News July 3, 2018

Spotify are reportedly offering refunds to users after their excessive Drake promotion

Did you open up your Spotify account over the weekend only to be swarmed by an abundance of Drake? Well, some users are reporting that the company is offering refunds in regards to their excessive ‘ScorpionSZN’ promotion over the last few days.

As we reported Sunday, Drake’s latest album, Scorpion, was released on Friday, and has since managed to break a number of records, including the single-day streaming record for Apple Music (with the record previously being set by Drake’s earlier release, More Life), and setting the record for the largest single-day streaming total for any record on any streaming service.

However, fans on Spotify soon took issue with the way that the plaftform promoted the record, with the artist’s face showing up on the artwork for countless playlists – including playlists that his music wasn’t even featured on.

“Spotify is being such an unprofessional company to the point of disrespecting the artists that are in those playlists,” wrote Reddit user jakebirdseye. “And when they realize that they can get paid by any famous artist for this shit to happen, it will become a recurring thing.”

“I just think it should stop now before it gets out of hand.”

Image of Drake’s saturation of the Spotify home page.

However, some users have since taken to Reddit to share the news that Spotify is offering refunds to some who have complained about the excessive Drakeification of their homepage.

“I just messaged spotify customer service on their website and told them I wanted a refund since this is advertising and I pay for premium with no ads, and they have now refunded my last payment,” explained Reddit user Schwagschwag.

“Complain, take your money back, and let them know you will cancel if they pull this shit again. Money talks. Money walking away talks.”

Likewise, others echoed the statement, with one user explaining that after being told by Spotify that Drake’s presence “wasn’t an ad”, they managed to get a month of their subscription refunded by explaining that, “The aggressive marketing campaign for an artist’s new album is an ad. My user experience on the app is affected by it.”

Other users still chimed in noting that their attempts at procuring a refund went less favourably, inspiring one user to suggest, “Have you tried being so annoyingly persistent that they just want you to go away?”

While Drake’s face has since disappeared from the majority of playlists on Spotify’s home page, there’s no telling when the service will again strike up a deal to promote an artist in such a way.