Spotify is letting fake albums appear on real artist pages

[Free]

Scamming the newest music industry.

Spotify criticized for letting fake albums appear on real artist pages

Real bands struggle to remove fake albums from their Spotify pages.

arstechnica.com

This fall, thousands of fake albums were added to Spotify, with some appearing on real artist pages, where they're positioned to lure unsuspecting listeners into streaming by posing as new releases from favorite bands.

An Ars reader flagged the issue after finding a fake album on the Spotify page of an UK psych rock band called Gong. The Gong fan knew that the band had begun touring again after a surprise new release last year, but the "latest release" listed by Spotify wasn't that album. Instead, at the top of Gong's page was a fake self-titled album supposedly released in 2024.

These junk albums don't appear to be specifically targeting popular artists, McDonald told Ars. Rather, generic music is uploaded under a wide range of one-word artist names. However, by using that tactic, some of these fake albums appeared on real artist pages, such as Gong, experimental rock band Swans, and English rock bands Asia and Yes. And that oversight is on Spotify, McDonald suggested.

"Given the scale of output and the randomness of the names, my guess is that the owners of this stuff might not even have intended it to end up on existing artist profiles," McDonald told Ars. "If they just submitted stuff with artist names, not IDs, then it’s the streaming service’s problem to match those names to profiles, and thus the streaming service’s fault for not figuring out that these are not by the real Yes, Asia, Gong, Swans, etc."

It almost feels like Spotify is allowing this to happen. They make something off every purchase, of course.

 

[Noodles]

I wonder if this sort of happens elsewhere. Mostly because in a few cases I found artist pages on Bandcamp, but then later they disappeared.

And in one case, I bought a "Discography" bundle for like $30 and then a month later the entire page was gone (Bandcamp refunded that one at least).

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Most of the music services can't handle multiple artists with the same name. It isn't that they are pumping fake bands onto real band pages, it's that the software literally can't tell the difference. There are a few artists that I follow that get mixed with unrelated bands because the software uses the artist name alone without any other info to sort band pages. And don't get me started on inconsistent use of "The" before band names on streamers...

 

[Casey Pelous]

.... And don't get me started on inconsistent use of "The" before band names on streamers...

I have a story about a radio station's record library where one staff member consistently filed all bands that started with "the" together.

For you youngsters, "records" were .................wait; "radio stations" were ........................... oh, hell, never mind. You'd never believe it, anyway.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

I have a story about a radio station's record library where one staff member consistently filed all bands that started with "the" together.

For you youngsters, "records" were .................wait; "radio stations" were ........................... oh, hell, never mind. You'd never believe it, anyway.

They put Jethro Tull in "T"?

 

[Essence Lumin]

Most of the music services can't handle multiple artists with the same name. It isn't that they are pumping fake bands onto real band pages, it's that the software literally can't tell the difference. There are a few artists that I follow that get mixed with unrelated bands because the software uses the artist name alone without any other info to sort band pages. And don't get me started on inconsistent use of "The" before band names on streamers...

Not related to music but I wrote some searching software for a place I used to work for. One of my rules was A, An, and The were stripped from the beginning of the line before searching.

 

[Casey Pelous]

They put Jethro Tull in "T"?

Or F for flute. A for Aqualung. Your guess is as good as anyone else's, including his.

Let's just say that when it came to smarts, he had a great voice.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Not related to music but I wrote some searching software for a place I used to work for. One of my rules was A, An, and The were stripped from the beginning of the line before searching.

How would you file The The?

 

[Essence Lumin]

How would you file The The?

Funny you should say that since I thought of them before posting but didn't mention it. This was a bookstore not a music store so it doesn't apply but umm, they would have got lost in the shuffle since I also stripped the 10 to 20 or so most common words. (Unlike VVO search where three letter or less words are not allowed in search)

 

[Khamon]

They put Jethro Tull in "T"?

Wull he should be billed The Jethro Tull but no nm that won't work either.

Not related to music but I wrote some searching software for a place I used to work for. One of my rules was A, An, and The were stripped from the beginning of the line before searching.

or the end, sometimes they are listed foo, The

 

[Free]

Any band with the audaciousness to call themselves The The deserves to be lost in alphabetical listings.