Kate Nash’s ongoing campaign to draw attention to the difficulties of maintaining a career in music during the streaming era has provoked a swift response from Spotify.
The singer/songwriter appeared on Women’s Hour yesterday on BBC Radio 4, discussing the iniquities of streaming and the length she’s has had to go to to finance touring, including selling pictures of her rear end via OnlyFans.
She said on air: “Foundations (her 2007 Top Three hit) has over 100million plays on Spotify. I am shocked I’m not a millionaire when I hear that! I am shocked at the state of the music industry and how the industry has allowed this to happen.”
“And what they’re saying to artists from non-rich privileged backgrounds, which is you’re not welcome here, you can’t do this, we don’t want to hear from you. Because it’s not possible to even imagine having a career if you don’t have a privileged background or a privileged situation right now.”
She continued: “We’re paid very, very, very poorly and unethically for our recorded music: it’s like 0.003 of a penny per stream. I think we should not only be paid fairly but we should be paid very well. People love music and it’s a growing economy and there are plenty of millionaires in the industry because of us, and our music.”
The presenter Nuala McGovern then read out a statement from Spotify in response: “We’re huge fans of Kate Nash. For streams of her track Foundations alone – which was released before Spotify existed – Spotify has paid out around half a million pounds in revenue to Kate Nash’s rightsholders.”
“Her most streamed songs were released via Universal Music Group. Spotify has no visibility over the deals that Kate signed with her rights’ holders; therefore, we have no knowledge of the payment terms that were agreed upon between her and her partners.”
“We do know that British artists generated revenues of over £750 million on Spotify alone in 2023 – a number that is on the rise year on year – so it’s disappointing to hear that Spotify’s payments are not making it through to Kate herself.”
What is interesting in the statement is Spotify’s passing of the buck to the record company Nash was signed to in 2007. Back then it was Fiction, which these days is a part of Universal Music Group, the largest record company in the world. It would be fascinating to see a full breakdown of whose pockets the streaming money from Foundations has actually gone into.
After the radio show Nash posted on her Instagram that she hadn’t had time to respond to Spotify’s statement on air: “This is great. I knew I was getting to them! I’m so happy. It’s such a good feeling.”
She played the Forum in London last night and promised that she would “respond to Spotify later”. At the time of writing there was no further updates on her Instagram. Watch this space, I guess...
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