Adele’s latest and highly anticipated album, “25,” will not be available on music streaming services, according to an executive with knowledge of the release strategy.
The New York Times, which first reported the streaming decision on Thursday, said Adele was personally involved in making it.
“Adele is an anomaly. If she decided to release her album on cassette tapes, it would still be the biggest album of the year,” an industry source said.
The album will be pirated of course — published illicitly on file sharing web sites and on sites like YouTube. But Adele’s label has an aggressive plan in place to fight attempts to digitally steal the songs, the executive source said.
The move comes a little more than a year after another female artist, Taylor Swift, banned her album “1989” and her whole music catalogue from Spotify. She also temporarily banned it from Apple Music, but later agreed to allow Apple Music to stream the album.
Adele’s first single from “25” titled “Hello” became the first song to sell more than one million U.S. downloads in a week earlier this month.
Adele’s “25” is set for release on Friday.
