Tidal sees bump with Jay-Z’s 4:44
Meanwhile, the music service struggles to grow user base, reportedly butts heads with Kanye West
Music service Tidal got a big bump from Jay-Z’s new release, 4:44, but could take a hit if a report that Kanye West is departing is true.
Tidal jumped to No. 1 in Apple’s App Store on Friday and Saturday — Jay-Z’s album launched early Friday morning — according to Apptopia, an app-tracking firm. Tidal’s app also jumped to No.12 from No. 432 in the Google Play store.
This was despite the grumblings among some new Tidal subscribers, who were surprised to learn they couldn’t hear 4:44 unless they were already subscribers or were customers of Sprint, a part owner in Tidal. The service loosened that policy on Monday, saying the album would be available even for new customers who signed up for the free 30-day trial.
Overall, Tidal had the most downloads on a single day in the last year, Apptopia data found.
The last time Tidal topped the app charts? Feb. 14, 2016, the day Kanye West’s The Life of Pablolanded for its one-week exclusive stint on Tidal.
West was among the original group of artists — others included Beyoncé, Alicia Keys, Daft Punk, Usher, deadmau5, Madonna, Rihanna, Jason Aldean, Nicki Minaj, Jack White and Chris Martin of Coldplay — who joined Jay-Z at Ti dal’s relaunch more than two years ago and were reportedly given equity stakes in the company.
The music service, which has a $19.99 high-definition music tier along with a $9.99 monthly standardres subscription, had other high notes with April 2016’s release of Beyoncé’s Lemonade album.
But it’s had a harder time turning those bursts into a mass subscriber base. Last year, Jay-Z sued the former owners, claiming they inflated subscriber numbers.
Tidal jumped to No. 1 in Apple’s App Store on Friday and Saturday — Jay-Z’s album launched early Friday morning, according to Apptopia, which is a mobile app-tracking firm
Then in January, wireless carrier Sprint took a 33per-cent stake, a financial boost for the company.
Sprint’s 45 million subscribers — all of whom get a free six-month pass to Tidal’s service — could help the service expand its subscriber base, something Tidal has struggled to do despite its star power. At three million subscribers, the last figure publicly announced, Tidal is dwarfed by Spotify (50 million paying subscribers worldwide) and Apple Music (27 million).
A reported rift with West wouldn’t help matters. West has left the company, arguing he is owed more than $3 million, according to TMZ.
West’s attorney has sent letters to Tidal saying the company “was in breach and the contract terminated,” the site reported, citing unnamed sources.
Tidal did not pay West a bonus for attracting new subscribers with Pablo and did not reimburse him for music videos, West alleges according to TMZ’s report.
In response, Tidal sent a letter to West threatening a lawsuit if he attempts to join another streaming music service, TMZ says.
Neither Tidal nor RocNation, which represents both artists, responded to requests for comment from USA TODAY.
There have been signs of ill will between West and Jay-Z, who have collaborated in the past.
West likely had tired of Tidal’s business strategy of using exclusives to build its subscriber base. Many others are also beginning to question the viability of exclusives, with Spotify global head of creator services Troy Carter telling Variety recently it has abandoned the strategy.
“I think people have learned over the last six months that it’s bad for the music industry, it’s not that great for artists because they can’t reach the widest possible audience, and it’s terrible for consumers,” Carter told Variety. And exclusives can time out quickly. Tidal had Beyoncé’s Lemonade to itself for only one day before it hit other services.
No word yet on how long Tidal will be the exclusive home to 4:44. MacRumors reported that iTunes and Apple Music would get the album this week.
Jay-Z’s album has “received a ton of positive feedback and the exclusive early release on Tidal certainly could not hurt the service,” said Glenn Hower, senior analyst with Parks Associates.
“However, as we see now with the Kanye West fallout, exclusivity can be complicated when dealing with larger-than-life personas.”
“This is not necessarily a new issue in the streaming music space,” he said. “Even for household names like Spotify and Pandora, margins are still razor-thin and there are plenty of questions about the profitability and long-term sustainability of streaming music services,” Hower said.
Losing West may not help Tidal’s cause, but it won’t likely be fatal for Tidal, says Zach Fuller, an analyst with Midia Research. “People want to make these sweeping statements and say that Spotify has won, or Apple Music can come in, or someone can bundle (Tidal) with another service,” he said. “But as we have seen, Tesla wants to get involved in streaming. There’s all these competitors. It’s really early days.”