Kanye’s Stem Player Is Ripe for the Physical Media Boom
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Kanye West released his highly anticipated Donda 2 on February 23rd exclusively on his Stem Player audio device available for purchase on his website alone — and reports to have made 2.2 million dollars in one day by keeping the new music off streaming platforms. He claims his company Yeezy Tech was producing 3,000 Stem Players per day towards the start of March, which only sounds like a waste of production for those who haven’t been aware of the gradual boom in physical music media sales over the last decade.
Half the story is in the numbers: physical album sales in the U.S., including vinyls and CDs, astonishingly sold over three times the amount of digital album sales — a whopping 22% increase in 2021 compared to 2020. (Digital album sales decreased by about the same amount.) Though single digital tracks are still the primary way we consume music, with streaming numbers surpassing a trillion, physical media is making a significant resurgence and seems to appeal to a younger generation’s nostalgia for an era gone by.
The Stem Player can be considered a similar revival of a past relic because it has the blueprint of an old-school MP3 player, but its capabilities are also fresh and unique when it comes to portable listening. Roughly the size of an egg, draped in silicone, with LED lights that are the only visual indicators (there isn’t a user interface touch screen), its minimal aesthetic is on brand for Yeezy Inc. One can find it difficult to argue that it’s all fluff, because once you get past the jarring lack of an LED screen, all you’re left with is the music and how you choose to experience it.
You can upload any song onto the device, then choose how you manipulate the “stems,” i.e. the various instruments: bass, synths, drums/beats or vocals. You can isolate one stem completely or change the degree of its prominence. You can also loop a section of a song or play it in reverse. With the unlimited ways in which you can make a personal remix of a song, you are always guaranteed to always have a new experience when you engage with the Stem Player. Some may deem its lack of a screen and direct internet connection flaws that can’t be ignored. But what they may be forgetting is that vinyls, CDs and cassettes (which are also being released more frequently by major artists) have no user interface or online connection either — yet they’re making the music industry money hand over fist.
Economist Scott Hiller noted, “Generally, the more interesting and different the experience from streaming, the longer the likely sustained success of physical media.” Because of this, he’s adamant that vinyl is “here to stay.” As for the Stem Player, he believes its future is still ambiguous. “We see vinyl making a comeback, which is a very profitable medium for big artists. But again, this is only possible for huge names. I don’t know that Stem is the answer, but for huge artists more physical releases may be.”
One can argue that, despite the $200 price point, the modernized (or glorified) MP3 player may predict a new wave of music consumption as it satisfies two ongoing needs: this current generation’s desire to revisit classic ways of listening to music and the artist’s need to be in control of their work and its revenue. West reportedly turned down a $100 million offer from Apple Music to license Donda 2 exclusively to its streaming platform for a limited time. Not only did he turn down the deal, but to date the full album still cannot be found anywhere but on his Stem Player — meaning streaming services and other outside distributors are not profiting from his work.
West (who has recently changed his legal name to Ye) is one of many artists in recent years attempting to regain control of their master recordings and publishing rights as the revenue they make from streaming has greatly reduced their pocketed income. Live performing is still in a precarious position with the threat of a new COVID variant every so often, which means an artist’s main stream of income is just as unsteady. This has left dozens of tenured musicians, such as Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, and Lil Wayne, with little choice but to sell their masters or publishing rights for lump sums. These multi-million dollar deals show that, in most cases, it’s more lucrative for a musician to get rid of the rights over their work altogether than to receive a fraction of a cent per stream.
Indie hip hop sociologist and historian Christopher Vito of Southwestern College believes West’s independent release via Stem Player will spark important discussions of a musician’s autonomy. “I think this could be a catalyst for the conversation about artist rights and fair pay for their labor,” he says. “I find [West’s] goal to release music on other platforms that are not named Spotify or Apple to be something we should fight for within the music industry overall. Aiming for a more decentralized music industry would certainly benefit artists.” Hiller’s belief counters that as he stated, “I don’t think streaming is going away even if many artists don’t like it for a simple reason: it’s a response to piracy. And the genie is not going back into the bottle. If you took away easy streaming, I would expect piracy to rise again with no revenue for the industry.”
Kanye West is no exception to the growing list of artists currently challenging the industry’s status quo of unfair contracts and royalty payouts. If West’s Stem Player takes off, record labels and music streaming platforms may even begin to offer better deals to artists in an attempt to deter them from going the Stem Player route, i.e. pursuing similar independent releases. In regards to artists being unsatisfied with the current system of streaming royalties, Hiller says, “I expect…artists may try to find more ways to sell directly to their fans, including various forms of physical media. Their success will depend on how committed their fans are.” Vito’s predictions are less optimistic. “Ye’s Stem Player is $200 and targets a specific niche of music listeners. So I’m not sure the big companies will be too afraid of losing market share,” he says. “If it does take away market share, my bigger concern would be that major businesses will co-opt the technology for their own benefit.”
Unlike the worlds of high-end fashion and athletic footwear, audio technology may be a newer venture for West, but it’s not completely uncharted territory for rappers. We’ve seen Dr. Dre’s Beats by Dre headphones become best-sellers with longevity and Jay-Z’s independently owned Tidal music streaming service rival the success of other apps on the market. On the other hand, it’s fair to detect elements of gimmick in Kanye’s foray into the audio tech world. “The question that comes to mind is what the vision of a democratic music industry might look like in the future,” Vito says. “I always think about whether artists want a truly decentralized music industry in general, or if they just want a larger part of the revenue under a capitalist model.”
