All Songs Greyed Out, Cross-Platform Issue (PC & iOS)

[lythwynn]

Plan

Premium (Student)

Location

Florida, USA

Devices

Both my iPhone 11 Pro and my Windows PC

Operating Systems

iOS 15.4.1

Windows 10 version 21H1

My Issue

There are many, many songs that are greyed out for me that seemingly should not be. For example, almost the entire discography of Joji and Glaive, among many others. This seems like it should not be the case because I asked a friend of mine to check it (who is also in Florida) and he could play the songs fine. 

It does not work on my PC (in app). It does not work on my phone. It doesn't even work on Spotify Web Player (in browser). 

Please help! I would really like to continue using Spotify but this is extremely discouraging. 

[AlejaR]

Hey @lythwynn,

Thanks for posting on the Community and welcome 🙂
 

Just to confirm, is this happening just with these two artists or is there any other artist whose discography you can’t see? Perhaps you accidentally blocked them on your mobile phone app.

To check if this is the case, go to these artists' profiles in the mobile device app and then, select the three dot menu. If the artist's content is blocked, you'll see the option "Allow to play this". Give it a try and let us know how it goes.

If this doesn't do the trick, (and since you mentioned a friend of yours can play this content), can you create a free test account on your side and let us know if you can play the music there?

We'll be on the lookout for your reply.

Cheers!

[lythwynn]

Hey @AlejaR,

Unfortunately it does not appear that these artists are blocked on my iPhone. Also, it's not just these artists, but many songs, and I even have entire playlists greyed out such as the one attached here. It's super bizzare.

Oddly enough, the test account does work, and is able to play all aforementioned songs/artists. So, I have no clue why it doesn't work on mine 😞

Any help is super appreciated. Thank you very much!

[Alex]

Hey there @lythwynn,

Thanks for the post. 

We also checked the availability of Joji's discography in the US and it appears that the songs are available for streaming. 

Since they work fine on the test account, the issue is most likely related to your own account. You can try the following:

• Log out everywhere and back in twice in a row. This will force sync your account with the servers.
• Try unfollowing the artists and hitting "Don't Play this artist". After that allow playing those artist and follow them back.

If none of this yields any results, you might consider transferring your music library to a new account. Sometimes Spotify accounts get broken and that's the best way to move forward. You can read more about the transfer process here.

Let us know how you get on with this.

Cheers.
 

[lythwynn]

Hello Alex,

I tried your method of logging out everywhere (including removing access from all connected apps) and then logging back in twice. This unfortunately did not work, and neither did "blocking" the artists and unblocking them. I am truly at a loss.

I don't mean this offensively, but I do not accept just "making a new account" as a solution. This is a service I have paid for and have had an account with since I was 15--that's 6 whole years. Spotify accounts getting "broken" is the fault of Spotify, not mine, and it's unfair that I should have to throw away playlists with hundreds of followers, my brand-name identity being attached to this account, and would have to message all of my friends/followers to ask them to follow me back.

Is there any way I can get in contact with someone at Spotify directly, or someone from their dev team? I would like to see this issue resolved not only for me, but for the other people in this forum who are experiencing the exact same issue with no solution other than to simply "get a new account".

I love my Spotify account. I don't want to get rid of it.

Thank you very much for taking the time to reply and help me out. It is extremely appreciated--genuinely.

[Alex]

Hi there @lythwynn,

Thank you for your reply. Sorry to hear that didn't work.

Something else you can try is this - add those unavailable songs to a playlist of your own and try playing them from them. Let us know if that works.

Something else I've noticed is that all the grayed out songs are marked as Explicit with the gray E icon underneath the name. Try turning on explicit content from within the Spotify app settings.

On another note, you can reach out to our customer support team through one of the channels here. If they can't find another solution, you can ask them for assistance with the transfer.

Hope this helps. We're here if you have additional questions.