From Taylor Swift to Drake, Apple’s pretty adamant on coming across as artist-friendly when it comes to Apple Music. But one artist who’s apparently less than impressed with Apple’s streaming music service is Bon Iver singer-songwriter Justin Vernon.
In a pair of tweets sent today, Vernon referred to Apple Music as “literally a horrid platform” and slammed Apple for its “commercialization.” Check out his comments below.
apple went from being innovative, plug + play … the best way to experience music and file management to literally a horrid platform ….
— blobtower (@blobtower) July 1, 2016
they let the commercialization of apple music get in the way of making a product easy, simple, and beautiful to use. #neversyncagain
— blobtower (@blobtower) July 1, 2016
This isn’t the first time Vernon has criticized Apple Music. When the service was launched, he made veiled comments about how he wished “that the humans who had the power, USED it to literally make things better.”
It’s not known what sparked today’s tirade, but Vernon’s not the only musician to shun Apple Music. In addition to Tidal artists like Jay Z (although that situation could change very soon), outspoken ex-Oasis singer/guitarist Noel Gallagher previously lambasted Apple Music for its supposed arrogance, and dismissed Beats 1 as “some sort of George Orwell s**t.”
Without knowing more about Vernon’s current beef with Apple Music, it’s difficult to know how to respond. But improving the interface of the streaming service is something Apple attempted to do with the Apple Music refresh it unveiled at this year’s Worldwide Developers Conference.
Via: Pitchfork
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
14 responses to “Bon Iver frontman slams ‘horrid’ Apple Music”
Who?
Who?
Bon bons, mmm I love those…
Vernon founded Chigliak, a record label which, by design, publishes albums that were never commercially successful. Sounds like a case of sour grapes.
Why does anyone bother when you can simply download MP3s for free and be done with it? These silly 3rd party go-between money making vultures like Apple and Spotify et al. all need to be avoided at all cost by anyone with half a functioning brain. Of course, in today’s dumbed-down generation such people are hard to find so what to do? I suggest avoiding GM products, following a vegan diet, eating organic food, not taking drugs or alcohol or anything else that could inhibit your comprehension and etc. Of course some clever bod will call me out for being a fanatic or say some daft retort regarding tinfoil hats or similar nonsense. OK that is the world we live in. Brainwashed idiots are everywhere, unfortunately. My message is, wake up and think for yourself.
“Why does anyone bother when you can simply download MP3s for free and be done with it?”
Why? I suppose I feel that artists should be paid for their work. That’s not to say that I like Apple or Spotify’s business model, but why not buy the MP3s from the artist directly. Or buy the CD and burn them yourself?
Full disclosure: I do have an apple music account, and quite like it. I use it for discovering new music (though it’s certainly not the only way I discover new music), and listening to new albums. If I like the album, I then buy it (usually from the artist’s site, or on CD if it’s not available on the artists site). I also use Apple’s Music Match because I love having access to all my music.
The only time I download music for free is if it’s not available anywhere else for purchase.
Regarding the second part of your post… It’s irrelevant to this thread.
(edited for a minor typo)
Who? Seriously Who? Looked him up…”Vernon has said that he will continue to make albums without engineers and producers because he is capable of doing it all himself.” Sounds like a nice guy!
What gets me is bands have ALWAYS made their money on live performances and merchandise sales. The song writer gets money when a song is played on the radio while the labels always made sure most bands never saw any money after their advance if there was one. Seems to me the thing to do is get your music out there and then get your @$$ on the road and make some cash. Like the software companies that used to basically print money with a once a year release for $500 times have changed.
Just because you used to be able to price your music more than it really should be worth doesn’t mean the gravy train is never ending!
He’s right ! iTunes needed fixing but instead of doing Apple gave us an app which mixes several iTunes stores (music, movies, TV and podcasts), Apple Music, Radio and however much music you were struggling to keep organised int he first place. I now have NO idea what I have downloaded, ripped, bought or streamed. When I search for something new there seems to be several places to find it and the I add n album to something called “My Music” sometimes it appears in my playlists, sometimes it doesn’t and I have to go back and find it again in Apple Music and either listen to it there or add it again – and this is just on my Mac. I have pretty much given up trying to work out how it works in my iPhone…
I agree. I’m really hoping the next iteration fixes some of these problems. I used to have less computer literate friends call me when they had an issue with the app, and I’d be able to easily help… Now, when they call I usually have to throw up my hands and say, “your guess is as good as mine.”
Would hardly call his comments a “tirade”. He’s just stating the obvious. Everybody already knows this.
The upside is that, Cook himself may kind of know this. We’ll see how the next rev goes.
Funny… All these people saying “who?” are just kind of making the guys point.
But, enjoy your J-z and Taylor Swift.
How is that true? You can’t be and aren’t required to be aware of every music act. It’s great for him that he has an opinion, but everyone else as one as well. I don’t use Apple Music, so I’m not going to say he’s wrong, but he does sound bitter about something.
“It’s not known what sparked today’s tirade, ”
Ha! He probably was just using the App and became really frustrated and went off.
(That’s how it happens for me)
I’m an Apple fan and own a lot of their stock, and subscribe to Apple Music and have high hopes for it, but … I can’t deny that Vernon is 100% right. Apple Music has just about the worst user experience of any software or service I’ve ever used. Almost infinitely baffling and user-hostile. I just don’t get it … Apple practically invented good interface design. I’m hoping they throw it all out and start over. A place to start would be breaking iTunes into 2 or 3 apps, so you don’t have a single monstrosity controlling everything from buying ebooks to organizing your music library.