what happened to jay z albums on spotify

Notably, the 60-million-user milestone was announced after Swift packed her bags and ditched the platform, so it may be a while before these artists’ exclusivity plays wind up making a dent. By banding together and putting heat on the incumbents in this space, this coterie of artists could wind up getting what they want without breaking up our music libraries: Spotify could cave to artists’ demands, which could be as simple as shuttering its free tier.įor now, Spotify remains the front-runner in this space with over 60 million users, 15 million of which are paying subscribers. So much for the dream of a single, all-you-can-stream music subscription provider. The coming battle over artist exclusivity in the music streaming business could put fans in an uncomfortable position: Instead of selecting a service based on sound quality, mobile features, and catalog size, fans may be forced to follow their favorite artists to whatever company to which they happen to be loyal to–or worse, wind up subscribing to multiple services and fracturing their collections across different apps. Jay Z and his allies have similar concerns over how artists get compensated as music listening shifts from downloads to streams. Most famously, Taylor Swift yanked her catalog from Spotify late last year, citing concerns over the service’s free, ad-supported (and less lucrative) tier.

With things like its celeb-heavy launch event and content exclusives, Tidal is drawing its battle lines around the interests of artists, some of whom are unhappy with the economics of services like Spotify. Shortly after relaunching Tidal, the rapper’s streaming service featured exclusive videos from Beyoncé and Rihanna, a sign that it plans to use star power to lure users away from competitors like Spotify–and one-up Apple’s upcoming Beats subscription service before it can even get off the ground.

That’s because what we’re witnessing here isn’t just a product launch: It’s an all-out war for the future of music streaming, and how the all-you-can-stream subscription model fits into the broader music industry moving forward. Related: Spotify, Tidal, and The Coming Music Streaming Wars

What happened to jay z albums on spotify