With over 675 million users worldwide, it’s safe to say that Spotify has quickly become our go-to when it comes to streaming our favorite tracks.

Though there are still many of CD, mp3, vinyl, or even cassette aficionados out there, it’s undeniable that Spotify is one of the most convenient ways to discover new music as well as stream old favorites.

It’s so ingrained in our lives that many of you will be listening to music or podcasts through Spotify as you read this very article.

But Spotify has seen its share of controversies.

Many artists and songwriters have publicly called out the streaming service for its low royalty payments, which have led musicians – who could once rely on income from album sales – to lean on merch and tickets for their income instead.

The algorithms with which Spotify recommends new music and builds playlists has also been decried by the music industry. Many music professionals have complained that streamers only really encounter other tracks in their own, limited musical bubble, and that more successful artists are significantly preferred by the algorithm, limiting exposure for others.

But, perhaps most alarmingly, is the exposure of Spotify’s ‘ghost artist’ scandal.

In her book entitled Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist, Liz Pelly – a journalist from New York – investigated these so called ‘ghost artists,’ obtaining testimonies from former Spotify employees along the way.

And her findings were staggering.

If you regularly use Spotify, you’ll be familiar with the ‘mood’ playlists that feature prominently on the home screen.

Perfect for background music while you’re working, providing the ambient sounds of a relaxing drive, or hyping you during a gym sesh or a night out, Spotify really does have a playlist for every occasion.

But tucked away within these playlists, former Spotify employees explained to Pelly, are tracks that are the work of these ‘ghost artists’.

Rather than the creative output of artists and musicians under their own names, these tracks are owned by Spotify. And, as a result, they don’t need to pay artists royalties when these tracks are played.

Known as ‘Perfect Fit Content’, these songs were created especially for Spotify by production firms – like a kind of stock image in the music world – on the cheap

So, if they can squeeze plenty of these tracks into your playlists, they get to keep all of the profits, as Pelly explains in her book:

“In doing so, they are effectively working to grow the percentage of total streams of music that is cheaper for the platform.”

A dirty trick, given how little they pay artists anyway.

But this music has to come from somewhere, right?

Well, it does – and professional musicians are involved. But they are heavily exploited along the way.

According to a jazz musician who worked on some of Spotify’s Perfect Fit Content, his fee was a low, flat rate – with his contract stating that he would not receive any royalties from the content.

But over time, the tracks began amassing millions of streams, thanks to the playlists they featured on. If the music had been recorded and published under his own name, with his rights retained, he would have begun to see financial benefits far beyond the pittance he was compensated to record the tracks:

“I’m selling my intellectual property for essentially peanuts.”

In essence, Spotify is massively profiting from other peoples’ skills and creativity, whilst ensuring that creators who publish music on the platform are suppressed in favor of their own tracks.

Not all of Spotify’s employees are on board with the scheme though.

In the 2010s, as Spotify’s Perfect Fit Content started appearing on the platform, the streaming service’s employees were increasingly pushed to include these Spotify-owned tracks on playlists, as one former employee told Pelly:

“Initially, they would give us links to stuff, like, ‘Oh, it’s no pressure for you to add it, but if you can, that would be great.’ Then it became more aggressive, like, ‘Oh, this is the style of music in your playlist, if you try it and it works, then why not?'”

And, as employees began to complain about the inauthentic tracks that were starting to dominate the playlists, they were replaced by others who didn’t have any suck qualms:

“We didn’t like that it was these two guys that normally write pop songs replacing swaths of artists across the board. It’s just not fair. But it was like trying to stop a train that was already leaving.”

Given how little we know about the number of ghost tracks on the platform, it is inconclusive how much of the music on the mood playlist you’re streaming actually belongs to legitimate artists.

But one thing is for sure: ghost or not, they’re not being compensated fairly.

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