Radiohead’s Thom Yorke has pulled his solo songs from the music streaming site, saying its payment rates do not help young artists. Make no mistake new artists you discover on #Spotify will no get paid. meanwhile shareholders will shortly being rolling in it. Simples. — Thom Yorke (@thomyorke) July 14, 2013 Thom Yorke revealed he […]
Radiohead’s Thom Yorke has pulled his solo songs from the music streaming site, saying its payment rates do not help young artists.
Make no mistake new artists you discover on #Spotify will no get paid. meanwhile shareholders will shortly being rolling in it. Simples.
— Thom Yorke (@thomyorke) July 14, 2013
Thom Yorke revealed he has pulled his solo songs, along with those of his alternative group Atoms For Peace, from the service.
He said that budding musicians get paid very little with the digital business model.
Yorke and producer Nigel Godrich argued that whilst streaming suits back catalogues for established acts, it simply doesn’t support new artistes providing new music.
Yorke wrote on Twitter: “Make no mistake new artists you discover on Spotify will not get paid. Meanwhile shareholders will shortly being rolling in it. Simples.”
Godrich, who has produced for both Yorke and Paul McCartney, also used the micro-blogging site to complain.
“The numbers don’t even add up for Spotify yet. But it’s not about that. It’s about establishing the model which will be extremely valuable,” Godrich said. “Meanwhile small labels and new artists can’t even keep their lights on. It’s just not right.”
Yorke and Godrich’s decision to leave the service has caused a mixed reaction among their fan base. Phil Meadley tweeted: “It takes guys like you to speak up for others to take notice. Behind the scenes a lot of people are saying the same thing.”
However, other fans called for the pair to adapt to the changes in the music industry brought about by new online streaming services.
Milton Graham tweeted: “Really? Bad move. I fell in love with your album on Spotify, then later bought the album and the merch,” while @manhugs said: “Cool, I’ll just switch back to radio, where artists names aren’t mentioned, only popular groups play, and there aren’t ‘buy’ links.”
The Spotify service allows for a limited free but gives unlimited access if subscribers pay monthly fees or either £5 or £10.
However, some musicians say the returns from CDs and digital downloads are more rewarding because the per-stream payments are comparatively tiny.
It is believed most artists get less than 0.4p for each Spotify stream, with a hit garnering one million streams on Spotify only generating some £3,800.
In a statement, Spotify streeesed that it’s still “in the early stages of a long-term project” and that it is committed to being “artist friendly”.
The statement read:
“Spotify’s goal is to grow a service which people love, ultimately want to pay for, and which will provide the financial support to the music industry necessary to invest in new talent and music. We want to help artists connect with their fans, find new audiences, grow their fan base and make a living from the music we all love,” said a spokesperson in a statement provided to TechCrunch today. “Right now we’re still in the early stages of a long-term project that’s already having a hugely positive effect on artists and new music. We’ve already paid $500 million to rightsholders so far and by the end of 2013 this number will reach $1 billion. Much of this money is being invested in nurturing new talent and producing great new music. We’re 100% committed to making Spotify the most artist-friendly music service possible, and are constantly talking to artists and managers about how Spotify can help build their careers.”
Last month, Pink Floyd made its back catalogue available on Spotify after fans streamed the song Wish You Were Here more than 1m times.
But Godrich said: “Making new recorded music needs funding. Some records can be made in a laptop, but some need musician[s] and skilled technicians. Pink Floyd’s catalogue has already generated billions of dollars for someone (not necessarily the band) so now putting it on a streaming site makes total sense. But if people had been listening to Spotify instead of buying records in 1973 I doubt very much if Dark Side [of the Moon, Pink Floyd’s record-breaking album released that year which sold hundreds of millions of copies] would have been made. It would just be too expensive.”
