Backlash against Spotify appears to be at an all-time high. But the music streaming platform is no stranger to controversy and boycotts — so will this time actually make a lasting impact?
A Brief History Of Backlash Against Spotify
Few streaming platforms, audio or video, inspire the same level of controversy as Spotify. This is in part, perhaps, because Spotify is the biggest and most popular platform in the space, and often considered a pioneer of the entertainment streaming era.
But as a pioneer and leader in the space, Spotify has also been at the forefront of setting "terms," whether those are expectations around compensation, content guidelines, AI, or even just how the company and its leaders choose to spend their money.
Spotify launched in 2008 but really started picking up steam in 2011 when the company made a free version available in the United States. In 2013, Radiohead's Thom Yorke became the first prominent musician to remove his music (that he owned) from the platform, saying the compensation was unsustainable. Taylor Swift followed suit in 2014 — but both artists returned in 2017.
The company continued to court controversy throughout the years for things like making certain artist's music harder to find and having confusing policies on hate speech. In January 2022, Neil Young removed his music from Spotify to protest the company's massive exclusive contract with controversial podcaster Joe Rogan. Other legacy artists like Joni Mitchell and Crosby, Stills, & Nash followed suit.
Earlier this year, Spotify also faced scrutiny for its seeming disregard for the presence of AI-generated music on its platform.
We've previously covered how difficult it can be for independent artists to join boycott's against the platform, whether for economic or ethical reasons.
Why Artists And Fans Are Speaking Up Now
This time, the backlash against Spotify has less to do with how they pay artists or who they platform. Instead, much of the current round of ire results from revelations that Spotify CEO Daniel Ek reportedly helped fund up to $600 million for AI-based military technology.
Ek's work with German company Helsing actually dates back to 2021, when he helped fund more than $100 million. But now with his recent involvement, Ek is also chairman of the company that has gone from creating AI-based defense software to manufacturing instruments of war, including drones and aircrafts.
At a time when more and more people are speaking out about the atrocities of war in places like Gaza and Ukraine, Ek's investment in an "AI war machine" has led a lot of independent artists to take their music off the platform. These include King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Xiu Xiu, and Deerhoof, who collectively represented millions of monthly listeners.
In a post on Instagram, King Gizzard wrote, "Hello friends. A PSA to those unaware: Spotify CEO Daniel Ek invests millions in AI military drone technology. We just removed our music from the platform. Can we put pressure on these Dr. Evil tech bros to do better? Join us on another platform."
Many prominent YouTubers and industry figureheads are also speaking out against the platform in ways like never before, including critic Anthony Fantano's, whose YouTube video titled "F**k Spotify" doesn't mince words. Even smaller creators, like this YouTuber are coming up with interesting ways to direct people away from Spotify.
Where Artists Are Sending Fans
So if artists would prefer their fans go elsewhere to listen to their music, just where are they sending them? Well, one of the obvious and most-talked about places is Bandcamp. The website emerged as a bit of a lighthouse in the streaming era with their "Bandcamp Fridays," which encourage people to buy music from artists on the site (Bandcamp waives their typical cut of the profits of music sales during these events). King Gizzard has made all of their albums available on the site for a "pay-what-you-want" price.
Xiu Xiu endorsed a newer platform known as Coda Music. Others encouraged fans to just go to other streaming platforms, while some artists said they were removing their music from all platforms entirely.
For fans of the show The Good Place, the moral dilemma around making your music available on these platforms seems never-ending. At some point, you have to draw a line as a creator with what you feel comfortable promoting your music on, since just about every platform is tied to a company that probably contributes to something you disagree with.
But for Spotify and Ek, the line to war tech is direct and crystal clear. And that's enough for some artists to say they don't want anything to do with it anymore.
Will It Matter?
Being blunt, outcry against Spotify hasn't really done much. Artists both big and small have been talking about issues with streaming payout models for more than a decade. The result? Spotify has rejected every call for new compensation models and only raised the price of Spotify Premium by $2 in the U.S. in the last 15 years.
In fact, accounting for inflation, Spotify Premium may even be cheaper now than it was when the platform first launched in the U.S. While the streaming model certainly resuscitated the music industry for master copyright holders, we're long beyond the grace period where all of streaming's current inadequacies can be overlooked.
While artists and influencers and fans can decry Spotify, the platform is only likely to lose its grip on the industry when the industry itself stops focusing on Spotify as a metric of success. After all, we've known for a while now that monthly listeners do not automatically equate to fans who are willing to buy from you. In fact, many of them may not even really be paying attention when they listen, anyway.
We've entered an era where Spotify's vaunted discovery algorithm is now costing artists more to unlock than it presumably is returning in the form of "real" fans. As soon as the biggest stakeholders in the traditional industry stop prioritizing Spotify as a destination or an outcome, we may see a shift in power dynamics and an increasing relevance from these yearly cycles of backlash. Spotify and music streaming will always be a part of the music industry — but until the industry stops treating it as the most important part, well, we seem likely to stay in the same cycle.