Songs by Adele, Kendrick Lamar, Bob Dylan, Nirvana, Green Day, Mariah Carey, and others are currently unavailable on YouTube due to a contract dispute between the platform and SESAC, a performing rights organization.
A YouTube spokesperson told The Hollywood Reporter on Saturday, “We’ve engaged in good faith negotiations with SESAC to renew our deal. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts, we couldn’t reach a fair agreement before the contract expired. We take copyright matters seriously, so content represented by SESAC is no longer accessible on YouTube in the U.S. We’re actively negotiating with SESAC and hope to reach a new deal soon.”
Users attempting to play certain songs received this message: “This video contains content from SESAC. It is not available in your country.”
SESAC is responsible for collecting royalties and protecting copyrights for songwriters and publishers in the U.S. According to its website, “SESAC licenses the public performance of over 1.5 million songs on behalf of more than 15,000 affiliated songwriters, composers, and publishers,” representing names like Bob Dylan, Neil Diamond, RUSH, Adele, Jack Harlow, Ariana Grande, Disclosure, Zac Brown, Rosanne Cash, Hillary Scott of Lady A, Lee Brice, Margo Price, Nicky Jam, Blanco Brown, and many others.
Throughout Saturday, the TeamYouTube account on X (formerly Twitter) responded to user frustrations, saying, “Our music license agreement with SESAC expired without a renewal. As a result, we’ve blocked SESAC-associated content in the U.S. in accordance with copyright law.”
The Hollywood Reporter reached out to SESAC for comment.
Earlier this year, a similar dispute between Universal Music Group and TikTok lasted for months before they reached a music licensing agreement. During that time, some artists’ music was also unavailable on TikTok.