The Green New Deal: Where Spotify Stands, And Where Artists Wish It Would
If it weren't for the signs reading "Spotify," "Amazon," "Google" and "Pandora" sitting atop four empty chairs on a warm Wednesday in April, the scene onstage at 3rd & Lindsley in Nashville would have looked like any writer's round. But this day wasn't about creating and sharing music, as is custom at these events, reveling in each other's catchy licks and smart lyrics — no one was happily drinking whiskey out of anything other than frustration. Instead, songwriters like Kenny Chesney producer Buddy Cannon and "Girl Crush" co-writer Liz Rose were gathered to hear about what they could do to push against these tech companies, whom they feel are aggressively lobbying in search of profit over songwriters' financial well being. In that room in Nashville, Spotify seemed to be the biggest offender — after all, it's the largest player in the streaming game, valued at over $26 billion dollars and with 217 million monthly users. But Spotify didn't show, leaving only an empty chair and a sign bearing its logo.
Assembled by the National Music Publishers Association (NMPA), with the Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI), that April town hall was in response to from Spotify itself to host a meeting intended to explain its motivations for appealing a 2018 ruling ( earlier this year) mandating a sharp increase in royalty rates for songwriters' compositions that would be phased in from 2018 to 2022. For many artists and creators, Spotify's appeal felt particularly egregious, coming from a company that has consistently labeled itself as "artist-friendly" through programs like Secret Genius, which was meant to "celebrate" those
