(Photo Courtesy Of Google Images)
By now we’ve all heard about the streaming service, Tidal, ushered in by Jay Z and 16 major headline artists. If you’re still in the dark about Tidal, it’s a streaming service like Spotify. But unlike Spotify, Tidal offers music, music videos, artist merchandise, and as of April 3, independent movies. You can get all this for 9.99 or $20 for the premium. Dope, right? Nope. According to some of y’all, you don’t want to help the rich get richer. Wait, let me rephrase that. You don’t want to help Jay Z and the other artists get richer. No, you guys really wrote that on social media. You saw Tidal was being brought to the table by Hov, and you grabbed your $600 iPhone to complain about prices. Then you brag about staying on Spotify, like you forgot that rich people run that service.
One of the main reasons Tidal came about was because artists were getting peanuts for their work. A song can be streamed over 150 million times on Spotify, and the artist would only be paid $4,000 – $7,000. 150 million streams for a couple stacks? That’s like working a 96 hour week but you only get paid for two hours. That’s unfair. No matter how you feel about musicians, at the end of the day that’s their art. And the fact that their willing to let you stream it for $10, should make you appreciate what they’re doing. Don’t forget Taylor Swift snatched her albums off Spotify. She needs all $16 of yours.
Let me help you out a bit. I’m kind of a tech nerd. And with that said in about five years there will be no such thing as free anything when it comes to the music industry. With artists teaming up, services like Pandora and Spotify will be forced to end their free streams. YouTube will be taking down artist’s videos soon. You will be asked to pay or you can listen to the same five songs that the radio plays. So what is the issue? The only issue I see is that you all only complain when it’s Black artists who are trying to advance. If Tidal was brought to you by Bono, not a peep would be said. It’s like y’all want Black artists to be content with where they’re at and that’s it. It seems as if you are consumers when it comes to Tim Cook/Apple and anti-capitalists when it comes to musicians and their products.
I’m not here to sell you on Tidal. I couldn’t care less about what you do with your money. I’m just over all this hypocrisy when it comes to certain artists. You’re paying (if you are) the same price for the same service. So why the anger? You are not being forced to buy in to it. All I ask is the next time an artist tries to sell you something you don’t want, ignore it. Simply because nobody on your news-feed wants to read your poorly written dissertation with countless contradictions. Now let me get back to streaming music off Tidal on this iPhone. –Pooh Bailey
