Lily Allen warns Jay Z's Tidal could lead to more music piracy and affect new artists

'Up and coming (not yet millionaires) artists are going to suffer as a result'

Warm: Lily Allen (Getty Images)

Lily Allen has criticised Jay Z's new music streaming service Tidal, warning it will lead to more piracy and could affect upcoming artists struggling to break into the industry.

Allen wrote on Twitter: "I LOVE Jay Z so much, but TIDAL is soon expensive compared to other perfectly good streaming services, he’s taking the biggest Artists, made them exclusive to TIDAL (am I right in thinking this ?), people are going to swarm back to Pirate sites in droves, sending traffic to torrent sites.

"Up and coming (not yet millionaires) artists are going to suffer as a result."

Jay Z pledged to change the financial model of music streaming by creating the first artist-owned streaming service.

Music fans were quick to criticise the host of wealthy artists who signed up to Tidal, accusing them of seeking to earn even more money from their audiences by hosting exclusive content.

After pulling her entire back catalogue from Spotify last year, Taylor Swift’s albums – with the exception of 1989 – appeared on Tidal last week.

Swift said she was "not willing to contribute my life’s work to an experiment that I don’t feel fairly compensates the writers, producers, artists and creators of music".