保羅·約翰遜低調地經營著一份名為Canyon City的音樂職業，同時還兼職零售、Uber司機，并為其他藝人灌制錄音。隨后，他的民謠流行歌曲《Firework》登上了2016年的Spotify歌單。如今，聽眾已經成為了Canyon City音樂的常客，而約翰遜也成為了一名職業音樂藝人，年收入約為20萬美元。在他看來，其中的大部分都來自于點播版權費。

查特怒加市的這位歌手和吉他手稱，這一變化主要源自于歌單曝光度。

30歲的約翰遜說，如果沒有Spotify的話，“我可能就不會做音樂這一行了。”在首次登陸歌單之后，這位獨立藝人的點播量迅速從每天數千次躍升至2萬次，在接下來的第二年，其點播量在額外歌單的支持下增至約20萬次。“我依然會制作音樂，但不會是現在這種全職的狀態，而且我現在可以做很多事情，例如買房子，來一場遠途旅行。”

Spotify一直都是眾多音樂人的批評對象，因為他們認為該平臺支付的版權費較低，但一些小眾藝人發現，如果自己的歌能夠進入Spotify經營的3000個歌單中，那么就可以接觸到聽眾，并以此來謀生。登陸歌單這種方式可以通過將其音樂推送給新聽眾，提升藝人的點播量，Spotify的一些歌單有著數千萬的粉絲。

告示牌在去年11月的報道稱，這些歌單曾經幫助洛杉磯歌手亞利桑那·澤瓦斯的點播量從每月50萬次激增至每年約1080萬次，而澳大利亞藝人托尼·沃森（又被稱為Tones and I）在其歌曲《Dance Monkey》登陸多個國際歌單之后，于2019年斬獲了6.1億次的點播量。上述兩位歌手均未對此置評。

Paul Johnson was scraping out a low-key music career under the name Canyon City while working part-time retail jobs, driving for Uber, and playing recording sessions for other artists. Then his folk-pop song “Firework” landed on a Spotify playlist in 2016. Now listeners stream Canyon City’s music often enough that Johnson is a full-time musician making around $200,000 a year, the “vast majority” of which he attributes to streaming royalties.

It’s a change the Chattanooga singer and guitarist credits largely to playlist exposure.

“I probably wouldn’t be doing this” without Spotify, says Johnson, 30, an independent artist who quickly jumped from a few thousand streams a day to 20,000 after the first playlist, and then grew to around 200,000 over the next year with additional playlist support. “I would still be making music, but not on the level where it’s a full-time career and I’m able to do things like buy a house and go on far-reaching tours.”

Though Spotify has long been the scourge of musicians who think the platform doesn’t pay enough in royalties, some smaller artists are finding they can reach an audience, and make a living, if they can get their songs onto one of the 3,000 playlists that Spotify operates. Playlist placement can amplify the number of streams artists receive by putting their music in front of new listeners—some of Spotify’s playlists have tens of millions of followers.

Playlists helped the Los Angeles singer Arizona Zervas jump from a half-million streams a month to 10.8 million in roughly a year, Billboard reported in last November, while Australian artist Toni Watson, known as Tones and I, has amassed more than 610 million streams in 2019 for her song “Dance Monkey” after it appeared on various international playlists. Neither singer was available for comment.

馬里蘭州流行歌手薩拉·李（藝名REI AMI）到目前為止還未獲得如此之大的成功，但其首支單曲《Snowcone》自去年9月登陸歌單之后已經獲得了Spotify用戶120萬次的點播量。24歲的薩拉一開始對此并不抱太大的期望，然而在其歌曲出現在“反流行”歌單上之后，其點播量從每天1萬次躍升至每天5萬多次。她稱其聽眾一直都說，他們通過Spotify才發現了薩拉。薩拉說：“我從未想過點播量會增加的如此之快。”對于音樂行業來說，她還是個新手，而且白天還有工作要做。“很明顯，這個結果讓我感到很高興，但也令我感到措手不及，因為我從未想過，登陸歌單這樣簡單的事情能夠開啟我的音樂職業生涯。”

關鍵在于讓自己的歌曲登陸歌單。Spotify藝人和廠牌營銷團隊負責人杰夫·斯特姆佩克表示，除了用戶自己創建的歌單之外還有三種歌單。有的歌單是由算法創建的，旨在用歌曲數據匹配聽眾數據（例如“每日混合曲目”或“每周新歌”），有的歌單則是由Spotify100名左右的編輯精心打造，還有的歌單同時包含了算法和人工元素。斯特姆佩克說：“我們編輯策略的整體目標完全在于努力為用戶提供適合他們的音樂。”

2018年7月的音頻流服務在Spotify for Artists平臺上引入了一個新的歌單提交工具，它實際上可以讓音樂人通過一個在線表格，向歌單推薦音樂，這個表格涵蓋的信息包括類別、場景、樂器和文化。Spotify編輯每周都會審核這些提交的內容，而且會根據數據以及個人直覺，將其中的一些歌曲導入歌單。

新的提交工具取代了此前毫無目標性的流程，也就是唱片公司和藝人可以通過任何方式聯系，例如電子郵件、短信、Instagram的直接留言。斯特姆佩克說：“如今，整個流程變得無比清晰、透明和有序，編輯每周可以聽到和編輯的音樂比以前要多得多。”

歌單不斷增長的重要性在某種程度上重塑了藝人制作音樂的方式。當音樂人提交歌曲供歌單編輯審核時，歌曲曲調會自動出現在“周五新音樂”歌單中，該歌單由算法為其粉絲創建。Canyon City的保羅·約翰遜指出，與每年或每兩年一次性發布一整張專輯的歌曲相比，一次放進一兩首短時長歌曲更為合理，因為此舉不僅更經濟，而且也有助于與粉絲互動。約翰遜說：“它有助于讓對話持續下去。”他還使用Spotify分析工具，按照其聽眾的所在地來預定巡演。

但也有藝人對此并不買賬

Spotify沒有明確透露自己每周會獲得多少首提交的歌曲，也沒有透露最終有多少歌曲進入了歌單，而那些希望這個流程更加透明的藝人對此頗有微詞。南卡羅來州電子音樂藝人 Anjali of Diaspoura說：“除非有開源文件記錄能夠讓所有作為工作者的藝人了解自己提交的歌曲如何進入其歌單，否則Spotify依然難以取得我的信任。”這位不到30歲的藝人于去年夏天在美國共同舉行了五場藝人權利聚會，來討論Spotify的薪酬政策。盡管Diaspoura的歌曲已經登陸Spotify，但這位藝人得以繼續制作音樂的經費則來自于基于注冊的眾籌平臺Patreon的收入。

Diaspoura并非是唯一不信任Spotify的藝人，藝人們對于平臺的大多數疑慮都與薪酬政策有關。當Spotify于2006年問世時，由于對音樂人薪酬以及公司“免費”業務模式存在疑慮，不少藝人高調地收回了其音樂，包括披頭士、齊柏林飛艇、平克·弗洛伊德和金屬樂隊。

另類搖滾樂隊Letters to Cleo歌手、倡導團體“北美詞曲作家”聯合執行總監凱·漢莉指出，所有這些行動自此之后接踵而至，但這種做法如今沒有任何優勢可言。51歲的漢莉說：“這便是消費者選擇傾聽音樂的方式，而我覺得，制作音樂的所有目的便是為了讓人們聽音樂。因此，如果你切斷了消費者幾乎所有的入口通道，那還有什么意義呢？”

漢莉說她自己總的來說是流媒體音樂的粉絲，但她不會使用Spotify，因為該公司正在與其他機構一道起訴美國聯邦版權委員會，因為后者最近做出決定，將訂閱服務公司向詞曲作家支付的薪酬提升44%。根據當前的規定，如果藝人自己演唱的歌曲（尤其這首歌由該藝人所寫，而且是其母版錄音的所有者）出現在Spotify的歌單上，那么藝人就可以獲得薪酬。但陳舊的版權法規定，那些未演唱自己所寫歌曲的詞曲作家獲得的收入要少得多，當前僅為總收入的10%，而演唱者能拿到60%，這意味著詞曲作家基本與歌單的吸金效應無緣。

漢莉說：“如今，如果詞曲作家既不是演唱者，也沒有參與母版錄制，那么他們完全依靠流媒體來謀生是不可能的。”版權費之爭極其晦澀難懂，因為對于那些不受其影響的藝人來說，自己沒有必要關注這件事情。作為母版錄音的所有者，約翰遜依然對于自己基本上靠Spotify點播量來謀生的事實感到驚嘆不已。他說：“我的巡演并不多，而且我是一名獨立藝人。我當前并非只是勉強度日，而是處于蒸蒸日上的狀態，這真是件瘋狂的事情。”（財富中文網）

譯者：馮豐

審校：夏林

Sarah Lee, a Maryland pop singer who performs as REI AMI, hasn’t reached those heights so far, but Spotify users have streamed her song “Snowcone”—Lee’s first-ever release—more than 1.2 million times since she put it out in last September. Lee, 24, had low expectations until the song showed up on the “Anti Pop” playlist and jumped from 10,000 streams a day to more than 50,000. She says her listeners tell her all the time that they discovered her through Spotify. “I never imagined things would pick up so rapidly,” says Lee, who is new enough to music that she still has a day job. “And it was obviously so great to see, but it was almost overwhelming because I just never thought that simply being playlisted would jump-start my career.”

The trick is getting your song on a playlist. Apart from user-created playlists, there are three kinds, says Jeff Stempeck, a team lead on artist and label marketing at Spotify. There are playlists populated by an algorithm that seeks to match song data with listener data (“Your Daily Mix,” for example, or “Discover Weekly”), human-curated playlists tended by 100 or so editors at Spotify, and playlists that combine algorithmic and human elements. “The overall goal with our editorial strategy, it’s really all about trying to serve the right music to the right users,” Stempeck says.

The streaming service in July 2018 introduced a new playlist submission tool on its Spotify for Artists platform, which allows musicians to essentially pitch songs for playlist consideration through an online form that includes information like genre, mood, instrumentation, and culture. Spotify editors review the submissions weekly and, through a combination of data and gut feeling, steer some of them into playlists.

The new submission tool replaced a more scattershot process in which record labels and artists would get in touch however they could: email, text messages, direct messages on Instagram. “Now it’s an incredibly clear, transparent, organized process where editors can listen to way more music and program a lot more songs each week,” Stempeck says.

The growing importance of playlists is, in some ways, shaping how artists make music. When musicians submit a song for editorial playlist consideration, the tune will automatically appear in the “New Music Friday” playlists that are algorithmically created for their followers. Rather than releasing a full album’s worth of tunes every year or two and submitting one tune for playlist consideration, Canyon City’s Paul Johnson says putting out one or two songs at a time at shorter intervals makes more sense, economically and in terms of fan engagement. “It helps keep a conversation going,” says Johnson, who also uses Spotify analytics to book tours based on places where users are listening to his music.

But artists aren’t fully sold

Spotify won’t specify how many submissions it gets per week, or how many of them end up on playlists, which irks musicians who want to see a more transparent process. “Until there is some sort of open source documentation for all artists as workers to see exactly how our submissions are funneling into their playlists, Spotify will remain untrustworthy to me,” says Anjali of Diaspoura, a South Carolina electronic artist under 30 who co-organized five artists’ rights rallies around the country last summer to discuss Spotify’s compensation practices. Though Diaspoura’s songs are on Spotify, the artist relies on income from the subscription-based crowdfunding platform Patreon to continue making music.

Diaspoura isn’t the only Spotify skeptic, and most of the misgivings musicians have about the platform revolve around the issue of compensation. When Spotify launched in 2006, concerns about musicians’ pay and the company’s “freemium” business model prompted more than a few high-profile acts to withhold their music, including the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, and Metallica.

All those acts have since come around, and these days there’s no advantage to that approach, says Kay Hanley, singer for the alt-rock band Letters to Cleo and co-executive director of the advocacy group Songwriters of North America. “This is how consumers have chosen to listen to music,” says Hanley, 51. “And the whole point of making music, I think, is for people to hear it. So if you're cutting off pretty much every entryway to the consumer, what is the point?”

Hanley says she’s a fan of streaming music services in general, but she won’t use Spotify because the company is among those appealing a recent decision by the federal Copyright Royalty Board to increase by 44% the compensation that subscription services pay to songwriters. Under current rules, artists on Spotify can make money if a song they perform ends up on a playlist, especially if they wrote the song and own the master recording. Because of archaic copyright laws, songwriters who do not perform the songs they write are paid much less—currently just 10% of the overall revenue, compared to 60% for performers—meaning the playlist bonanza effectively leaves out songwriters.

“There is no world where a songwriter can make a living with streaming as your only source of revenue if you’re not the artist, and you have no participation in the master,” Hanley says. The royalty dispute is arcane enough that it doesn’t always resonate with artists who aren’t affected by it. Johnson, who owns his master recordings, still marvels over the fact that he is making a living largely through Spotify streams. “I don’t tour too much, and I’m an independent artist,” he says. “So it’s really kind of wild to me that I’m not just getting by, but really kind of thriving.”