Tag: music streaming

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Have you heard about Spotify’s new AI DJ yet?

Through the power of AI, users on Spotify now have access to their own personalized DJ that will play them a curated selection of tracks based on users listening history.

The AI guide rolled out by the music streaming service sorts through the user’s latest music and looks back at older favourites to best deliver a stream of songs picked specifically for them. Users can even provide feedback, which the DJ will use to change and refreshen the song list.

To prevent itself from feeling lifeless, the virtual DJ also features commentary, giving listeners in-depth reasoning as to why the songs being played were chosen, what’s coming up next, and overall artist and track information.

If listeners don’t like what’s being played, they can hit the DJ button at the bottom right of the screen to have the AI model play another track or switch up the genre entirely.

The AI DJ launched to premium Spotify members on February 22nd, 2023, and users have since praised its accuracy and personal charm.

Spotify uses a blend of personalization technology and OpenAI technology to provide a personal listening experience to every user. The feature sounds pretty fluid, with the company getting Xavier “X” Jernigan’s voice to be the first model for the DJ. Spotify says it will continue to “iterate and innovate,” meaning more voices could be possible in the future.

The AI DJ is available on both iOS and Android versions of the app. Those who want to test out the DJ for themselves can do so by:

  1. Head to your Music Feed on Home in the Spotify mobile app on your iOS or Android device.
  2. Tap Play on the DJ card.
  3. Let Spotify do the rest! The DJ will serve a lineup of music alongside short commentary on the songs and artists picked just for you.
  4. Not feeling the vibe? Just hit the DJ button at the bottom right of the screen to be taken to a different genre, artist, or mood.

Be warned, however, as the AI DJ knows exactly what you’ve listened to. Don’t be startled if guilty pleasures like the Mama Mia soundtrack come through your speakers, even if you listened to it years ago.

Spotify Premium subscriptions are available for $9.99 CAD per month, and new users can get three months free until July 21, 2023. You can sign up here.

Image credit: Spotify

Source: Spotify

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Spotify is still launching a HiFi Lossless plan, it’s just unclear when

Spotify says it still has plans to release a HiFi Lossless subscription tier, but it’s unclear when it will drop.

The streaming music giant first announced that a premium audio subscription was on the way over two years ago, alongside a rough 2021 release date. In the time since Apple Music brought lossless audio to its base subscription plan ($10.99/month) at no additional cost, and Amazon Music Unlimited ($8.99/month) also started offering lossless music for free.

This puts Spotify in a tough position because it had plans to launch its higher-quality streaming tier with a premium price tag. Why would anyone pay more for high-quality music on Spotify when its key competitors offer it alongside a base subscription?

In a recent interview with The Verge’s podcast ‘Decoder,’ Spotify president Gustav Söderström said, “We announced it, but then the industry changed for a bunch of reasons. We are going to do it, but we’re going to do it in a way where it makes sense for us and for our listeners. The industry changed and we had to adapt.”

The Verge says that the HiFi tier has been ready to release for more than a year and that internal Spotify employees have access to it. It’s believed that the feature will likely still release as a more expensive subscription option, but it will also include spatial audio, premium audiobooks and podcasts.

Towards the end of Söderström’s Decoder interview, the executive confirms that HiFi is on the way, stating that it’s “coming at some point.”

As important as high-quality audio is to some users, the feature’s audience is likely very limited as the average music streaming service subscriber doesn’t own headphones or speakers that are capable of really taking advantage of the additional audio fidelity.

Source: The Verge Via: MacRumors

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The Weeknd becomes first artist to hit 100 million monthly listeners on Spotify

Canada’s own The Weeknd has set a new Spotify record.

On February 27th, the Toronto-born singer-songwriter has become the first artist on Spotify to hit 100 million monthly listeners. For context, this is well above the runner-up, Miley Cyrus, who has 82 million monthly listeners. Meanwhile, Taylor Swift comes in at No. 3 with 80 million and Rihanna with 79 million.

This also comes just a few days after he dropped a remix of his 2016 single, “Die For You,” with Ariana Grande. In December, The Weeknd also released “Nothing Is Lost (You Give Me Strength)” for Avatar: The Way of Water, the third highest-grossing movie of all time from fellow Canadian James Cameron.

Notably, this isn’t The Weeknd’s only Spotify record. His 2019 single, “Blinding Lights,” is Spotify’s most-played song ever with more than 3.4 billion streams.

In related news, The Weeknd just dropped a concert special, Live at SoFi Stadium, on Crave. Later this year, he’ll also co-star in The Idol, an upcoming HBO drama he co-created with Sam Levinson (Euphoria).

Source: Spotify

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Spotify hits over 200 million subscribers, becoming first music streaming service to do so

Spotify reveals that it continues to see an increase in paid subscribers, becoming the first to hit over 200 million. As of December 31st, 2022, Spotify’s premium subscriptions rose to 205 million, according to its earnings report.

The end result of the last quarter outpaced Spotify’s projections. Initially, the company believed it would reach 202 million paid subscribers and increase its monthly active users (MAUs) to 479. However, with its 205 million subs, Spotify also reports it’s achieving 489 million MAUs. This total represents a 20 percent rise from the past quarter.

By comparison, Apple Music is said to have 60 million paying subscribers as of 2019. Amazon Music is reported to have had 55 million as of 2020. Of course, these figures have likely fluctuated. However, given Spotify’s milestone, it paints a fairly obvious picture of which company holds the market share.

Despite breaking records and surpassing its own estimates, Spotify is reporting an imminent layoff of six percent of its workforce. Much like other tech companies, the music streaming service hasn’t deflected economic challenges. Therefore, roughly 600 staff members will be laid off from the company.

It’s reported that Spotify’s operating loss totals around $250 million USD (roughly $334 million CAD). This past quarter’s losses landed under Spotify’s estimates of $325 million (around $434 million CAD.) A premium subscription to Spotify costs $9.99 per month in Canada. Revenue for the premium subscription branch at the company sits at an estimated $4.93 USD (roughly $6.58 CAD). This marks a year-over-year increase of three percent. However, the figure remains slightly lower than the previous quarter’s $5.01 USD (est. $6.68 CAD).

This past month, we’ve seen some of the biggest tech companies report massive layoffs. For instance, Google recently laid off 12,000 employees. Microsoft also had 10,000 staff members on the chopping block. Plus, late last year, Meta also made the decision to lay off 11,000 employees. While Spotify’s ~600 affected staff members pale in comparison, it’s still a blow to the livelihoods of those working for the company.

Source: The Verge

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Spotify offering 3 months of Premium for free

Now is a great time to upgrade to Spotify Premium if you aren’t currently a subscriber.

As part of a new promotion, the music streaming platform is offering Spotify Premium for free for three months. After the three-month trial is over, you’ll be charged the standard $9.99 per month. The Premium version of Spotify offers ad-free music listening, unlimited skips, higher-quality streams and offline listening via downloads.

According to Spotify’s website, the offer ends on December 31st, 2022. It’s worth noting that this deal isn’t available to current Premium subscribers or users located in Quebec.

Spotify is available on iOS, Android, desktop, Mac and more.

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Black Panther: Wakanda Forever soundtrack now available to stream

The Blank Panther: Wakanda Forever soundtrack is now available on Spotify, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, iTunes Store, Apple Music and Deezer.

The soundtrack features music from Rihanna, her new song Lift Me Up, and performances from Snow Tha Product, Burna Boy, E40 and more.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, launches on November 11th in theatres across Canada. The film stars Angela Bassett, Dominque Thorne, Letitia Wright, Tenoch Huerta and more.

Source: @theblackpanther

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watchOS 9 update reportedly breaks Spotify Apple Watch app

If you’re a Spotify user thinking about updating to watchOS 9, you might want to wait a few weeks.

As first reported by MacRumors, Spotify has sent out an email to subscribers warning them that watchOS 9 causes the music streaming service’s app to stop working. Spotify’s Apple Watch app allows you to control tracks and also download songs to Apple’s wearable.

The email reads as follows:

“Apple WatchOS 9 introduced a bug that causes Spotify streaming on the Apple Watch to stop working. We urge Spotify Apple Watch users not to install the WatchOS 9 update until Apple has implemented a fix for the issue. Users who are already affected can instead download their content to their Apple Watch and listen offline or stream from their phones.”

Users affected by the issue say that the Spotify app stops working within roughly one minute even though the track continues to look like it’s playing visually. The issue occurs over Wi-Fi and cellular. However, if you download the songs directly to your Apple Watch, the problem doesn’t occur, according to reports.

Given how swift Apple typically is when it comes to responding to issues like this, a fix is likely coming soon. On the other hand, Spotify and Apple are still engaged in a cold war surrounding the cut the App Store takes from subscription fees, so there’s a possibility the tech giant could delay resolving this problem.

For what it’s worth, I haven’t yet encountered this issue with Spotify running on the Apple Watch Series 8. There’s a possibility the problem doesn’t affect the latest version of Apple’s smartwatch.

watchOS 9 includes features like ‘Low Power Mode,’ ‘Car Crash Detection,’ ‘Sleep Stages,’ medication tracking, more detailed workout metrics and more, alongside additional Watch Faces like ‘Playtime,’ ‘Lunar,’ ‘Metropolitan’ and ‘Modular.’

Source: Spotify Forums Via: MacRumors

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Spotify says it paid out $7 billion in royalties to artists in 2021

Streaming music platform Spotify says it paid $7 billion USD (roughly $8.7 billion CAD) in royalties to rights holders last year, according to the company’s latest transparency report on its ‘Loud & Clear‘ website.

This follows several reports that the music streaming giant continues to pay artists minuscule royalty amounts.

Here are a few notable facts from the report:

Spotify’s royalty payments went up $2 billion USD (about $2.5 billion CAD). This is an increase from $5 billion (about $6.2 billion CAD) last year.

The streaming service says that it pays rights holders like record labels and distributors, who then in turn, pay artists.

Spotify says that over 1,000 artists made more than $1 million USD (roughly $1.2 million CAD) through royalties on its platform

The streaming platform says that 28 percent (52,600) of artists that self-distribute on its platform and that do not have a record deal, earned over $10,000 (approximately $12,500 CAD). Further, 16,500 artists earned $50,000 (about $62,000 CAD) in royalties in 2021.

Like last year’s report, Spotify has also released a calculator where artists and fans can input a monthly listener count to compare their song streams to the rest of the platform.

Unsurprisingly, the entire report is extremely positive and neglects to mention the thousands of artists that aren’t pulling in a ton of cash every month. It’s also worth mentioning that these figures don’t include the final amount of money an artist receives after labels and publishers take their cuts.

Source: Spotify 

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The Batman’s emo-ness drives Nirvana streams up by 734 percent

One of the standout elements of the marketing for Warner Bros.’ recently released The Batman has been the film’s use of Nirvana’s “Something in the Way.” In addition to featuring in the movie’s trailers, the 1991 song plays twice in the actual film.

Now, all of that exposure has led the track to top music streaming charts. According to music sales data firm MRC Data, The Batman‘s opening weekend (Friday, March 4th through Monday, March 7th) saw “Something in the Way” accumulate 3.1 million on-demand U.S. streams — up 734 percent from the previous four days.

What’s even more impressive is that this only includes “official” streams on platforms like Spotify, and it also only accounts for the U.S. It’s unclear how many people were listening to the song via other means and/or in other countries like Canada.

Earlier this year, The Batman co-writer and director Matt Reeves told Esquire that he chose the song for the film after listening to it early on in the writing process.

“When I considered, ‘How do you do Bruce Wayne in a way that hasn’t been seen before?’ I started thinking, ‘What if some tragedy happened and this guy becomes so reclusive, we don’t know what he’s doing? Is this guy some kind of wayward, reckless, drug addict?’” said Reeves. “And the truth is that he is a kind of drug addict. His drug is his addiction to this drive for revenge. He’s like a Batman Kurt Cobain.”

This isn’t the only DC Comics property that’s recently led to a spike in popularity of an old song. Earlier this year, James Gunn’s use of Wig Wam’s “Do Ya Wanna Taste It” in his Peacemaker series pulled the Norwegian glam metal rock band out from a career slump and allowed it to keep its agent. The song plays during the catchy, meme-worthy opening credits of Peacemaker, which streams on Crave in Canada.

Image credit: Warner Bros.

Via: Billboard

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Spotify delays HiFi tier, but no new release window given

In a bid to keep up with Apple Music and Amazon, last year, Spotify announced it would begin to offer a new high-fidelity Music tier for an additional cost.

The Swedish music streaming giant said the high-res music option would launch by the end of 2021, but since that year has come and gone, it’s become unclear when the feature will release.

9to5Mac has discovered a Spotify forum thread where a moderator mentions that Spotify doesn’t have any “timing details to share yet.”

As disappointing as this delay is, I’m not sure how much of a draw Spotify’s HiFi offering will be for listeners. Since it’s going to cost more than $10 per month, the price for Apple and Amazon’s top-tier offerings. That being said, Spotify still offers numerous other features in its favour. You can read how the music streaming service stacks up against its competitors here.

It’s weird Spotify is keeping the timeline under wraps for the HiFi tier’s release. This leads me to believe that it might be a lot further away than expected.

Source: 9to5Mac