Rock star left Spotify in 2022 in protest over podcaster Joe Rogan, but says he can’t keep up fight as Rogan broadens distribution to Apple, YouTube and Amazon
Neil Young is to return his music to Spotify after keeping it off the streaming platform for more than two years.
Young removed his entire catalogue from the world’s biggest streaming company in January 2022, in protest against Joe Rogan whose chart-topping podcast was exclusive to Spotify.
Continue reading...Singer-songwriter says ‘the old days are gone’ amid wider consternation at ticketing company’s pricing policies
Neil Young has lambasted Ticketmaster over its concert ticketing policies, saying “concert tours are no longer fun” due to what he sees as exploitative pricing.
Young wrote on his website:
It’s over. The old days are gone. I get letters blaming me for $3,000 tickets for a benefit I am doing. That money does not go to me or the benefit. Artists have to worry about ripped off fans blaming them for Ticketmaster add-ons and scalpers. Concert tours are no longer fun. Concert tours not what they were.
Continue reading...Streaming platform publishes rules for creators and announces plan to tackle misinformation, including ‘content advisories’
Spotify is adding a message that will direct listeners to correct Covid-19 information as controversy over misinformation shared on Joe Rogan’s podcast continues to grow, with the streamer losing billions in market value and more musicians withdrawing their music.
On Sunday, the CEO of Spotify, Daniel Ek, released an official statement setting out the streaming platform’s plan to tackle misinformation. New content advisories will direct listeners of any podcast that discusses coronavirus to a dedicated website that “provides easy access to data-driven facts, up-to-date information as shared by scientists, physicians, academics and public health authorities around the world, as well as links to trusted sources”.
Continue reading...Singer thanked for ‘standing up against inaccuracies' after the streaming service refused to remove Joe Rogan’s podcast
The World Health Organization chief has backed the veteran rock star Neil Young in his dispute with the music streaming behemoth Spotify, thanking the musician for “standing up against misinformation and inaccuracies” around Covid vaccinations.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO’s director general, tweeted that “we all have a role to play to end this pandemic and infodemic” – in particular social media platforms.
Continue reading...In pulling his music from Spotify in protest at Joe Rogan’s Covid misinformation, the singer continues a life of political action – but unlike others, he doesn’t need to please the streaming giant
If you had been forced to predict which blue-chip American rock legend was going to suddenly pull their music off Spotify in protest at the streaming site hosting a far-right-friendly podcast that spreads medical misinformation, Neil Young would have been a very safe bet.
He is famously among the most ornery, uncompromising and capricious of said blue-chip legends. The years that produced his most famous work also played host to Young wilfully sabotaging his own commercial prospects in order to follow his muse (or, as he memorably put it, “heading for the ditch”); suddenly abandoning tours midway by directing his tour bus to pull off the motorway en route to the next show; whimsically declining to release a succession of completed albums; and incurring the wrath of his partners in Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (CSNY) by removing their contributions from the master tapes of his songs before releasing them. He spent a substantial chunk of the 1980s making wildly uncommercial albums, apparently with the specific intention of annoying his record label, which ended up suing him for being unpredictable – it lost, perhaps because, as his labelmate Elton John put it, its lawsuit “felt a bit like suing Neil Young for being Neil Young”.
Continue reading...Musician condemned spread of misinformation on platform’s top podcast: ‘They can have Rogan or Young’
The music streaming platform Spotify is in the process of removing Neil Young’s music after the company refused to take down Joe Rogan’s podcast amid the musician’s objections that it spread vaccine misinformation.
Rogan has been described by the New York Times as “one of the most consumed media products on the planet”. His podcast, the Joe Rogan Experience, is Spotify’s most popular. In 2020, Rogan signed a $100m deal that gave the streaming giant exclusive rights to his show.
Continue reading...Carlos Santana, Jefferson Airplane, the Flying Burrito Brothers and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young also appear in 26 minutes of home video at event that marked end of hippy dream
Twenty-six minutes of unseen footage of the vast and notoriously violent Altamont music festival held in northern California in 1969 have been unexpectedly uncovered.
The home-movie footage – which is vividly shot on 8mm film, but frustratingly silent – has been published by the Library of Congress on its website.
Continue reading...As Cop26 opens in Glasgow, we provide the soundtrack, ranging from Gojira’s metal fury to gorgeous environmental paeans by Childish Gambino, Neil Young and Joni Mitchell
From its cover shot of a submerged bedroom down, 2019’s Titanic Rising feels like an album informed by the climate crisis, but the lyrics seldom address it explicitly. Something to Believe is the perfect example: a plea not to feel overwhelmed by or nihilistic about the challenges faced, beautifully steeped in the lush sound of early 70s Los Angeles.
Continue reading...At 80, the superstar musician has survived heroin addiction, illness and tragedy to hit an unprecedented run of musical form. He discusses the joy of fatherhood, the pain of falling out with bandmates – and why Joni Mitchell is still the greatest
David Crosby has just turned 80. Congratulations, I say. “Thank you, man!” says the great singer-songwriter, trailblazer and trouble-maker. How did he celebrate? “Eighty years old is something you mourn, not celebrate,” he says.
But that, it turns out, is not quite true. Crosby admits he did celebrate. “We had a great time, man! My son and my wife made me a cake, then my son barbecued some steaks. We baked potatoes, made salads and feasted.”
Continue reading...Hit songs can be a better investment than gold – and by snapping up the rights, Merck Mercuriadis has become the most disruptive force in music
Merck Mercuriadis had a good Christmas. On Christmas Day, the No 1 song in the UK was LadBaby’s Don’t Stop Me Eatin’, a novelty cover version of Journey’s 1981 soft-rock anthem Don’t Stop Believin’. It replaced Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You, which had topped the chart 26 years after its original release. Both songs are unkillable, evergreen hits, which are closing in on 1 billion Spotify streams apiece. Both songs are among the 61,000 owned, in whole or in part, by Mercuriadis’s investment company, Hipgnosis Songs Fund, and epitomise the thesis that has made the 57-year-old Canadian, in less than three years, the most disruptive force in the music business.
Put simply, Hipgnosis raises money from investors and spends it on acquiring the intellectual property rights to popular songs by people like Mark Ronson, Timbaland, Barry Manilow and Blondie. In a fast-growing market, what sets Hipgnosis apart from competitors is its founder’s bona fides as a veteran A&R man, manager and record label CEO. Like an old-school music mogul, Mercuriadis sells his brand by selling himself. Unlike those moguls, he’s a buff, teetotal vegan with spartan tastes. “The only material thing that I really care about is vinyl,” he says. “And Arsenal football club.” He looks rather like a rock-concert security guard: shaven head, burly torso, plain black T-shirt, hawkish gaze. Mark Ronson calls him “the smartest guy in the room”.
Continue reading...As a new live album is released and a 50th anniversary edition of After the Gold Rush approaches, we rate every album by Canada’s irascible godfather of grunge
If other 1970s greats, including Don Henley, were having 80s hits with modern, synth-heavy records then why shouldn’t Neil Young give it a go? A question to which the obvious answer is: because it might sound like Landing on Water, on which perfectly good songs – not least Hippie Dream’s devastating portrait of David Crosby in his coked-out ruin – were knackered by sterile, unsympathetic production.
Continue reading...Musician files lawsuit against the president for copyright infringement after Rockin’ in the Free World and Devil’s Sidewalk were played at a rally
Neil Young is suing Donald Trump’s campaign for alleged illegal usage of his music at a rally.
The musician claims that Rockin’ in the Free World and Devil’s Sidewalk were played at the president’s recent rally in Tulsa without a license. Both songs have also been used before by the campaign.
Continue reading...Singer says senator is the ‘Real Deal’ who offers the big changes needed to beat Trump
Neil Young has endorsed Bernie Sanders for president, saying the Vermont senator is “the real deal” to win the Democratic nomination.
Writing on his personal website, the 74-year-old folk singer said that Sanders’ policies on climate change, student debt, healthcare and the minimum wage were the “big changes” required to beat Donald Trump in the 2020 election.
Continue reading...Internal documents show how the company worked to discredit critics and investigated singer Neil Young
Monsanto operated a “fusion center” to monitor and discredit journalists and activists, and targeted a reporter who wrote a critical book on the company, documents reveal. The agrochemical corporation also investigated the singer Neil Young and wrote an internal memo on his social media activity and music.
The records reviewed by the Guardian show Monsanto adopted a multi-pronged strategy to target Carey Gillam, a Reuters journalist who investigated the company’s weedkiller and its links to cancer. Monsanto, now owned by the German pharmaceutical corporation Bayer, also monitored a not-for-profit food research organization through its “intelligence fusion center”, a term that the FBI and other law enforcement agencies use for operations focused on surveillance and terrorism.
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