Jay Z has decided to play hard ball when it comes to offering his music on popular streaming services.
The rapper, who owns a sizeable stake in high-fidelity specialising streaming service Tidal, has reportedly pulled much of his music from rival services Spotify and Apple Music.
The move, spotted by 9to5Mac, is seen as an aggressive strategy to try boost interest in his stagnating company.
Although a number of singles and collaboration tracks remain available on the two streaming services, many of Jay Z’s own albums have been removed.
According to a Spotify spokesperson, the move was one of the musician’s own doing.
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“Some of his catalog has been removed at the request of the artist,” the streaming specialist confirmed.
Despite disappearing from Spotify and Apple Music, the rapper’s albums are still currently available to Google Play Music subscribers.
Although having more interest in boosting Tidal’s list of exclusive tracks, Jay Z isn’t the only artist to pull his tracks from rival services to favour of single service exclusivity.
Not all have remained exclusive to Tidal for long, however.
Prince’s music returned to Spotify and Apple Music back in February, a little over a year after first being pulled.
This followed Taylor Swift backing up a very public spat with iPhone maker Apple only to return to Apple Music in big fashion months later.
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Will Jay Z’s move tempt you into turning to Tidal? Let us know in the comments below.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
