Neil Young is putting his music back on Spotify, but he's not exactly happy about it.
The 78-year-old rock icon pulled his music from the streaming platform in January 2022 in protest of COVID vaccine misinformation being spread by the controversial Joe Rogan Experience podcast, which was hosted exclusively on Spotify.
"I am doing this because Spotify is spreading fake information about vaccines — potentially causing death to those who believe the disinformation being spread by them," Young wrote in a statement at the time. "They can have Rogan or Young. Not both."
But in the wake of a new deal inked last month that ended the podcast's exclusivity to Spotify, Young is reluctantly returning.
Young pulled his music from Spotify in 2022.
"Spotify, the #1 streaming of low res music in the world - Spotify where you get less quality than we made, will now be home of my music again," Young announced in a post on his Neil Young Archives website on Tuesday. "My decision comes as music services Apple and Amazon have started serving the same disinformation podcast features I opposed at SPOTIFY.
"I cannot just leave Apple and Amazon, like I did with Spotify, because my music would have very little streaming outlet to music lovers at all," he explained. "So I have returned to Spotify, in sincere hopes that Spotify sound quality will improve and people will be able to hear and feel all the music as we made it. Qobuz and Tidal, where my music is presented, are all High res as well.
"Hopefully Spotify will turn to Hi Res as the answer and serve all the music to everyone," he added. "Spotify, you can do it! Really be #1 in all ways. You have the music and the listeners!!!! Start with a limited Hi res tier and build from there!"
Spotify "will now be home of my music again," Young said.
Young, a longtime sound quality obsessive who once launched his own music service and portable media player dedicated to uncompressed audio — remember Pono? — has frequently criticized Spotify's quality.
"Amazon, Apple Music and Qobuz deliver up to 100% of the music today and it sounds a lot better than the sh---y, degraded and neutered sound of Spotify," he wrote shortly after removing his catalog from the service in 2022. "If you support Spotify, you are destroying an art form. Business over art. Spotify plays the artists' music at 5% of its quality and charges you like it was the real thing."
Young has often criticized Spotify's sound quality.
Young's music is not yet streaming on Spotify again, but it should be available soon.
The ever-prolific Young and Crazy Horse recently announced their new album FU##IN' UP, featuring newly recorded versions of songs from their 1990 album Ragged Glory, out on April 20 for Record Store Day. They're also hitting the road for a full tour for first time in 10 years, embarking on the Love Earth Tour in April.
Young and Crazy Horse are hitting the road in April.
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