After a two-year hiatus, Shawn "Jay Z" Carter's music is back on Spotify — and it's just in time for his fiftieth birthday.
As the clock struck midnight on the east coast of the US, Spotify announced that Jay's massive discography was back on the massive music streaming service. That starts with his first album, 1996's classic "Reasonable Doubt," and goes all the way through 2017's "4:44."
Spotify announced as much with a birthday message directed at Carter:
—Spotify (@Spotify) December 4, 2019
Among several other nicknames by which he's known, one of Carter's oldest is "Hov" or "Hova" — a shortening of "Jehova," a Hebrew word for God.
Longtime Spotify users may remember a time in the not-so-distant past when Carter's music was available on the music streaming service. It was only removed back in 2017, despite the fact that Carter's catalog remained on the other big Tidal competitor: Apple Music.
It's unclear what has changed since 2017 to make way for Carter's return to Spotify, but it likely has something to do with Tidal's inability to draw users away from Spotify and Apple Music. Tidal has struggled to compete with the two titans of music streaming, and the move to put Carter's music back on Spotify is the latest sign that the competition remains challenging.
