Legendary rocker Neil Young recently issued an ultimatum to the platform Spotify, which broadcasts many of his songs, as well as Rogan’s podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience.
Like many Boomer celebrities who once proudly declared themselves anti-establishment rebels, Young has become nothing more than a preening Karen who dislikes Rogan’s show for allegedly spreading misinformation about COVID.
Young’s demand was basically ‘either he goes or I do’ and you might say he chose poorly.
Spotify basically told Young not to let the door hit him on the way out.
Hannah Frishberg reports at the New York Post:
Spotify sides with Joe Rogan, removes Neil Young’s music: ‘A costly move’Spotify has sided with its podcast superstar over Neil Young.The legendary folk singer gave the streaming behemoth an ultimatum earlier this week, saying he refused to allow his music on the same platform as Joe Rogan. The “Heart of Gold” singer accused Rogan and his podcast of spreading false information about COVID-19 vaccines.Spotify reportedly paid more than $100 million deal to be the exclusive home of Rogan’s show. Young, meanwhile, stands to lose 60% of his streaming income from his defiant stance, he said in a statement on his website…Since the start of the pandemic, the spokesman noted, Spotify has removed more than 20,000 COVID-related podcast episodes. Still, Young’s protests were not sufficient for it to drop its lucrative star talker.“We regret Neil’s decision to remove his music from Spotify, but hope to welcome him back soon,” the spokesperson added.Rogan’s podcast has attracted an estimated 11 million listeners.
Young greatly overestimated his own influence, while vastly underestimating that of Rogan. Spotify knows which side of its bread is being buttered.
The great Ace of Spades weighed in on this as only he can:
Spotify to Neil Young: We Accept Your Conditions. We Are Removing Your Shitty Music From Our Service.Neil Young, greatly, greatly overestimating his relevance and clout, demanded that Spotify either drop Joe Rogan or drop him.Spotify thought about this for five minutes — four minutes and fifty six seconds were taken up trying to figure out who Neil Young was (He’s not an astronaut, is he?) — and then decided, “Uh, yeah. Okay, bye-bye then.”…Is Spotify removing his music to spare itself the headache, then? Or out of spite?Note that that last possibility is not out of the question: they have a strong business incentive in laying down the law as far as artists making demands like this. Imagine all of these prima donna, leftwing opinion-shrieking Artistes all making demands like this. Or rappers saying “Drop my rivals’ music or drop me!”No — best to lay down the law with a has-been like Neil Young and let the rest know, “We’re not playing, we’ll drop you like a bad habit.”
Read the whole thing. Trust me.
There are already some great memes floating around.
Let’s pour one out for the music of Neil Young. Sing along with me. Hey, hey. My, my. Neil Young got booted by Spotify…
Neil Young half of featured image via YouTube.
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