Coming to you from the category of “How quickly your entire life can go downhill after a few comments,” Apple has removed rapper Kanye West’s (who has legally changed his name to “Ye,”) from the Apple Music streaming catalog.
The move marks the latest step in companies that have ended their business relationships with the artist after several antisemitic comments from him on a recent podcast.
Apple had, until now, kept his music in its streaming catalog, and represents the first streaming service to remove his work from their catalog of available music.
In early October, Kanye West posted a screenshot of a conversation with Sean “Diddy” Combs to Instagram. Within that dialogue, West made several antisemitic remarks. Days later, West tweeted that he would go “death con 3” on Jewish people.
Instagram also deleted controversial contest posted by the artist and restricted him account. Twitter did likewise, but would later ban the singer. What followed was a seemingly mass exodus of companies cutting ties with West. These included Adidas, Gap and Foot Locker.
Amidst recent incidents, music streaming services have kept West’s tracks in their catalogs. Users can still find Kanye West albums on Amazon Music, Spotify, Tidal and Apple Music. Spotify CEO Daniel Ek stated his condemnation of West’s “just awful comments,” but said the platform’s hands are tied when it comes to removing the music. “It’s up to his label, if they want to take action or not,” Ek added.
Apple Music, on the other hand, has finally taken some action against the rapper. Users you can still find West’s albums and add them to their library, but the streaming service has removed a playlist that showcased the rapper’s work.
The Apple-curated playlist, Kanye West Essentials, used to exist within the streaming service. As of Thursday, however, the playlist is gone. Clicking the link for Kanye West Essentials just results in an error message that the “item you’ve requested is not currently available.”
This appears to have occurred for Apple Music in the U.S., and per The Independent, the U.K. as well. It also seems likely that the playlist has been removed for every one of Apple Music’s markets.
Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.
Via The Mac Observer and The Independent