topic Re: When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back? in Content Questions

When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back?

aschwalm — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 21:27:45 GMT

I'm looking for an answer as to why Streetlight's record company couldn't be paid? I beleive they had at least 50 millions streams of their music. Also with some searching on the web, it also looks like victory records were not paying streetlight for this either on top of things. I have thankfully bought their albums and will add them myself temporarlily.

I would prefer an answer from a spotify employee as to the details on this? I am currently paying for 3 accounts and things like this really make me want to just go back to buying all my albums.

Re: When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back?

user-removed — Wed, 04 Nov 2015 18:55:57 GMT

@aschwalm

Hello:

Yes you are correct there was royalty payment issues between the band Streetlight Manifesto and a few other artists and Victory records. Also this article here http://www.forbes.com/sites/bobbyowsinski/2015/10/22/spotifys-victory-records-flap-shows-how-complicated-digital-music-really-is/ helped me at least to see where the royalties issue is and if I understood the article correctly it has to be around the streaming mechanical royalty that is paid. There are 3 royalty payouts at least when it comes to public available music like on Radio, TV, and Internet webcasting and also music streaming where the music is broadcasted in a sense.

"Where it gets complicated is that there are actually several royalties generated from each stream, regardless of whether it’s from a webcast or interactive service.

The first and largest payout goes to the owner of the sound recording, which is usually the record label. The label then splits this royalty with the artist according to the terms of their agreement together (the artist usually gets around 20%, which is one reason why their royalty statement can seem so meager sometimes).

The second much smaller (about 1/10th of the sound recording royalty) payment is for the performance of the song and is collected by a performance rights organization like ASCAP, BMI or SESAC, who takes a cut to cover expenses then forwards the remainder to the publisher. This amount is then split between the publisher and the writers of the song, with the publisher taking as much as 50%.

Interactive streams include a third royalty called a streaming mechanical royalty that’s collected by the record labels then forwarded to the publisher, who splits it with the songwriter. This is the royalty in question between Spotify and Victory Records."

It all falls around the streaming mechanical royalty, not all of the content from Victory Records has been pulled just some, the tracks in question about 2k there abouts with the issue around the wrong meta data attached to the songs and making it difficult to track accurately which songs should be paid on this third royalty. Most labels are not that up todate with meta data, some labels in their rush to make the content available to streaming do not have all the meta data accurate on all the tracks submitted to the service. The reason sometimes releases get added multiples times to fix issues like this from other labels.

Hopefully there will be a solution to this issue that is acceptable to all parties involved. As there is about 10 or so artists I listen to that had music from the Victory Records label on the Spotify service.

Re: When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back?

aschwalm — Wed, 04 Nov 2015 21:32:10 GMT

Thanks for the in depth responses.

Re: When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back?

meahtenoha — Thu, 05 Nov 2015 16:25:22 GMT

Hi @aschwalm Spotify staff here, we're working with Victory Records to get this resolved and have their music back as soon as possible.

Re: When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back?

aschwalm — Thu, 05 Nov 2015 18:36:56 GMT

Thank you Meredith! That is the real information that I wanted out of this aswell.

Re: When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back?

user-removed — Sun, 15 Nov 2015 00:06:58 GMT

@aschwalm

Hello:

Good news double check the artist page for Streetlight Manifesto: http://open.spotify.com/artist/1OKOTYGoCE2buxTYMegJp7

as I am unsure of your listening location, their content showed up for me as I am a U.S. listener. Also content from The Autumn Offering: http://open.spotify.com/artist/0ytz7kc6t3zhHuOJuBArDJ the band's content showed up and was available again, both bands are on the Victor label currently. So other users double check those artist pages again, some of the missing content could have showed up again this Saturday.

Re: When will Spotify finally pay to have Streetlight Manifesto back?

aschwalm — Fri, 27 Nov 2015 20:07:44 GMT

Great to see that they are back! Thanks Spotify!