Cyrus Langhorne
Streaming giant Apple Music is out here steady flexing. The digital powerhouse has reportedly reached a new subscriber milestone.
According to reports, Apple Music now has at least 50 million subscribers.
Tim Cook says Apple Music has topped 50m subscribers, including paid memberships and trials, a 2m spike from April. The Apple CEO gave out the number in a Bloomberg interview that will be posted in June. Clips were made available to whet the appetite. In April, Apple Music had 40m active paid subscribers and 8m trials. This means the company saw an increase of about 2 million active users in a month’s span. (HITS Daily Double)
Apple Music recently made headlines for low-key censoring controversial singer R. Kelly from its playlists.
Now, a source close to the matter tells Pitchfork that Apple Music also begun to stop promoting R. Kelly in featured playlists over the past several weeks. The decision was made quietly, and it pre-dates Spotify’s announcement. Kelly’s music has been pulled from Apple Music-curated playlists such as “Best Slow Jams of the 90s, Vol. 1” and Vol. 2. (Kelly is prominently featured in the artwork for the playlists, but his music is no longer in them.) Seven R. Kelly-centric playlists (including “R. Kelly Essentials,” “R. Kelly: Influences,” and “Inspired by R. Kelly”) are still on the streaming service. (Pitchfork)
Recently, Young Money’s Nicki Minaj revealed she wouldn’t pick sides in the streaming wars with her new music.
Videos will be everywhere/on all platforms @ the same time
— Mrs. Petty (@NICKIMINAJ) May 1, 2018
Last month, rap star J. Cole‘s KOD album broke an Apple Music record previously held by Drake.
J. Cole’s fifth album, KOD, has broken Apple Music’s record for streams in the first 24 hours in the US with 64.5 million streams on its first day, Apple tells The Verge. KOD surpassed the previous record holder, Drake’s Views, by nearly 1 million streams. Seven out of the top 10 most streamed songs in a 24-hour period on Apple Music are now from KOD. (The Verge)
