Singer gives no clue about why he withdrew his music – and also posts new track Hardrocklover to Soundcloud

Prince, always a man to do exactly what he wants whether or not it might appear to be the sensible thing, has struck his latest inexplicable blow against music’s surrender to the internet.

This time, he has withdrawn his music from all streaming services – except Tidal – without any explanation. “Prince’s publisher has asked all streaming services to remove his catalog,” Spotify posted on its Prince page. “We have cooperated with the request, and hope to bring his music back as soon as possible.”

Prince’s decision comes in the same week Apple launched its Apple Music streaming service, on which Prince was present, initially at least. He has long sought to tightly control the availability of his music: his team have long sought to remove his tracks from YouTube, and he has no official presence on the site.

In recent years, he has even released albums via British national newspapers – 2007’s Planet Earth was released as a covermount with the Mail on Sunday, while 2010’s 20Ten was given away with the Daily Mirror and Daily Record.

Prince has been critical of music relationship with the internet. “We made money [online] before piracy was real crazy,” he told the Guardian in 2011. “Nobody’s making money now except phone companies, Apple and Google … It’s like the gold rush out there. Or a carjacking. There’s no boundaries.”

He added: “I personally can’t stand digital music. You’re getting sound in bits. It affects a different place in your brain. When you play it back, you can’t feel anything. We’re analogue people, not digital.”

However, there’s one corner of the internet where Prince remains a presence: Soundcloud. He has increasingly used the site as a means to put new music out to the world. It’s perhaps not a coincidence that even as he was withdrawing from streaming services, he was posting a new track – Hardrocklover – to Soundcloud.