Exactly three years ago, on April 23, 2016, Beyoncé released her titanic achievement of a visual album, Lemonade. Lemonade rapidly became required viewing/listening — and also impossible to listen to on any of the major streaming services like Spotify or Apple Music. After a brief window in which the whole thing was available on HBO, Lemonade was only available to buy via download or to stream on the members-only streaming service Tidal, in which Beyoncé and her husband Jay-Z have partial ownership.
Beyoncé’s Lemonade is now available to stream on all major services
Including Spotify and Apple Music.
HBO
Constance Grady is a senior correspondent on the Culture team for Vox, where since 2016 she has covered books, publishing, gender, celebrity analysis, and theater.
Now, all that has changed. Today, for the first time, Lemonade is streamable on all the major streaming services, including Spotify and Apple Music.
This development marks a major change for Beyoncé, who until now has pointedly restricted her grandest musical accomplishment to platforms in which she herself has a vested interest. She’s even made a point of noting that preference in her music. “If I gave two fucks about streaming numbers would have put Lemonade up on Spotify,” she says on Everything Is Love’s “Nice.”
So why the change of heart? That’s something Beyoncé is keeping to herself for the time being — and since Beyoncé is notoriously tight-lipped on what happens behind the scenes in her camp (that’s how you manage to release three surprise albums!), I wouldn’t expect to hear any solid rumors about the reasoning behind her decision until she sees fit to share it with the world.
The newly streaming Lemonade also includes the original demo version of “Sorry.” You can listen to it on Spotify, Apple Music, and other streaming platforms.
