Thom Yorke On Spotify: 'The Last Desperate Fart Of A Dying Corpse'

Thom Yorke: 'Spotify Is The Last Desperate Fart Of A Dying Corpse'

Radiohead singer Thom Yorke has launched another blistering attack on Spotify, labelling it "the last desperate fart of a dying corpse".

Yorke drew headlines earlier this year when he decided to pull his side-project Atoms For Peace from the streaming music service.

At the time he said his act of "small meaningless rebellion" was a direct protest against Spotify's payment policies, which he said give new artists "fuck all" for their work.

Now in an interview with the Mexican website Sopitas, subsequently picked up by The Guardian, Yorke has renewed his criticism of the site saying the service "is the last gasp of the old industry".

He said:

"It's all about how we change the way we listen to music, it's all about what happens next in terms of technology, in terms of how people talk to each other about music, and a lot of it could be really fucking bad."

"When we did the In Rainbows thing what was most exciting was the idea you could have a direct connection between you as a musician and your audience. You cut all of it out, it's just that and that. And then all these fuckers get in a way, like Spotify suddenly trying to become the gatekeepers to the whole process," said Yorke.

"We don't need you to do it. No artists needs you to do it. We can build the shit ourselves, so fuck off. But because they're using old music, because they're using the majors… the majors are all over it because they see a way of re-selling all their old stuff for free, make a fortune, and not die."

Spotify boasts more than 24 million active users, of which about 6 million are paid subscribers. It has often been the target of criticism that it pays artists relatively little for streams of their material. But the group says it has paid out more than $500 million to artists as of January 2013.

Yorke, though, isn't impressed by the figures and says his opposition is idealogical as well as financial.

"To me this isn't the mainstream, this is is like the last fart, the last desperate fart of a dying corpse. What happens next is the important part," he told Sopitas, before suggesting that the music industry should rethink its backing for certain new business models.

"It's like this mind trick going on, people are like 'with technology, it's all going to become one in the cloud and all creativity is going to become one thing and no one is going to get paid and it's this big super intelligent thing'. Bullshit."

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