The "Fake" Artist Problem - And What It Tells About Our Music Consumption

Think of this scenario: You lay on your bed after a long, tiring day. Exhausted, you open your favorite music app and listen to some music to soothe your soul. The playlist will deliver you music that will just play in the background as you relax and pick yourself up to finish your day.
But ever wondered how these amazing “vibey” songs on the playlists come from artists you never heard of, and probably wouldn’t hear again? It’s because most of those artists are fake!
In 2017 Music Business Weekly released a list of 50 artists that were “fake”, meaning that real musicians created pseudonyms and started uploading some music while leaving little to no trace of who the artist is.
In a lot of cases, these artists did not even have music on any other streaming platform. Soon enough, the internet caught wind of this report and started doing their research.
Several publications confirmed that streaming app, Spotify in particular employed artists from Stockholm (Spotify’s hometown) to create songs for their “Mood” playlists. While Spotify has been denying their involvement, one survey recently claimed that about 20 artists are responsible for over 500 artist names.

The benefits of doing this are two-folded. First, a streaming app will have control over the algorithm and can easily promote songs on the playlists that will generate more revenue for them. Not only the streaming apps can have a bigger share of royalties from the songs, but they will also have larger ownership of the content they created. The artists, as confirmed by a lot of industry insiders, receive fixed income for such projects.
Secondly, flooding such songs on every playlist gives them an upper hand over the major labels. Playlist placement is of supreme importance for an artist right now, so the record labels must negotiate more with the streaming apps to get the placement.
Just like targeted ads, the companies have started giving targeted music for the audience too. Many consume music in the background while they relax, drive, work out and even, sleep! The audience doesn’t pay enough attention to what the music is, or who the artist is, as long as it suits our vibe.
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