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It’s probably not a surprise, but Taylor Swift’s new double album is already breaking records.
Spotify announced on social media early Friday evening that “The Tortured Poets Department” released overnight had since become the most-streamed album in a single day, and Swift became the most-streamed artist in a single day in the streaming service’s history.
One of the most-anticipated album releases of the year dropped overnight to much fanfare, with even more coming hours later when Swift announced it was actually a double-album release.
Swift now holds the top three most-streamed albums in a single day in Spotify’s history, the company said, with “Midnights” and “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” rounding out the list. Swift also broke her own record for the most-streamed artist in a single day, which was October 27, 2023, for the release of the aforementioned “1989” album.
The music video for her song “Fortnight” featuring Post Malone is slated to be released at 8 p.m., EDT, on Friday.
Swift described the album as “new works that reflect events, opinions and sentiments from a fleeting and fatalistic moment in time — one that was both sensational and sorrowful in equal measure.”
She also said that time has been “closed and boarded up. There is nothing to avenge, no scores to settle once wounds have healed. And upon further reflection, a good number of them turned out to be self-inflicted.”
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Spotify has signed a new multiyear deal with Joe Rogan that will allow the hit podcaster to air his program on competing platforms, the streaming company announced Friday.
“The Joe Rogan Experience,” which had aired exclusively on Spotify, will also soon be available on streaming services including Apple, Amazon and YouTube, the company said. The show “remains podcasting’s king, consistently ranking as the most-listened-to podcast globally,” the company said in a statement.
Spotify declined to comment on the terms of the deal. A Wall Street Journal report said the contract could be worth up $250 million over the life of the contract.
Beyond his ability to air his show on other venues, Rogan will also receive a share of the revenue generated by his program, according to the newspaper, which cited people familiar with the terms.
Known for giving a platform to conspiracy theories, Rogan and Spotify were accused of spreading misinformation about COVID-19 during the pandemic, prompting some musicians to pull their work from the service.
Rogan has also hosted a range of high-profile figures, from scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson to Senator Bernie Sanders, creating more than 2,200 episodes that average two to three hours in length.
“I only have people on the show that I’m genuinely interested in talking to. I never do a podcast just because a person is popular. It’s always from a place of ‘I think it would be cool to talk to that person’,” Rogan wrote in a Spotify blog post.
Spotify has more than 574 million users. Shares of Spotify were lately up 1.3% at $221.81, in keeping with market gains overall.
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There were 4.1 trillion music streams worldwide in 2023, according to a report released Wednesday, the first time streaming has ever crossed the four-trillion mark in a single year.
The milestone number of global audio streams marked a 22.3% increase from 2022, according to data provider Luminate.
The U.S. accounted for just over a quarter of that total, or 1.2 trillion streams, also a bump up from the previous year.
To no one’s surprise, pop star Taylor Swift’s music drove a large chunk of that, making up 1.79% of total streams in the U.S. — meaning about one in every 78 audio streams was a Swift song, the Luminate report said.
Both Swift and Beyoncé saw a significant uptick in streams following the releases of their concert movies, “The Eras Tour” and a “Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé.”
One of the report’s biggest takeaways was that U.S. listeners are streaming more non-English music. It found that the fastest-growing audio streaming genres were world and Latin, which saw increases of 26% and 24% respectively compared to 2022.
Luminate also found that the share of English-language content in the top-10,000 audio and video streaming tracks in the U.S. has dropped 3.8% since 2021, while the Spanish-language share has increased by the same percentage over that period.
Overall, Spanish audio content was the second most popular to English content in the U.S., making up 8% of total audio streams, per the report.
Last year, Bad Bunny roped in 3.6 billion on-demand audio streams in the U.S., while Peso Pluma brought in about 1.9 billion, the report found. They were among six Spanish-language artists who crossed the one billion mark.
Johnny Nunez/Getty Images for The Recording Academy
The Regional Mexican music genre also saw a massive boom, growing 60% compared to last year in on-demand audio streams.
U.S. millennials and Gen Zers are driving the interest in foreign language music, the report found, with over 63% of both age groups saying they “listen to new music to experience new cultures and perspectives.”
But many within those generations are also powering the fast growth of country music in the U.S., with younger fans supporting artists like Luke Combs and Morgan Wallen. Wallen’s “Last Night” was the most streamed song in the U.S., according to the report, with over one billion streams.
Although foreign-language and country music saw big streaming gains, listeners in the U.S. still tuned into R&B and hip-hop more than any other genre, the report found, with almost a third of the total streams in the U.S. It was fitting, as 2023 marked the 50th anniversary of hip-hop.
Spotify is laying off 17% of its workforce in the popular music streaming service’s third round of layoffs this year.
The cuts reflect the company’s efforts to adjust its workforce to sustain “profitability amid slowing economic growth,” Spotify CEO Daniel Ek said Monday in a letter to employees. The post didn’t specify how many employees would lose their jobs, but a spokesperson confirmed that it amounts to about 1,500 people.
“Despite our efforts to reduce costs this past year, our cost structure for where we need to be is still too big,” Ek said in the letter.
The Stockholm, Sweden-based company had used cheap financing to expand its business and “invested significantly” in employees, content and marketing in 2020 and 2021, a time when many tech companies were ramping up their hiring, Spotify said in its blog post.
But Ek indicated that the company was caught out as central banks started hiking interest rates last year, which can slow economic growth. Both are posing a challenge, he said.
“We now find ourselves in a very different environment. And despite our efforts to reduce costs this past year, our cost structure for where we need to be is still too big,” he said.
This latest wave of layoffs marks Spotify’s third round of mass job cuts this year. In January, the firm slashed 6% of jobs, bringing its workforce to 9,200 employees. Just four months later, it cut another 2%, or 200 employees, mostly in its podcasting division.
Spotify has struggled to achieve profitability, posting a net loss this year of roughly $500 million for the nine months to September, despite growing its monthly active users to 574 million in the third quarter of 2023, the company’s financial statements show.
Spotify shares rose 14 points, or 7.5%, to $194.26 in morning trade Monday. Despite its financial losses, the company’s share price has more than doubled this year.
A slew of major tech companies, including IBM, Snap, Google, Roku and Meta, among others, engaged in sweeping job cuts this year, reversing a hiring spree that surged during the pandemic as millions of Americans began working from home.
Microsoft in January announced a 5% reduction in its workforce, or about 11,000 workers across offices worldwide.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — It’s been anything but a cruel summer — or year — for Taylor Swift.
Spotify Wrapped revealed Wednesday that Swift was the most-streamed artist globally in 2023, checking in with more than 26.1 billion streams since Jan. 1.
Rounding out the top five are Bad Bunny, The Weeknd, Drake and Peso Pluma.
Swift’s songs “Cruel Summer” and “Anti-Hero” came in as the sixth and 10th most-streamed songs globally, respectively. Her album “Lover,” was the seventh most streamed album.
It’s been quite the year for the Berks County native.
Swift’s Eras Tour broke records, then the movie release broke AMC Theatres presale records — the film will be available to rent on demand beginning Dec. 13. She released two re-recorded albums — “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” and “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version).”
The Year of Swift didn’t just take over the music world — Swift entered the sports sphere by entering a relationship with Travis Kelce, the brother of Eagles legend Jason Kelce.
If you want to see how much Swift — or other artists — you listened to this year, here’s how to access your Spotify Wrapped.
It’s the time of the year where Spotify users get to see what artists they spent the most time with over the past year — but there’s a new wrinkle for 2023. Spotify Wrapped will not be limited to just the mobile app for iOS and Android.
Spotify said Wednesday that this year’s Wrapped will be available for the first time online at Spotify.com/Wrapped.
Users on their phone should see an option on the top menu on the Spotify app that says “Wrapped” — it should be the last option on the menu where it says “all,” music,” podcasts” and “audiobooks.”
Mobile users can also access Wrapped via the search section of the app — or even on the home screen. When users open the app, there will be a badge saying “Your 2023 Wrapped,” with a subtitle saying “Unwrap your listening highlights.”
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Spotify and Archewell Audio, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s podcast production company, have ended a commercial partnership after the couple delivered only a single podcast series.
“Spotify and Archewell Audio have mutually agreed to part ways and are proud of the series we made together,” Spotify and Archewell Audio announced Thursday, without elaborating on why they decided to pull the plug.
The deal ends less than a year after Markle’s debut podcast, “Archetypes,” first aired. The segments dug into “the labels that try to hold women back,” according to its description on the platform, with Markle’s guests including Serena Williams, Mariah Carey and Mindy Kaling.
At the time, Dawn Ostroff, Spotify’s chief content and advertising business officer, called Prince Harry and Meghan “citizens of the world,” celebrating their goal of uplifting underrepresented voices in their work.
After the partnership ended, Bill Simmons, Spotify’s head of podcast innovation and monetization, blasted the couple, calling them “grifters” in an episode of the his podcast. His guest, podcast host Joe House referred to Simmons’ dealmaking and negotiation experience, when Simmons turned to the news of Harry and Meghan’s deal dissolving.
“I wish I had been involved in the Meghan and Harry leave Spotify negotiation,” said Simmons, best known as an outspoken former ESPN personality. “I got to get drunk one night and tell the story of the Zoom I had with Harry to try to help him with a podcast idea. It’s one of my best stories.”
Simmons is also the founder of sports and pop culture website and podcast network The Ringer, which was acquired by Spotify in 2020.
Spotify first announced what it called an exclusive “multiyear partnership” with The Duke and Duchess of Sussex in December of 2020 focused on producing podcasts and shows that share “uplifting and entertaining stories” with the streaming platform’s massive audience.
Harry and Meghan also have a multiyear deal with Netflix to produce children’s programming, documentaries, feature films and scripted shows.
The pair relinquished their royal duties in 2020, cutting them off from the British Crown’s estimated $34 billion estate. Forbes last year pegged their net worth at $10 million, including Harry’s inheritance from his mother, Princess Diana, and the equity the couple have in their California mansion.