Music industry analyst: Apple should be investigated for antitrust practices

On Saturday singer/songwriter/rapper Frank Ocean on Saturday debuted his new album, Blonde, on Apple Music and iTunes — as a two-week windowed exclusive on Apple’s streaming music service. Some folks are’t happy about it.

Lucian Grange has sent out an email to Universal executives today ending all future exclusives with Universal artists. Those artists include Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Coldplay, Kanye West,The Weekend, and Kendrick Lamar among others.

The news was shared by Bob Lefsetz, a music industry analyst and critic, who penned a letter over the weekend in response to Blonde’s deal with Apple. He says that the Cupertino, California-based company should be investigated by the government for antitrust. 

He writes: “Because there’s a conspiracy between Apple Music and the industry to change the game, to get everybody to pay for a subscription by putting hit content behind a paywall.

“Apple should be investigated by the government for antitrust. How do you compete with the world’s richest company that’s got endless cash on hand? You can’t. It’d be like expecting hillbillies to get into Harvard if slots went to the highest bidder. The rich get richer and the rest of us…we’re left out, just like in America at large, which is why Bernie and Trump got traction, the usual suspects doing it for themselves have rigged the game in their favor, and now the music industry is trying to do this too.”