Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante has shared his thoughts on streaming within the music industry and why Spotify is “where music goes to die”.
Benante, who has been with the thrash metal band for four decades, recently spoke to The Irish Times, where he was asked how much the music industry has changed over the last 40 years.
The drummer replied: “There is no music industry. That’s what has changed. There is nothing any more. There are people listening to music, but they are not listening to music the way music was once listened to.”
He continued, expanding on the part digital streaming has had to play: “The industry of music was one of things hit the worst and nobody did anything about it. They just let it happen. There was no protection, no nothing. Subconsciously this may be the reason why we don’t make records every three years or whatever because I don’t want to give it away for free.
“It is like I pay Amazon $12.99 a month and I can just go on Amazon and I can get whatever I want. It is basically stealing. It is stealing from the artist – the people who run music streaming sites like Spotify. I don’t subscribe to Spotify. I think it is where music goes to die.
“We have the music on there because we have to play along with the fucking game, but I’m tired of playing the game. We get taken advantage of the most out of any industry. As artists, we have no health coverage, we have nothing. They fucked us so bad, I don’t know how we come out of it. You’d probably make more money selling lemonade on the corner.”
Charlie Benante was then asked if he supports Metallica suing Napster in the early 2000s: “They were absolutely right about it. You see where it went. All those people who said, ‘fuck Metallica, they are rich bastards’. They were protecting their art, their intellectual property so that some asshole does not come along and take your art. They make the money while you just make the art and you just give it away.”
Benante’s comments come after Spotify CEO Daniel Ek’s controversial comments earlier this year about about the cost of “creating content”.
In late May, Ek – who also co-founded Spotify – made comments implying that it is easier and more affordable than ever to create “content” thanks to modern technology. “Today, with the cost of creating content being close to zero, people can share an incredible amount of content. This has sparked my curiosity about the concept of long shelf life versus short shelf life,” he wrote.
Needless to say, his comments were quick to spark a response from across the online community, with countless music lovers and musicians coming forward to criticise the CEO as being “out of touch”.
Daniel Ek walked back his post, explaining in an apology that he had no intention of dismissing the struggles faced by musicians and using the “reductive” label of “content”, and instead “was most interested in exploring was how, in this environment of constant creation, we can identify and ensure that the bold, exciting, world-changing ideas and pieces of art don’t get lost in the noise.”
Part of the criticism towards Ek’s latest comments may have also stemmed from the recent reports that Spotify have made record profits of over €1billion (£860m) – following staff being laid off and subscription prices rising.
It also came following the news that the streaming service had officially demonetised all songs on the platform with less than 1,000 streams. The policy was launched on April 1, but had been planned by the platform for some time. It was quickly criticised for making it harder for artists to generate royalties from their music and restricting new artists looking to crack the music industry.
