When Bloomberg reported that Spotify would be upping the cost of its premium subscription from $9.99 to $10.99, and including 15 hours of audiobooks per month in the U.S., the change sounded like a win for songwriters and publishers. Higher subscription prices typically equate to a bump in U.S. mechanical royalties — but not this time.
By adding audiobooks into Spotify’s premium tier, the streaming service now claims it qualifies to pay a discounted “bundle” rate to songwriters for premium streams, given Spotify now has to pay licensing for both books and music from the same price tag — which will only be a dollar higher than when music was the only premium offering. Additionally, Spotify will reclassify its duo and family subscription plans as bundles as well.
All the streamers suck; plus Spotify definitely sucks the most and it has the most subscribers. So I do my best to support artists I love by buying their albums in some physical form (vinyl if possible because it encourages active listening), t-shirts when I need a t-shirt, fan clubs, etc. It’s all I can think to do.
The thing is, you’re buying from their record labels, not directly from artists. And then it depends on their contract how much they actually get. But they are still getting more from it, I guess.
It helps when the band runs their own label.