As the Spotify-Neil Young-Joe Rogan controversy continued to rage on Saturday amid a firestorm of criticism toward the streaming giant, an image reading “Delete Spotify” appeared on Spotify’s own platform in a very unexpected place: the homepage of the ‘90s alt-rock band Belly — and only on desktop, not on phones.
A rep for Spotify did not immediately respond to Variety’s request for comment.
Variety was unable to immediately reach a band rep for comment on Saturday afternoon, however, judging by Belly’s social media accounts, they are no fans of Spotify’s payment policies or its stance on Rogan. “Strictly from a business standpoint: Heinous enough that @Spotify doesn’t pay its artists but to use that revenue to fund Covid disinfo thereby prolonging the pandemic which has kept all of us from touring income makes it even more obvious #cancelspotify + #maskup #GetVaccinated” the band posted on Twitter Friday.
While rights-holders, usually a record label, control the uploading of music to Spotify, artists often can control the imagery that goes with their pages on the platform through the Spotify for Artists portal. It seems likely that a rep for the band uploaded the image independently of the rights holder, which ironically is Warner Music for all of Belly’s albums except its most recent studio album (Warner also holds the rights to most of Neil Young’s and Joni Mitchell’s catalogs and have removed all of the titles the company controls from Spotify, at the artists’ request). It was not immediately clear why the “Delete Spotify” image appears only on desktops, not on phones.
The band wrote on Facebook Friday that it would like to remove its music from the platform, but the process is “difficult” and “very complicated”: “There are many ways to listen to our music. If you can find a way to avoid supporting a platform like spotify, we say ‘noice job!’,: they wrote. “Originally Spotiify just hosted content, now they have moved into paying for exclusivity. They are making harmful choices. It’s not about taste, it’s about truth. Chaos and crisis can be a very profitable environment. Some find ways to mine this environment and seek to prolong it to their own ends. This hurts the world. Hurting the world sucks.
“Why are we still ‘on’ spotify if we dont like them? It’s very complicated,” they concluded. “Once you are in it is hard to get out. We are looking at options, but you will see that there are many who oppose spotify policies who are still there, an indicator of just how difficult it is.”
Strictly from a business standpoint: Heinous enough that @Spotify doesn’t pay its artists but to use that revenue to fund Covid disinfo thereby prolonging the pandemic which has kept all of us from touring income makes it even more obvious #cancelspotify + #maskup #GetVaccinated https://t.co/T6nlr50kYM
— Belly (@bellytheband) January 28, 2022
Belly was formed in 1991 by former Throwing Muses and Breeders singer-guitarist Tanya Donnelly and scored a gold album and two Grammy nominations for their 1993 debut, “Star,” which included the alternative radio smash “Feed the Tree” among other singles. However, the 1995 follow-up “King” was not as successful and the group split soon after, with Donnelly pursuing a solo career and releasing several albums over the years. The group reformed in 2016 and released the album “Dove” two years later via its own Belly Touring label; its first two albums were released by Warner Bros. Records and remain affiliated with Warner Music.
Young announced Wednesday that he was demanding the company drop his music, writing that “Spotify has recently become a very damaging force via its public misinformation and lies about COVID.” He didn’t cite Rogan by name, but referred to an open letter from doctors and health professionals issued earlier this month calling on Spotify to crack down on coronavirus-related falsehoods on “The Joe Rogan Experience.”
Spotify’s market capitalization fell about $2.1 billion over a three-day span this week, coming afterYoung yanked his songs from the audio-streaming giant in protest.
Shares of Spotify fell 6% from Jan. 26-28. Over the same time period, the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index rose 1.7% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1.1%. For the sake of comparison, Netflix’s stock recovered a bit, up 4.9% over the last three days, after getting hammered following its Jan. 20 earnings report.
To be sure, Spotify’s stock price was already on the slide — having plummeted 25% year-to-date as of Jan. 25, the day before Young’s catalog was pulled off Spotify. Investors have been rattled by signals that Spotify’s growth may be slowing, particularly after Netflix’s warning of a significant cooldown in first quarter subscriber net adds (which precipitated a 24% drop in its share price).
Also, it’s worth noting is that Spotify’s stock rebounded slightly Friday, closing up 1% to $172.98/share, amid a broader market upturn. However, that came before Joni Mitchell announced that she, too, would be removing her music from Spotify. “Irresponsible people are spreading lies that are costing people their lives. I stand in solidarity with Neil Young and the global scientific and medical communities on this issue,” the singer-songwriter wrote.