Late last night, something really weird happened on Tidal. The tracklist to Rihanna‘s new album, ANTI, was leaked, then her actual album was accidentally made public by the streaming service. It was quickly yanked back, but it was too late. Stream-rippers and hackers already had Anti.zip files fluttering from inbox to inbox, WeTransfer to WeTransfer. So, Tidal did the smart thing, and said f*ck it. Let’s drop it.
So, at about 9 p.m. last night, Tidal officially released ANTI in its entirety, exclusively. Neither Spotify nor Apple Music was granted access to her new music. The only places you can stream ANTI is via Tidal or by subscribing to the Samsung software that allows Samsung mobile users to stream it on their phones. Think it’s too complicated a process to get enough ears on it? Think again. Rihanna’s new album has already been streamed in excess of 13 million times Jay Z‘s streaming service, and a million of those streams are accredited to the Samsung subscription service.
1 MILLION in under 15 hrs!!!! NAVY R die!!!! Thank u to all my fans and @samsungmobileus Listen to ANTI now: https://t.co/0FRaUXR8bk
— Rihanna (@rihanna) January 28, 2016
No word yet on when Rihanna’s new album will be made available to other physical and digital retailers, but chances are right now she’s just happy that despite a notably awkward roll-out, ANTI is doing the numbers.
