NEW YORK – Beyonce fans who don’t have subscriptions to Jay Z’s streaming music service Tidal can take heart.
“Lemonade” is expected to be offered for sale via Apple at midnight on Sunday, according to the New York Times.
The much-anticipated “visual album” was released on Tidal exclusively on Saturday night.
CNN has reached out to both Apple and a spokesperson for Beyonce for comment.
The quick release on iTunes highlights the complex dynamics at work in music distribution. Online retailers like iTunes allow buyers to download music and pay for it a la carte, while all-you-can-listen streaming services charge subscription fees.
Beyonce is a partner in Tidal, which her husband, Jay Z, relaunched in March 2015. It was billed as “the first ever artist owned global music and entertainment platform.”
The Spotify competitor is also where Beyonce debuted her album’s first single, “Formation,” in February.
Tidal does not have the vast numbers of subscribers of either Spotify or Apple Music. Given the frenzy over the release of new Beyonce music, the singer risked angering fans who were not Tidal subscribers.
On Saturday night, Tidal promoted itself as the only place where listeners could access “Lemonade.”
Beyonce’s release definitely gave the service a boost. While exact data is unavailable, Tidal was No. 3 on Apple’s chart of free apps on Sunday afternoon. The app offered a 30-day free trial to entice new subscribers.
“What a week for Tidal, right? They have, in one week, changed the entire narrative of their business, which was, ‘It’s not doing well, to, ‘Oh my gosh, you have to go to Tidal,'” editor Janice Min, who oversees Billboard, said Sunday on CNN’s”Reliable Sources.”
Industry observers like Min knew the period of exclusivity probably wouldn’t last long.
Withholding the album from online stores like iTunes would make it much more difficult for “Lemonade” to soar to the top of charts like the Billboard 200.
Partly for that reason, when Rihanna streamed her new album “Anti” on Tidal for a week in January, she also sold it through stores like iTunes after a day.
The availability of “Lemonade” so soon on iTunes may dampen new subscriptions for Tidal in the coming days.
Fans will be happy. Soon after “Lemonade” dropped on Saturday, Twitter was abuzz with complaints that “Lemonade” was not available on Apple Music.
