Alice In Chains’ Sean Kinney Calls Spotify And Pandora ‘A F—ing Ripoff’ For Musicians

As the music industry evolves, musicians tend to receive the short end of the stick. It's becoming harder and harder for bands to live off their craft with the rise of illegal downloading, but Alice in Chains' Sean Kinney explained in a recent interview how even legal forms of song streaming are harming artists.

Alice in Chains have been going strong off the release of their 2013 full-length, 'The Devil Put Dinosaurs Here.' The album debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 list, selling 61,000 copies in its first week. The record's sales grew substantially, hitting over 120,000 units sold shortly after.

Despite the album's success, Alice in Chains aren't exactly swimming in cash. In a new interview with 96.5 The Fox, Kinney spoke about how streaming services such as Spotify and Pandora are "a f---ing ripoff" for musicians.

“You have these Spotifys and Pandoras where you get access to almost every single piece of recorded music on the planet," Kinney begins. "That’s great, for the consumer. But for every person who has ever recorded music, it’s a f---ing ripoff. Oops, I swore on the radio. Because I think I hear that people are starting to post their checks. You get 10 million plays of your song, and you get a check for 111 dollars. It’s a weird time we live in, it’s a real balancing act. So basically, you hope to get an audience, and you can tour. Try to break even, or maybe make a little bit to make a living on tour.”

The drummer continues, “But it costs a lot. Gas prices aren’t lower, instrument prices aren’t lower. [Laughs] It [doesn't] cost less. Last I checked I think CD’s and stuff like that cost the same or less than they used to, so I don’t know. I really don’t know how to deal with that. It is what it is. We just go about it by doing what we want, and play music and stuff. If it comes to a time when we can’t afford to get to places, and we do, we invest to go to a lot of places. We’re not leaving there with a briefcase of dough. If it comes to a time where we can’t do that, we just won’t be able to do it.”

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