Join TIDAL . . . Or Get DESTROYED!! Insider Claims It Was JAY Z . . Who Sent Nicki And Meek Out . . . TO DESTROY Drake And Taylor Swift . . . For Not JOINING TIDAL!!

If you're wondering WHY Nicki and Meek went after two of the HOTTEST STARS in MUSIC in a public twitter battle . . . look no further than JAY Z and his company TIDAL.

MediaTakeOut.com spoke to a member of Drake's OVO camp who told us that he suspects that JAY Z is behind the effort to try and SLANDER Drake and Taylor Swift. And that it's all because Taylor and Drake REFUSED to sign on to TIDAL.

The insidre explained, "[Jay Z] is upset that Taylor Swift isn't putting all her music [like her new album 1989] on TIDAL even though she puts it on Apple Music. And they're upset that Drake signed onto Apple Music over TIDAL." The insider explained, "So [Jay Z] put a BATTERY in Meek and Nicki's back . . . and is using them like HITMEN - to go after artists that didn't sign on to TIDAL."

The OVO insider had some advice to Meek and Nicki though. The industry heavyweight explained, "Meek and Nicki should be very careful if they're Jay Z's hitmn. Look what happened to Beanie Siegel and Dame Dash, they were his old hitmen and where are they now." And they added, "What do you think [Jay and Bey] have in common with a dusty n*gga like Meek and a RAT like Nicki - they're using them."

Jay Z's TIDAL streaming service is picking up steam, but it needs to RAISE NEW CAPITAL. Reports are that if it doesn't get another MAJOR INVESTMENT, it faces shutting down.