Here’s a novel way to protest streaming royalties: Interrupt your own song on Spotify.
Artists continue to draw attention to the small payouts they’re getting from music streaming services. Esthero has found an interesting way protest the situation.
If you go to Spotify and look up her song “Gimme Some Time,” there’s an interruption at one minute and 37 seconds into the song. Esthero comes on and says “Hello there, sweet listener. So, I really hope you’re enjoying my song. This is Esthero by the way. But I hope you’re enjoying it enough to go over to www.esthero.net… and purchase the uninterrupted version.
“It’s really hard as an independent artist to make money, and Spotify and other streaming services only pay about .003 to .008 cents per stream. It’s really not a liveable income. So once again, I really hope you enjoy my music, and I hope you enjoy it enough to actually go and support and buy the song from me…”
Clever. Already other artists are lauding her methods.
I love that Esthero has done this and it would ideal if every artist did this encouraging, or forcing if you will, the audience to make a donation for the artist’s work. The problem is there would be very few listeners who would even consider such a transaction. As an artist myself I too am victim of the financial perils of streaming. It’s disappointing because even making money gigging is damn near impossible which means recording top quality music is a huge financial crisis. And, when taking into consideration cutbacks on government funding for the arts, where do you look for assistance? Self financing is fine, we all do it because we love what we do but the current mentality of “can I have your music for free” – because essentially they can – is a bitter pill. Onward and upward. http://www.thisis416.ca