Canceled as an artist? This is what happens on Dutch radio

NOS

Jeanine Duijst

editor NOS on 3

Sophie Frankenmolen

editor NOS on 3

Semina Ajrovic

editor NOS on 3

Jeanine Duijst

editor NOS on 3

Sophie Frankenmolen

editor NOS on 3

Semina Ajrovic

editor NOS on 3

Marco Borsato, Lil Kleine and Bilal Wahib have one thing in common: they were ‘canceled’. They were in the news because of their – proven or not – transgressive behavior. Radio stations stopped playing their music and Spotify removed them from playlists. But for how long?

NOS op 3 investigated whether Dutch people still listen to canceled artists and how many radio stations the artists still play. The listening figures of almost forty radio stations (FM and online) and figures from Spotify playlists provide insight into how long artists were no longer on the air or on headphones after they were accused of misconduct.

Marco Borsato

One of the artists that NOS requested on 3 dates is Marco Borsato. Yesterday it was announced that the singer is being prosecuted for indecency with an underage girl. Borsato was previously discredited after BNNVARA program BOOS exposed the abuses in the talent show The Voice of Holland.

Before that time, his music was still a regular fixture on the radio. The social outrage after BOOS is clearly reflected in the listening figures of the radio stations. Borsato has been heard on the radio more often in recent months. The news of the upcoming lawsuit is not yet reflected in the figures.

NOS

Lil Kleine was also barely heard on the radio for a long time, after images were leaked showing him abusing his then girlfriend Jamie Vaes. The Public Prosecution Service is investigating this. For a while his career seemed to have come to a standstill, but as can be seen below, he is back again. The two new hits Memory and Pornstar Martini led to a comeback.

NOS

NOS op 3 collected much more listening data and also submitted it to radio stations. In the video below you can see which artists can no longer be heard and how radio stations make this choice.

A similar picture also emerges of other canceled artists: an artist is hardly played anymore if he/she receives negative news coverage, but as soon as the artist releases a new hit, radio stations quickly follow suit. Canceling therefore does not seem final in almost all cases.

Radio stations follow the listener

That image is confirmed in a tour of the ten largest radio stations. The stations say: we follow the listener. If they want to hear the music, we’ll play it. Jelle Klerx from Qmusic: “We look very much at the moment and we ask ourselves the question: are we hurting people if we play that person?”

The radio stations certainly don’t want one thing: playing court. Klerx: “The most difficult question in this matter is: where do you draw the line? If someone is suspicious? If someone has been convicted? You could say: don’t turn it, because better safe than sorry, but then you can help a lot of artists no more turning.”

When asked if there are any artists who no longer play radio stations, both FunX and Qmusic indicate that they no longer play R. Kelly. Klerx: “We never say never, but we haven’t played R. Kelly for a while, because he has really been convicted.”

How do we listen in private?

NOS op 3 also investigated whether there is a difference between public and private cancellations. Will listeners continue to listen to canceled artists in the privacy of their headphones?

Spotify does not share listening figures that show how often a song is listened to over a certain period, but it does share data that shows how many active listeners a song has. Take Lil Kleine’s listening figures. It can be concluded that although people listened less briefly after he was discredited, the number of monthly listeners exceeded 2 million at almost any time.

NOS

People still often listen to Lil Kleine in private and that actually applies to every artist who is discredited. Media scientist Simone Driessen from Erasmus University has an explanation for this: “Cancelling in itself is something public. You need a certain crowd for cancellation, a crowd that participates in that boycott. And that can of course be different in private.” The question is, she says: “Can you separate the art from the maker? Or do you see it as a whole?”

Accountability

For this research we analyzed 37 radio stations (FM and online). We presented our results to ten major radio stations: Radio2, FunX, 3FM, Qmusic, Talpa (538, Skyradio, Radio 10) and Radiocorp/Mediahuis (SLAM!, 100% NL, Veronica).

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