts electrifying and precarious.
As the sports industry continues to battle lawsuits from Rights Holders, they will continue to source solutions like ours that are both culturally relevant and legally compliant. Rights Ownership and Usage will continue to be a major point in our respective industries, but the speed of these passions won’t wait for us, so creative solutions will continue to be required.
LBB> Athletes and musicians have become increasingly intertwined in popular culture. Do you foresee more cross-industry collaborations that involve both musicians and athletes, and how might brands and agencies capitalise on these partnerships to create immersive experiences for fans?
John Rough> Every rapper wants to be a baller, and every baller wants to be an athlete. The advertising industry has been on this for years. This crossover has created unique creative opportunities for decades - like seeing Allen Iverson providing a bouncing ball beat for Jadakiss for Reebok - but now the dynamics have changed.
Instead of just an athlete and just an artist, they are multi-hyphenates – they are entrepreneurs. Name, image, and likeness (NIL) and Artist Partnerships have entered the picture much earlier, altering the goals of these collaborations. Now you have college athletes looking to inject themselves into popular culture in the same manner as professional athletes. Sitting at the intersection, we see these cross-industry collaborations increasing, but even more interestingly, they will start to resemble Joint Ventures and Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) deals that both drive fandom and commercial opportunities for all those involved. That level of impact will lead to tremendous creative opportunities for brands and agencies to co-build with artists and athletes directly at the centre of the popular culture venn diagram.
LBB> How do you see UnitedMasters’ role in helping brands and content producers access and integrate more diverse, independent music into their sports media campaigns, especially in the NFL context?
John Rough> Independent music is often thought of as a solo journey at worst and a fragmented market at best. UnitedMasters has used our capabilities as a tech company to democratise, demystify and simplify the process of getting independent artists’ music in front of the biggest brands and media houses in the world, just like the NFL.
Beyond this, we also operate one of the fastest growing record labels in the industry, so that mix of tech efficiency and industry-leading music discovery and curation allows our white glove sync service to effectively partner with brand and content producers. We work closely with the NFL Music team, and now their member clubs, to bring their content to life with curated playlists that mirror the Billboard Chart rather than background noise.
LBB> As brands become more involved in sports content creation, what role do you see independent artists playing in this evolving landscape? How can agencies use this new access to create more authentic, original brand narratives?
John Rough> Beyond legal compliance, ease of use and a diverse array of tracks, our superpower is storytelling. Our sync library is filled with distributed tracks from real artists with stories to tell. We like to say every UnitedMasters sync has a story. Sometimes all you need is the perfect track, but when the artist reposts the content with their art, they become a piece of the campaign narrative.
With over 20,000 tracks, that’s 20,000 stories like Amira’s appearance in AT&T’s 5G Helmet campaign. Our work with the NFL (which involves linking artists with core connections to the fandoms of the NFL and its teams) provides content producers with the capability to tell deeper stories without increasing the friction in the production or licensing processes.
LBB> UnitedMasters’ extended agreement with the NFL takes the partnership through the 2027 season. From a brand and production standpoint, how does this new phase of the deal open up opportunities for agencies and content creators looking to leverage music in sports media?
John Rough> The extension of our partnership showcases the forward thinking nature of the music team at the NFL. They’ve made it very clear that emerging, independent, and geographically diverse artists are a key element to the growth and expansion of the league. So for agencies and content creators looking to engage in sports media, they need to understand this isn’t a short term investment in music. It’s something they need to take seriously and think long term about. The NFL realised that merging fandoms is a cheat code to brand longevity; so too should those preparing to take part in the conversation.
LBB> Looking ahead to the next five years, what kind of partnerships and collaborations do you think brands should be paying attention to in the evolving world of sports and music? How should they be preparing for a future where music and sports media are even more intertwined?
John Rough> I love this question, because it’s an area where we're deeply placing big bets. The thing that has always separated sports investment from music is that sports has significantly more infrastructural investment areas for brands. You can tap in at the league or team level, you can buy up real estate on media surfaces that surround the athlete and you can partner directly with the athlete themselves. This allows for brand safe investment across the entire journey from amateur to professional to veteran.
In music, the infrastructure is disparate or altogether non-existent for brand investment. This causes investment to only take place at the highest levels or just with specific names. That is risky and inefficient. With emerging tech investments and the rise of the independent artist, we see the development of infrastructural organisations and artist-first media surfaces being a major change coming to the industry. These new players will be more reliant upon, and very welcoming to, brand investment and creative integrations. This gives brands the ability to have scaled impact in both music and sports, allowing for those campaigns looking to bridge their creative thinking across passions to unlock a much higher potential for mass impact.
