Speaking to presenter Howard Stern on Wednesday (November 16), Neil Young explained why he asked for his music to be removed from Spotify earlier this year. The reason for this was probably the misinformation about Covid-19 spread by Joe Rogan and his podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience” – also distributed via Spotify. Young wanted his music removed in 2015, but for a different reason.
Back then, Neil Young was complaining about the quality of his music listened to on Spotify. “Why should I [die Musik] leave it there if it sounds like a pixelated movie?” he said at the time — the streaming service granted his request and removed most of his music. For Young, the problem really was only with Spotify, because: “There’s Amazon, Apple and QoBuz, they’re three streaming services that play in high definition.” Swedish, because “that’s where people listen to music. I want people to hear my music no matter what they go through. I’m just trying to make them listen a lot more and enjoy it a lot more. Music is music.”
Then, in January 2022, Neil Young urged Spotify to take action for other reasons. In an open letter to his management and record label, he reportedly wrote: “Losing 60% of global streaming revenue by leaving SPOTIFY is a big deal, a costly step, but well worth it for our integrity and our beliefs Misinformation about COVID is crossing the line.”
By that, Young was referring to Joe Rogan and his podcast. In one episode she spoke to virologist Robert Wallace Malone, who was spreading misinformation about the corona vaccine. For example, he compared the COVID-19 vaccination campaign in the United States to the rise of the Nazis in Germany in 1933. Joe Rogan, who has an exclusive contract with Spotify and therefore only offers his podcast via this platform, does not he clearly debunked Malone’s claim of lies, he even partially spread his own theories, giving Malone a platform. Neil Young relates, “After listening to the episode, ‘I [ich] I just called my management and said, “We’re out of there. Get me out of there.”
Hardly any Neil Young songs are available on Spotify these days anyway, and the rocker seems to stick to his principles. Given that Spotify paid an estimated US$100 million to Joe Rogan to acquire his podcast in May 2020 and “The Joe Rogan Experience” is one of the most successful podcasts worldwide, it seems unlikely that the controversial conspiracy narrator will leave the platform.
