Taylor Swift’s record label has denied Spotify’s claims that the singer was “on track” to make $6m (£3.8m) a year from the music streaming service.
In fact, Swift earned $496,044 (£317,000) in the past 12 months for streams of her songs in the US, Big Machine CEO Scott Borchetta said.
Borchetta told Time magazine his label had made more from video streaming site Vevo than from Spotify.
Spotify hit back, saying Swift’s global earnings were closer to $2m (£1.2m).
“The more we grow, the more we pay artists, and we’re growing like crazy,” Spotify’s global head of communications Jonathan Prince said.
The argument between Swift and Spotify has escalated since she pulled her back catalogue from the service, just as her new album 1989 hit the charts.
“I’m not willing to contribute my life’s work to an experiment that I don’t feel fairly compensates the writers, producers, artists, and creators of this music,” she told Yahoo Music.
“I just don’t agree with perpetuating the perception that music has no value and should be free.”
Daniel Ek pitches Spotify as a more lucrative alternative to piracy
On Tuesday, Spotify’s chief executive defended its business model, saying it had paid $2bn (£1.2bn) to the music industry to date.
“Taylor Swift is absolutely right: music is art, art has real value, and artists deserve to be paid for it,” Ek wrote in a blog.
He argued that Spotify protected artists against illegal downloading, writing: “Piracy doesn’t pay artists a penny – nothing, zilch, zero.
“And sure enough, if you looked at the top spot on the Pirate Bay last week, there was 1989.”
Source:: BBC Entertainment
