Spotify
Spotify Nukes Thousands of Comedy Tracks in Battle over Royalty Rights
On Wednesday, November 25th, after business hours closed and Americans looked forward to a long Thanksgiving weekend, Spotify suddenly took down thousands of comedy tracks by Robin Williams, John Mulaney, Mike Birbiglia, Jeff Foxworthy, and more. The move appears to be an aggressive response to new organizations trying to collect literary royalties on behalf of comedians. On November 27th, Birbiglia tweeted, “Random question: Does anyone know why some of the Comedy Central albums got taken off Spotify? 3 of mine are gone, some of Mulaney’s, one of Attell’s, but then some are still there— like Hedberg. Anyone know about any rights things happening behind the scenes with comedy albums?” Earlier this year, Birbiglia signed with Spoken Giants, a rights administration company formed in 2019 to ...
How to Find Your Spotify Wrapped 2021
It’s the most wonderful time of the year! No, not the start of the Christmas season — it’s Spotify Wrapped day! That’s right, it’s what all your listening habits have been leading up to: the day the streaming giant tabulates all your personal data to serve up a custom accounting of your top artists, songs and playlists from the past year. Plus, it’s all presented in a colorfully curated package, perfect for sharing on Instagram. (And while we’re at it, don’t pay any attention to the haters: Only Grinches take time to post about how “no one cares about your Spotify Wrapped.”) While this year’s feature also comes with personalized audio auras (were you “wistful and focused” or “euphoric and bold”?) and a funky display of your top genres, your Spotify Wrapped can sometimes be hard to find. So...
John Mulaney, Mike Birbiglia & More Comedians Pulled Off Spotify Over Licensing Dispute
Spotify hosts a large offering of spoken word content on its platform these days, including comedy, podcasts, and poetry along with the music the platform has always been known for. Last week, however, on Nov. 24, the day before Thanksgiving, the streaming service quietly took down a broad swath of its spoken comedy recordings, including some of major comedy stars like Mike Birbiglia, John Mulaney and Jeff Foxworthy. Sparking confusion and outrage among these affected comedians and their fans, as of Wednesday (Dec. 1), a full week later, the Spotify takedowns remain in place. So why did this happen in the first place? Like music, there are two copyrights for a spoken-word comedy routine. First, the copyright for sound recording itself — for which many comedians collect royalties via SoundE...
You Can Now Easily Find Music From Your Favorite Netflix Shows On Spotify
Forget having to remember that one song from that one show you watched on Netflix. With Netflix and Spotify‘s new partnership, the two media conglomerates offer users access to easily find the music and podcasts within their favorites shows, like the wildly popular Squid Game, which received many electronic remixes and has crossed over into the EDM hive mind. Netflix Hub offers soundtracks and playlists from hit shows like Narcos: Mexico, Stranger Things, La Casa De Papel, and many more. It will also feature podcasts like Netflix Is A Daily Joke, 10/10 Would Recommend, and You Can’t Make This Up. Recommended Articles This partnership is not an advertisement for Netflix on Spotify’s platform. Both companies reportedly identified a strong opportunity to work together ...
Spotify Reveals the Most Streamed Artists, Albums, and Songs of 2021
Christmas Day for music geeks is here: Today (December 1st), Spotify’s 381 million-plus users were gifted with their Spotify Wrapped, a roundup of their most-listened music of the year. Aside from individual rundowns for each user, the streaming giant also unveiled details about the world’s listening habits in 2021. Some of the stats shouldn’t come as a surprise. Much of the world was drinking the Olivia Rodrigo Kool-Aid this year, with her smash hit “drivers license” cruising straight to the No. 1 song in the world. Meanwhile, Bad Bunny took the title of the most-streamed artist globally for the second year in a row, with Taylor Swift and BTS trailing right behind in the second and third spots, respectively. In the US specifically, Drake was the most streamed artist, followed by T-Swift, ...
Four Tet Alleges Domino Removed 3 of His Albums Amid Ongoing Lawsuit
Amid a bitter contract dispute, Four Tet has accused the Domino Recording Company of removing three of his albums from streaming platforms to prevent his lawsuit from progressing any further. “This is heartbreaking to me,” Four Tet tweeted. “People are reaching out asking why they can’t stream the music and I’m sad to have to say that it’s out of my control.” “I considered the people who ran Domino to be my friends and to be driven by trying to create a great musical community,” he added. “As a result Domino own 3 of my albums forever. Music I created that’s important to me and to many of you too.” Late this summer, Four Tet sued Domino for a massive discrepancy in their agreed-upon streaming roya...
Spotify Disabled Auto-Shuffle on Albums, All Thanks to Adele
Spotify has disabled auto-shuffle on albums, and we have Adele to thank for it. Before Friday, shuffle was the streaming platform’s default setting when a user listened to an album. But after the release of the pop star’s powerful new album, 30, that is no longer the case. You can still listen to an album on shuffle if you wish, but you’ll have to do it manually. “This was the only request I had in our ever changing industry,” Adele tweeted, revealing she was responsible for the change. “We don’t create albums with so much care and thought into our track listing for no reason. Our art tells a story and our stories should be listened to as we intended. Thank you Spotify for listening.” This was the only request I had in our ever changing industry! We don’t create albums with so much ca...
Adele Single-Handily Got Spotify to Disable Auto-Shuffle For Albums
The enormity of Adele’s stardom can be illustrated in a number of recent headlines. The release of her long-awaited new album, 30, led to a global backlog in vinyl production. On the Sunday prior to 30’s arrival, she was given her very own primetime television special on CBS. And now we’ve learned that the UK singer single-handily forced Spotify to disable its auto-shuffle feature for albums. “This was the only request I had in our ever changing industry,” Adele wrote in response to a social media post from Pop Crave noting the change. “We don’t create albums with so much care and thought into our tracklisting for no reason. Our art tells a story and our stories should be listened to as we intended. Thank you Spotify for listening.” As Stereogum points out, prior to the change Spotify woul...
This App Generates Your Dream Festival Lineup Flyer Using Your Spotify Playlists
We all conjure dream music festival lineups in our heads, but a new app called Anthems is taking it a step further. When first launching Anthems, the app requests access to your Spotify account. From there, they are able to access your playlists and listening history. Anthems then takes your most-listened-to artists of all-time and constructs a festival lineup comprising a handful of those you just couldn’t stop rinsing. To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect when I learned it would be digging through my crates. But I was pleasantly surprised by all of the selections and would be willing to pay top dollar to check out this lineup, regardless of how strange it would be to see ILLENIUM and Boombox Cartel at a music festival with The 1975 and Ca...
Spotify to Acquire Audiobook Platform Findaway
“It is Spotify’s ambition to be the destination for all things audio both for listeners and creators,” Gustav Söderström, Spotify’s chief research and development officer, said in a statement. “The acquisition of Findaway will accelerate Spotify’s presence in the audiobook space and will help us more quickly meet that ambition.” Findaway will still be led by founder and CEO Mitch Kroll and remain headquartered in Ohio. Kroll will report to Spotify’s head of audiobooks, Nir Zicherman. “Together with Spotify we have the opportunity to innovate and democratize the audiobook ecosystem,” Kroll said. “We founded Findaway with the recognition of the power of the spoken word through audiobooks and the unique opportunity to empower storytellers and connect them with listeners. We look forward to co...
Nas & Miss Info Team To Host ‘The Bridge’ Podcast For Spotify
HipHopWired Featured Video Source: Spotify / Mass Appeal The iconic Grammy-award-winning rapper Nas and media personality and journalist Minya “Miss Info” Oh are embarking on a new podcast that will give listeners the opportunity to celebrate and deeply examine the five decades of Hip-Hop history. Announced on Tuesday (November 9), the new podcast, titled The Bridge, was created and produced as part of a collaboration with streaming giant Spotify and Mass Appeal. Related Stories The Bridge is part of the #HipHop50 Initiative that was launched earlier this year in a collaborative effort with Mass Appeal and Showtime/Viacom which will celebrate and amplify the culture of Hip-Hop through various projects including documentary films. The podcast reunites Nas and Miss Info, who’ve had a strong ...
Spotify Stock Soars on Promising Q3 Earnings: What to Expect for Q4
Spotify landed within prior guidance for the third quarter and reached the high end of expectations for revenue and monthly active users. In other words, the company met expectations and didn’t unveil the kinds of surprises investors hate. What’s more, the company raised its expectations for fourth quarter revenue and gross margin. That’s good news for both investors and anybody due to receive royalties. The fourth quarter is peak season for subscription services and no time to disappoint. Spotify added 11 million subscribers in each of the last two fourth quarters, almost double its average for the first through third quarters of both years. Appropriately, CEO Daniel Ek said during Wednesday’s earnings call, “We’re all hands on deck to make sure the positive trend continues.” What t...
