My song taken down

[il5920]

So, around 3 months ago, I have uploaded a song on Spotify and Apple music.

It had around 20k views/stream

However, my song just got removed 30minuets ago from Spotify and is still up on Apple music - it also says on distrokid that the song is still up.

I have not received any emails from anywhere about why and how. 

Help me out, please.

[heh]

The same thing happened to me.  My song has been up for seven months and has racked up a lot of listens in that time.  I have a new one coming in a couple of weeks and find this very disconcerting.

[sam323]

Happened to me to. Spent the last 24 hrs trying to figure this out. I reached out to my distributor and I recommend you do the same. I also have distrokid.

[conoros97]

I've just had the exact same problem. Uploaded a song 3 months ago, it got about 4.5k streams (my most popular song yet), I noticed my monthly listeners were dropping so a few days ago I started an instagram ad campaign, checked the campaign today to see how it was going, clicked the link and the song was gone. It was still there yesterday. Im absolutely distraught, It was my most popular release yet and I've spent so much money on IG promotions. I need to get the song back

[conoros97]

Has anyone had this happen and gotten it fixed, Im genuinely heart broken. I hope this isnt permanent

[heh]

I reached out to Spotify but not Distrokid yet.  My song was a cover, but I obtained the proper license through Distrokid.  My fear is, they think I somehow "faked streams" or something depending because it was my first single as a solo artist and I got quite a few streams between playlists and fans of my other projects.

[heh]

Conor, I am right there with you, man.  I've spent a bunch of money trying to promote this song, and now it's gone without so much as a word.

[sam323]

@heh Worked so hard 2020 and landed on playlists with over 100k+ followers all legitimate. Someone removed most of my catalogue with no communication 2021 off to a frustrating start. I'm also worried they have mistaken me for "faking streams"

[heh]

I'm sorry to hear that, Sam.  You are not alone.  In my case, I wonder if I was flagged because it was my only release as a solo artist.  They forget the hundreds of thousands of streams I've gotten on my other projects and how many of my bands' fans have filtered over to check things out.

[sam323]

The weird part is that if I click my link via distrokid it shows the song still on Spotify but it is greyed out. When I log in on my consumer account it's not there.

[heh]

Same here, Sam.  You can see removed songs by going to your settings via the Desktop app.  I feel I've done absolutely nothing wrong.  This sucks so much.

[conoros97]

yeah i get the same thing, I think the songs are still there but they are hidden or blocked or something its honestly ruined my day, did your release vanish recently? mine disappeared some time in the last 2 days? maybe they did a sweep of content and just removed a load of stuff in bulk. I'm really hoping that they can fix this for me. if you guys get any updates please let me know

[heh]

My song got taken down today, or late last night.  Literally, I can see my numbers drop a bit yesterday (pretty normal for holidays/weekends), but today I can't even see any stats or live streaming going on.  I will def update you, but I'm not holding my breath.  This is a big, faceless corporation.  They don't care about us.

[heh]

I just heard back with one of their form letters:

"

Hey there,

Thanks for reaching out to us.

We’ve taken a look backstage, and it seems your single was made unavailable as a result of artificial streaming. 

Your distributor should be aware of this removal and will be able to give you more info.

If you have any other concerns or questions, we're just an email away."

I responded that I have no idea where the artificial streaming came from, but I would like to be placed back on the platform.  This is all very upsetting.

[sam323]

How long did it take for them to reply to you?

[heh]

Just a few hours.

Even if you were on a 100 percent legitimate playlist, what's to stop someone from running bots on there or whatever, just to mess around or to sabotage the playlist?  And then, they will take down ARTISTS because of that?  I don't even know who did this!

[sam323]

True, I'm assuming that I'm in the same boat as well. I just emailed spotify and letting them know it was a mistake. They cant just take my music off when I did nothing wrong. Distrokid probably wont get back to me until Tuesday so now I'm in the anxious waiting loop..

[heh]

This is awful.  Spotify is being totally evasive.  They don't say if it came from a specific playlist, directly to my account, or what.  And I honestly don't know what they're talking about.  If they at least gave me more details, I could try to fix it.

[heh]

Distrokid just responded and was only slightly more helpful.  They basically also didn't have any ideas or exact problems they could pinpoint though...even though Spotify threw them under the bus and said they would.

[KrustyRockStar]

Glad to have found this thread.

Is it a coincidence that I received the heartbreaking Distrokid email today too?

Had about 35k streams on this one and have spent quite a bit on marketing over the 2 years.

We Artists are always taking a gamble with new promotion services.

A more reasonable penalty would be to remove these "fake streams" as opposed to removing a whole track due to your marketing agent's mistakes.

Look forward to some updates from you guys!