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CD Baby encourages its community to keep an eye out for hate bands
By Chris Cooke | Published on Monday 21 August 2017
Music distributor CD Baby has encouraged members of its community to get in touch if they reckon there is music on its platform that constitutes hate speech.
The distribution firm’s statement followed the previously reported news that Spotify had removed music from its servers by acts that have been categorised as racist “hate bands” by US civil rights advocacy group the Southern Poverty Law Center. Spotify acted after Digital Music News reported on the hate bands whose music was available via the streaming service in the wake of recent news events Stateside.
Spotify said that it “takes immediate action to remove any such material as soon as it has been brought to our attention”, though added that it relied to an extent of its label and distributor partners to filter out tracks of this kind.
Which means companies like CD Baby. Though – as a DIY distributor open to any self-releasing artist – there is only so much CD Baby itself can do to filter tracks that flow through its channels, hence the message urging community members to get in touch if they see music on its platform that causes concern.
The firm’s CEO Tracy Maddux told reporters: “We believe hate speech is particularly odious, and we try not to carry it, per our hate speech policy. However, we carry over eight million songs that hundreds of thousands of artists self-distribute on the CD Baby platform, and it is impossible to screen every song for objectionable content”.
Maddux added: “Our practice has been to encourage our community to let us know if there is content available on our site that violates our guidelines. Reports of hate-promoting music are taken very seriously and we are making every effort to flag and vet tracks of concern. In the event we find content in violation of guidelines, we will take it down”.
CD Baby also confirmed it is distributing the previously reported album ‘Philia: Artists Rise Against Islamophobia’, which features tracks from the likes of Mac DeMarco, Heems, Fruit Bats and former Walkmen vocalist Hamilton Leithauser, and which was released on Friday.
