Musicians Pull Music From Amazon Over ICE Contract

Musicians Pull Music From Amazon Over ICE Contract

A couple weeks ago, a group of musicians pledged to boycott Amazon-sponsored events because of the company’s contract with U.S. Immigration And Customs Enforcement and other government agencies. Now, much of the same group — who have organized under the banner No Music For ICE — have agreed to remove their music from Amazon’s streaming platform beginning on Black Friday.

The organization wrote in a statement:

Today, we are calling on musicians to take the next step: do what we did and remove your music from Amazon. A mass, collective takedown is an escalation, another step in musicians acting in solidarity with the numerous groups across the country protesting to shut down ICE and end family separations, deportations, and other horrors.

Amazon is aggressively trying to compete in the music sales and streaming markets, with mixed results. Based on a few numbers for major “rock” acts an industry insider shared with us recently, Amazon Streaming accounted for only around 4% of first week streams. Amazon MP3 digital sales equated to 3% total of album sales, excluding ticket/album bundle sales. Pulling down your music kicks Amazon where it already hurts, and it’s easy to do.

Read the full statement here, which also includes instructions for artists that want to pull their music from Amazon’s digital sales and streaming services.

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