Music Streaming Revisited – The Superstars’ Music Streaming Income

Some artists have unveiled their royalties’ statements highlighting that just a small proportion of their income comes from music streaming services (e.g. cellist Zoe Keating in February 2013). However, the question remains open if and how the superstars benefit from shift to the music streaming business? In the following analysis the top superstars’ income from recorded music sales, music streaming, publishing and touring is highlighted. The statistics are based on the Billboard Money Makers List 2015 for the 40 top earners of the US music business. See here for the methodology[1].

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Is Streaming the Next Big Thing? – The artists’ perspective

In mid of July 2013 Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke caused for controversies when he pulled his song catalogue and those of his band Atoms For Peace from music streaming service Spotify. His straight forward argument was as cited in The Guardian that “new artists get paid fuck all with this model”. Several artists take the same line as Yorke. The co-author of the Belinda Carlisle hit “Heaven is a Place on Earth”, Ellen Shipley, complained that the royalty paid by Pandora to her for more than 3m plays was US$ 40. She accused Pandora, Spotify, YouTube and Google for “(…) the meager, insulting, outrageous amount of money songwriters are being paid” according to Business Insider. In fact some big names are not available on Spotify: The Beatles, AC/DC, The Eagles, Garth Brooks, George Harrison.

Thus, the question arises if and how music streaming services can be valuable for artists? In the following I would like to highlight the pros and cons of music streaming services form an artists’ perspective.