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Dave Stewart defends Spotify, launches bank

By | Published on Monday 30 September 2013

Dave Stewart

Former Eurythmic Dave Stewart, a one-time streaming naysayer, has changed his mind and decided that “as a songwriter you should worship Spotify”.

Speaking to The Guardian about Thom Yorke and Nigel Godrich’s recent anti-Spotify rant, Stewart said: “Thom Yorke made a mistake there, him and Nigel Godrich. They were misinformed. I think they just suddenly got a bee in their bonnet, because Spotify is one of the few companies that is transparent and actually pays properly – as a songwriter you should worship Spotify, because they’ve come along with a solution”.

He added: “It’s a volume business. If they had 100 million subscribers, which is possible, the payment [for the Eurythmics catalogue] would be equal to the band’s income back at the peak of selling”.

Increasingly chatty of late, with a new album to promote, Stewart also gave a keynote address at last week’s Reeperbahn conference in Hamburg, where he announced the launch of his new project, the First Artist Bank, which he described as “a global creative community bank … for artists, creators and their fans”.

Created with former chairman and CEO of Credit Suisse EMEA Michael Philipp, the bank will provide funding, management of digital assets and intellectual property, and business advice to creative types in music, film, TV and theatre, so that they “don’t sign stupid deals”, said Stewart.

Due to open next year, culture fans will also be able to open accounts with the bank, and its credit cards will offer a reward scheme providing access to free tickets to events.



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