Spotify boss explains how he convinced Taylor Swift to return to the streaming service

"I think she saw the fans were asking for it"

Spotify’s co-founder and CEO Daniel Ek has spoken about how he managed to convince the star to stream his music via the platform again.

Swift famously removed all her music from Spotify back in 2014, before returning to the streaming service last year.

Originally arguing that “music should not be free”, Swift later said that she had returned to Spotify to “thank her fans” after her album ‘1989’ sold over 10 million copies. It was also the same day that Katy Perry released her latest album ‘Witness’.

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Following news that Spotify has gone public, Ek appeared on CBS This Morning and touched upon the Swift saga.

“I should’ve done a much better job communicating this, so I take full ownership for that,” Ek said. “I went to Nashville many, many times to talk to [Swift’s] team, spent more time explaining the model, why streaming mattered. And the great news is I think she saw how streaming was growing.”

“I think she saw the fans were asking for it. So eventually when the new album came out, she came to Stockholm and spent some time there, figuring out a way that made sense for her.”

Spotify filed to trade in the New York Stock Exchange under the name ‘SPOT’.

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In the filing, Spotify declared that it had contributed hugely to reversing the downward financial trajectory of the music industry, while also arguing that music streaming would continue to be big business for the industry.

“Our mission is to unlock the potential of human creativity by giving a million creative artists the opportunity to live off their art and billions of fans the opportunity to enjoy and be inspired by these creators,” the filing said.

“We are transforming the music industry by allowing Users to move from a ‘transaction-based’ experience of buying and owning music to an ‘access-based’ model which allows Users to stream music on demand.”

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