Spotify UK will be dropping the term ‘urban’ from their platform. The term is usually used to describe music made by a black artist. The playlists containing the word urban will now be named based of the genre they fit into.
Safiya Lambre-Knight, UK artist and label partnership lead for hip-hop, rap, grime, drill, R&B, Afrobeat, reggae and dancehall, spoke to Music Week about Spotify’s decision; “Moving forward, we won’t be using the word ‘urban’ in the UK anymore. I look after a breadth of what were previously ‘urban’ genres and it will allow us to have broader conversations around creativity and artists. Honestly, I think there are bigger problems that we need to resolve, but we will be talking about music in genres going forward.”
This decision stems from an open letter written last month by black music executives from Sony Music, UMG, Warner Music Group, and the Black Music Coalition to “Chairmen, CEOs, Presidents and Music Industry Leaders” to introduce measures aimed at destabilising the systemic racism embedded within the UK music industry. They also called for the words ‘urban music’ be dropped as an industry term and be replaced by ‘black music.’
Following this Republic Records announced last month that they would no longer be using the word. The Grammys Awards also changed the name of the ‘Best Urban Contemporary Album’ award category to ‘Best Progressive R&B Album.’
While the resurgance of the #BlackLivesMatter movement is opening the door for these conversations, this is not a new issue. After he won the Grammy for Best Rap Album in 2020, Tyler, The Creator spoke backstage about how he felt his award was miscategorized as rap due to the colour of his skin. He said; “Whenever we – and I mean guys that look like me – do anything that’s genre-bending or anything, they always put it in a rap or urban category. I don’t like that ‘urban’ word. It’s just a politically correct way to say the N-word … why can’t we just be in pop?”
Adele White, an A&R for Island Records, spoke to Music Week about Universal’s disscussions over the word ‘urban’ too but highlighted that ‘urban’ is sometimes a positive word to use. “There’s a conversation going on internally at Universal. In some territories, ‘urban’ is seen as a very positive thing, I believe it has different meanings in different countries. In the UK, it’s been used as a PC term for Black people that felt uncomfortable. I think people feel it’s stigmatised. People may feel that urban isn’t given the same respect in the UK or, I don’t know, not treated the same. Maybe we don’t need it as much, but I know it’s important in other territories.”
She continued by saying; “If we’re working with Black artists, there’s nothing wrong with saying that, in the same way there’s nothing wrong with saying dance or indie. ‘Black’ isn’t a bad word, to specialise in music that comes from a diaspora of people that you may understand better for whatever reason. Black music has always existed and there’s nothing wrong with saying ‘black music’ or ‘music by black artists’, it’s positive.”
