Tag: Amazon Music

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Mobile Syrup

Amazon Music now offers 100 million songs, but they’re shuffle-only

Amazon is upgrading its Amazon Music with Prime streaming service big time. The music service’s catalogue, which had roughly 2 million tunes on it, will soon boast over 100 million songs and tracks completely ad-free for Prime users at no additional cost.

However, there is a catch — users can only play music in shuffle mode.

“Prime members can discover more new music based on their likes; shuffle play any artist, album, or playlist in the catalogue; stream a collection of All-Access playlists tailored to personalized listening preferences on demand and download them for offline listening,” said an Amazon spokesperson.

In addition to songs, Amazon Music with Prime will also offer several podcasts from the likes of NPR, CNN, ESPN, The New York Times, and more, also ad-free.

The only major limitation with the service is that users won’t be able to listen to specific tracks of their choice, and only shuffle music based on an artist, album or playlist, making the service a great option for someone who already has a Prime subscription, but not something on par with the likes of Apple Music and Spotify. Additionally, Amazon Music with Prime only offers songs in standard definition.

To overcome these limitations, users can subscribe to Amazon Music Unlimited for $8.99/month and play songs in high-fidelity and Spatial Audio, all while being able to choose specific tracks to play.

Being stuck with the shuffle button isn’t necessarily great, but it’s much better than what Amazon Music with Prime was offering up until yesterday, and considering that the service comes bundled for free with Prime, the average listener would be more than happy to use the service.

Learn more about the Prime Music upgrade here.

Image credit: Amazon

Source: Amazon

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Mobile Syrup

Amazon Music for Prime members will be a little more expensive starting May 5

Amazon is set to increase the cost of its Music streaming service in Canada for Prime members, and the changes go into effect on May 5th.

Revealed in an updated FAQ page, Amazon says it is increasing the Amazon Music subscription cost to be able to bring its users more “content and features.”

The Amazon Music single-device plan is changing from $3.99 to $4.99 per month while the Amazon Music Unlimited individual plan is changing from $7.99 to $8.99 per month, or from $79 to $89 annually.

The Amazon Music single-device plan gives you access to Amazon Music Unlimited on one eligible Echo or Fire TV device, whereas the Unlimited individual plan allows you to listen to Amazon Music Unlimited on all your compatible devices, though one device at a time.

Any bills after May 5th will show the updated pricing. If you’re on a trial or promotional offer, you’ll get the lower rate for the rest of your trial or promotional offer time.

It’s worth noting that Amazon Prime Music, the company’s version of the music streaming service with fewer features and a smaller catalogue of two million songs, is still included for free with a Prime membership.

Image credit: Shutterstock

Source: Amazon

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos supports lossless music from Amazon, Apple Music likely to follow

It’s taken Sonos some time, but the audio company finally has another app ready to take advantage of its speaker’s high-quality streaming abilities.

Amazon Music joins french streaming service Qobuz and Sonos’ own Sonos Radio HD as one of the few music streaming platforms that supports lossless audio. Select devices like the Sonos Arc and Gen 2 Beam soundbars can also play supported songs from Amazon Music with Dolby Atmos.

Beyond the high-quality 3D audio, Amazon Music supports both 16-bit streams, marked ‘HD’ or 24-bit streams labelled as ‘ultra HD.’ The sample rate also caps out at 48kHz for those interested. However, to get these higher-end streams, you’ll need to use a Sonos speaker that’s compatible with the Gen 2 app (the brown one).

While I’m sure there are lots of audiophiles with Amazon Music, I imagine that there more people using Apple Music, so I’ll be very keen to see when Sonos drops that update. The company hints that it’s coming, in a recent blog post outlining HQ audio terms, but no timeline is given. The audio quality explainer is very interesting if you’re into that kind of thing.

It’s nice to see Sonos expanding to support high-quality audio from more services. Apple and Amazon both added lossless streaming to their services in May 2021 and Tidal has had the feature for ages. Now that many Sonos users are upgrading to the newer speakers that use the new app, it’s nice to be able to stream music in HQ easily.

Source: Sonos

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Mobile Syrup

Amazon Music launches Billy Talent and Arkells playlists for Toronto Maple Leafs doc

Amazon Music has rolled out two playlists featuring Billy Talent and Arkells music to coincide with the impending release of its All or Nothing: Toronto Maple Leafs documentary.

The playlists were curated by the Canadian rock bands, so they include some of their own songs mixed in with other tracks. Billy Talent’s playlist can be found here and includes the likes of ‘Red Flag’ (Billy Talent), ‘Thunderstruck’ (AC/DC), ‘Familiar Drugs’ (Alexisonfire) and ‘Immigrant Song’ (Led Zeppelin).

Meanwhile, Arkells’ playlist will release on October 1st, the same day that All or Nothing premieres on Amazon Prime Video.

Narrated by Toronto’s own Will Arnett (Arrested Development), All or Nothing follows the Leafs during the historic 2020-21 NHL season. The series offers a behind-the-scenes look at the players, coaches and fans — both on the rink and into the locker room.

Image credit: Amazon