Another day, another Spotify change. It's been a big year so far for the music service after partnering with Waze for in-car listening and acquiring Sonalytic. But this latest change will have a significant impact on you, especially if you're a non-paying user of the service.
Spotify has signed a deal with Universal music that allows artists to release their new material onto the music platform but only to those who pay the monthly subscription. The non-paying user will have to wait two weeks before they can listen to the artist's new album.
Spotify has now become a part of our everyday lives as we listen to music and share our favourite artists and tracks. The streaming service not only provides new releases but hundreds of thousands of unique playlists. Over 50 million users pay for the service with another 50 million non-paying users. Artists such as Taylor Swift have previously pulled their music from Spotify as they felt their worked was not commercially valued under the service provider.
According to the BBC, Daniel Ek, Spotify CEO, said: "This partnership is built on a mutual love of music, creating value for artists and delivering for fans. We know that not every album by every artist should be released the same way, and we’ve worked hard with UMG to develop a new, flexible release policy...Starting today, Universal artists can choose to release new albums on premium only for two weeks, offering subscribers an earlier chance to explore the complete creative work, while the singles are available across Spotify for all our listeners to enjoy."
Today it has been announced that Jay-Z has taken the majority of his music from Spotify. The music tycoon has his own streaming service in the form of Tidal which has had significant investment from artists such as Madonna, Beyoncé and Usher, with some artists providing material exclusive to the service. Tidal has been championing the artist as the chief beneficiary and decision maker when it comes to their music whereas Spotify offers public exclusivity. So far it is just Universal that have struck a deal with Spotify but it's clear other music publishers will follow.
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