Monday, December 30, 2024

Kanye Caves: Remember When He Said His New Album Would “Never Ever” Be on AppleMusic or Spotify? He Caved

You do remember when Kanye West Tweeted that his new album, “The Life of Pablo,” would “never ever” be on Apple Music? Or for that matter, Spotify?

Alas, that’s where it will be after midnight tonight. After sinking into obscurity on Tidal, Jay Z’s service, “Pablo” is about to have a life. And apparently, this is a more finished version. This week Kanye already released a track to Spotify called “Famous.” I told you yesterday the song has 17 credited writers.

Tidal is all but done at this point. A valiant idea, the service could not cross over for the mainstream acts that signed up as “partners” or investors or whatever. Rihanna gave in right away. If she hadn’t, her “Anti” album would have remained MIA.

Now Jay Z is suing the people he bought Tidal from, saying they lied about the number of subscribers they had. Well, of course they did. They’re in Sweden. How many people are in Sweden? Who listen to streaming music?

“The Life of Pablo” meanwhile should be downloadable imminently, too, and probably issued as a CD. This means Kanye– who has already Tweeted dozens of times today– will be in his own spotlight for weeks to come.

This news certainly puts a crimp in the Zayn story for next week. This past week it looks like Zayn sold an anemic 110K copies of his debut album. Hard numbers in the AM.

Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman began his Showbiz411 column in April 2009 after 10 years with Fox News, where he created the Fox411 column. His movie reviews are carried by Rotten Tomatoes, and he is a member of both the movie and TV branches of the Critics Choice Awards. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. He is also the writer and co-producer of "Only the Strong Survive," a selection of the Cannes, Sundance, and Telluride Film festivals, directed by DA Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus.

Read more

In Other News