FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Music

True Tidal Devotee Jay Z Has Pulled A Bunch of His Music from Spotify

The streaming wars rage on.
Lauren O'Neill
London, GB

Not content with being the world's premier purveyor of £680 champagne or briefly hopping onto Frank Ocean's new "Biking cut, Jay Z is still hellbent on making TIDAL happen. As if to prove that he means business, he's now pulled most of his music from Spotify, one of TIDAL's major competitors (along with, obviously, Apple Music).

All that remains on Spotify of Jay Z's catalogue is his first three albums (In My Lifetime Vol 1.Reasonable Doubt and Vol. 2 Hard Knock Life), as well as some of his greatest hits-style compilation, the deluxe edition of his Linkin Park Collision Course collab and a selection of other tracks. There's also no sign of Watch the Throne – track "H.A.M" is available for now in the UK, though.

In a statement given to the BBC, Spotify said "We can confirm that some of Jay Z's catalogue has been removed at the request of the artist," and to be real, they had to have seen it coming. As TIDAL was set up in direct competition with services like Spotify it makes sense that Jay would take his music, which probably a pretty sweet earner for the Swedish service, off it at some point, reasserting his power as an artist (which is one of the aims of TIDAL, who give artists the biggest monetary share of any streaming service). What's potentially worrying for Spotify is that some of TIDAL's banner artists – like Nicki Minaj, or Beyoncé, whose Lemonade is still only available to stream via TIDAL – might follow suit.

So the streaming wars – probably the most boring wars in existence – rage on, but from here, it looks like Jay Z and TIDAL might have won this particular battle. We'll all just sit tight until Taylor Swift launches her own streaming service.

Follow Lauren on Twitter.

(Image via Wikimedia Commons)