Tidal is fighting back against a ‘smear campaign’.
The Jay Z-backed high-fidelity music streaming platform was accused this week of manipulating the streaming numbers on Kanye West’s and Beyonce’s albums by Norwegian newspaper Dagens Naeringsliv.
“This is a smear campaign from a publication that once referred to our employee as an ‘Israeli Intelligence officer’ and our owner as a ‘crack dealer,” a Tidal rep told Billboard, referring to Roc Nation exec Lior Tibon and Jay Z, respectively.
“We expect nothing less from them than this ridiculous story, lies and falsehoods. The information was stolen and manipulated and we will fight these claims vigorously.”
The newspaper’s core claim is that the platform inflated the play counts relating to Beyonce’s Lemonade and Kanye’s Life of Pablo albums and subsequently paid out higher royalty fees.
“Beyoncé’s and Kanye West’s listener numbers on TIDAL have been manipulated to the tune of several hundred million false plays… which has generated massive royalty payouts at the expense of other artists.”
Jay-Z bought the streaming platform in March 2015 for $56 million, through his Project Panther company.
