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.
Rogan was widely accused of spreading misinformation about Covid vaccines via the podcast, not only by Young but also a group of 270 scientists and healthcare professionals who said Rogan’s misinformation was “a sociological issue of devastating proportions and Spotify is responsible for allowing this activity to thrive on its platform”.
Young called Spotify “the home of life-threatening Covid misinformation. Selling lies for money … They can have Rogan or Young. Not both.” His music was duly taken down, with a Spotify spokesperson saying: “We regret Neil’s decision to remove his music from Spotify, but hope to welcome him back soon.”
Rogan apologised in January 2022, saying “I don’t always get it right”, and adding that he would try to “balance things out” with “experts with differing opinions”. Spotify chief executive Daniel Ek also apologised, saying: “We have an obligation to do more to provide balance and access to widely accepted information from the medical and scientific communities.”
As of February this year, The Joe Rogan Experience podcast is no longer exclusive to Spotify. The host signed a new multi-year deal, believed to be worth $250m (£196m), that allows the podcast to be distributed by other platforms including Apple Podcasts, YouTube and Amazon Music.
Young has now said he can’t sustain his opposition across each of the streaming platforms, and will therefore return his music to Spotify.
Writing on his website he said: “My decision comes as music services Apple and Amazon have started serving the same disinformation podcast features I had opposed at Spotify. I cannot just leave Apple and Amazon, like I did Spotify, because my music would have very little streaming outlet to music lovers at all, so I have returned to Spotify.”
Young, a longtime proponent of high-quality audio who once launched a rival to Apple’s iPod, criticises Spotify for the quality of its playback, describing it as “the #1 streamer of low res music in the world – Spotify where you get less quality than we made … I hope all you millions of Spotify users enjoy my songs! They will now all be there for you except for the full sound we created.” He said he hoped Spotify would introduce a high-definition tier to its service, and pointed fans towards competitors Qobuz and Tidal.
Young, 78, continues to be as outspoken today as he was with his famous musical broadsides against war, the US government, environmental destruction and more. In November he boycotted X (formerly Twitter) after owner Elon Musk promoted an antisemitic tweet. “Tesla should fly flags of love – not hate,” the rocker wrote. He lambasted Ticketmaster earlier in 2023, writing: “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.”
Nevertheless, in April he is heading out on a tour promoted by Live Nation, Ticketmaster’s parent company, playing 16 dates across North America with his band Crazy Horse.
Young is also preparing the April release of Fu##in Up, a live album recorded in November featuring songs mostly from 1990 album Ragged Glory. “I had been playing with arthritis in my hand for years and years and finally discovered a way around the pain with no drugs that let me play as I felt,” Young wrote after the recording. “The last show was a lifetime experience … It was a very special night! We captured it. Nothing new. Just my old songs and the Horse, but I felt so great, my singing was free and easy. I can’t remember a night like that in decades, if ever.”
In February, Young released Dume, a collection of material recorded with Crazy Horse during sessions for 1975’s Zuma. It follows Before and After, an album of solo acoustic rerecordings of older Young songs, released in December 2023.