In the wake of accusations and allegations against multiple musicians, one of the music industry’s dominant streaming services, Spotify, has a newly launched feature that could eliminate the support and streaming usage of a music artist of one’s choice.
Spotify's latest version of its iOS app will now allow its listeners the opportunity to avoid listening to artists with its new “block” feature. A new “Don’t play this artist” button will essentially allow listeners to remove that artist from their private and public playlists. This feature has been in the works for some time.
Initially arising in an attempt to realign its stance and overall values, the streaming service announced in May of 2018 that it would “stop promoting or recommending music by artists whose content or conduct it deemed to be offensive,” according to the New York Times.
In other words, Spotify will no longer promote artists whose content and actions veer away from the streaming service's values. Those values are listed in an abruptly implemented policy specifically directed toward “Hate Content and Hateful Conduct.”
The new policy immediately became applicable to a few artists. Simultaneously being recognized as the “King of R&B” and an alleged predator, R. Kelly became a controversial spectacle for the policy. Not only did the policy no longer overtly promote Kelly’s music, but his alleged actions as well. He was then also joined by rapper and singer, XXXTentacion with similar problems.
An artist fixated on trauma, pain and controversy, themes still evident in his music today, last year the Florida native awaited trial for alleged assault on his then girlfriend. Despite his rough reputation, XXXTentacion’s music still resonates with his audience. The decision to ban him was immediately greeted with backlash from record labels such as Top Dawg Entertainment that houses artists such as Kendrick Lamar.
Bloomberg reported that Punch, the president of Top Dawg Entertainment, posted, “Whoa. Are they censoring the music? That’s dangerous,” on Twitter.
Though the conversation surrounding censorship within the music industry is nothing new, it has evolved over the years. Artists such as The Rolling Stones, N.W.A., Madonna and more have been including more graphic content and themes such as sex, violence and politics. Their inclusions have been met with both praise and criticism from the public.
According to the National Coalition Against Censorship, "Objecting parties attempt to curtail the spread of these allegedly dangerous ideas or images to vulnerable listeners or claim that such lyrics are indecent and have no value as a form of art."
In doing so, this backlash perhaps forced Spotify’s hand, as they reversed the “Hate Content and Hateful Conduct” policy in June of 2018.
“Across all genres, our role is not to regulate artists. Therefore, we are moving away from implementing a policy around artist conduct. And while we believe our intentions were good, the language was too vague, we created confusion and concern, and didn’t spend enough time getting input from our own team and key partners before sharing new guidelines,” Spotify said in a newsroom release.
Despite these accusations, people like Kelly, accused of sexual misconduct with a child, and rapper Tekashi 6ix9ine, accused of firearm misuse and sexual conduct with a minor, have maintained their reputation within the music industry.
With this pass given to popular artists, a disturbing question has been raised: what is valued more, content or context?
Now fast-forwarding into the new year, artists such as Kelly are being exposed via the media, like Lifetime's newly released docuseries, “Surviving R. Kelly.” The media is steaming with the #MuteRKelly movement, nonetheless allowing some of the heat to leave Spotify.
With its new block feature, Spotify has expanded their efforts to make censorship available for all of its streamers, so be on the lookout.
Courtesy of The Daily Dot
