TIDAL Blames Universal Music Group for 'ANTI' Leak
Rihanna’s ANTI leak is still making headlines.
TIDAL has revealed the reason behind the mysterious leak of the singer’s eighth album. Despite conspiracy theories, ANTI was accidentally released ahead of schedule due to “a system error caused by Universal Music Group.”
Grace Kim, TIDAL’s director of marketing, told Spin that the leak wasn’t impactful. “Unfortunately we still rely on systems, and there was a system error,” she explained. “But I don’t think it hurt it at all.”
That claim is holding true. Last week, the RIAA certified ANTI platinum after registering 1 million downloads in just 14 hours. Billboard and Nielsen are counting ANTI‘s sales on TIDAL towards their totals, but they won’t count the Samsung download codes gifted to fans. The 400,000-plus sales of ANTI via TIDAL will be counted by Billboard on next week’s charts.
ANTI was released on Jan. 27 exclusively through TIDAL. It features collaborations with Drake and SZA, along with production from Boi-1da, DJ Mustard, Timbaland, and No I.D. Additionally, a physical version of the album will be available Feb. 5.
You can stream the project here.