Russ recently spoke with Spotify for a new interview, in which he argued that the service's monthly listeners statistic is “a facade.” In making his point, Russ noted that only 10 million of his 14 million monthly listeners are active, meaning the other four million only stumbled upon one of his songs in passing, either through playlists or other features. Russ also took time to thank his “super listeners,” who make up just under 10 percent of his fan base.
“Sat down with Spotify and got to finally debunk wtf monthly listeners actually means,” he wrote on Twitter. “Shoutout to all my ‘super listeners’. Super listeners on average make up 2% of an artists monthly listeners. Y’all make up 9% of mine.”
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From there, Russ continued in another post: “I have 10,000,000 people in my active audience out of my 14m monthly listeners. That’s people who go out of their way to listen to my music. The rest is people who heard it on a playlist or Spotify radio etc.. they weren’t actively tryna hear it. This is why I say the monthly listeners number is a facade. I wonder what the active audience number really is for other artists who have cr*zy playlisting etc."
In the interview, Russ also revealed that he stays up late DMing with fans from other time zones to express his gratitude for their support. “I think it’s a testament to staying connected with my fans,” he said of his “super listeners.” “It’s funny to sort of debunk the monthly listeners number because I see how volatile it is. To see that I actually have 10 million that are active is awesome.”
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He continued: “That’s a way more honest number, and it’s a way more useful number. So many times throughout my career I’ve seen, you know, just in my comment section like Cape Town fans or Saudi Arabian fans. Every time I see enough of it where it’s making a dent, I single them out and acknowledge it. That’s always made it expand. For me just acknowledging your fans is step one of being a fucking good person.”
[Via]