https://twitter.com/Eve6/status/1488158473028202496?t=piiC1W1eIG_zhCDLFlhFjA&s=19
How much revenue would Eve 6 be bringing in in 2021 if spotify didn't exist? I bought Eve 6's self-titled album (great album btw), and summarily lost it probably 20 years ago. Spotify isn't negotiating directly with Eve 6 because "Eve 6" doesn't own the music. If anyone is the "bad guy" in this scenario, it seems like it's the record label for whatever contract they signed with Eve 6 when the band gave up their music rights way back when.
More generally, it's really easy for artists to look at 1,000,000, 10,000,000, 20,000,000 spotify streams and argue "think of how many albums that equates to, we'd be making a killing!" But it's apples and oranges. With the broad accessibility to everything now (via spotify/youtube/apple/amazon/etc.), it's a lot easier for listeners to find you. And it's a lot easier (and cheaper) for listeners to hear a particular song. Whereas, when people had to actually (1) hear a song on the radio; (2) happen to see a band at a show; or (3) find a band via some other organic/word-of-mouth, and
then decide to drop 15/20 bucks on an album -- that made the music world a whole lot smaller and gatekept by a relatively miniscule group of DJs/VJs/Record Execs acting as curators.
I don't know - the model has obviously changed and made touring more imperative for all but a small number of artists, but I do think Spotify (and the accessibility) makes it a lot easier for talented artists to get discovered and make a decent living playing music. And for the listeners (us), it's the invention of the printing press.