Spotify officially responds to Nicki Minaj’s claims of discrimination against her

Spotify has responded to Nicki Minaj's accusations that the streaming service didn't promote her album Queen in an effort to to teach her a lesson for debuting new music on a competitor's platform.

"Spotify supported Nicki Minaj with a Times Square billboard, a host of the largest playlists, New Music Friday and the new music release shelf,” a rep for the company said in a statement released to Variety.

“Her song ‘Bed’ actually saw an increase based on the promotions put behind the campaign. The company continues to be big fans of Nicki.

In a series of tweets yesterday, Nicki claimed Spotify didn't promote her album, despite promising to do so, because she debuted her music "10 minutes early on #QueenRadio," her show on Apple's Beats 1 Radio.  

Minaj's Queen debuted at no. 2 on the Billboard Hot 200 behind Travis Scott's Astroworld. The rapper also criticized Billboard's charting rules, claiming the rapper's merch bundles unfairly helped him secure the top spot on the chart.  

Billboard has not responded to Minaj's claims specifically but an article published yesterday by the publication notes the rapper also took advantage of merch bundles.  

"Queen, like Astroworld, saw its sales bolstered by an array of merchandise/album bundles sold via Minaj’s official website. ‘Queen’ also benefits from sales generated by a concert ticket/album sale redemption offer with her upcoming co-headlining tour with Future.”