Musicians protest: King Gizzard and others pull out of Spotify over military drone investment
Automatic translation. Read the Russian original
Musicians King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Deerhoof and Xiu Xiu have removed their recordings from Spotify in protest at the platform's head, Daniel Ek,'s investment in military drones powered by AI. The group explains that Spotify uses music revenues to fund projects related to the development and application of military AI through its Prima Materia investment fund, which invested in Helsing.
The bands expressed outrage that Spotify, in their opinion, “kills people and makes extra money from it” through the theft of music. Despite legal hurdles that are currently preventing the band from completely removing the recordings, the band is determined to stop working with the platform. Deerhoof and King Gizzard also criticize Spotify's treatment of artists, accusing them of "fraudulent" theft of music rights and unwillingness to cooperate with a platform they believe "serves to kill people." They emphasize that they do not want their music to be used to develop military AI. King Gizzard, through his own labels, was able to remove most of his recordings, including the 2022 EP "Satanic Slumber Party."