India.Arie is clarifying her choice to boycott Spotify after the Grammy Award-winning singer said in a recent video that her protest is being misinterpreted in media reports. The latest announcement comes just days after the “Brown Skin” singer revealed that she would be removing her discography from the streaming platform following Joe Rogan’s misinformed remarks about the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and race.
“Hey y’all. I want to leave a short message here about why I decided to ask my music be pulled off of Spotify. So check this out,” she said in a video uploaded to her Instagram Story earlier this week before showing a clip of what appeared to be the podcaster engaged in a story about being taken to a predominantly Black gathering, which he refers to as “Planet of the Apes.”
“We walked into Africa, dude,” he’s heard saying in the snippet. “We walked in the door, and there was no white people,” he added, laughing.
“I empathize with the people who are leaving for the COVID disinformation reasons, and I think that they should,” the singer said, acknowledging initial reports that several musical artists, including Joni Mitchell, would be removing their music from the platform following Rogan’s misinformed comments about COVID-19.
“I also think that Joe Rogan has the right to say what he wants to say. I also think that I have the right to say what I want to say,” she added.
“So, as an artist… Spotify is built on the back of music streaming. So, they take this money that’s built from streaming, and they pay this guy $100 million, but they pay us 0.003 percent of a penny,” she said before asking Spotify to “Just take me off.” She added, “I don’t want to generate money that pays this. Just take me off; that’s where I’m at.”
As previously reported, earlier this week, India wrote on Instagram that “Neil Young opened a door that I MUST walk through.” She continued, “I believe in freedom of speech. However, I find Joe Rogan problematic for reasons OTHER than his Covid interviews… FOR ME ITS ALSO HIS language around race.”
“What I am talking about is RESPECT — who gets it and who doesn’t, she wrote in another slide. “Paying musicians Fraction of a penny? And HIM $100M? This shows the type of company they are and the company that they keep.”
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