Take That Snub Spotify With Google Album Deal

Take That have snubbed Spotify after striking a deal with Google (Xetra: A0B7FY - news) 's streaming service for their new album.

The group has teamed up with Google Play Music to enable their new release, called III, to be exclusively streamed for a month when it goes on sale on Monday.

The band - Gary Barlow, Howard Donald and Mark Owen - is now down to three after Jason Orange left in September.

The move comes at a time when there is growing interest in the relationship between artists and Spotify, after Taylor Swift removed her entire back catalogue from the streaming service just before releasing her new album 1989.

Her action was taken to help drive sales rather than allowing people to listen to it for free, but there have been concerns about the level of financial returns for artists whose music is featured on Spotify.

Take That's other albums continue to be available to fans on Spotify, despite Polydor's deal with Google.

Google has declined to reveal details about the deal.

A statement from the group said: "We would like to thank Google Play for coming up with such a great, creative campaign around the release of an album we're extremely proud of.

"We also wanted to do something different for this release and are looking forward to seeing it come to life, kicking off with a very special album launch party on Monday for a small number of some of our biggest supporters."

Take That are jostling to be number one in the UK singles chart this week, just a few sales behind the current chart-topper Band Aid 30's new version of Do They Know It's Christmas?.

The track, called These Days, is just 1,500 copies behind the charity single according to midweek data released by the Official Chart Company.