Kanye West is shunning streaming services and releasing his upcoming album Donda 2 on his new device.
The Touch the Sky hitmaker announced on Instagram on Thursday that Donda 2 would not be available on services such as Spotify or Apple Music when it is released on 22 February. He explained that fans would need to buy the Stem player - a device that costs $200 - to listen to the upcoming record.
"Today artists get just 12% of the money the industry makes. It's time to free music from this oppressive system. It's time to take control and build our own," he explained across numerous posts. "Donda 2 will only be streaming on my own platform, the stem player. You can download new music from stemplayer.com. You can play 4 different elements of the track: vocals, drums, bass and music. It also has a MP3 player available. We currently have 67,000 available and are making 3,000 a day."
The 44-year-old rapper claimed his decision is part of a revolution to help artists make more money from their music.
"After 10 albums after being under 10 contracts. I turned down a hundred million dollar Apple deal," he claimed. "No one can pay me to be disrespected. We set our own price for our art. Tech companies made music practically free so if you don't do merch sneakers and tours you don't eat.
"Jay Z made (streaming service) Tidal and fake media attacked him. Well in the words of my big brother. Come and get me. I'm willing to die standing cause I ain't living on my knees no more. God please cover me. I run this company 100% I don't have to ask for permission."
Kanye also shared a photo of a notepad on which he'd written the titles of the 21 tracks on Donda 2. The tracklisting did not specify any featuring artists.
