After 10 weeks of being absent from the platform, Taylor Swift’s music has returned to TikTok — or at least her more recent songs and “Taylor’s Version” cuts, since she owns those masters.
Taylor Swift’s music, and music from all artists signed to Universal Music Group, was pulled from TikTok when the two parties were unable to come to a renewed licensing agreement.
UMG framed its refusal to come to a deal with TikTok as a means of standing up for emerging artists.
By selectively removing the music of certain of our developing artists, while keeping on the platform our audience-driving global stars,” UMG wrote.
Her “Taylor’s Version” recordings are back on TikTok, but songs from records like “Reputation,” which doesn’t yet have a “Taylor’s Version,” are still absent from the platform.
The addition of music videos is included among these new features in the U.S.Spotify recently announced its plans to support music videos, saying in March it would test the option in beta in 11 select markets — which, at the time, didn’t include the U.S.
With the UMG deal, U.S. users will also have the option of watching music videos instead of just streaming audio.
To watch videos, Spotify users can access a new “Switch to Video” option from the app’s Now Playing Screen.
For instance, UMG artists will be able to share teasers of upcoming songs and users will be able to pre-save music before a new release.
By partnering with Spotify, UMG still has a way to promote its music to fans, even if its artists lose the ability to market themselves on TikTok.
TikTok is losing even more songs over its quarrel with Universal Music Group (UMG), as the social media network is starting to remove songs published by UMG, the company confirmed to TechCrunch on Tuesday.
As a result, TikTok had to remove songs owned or distributed by UMG by January 31.
Now, the company has to remove songs that contain compositions controlled by Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG).
The company says UMG and UMPG’s catalogue represents anywhere from 20-30% of popular songs on TikTok.
Artists and songwriters will also be losing out on royalties earned from their music on TikTok.
