Jay Z responds to Tidal backlash

Following Tidal’s swift drop out of the US iPhone Top 750 downloads, the departure of its CEO, and numerous qualms from potential customers, artists and industry figures, Tidal’s new owner Jay Z has responded.

Taking to Twitter early this morning (AEST), the rap mogul used the hashtag #TidalFacts to tell his 3.16 million fans the streaming service is “doing just fine.”

“We have over 770,000 subs. We have been in business less than one month," said one tweet. Another tweet addressed comments by artists like Lily Allen, Mumford & Sons and Deathcab for Cutie, who were concerned the Swedish-based service didn’t support emerging artists; “Indie artists who want to work directly w/ us keep 100% of their music. 'If you don't want the CEOs all in the videos'haa,” Jay Z tweeted.

Jay Z also stated the service pays a 75% royalty rate to “ALL artists, writers and producers – not just the founding members on stage,” and that its equity value is currently US$60 million.

JayZ and his company Project Panther Bidco, launched Tidal on March 30 with its 16 other artist shareholders including Beyoncé, Calvin Harris, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Daft Punk and Jack White. Since then, Tidal’s CEO Andy Chen departed ways with the service anda reported 25 stafferswere axed with Tidalcategorising the firings as “redundancies” and “streamlining resources.”

"The iTunes Store wasn't built in a day," Jay Z tweeted."It took Spotify 9 years to be successful…"When Tidal dropped out of the Top 750 Apple app downloads last week,its competitor Spotify was the 18th most popular iPhone app in the US, #11 in its native Sweden and #20 in Australia, while Beats Music, which will be rebranded when it enters the market in June, ranked at #60 in the US.

Read Jay Z’s full defense on Twitter below: