BTS will debut their music video for ‘Dynamite’ on Fortnite Party Royale

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

The BTS boys are back and their launching their new music video exclusively through the video game Fortnite Battle Royale for the first few days.

Fortnite have been colliding the worlds of video games and music icons to great success in recent years. With in game gigs from Marshmello and Travis Scott under their belts, they are now debuting the new music video for one of the biggest acts in the world.

The new video from the South Korean megastars of BTS will launch on Fortnite this Friday, September 25th at 8PM ET. Fortnite makers Epic Games have worked with BTS to choreograph two new emotes for players which will go on sale before the launch of the video.

The choreographed music video for ‘Dynamite’ will be played in Fortnite’s Party Royale mode where players can’t attack each other. It has made for a perfect musical platform where they have hosted huge acts like Marshmello and Travis Scott for in-game concerts before.

In a time when people are cut off from live music experiences their in-game concerts, like Travis Scott’s recent virtual performances within the platform, are perhaps more sought after than ever.

Spotify add polls to podcasts to get listeners involved

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

Spotify are experimenting with polls to let podcasters and their audience interact and have their say on topics and discussions.

Spotify’s new polls offers some much needed community interaction with the platform. The feature is being tested on their podcasts and allows podcast creators and hosts to post a question or discussion topic and let fans choose their response form a list.

With podcasts exploding in popularity on Spotify it makes sense for them to introduce some interactivity. Community features on the past haven’t really worked, when the platform was still primarily music streaming, but with podcasts the potential for communal features and discussion are huge.

Podcast polls can be placed on individual episodes where listeners will be able to find them at the bottom of the episode page. They’re currently testing the feature on some of their Spotify-exclusive and original shows.

They’re being made available on the iOS and Android app at first but will be expanding it so that polls are available on all platforms soon. They haven’t said whether they will make the option to create polls available to all podcast creators or keep it only to Spotify exclusive and original shows.

Streaming in Italy up over 1/4 for 2020, making over 80% of their music industry

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

Despite the potential downturn from COVID, Italy’s music industry has grown in the first half of 2020 thanks to huge streaming growth.

Near the start of the year, forecasts for Italy’s economy were not looking good as the impact of Coronavirus made of the earliest big impacts in the country. Despite predictions of losses across the board, their music industry has still seen growth in the first half of 2020.

The latest IFPI report shows that Italy’s recorded music industry saw 2.1% growth for H1 2020, compared to the same period last year. Over 80% of their H1 earnings came from music streaming revenues which increased by a huge 26.4% year on year.

Physical music revenues were however, unsurprisingly, down significantly for the period. Physical music sold 47.9% less than in the first half of 2019 following continuing trends that were worsened by the impact of Coronavirus and people spending less because of that.

Music streaming now makes up a huge majority in the earnings for the music industry in Italy and is helping it to continue earning and growing even in such difficult times of losses elsewhere. Italy’s leading music analysts, FIMI, found that older audiences were taking up streaming this year which helped to grow it so significantly.

FIMI CEO, Enzo Mazza said: “We saw an increase in adults using the streaming services. The so-called lockdown economy gave a strong push to digital in Italy and a lot of adult consumers turned to E-Commerce and streaming.”

It’s interesting to see how much streaming has grown in Italy and the impact of that. Music streaming is huge but there are many people who still don’t use it. If more generations have been picking the format up this year then we could be seeing a spectacular year for digital music.

Qobuz raise €10 million to take their hi-res music service global

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

Qobuz have been taking on the big streamers for a few years now with a focus on Hi-Res and their latest funding pushes them even further globally.

French music streaming service have been operating for a few years now, but compared to the rest of the streaming scene they are the fresh faces. Last year they made two big moves: launching in the U.S. and ditching MP3 to focus entirely on high resolution music.

Following a new round of funding, Qobuz are poised to expand even further around the globe. They have raised €10 million following their previous round of capital earnings last August which raised them €12 million.

The company states they are “now pursuing a major development plan” with significant funding and over 45% growth in their last fiscal year. They are now planning an “unprecedented” recruitment drive for the year.

Qobuz chairman and CEO, Denis Thébaud says: “We are very proud of our latest fundraising milestone of 10 million euros, which shows our historical shareholders’ confidence in our model. The end of the year promises to be full of exciting projects for Qobuz.”

Qobuz is currently available in the U.S., U.K., Ireland, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Spain, and Italy. It will be exciting to see where they go next.

Apple’s deeper Shazam features will have it scanning music all the time

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

iPhones and iOS devices will be able to turn Shazam on to tell them what music is playing around them and in their apps constantly.

Apple have only just updated devices with iOS 14 but as developers have got their hands on another update it seems to bring some enhanced features. Notably, Apple seem to be capitalising on their ownership of Shazam in iOS 14.2 with some seriously deep integration.

In the upcoming update, the music recognition app will be added to the ‘Control Center’ on iPhones. From there users will be able to switch it on to identify music constantly in the world around them so you never miss out in the time it takes to open the app.

The new always-on feature will scan for music when you’re using apps as well, so it can tell you the songs playing on your applications. It will scan apps internally so it will be able to pick up music whether you’re playing it out loud or through headphones.

Apple bought Shazam in late 2018 but promised not to restrict the app’s availability. It’s still available on other devices, but clearly Apple are making use of their ownership in other, unique ways. It’s a question of whether people will want their phones constantly listening, however.

Whilst iOS 14.2 is available for developers at the moment, Apple haven’t revealed when they might launch the update to general iPhone users.

Amazon launch their HD music streaming service in Canada

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

Amazon Music Unlimited is expanding its high definition streaming service to offer top quality music to Canadians with their first 90 days free.

Amazon have announced that Canadians can now sign up to Amazon Music Unlimited HD. The streaming service offers Amazon’s full streaming catalogue in their best possible quality with millions of songs in CD quality HD and more than a million in 24-bit, 192 kHz Ultra HD quality.

It’s great news for audiophiles in Canada who may be upset at the compressed sounds of standard streaming services. To let users decide whether they feel that the HD upgrade is worthwhile, Amazon are offering a huge 90 day trial to new sign ups in Canada.

If you’re looking to sign up to Amazon Music Unlimited HD, it is best experienced with a good pair of headphones or speakers with a compatible amplifier. Amazon recommend speakers from Sonos, Sennheiser, Polk Audio, among others to get the most out of HD streaming at a decent price.

Amazon Music Unlimited HD costs $12.99 a month after the free trial or $8 a month for Prime members. As well as Canada, it is available in the U.S., U.K., Germany, Austria, Japan, France, Italy, and Spain.

New Twitch charts shows the top music used in streams each week

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

Twitch streams are more popular than ever and Chartmetric have launched a series of new charts to track all of the popular music that finds its way onto the biggest streams.

Twitch had already become huge before 2020, with millions tuning in to people’s streams. This year it has exploded in lockdown with musicians and personalities heading to Twitch to connect with fans and with that music has boomed on Twitch as well.

In particular the amount of music played as gamers stream has increased massively and shows how well the two go hand in hand. To keep track of just how popular certain artists and songs are doing on Twitch, Chartmetric have launched four new charts.

  • Weekly Top Users by Viewer-Hours
  • Monthly Top Users by Viewer-Hours
  • Weekly Top Users by Followers
  • All-Time Top Users by Followers

Chartmetric founder and CEO, Sung Cho says: “We feel these charts give a great overview of who’s gaining traction, as well as what level and kind of engagement they’re getting on Twitch. We think these charts will prove valuable to music professionals of all sorts as they try to see how livestreaming fits into the business.”

The uptake in both streamers and viewers on Twitch has seen notorious music presences appear. Monstercat have gained nearly 800k followers on their 24/7 stream of their label music. deadmau5 has also gained a following of almost half a million on Twitch amongst many other musicians and music organisations.

You can find all four of Chartmetric’s new Twitch charts at chartmetric.com.

Spotify may finally be streaming on Apple Watch with Series 6

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

Spotify are looking to build their app up after 2 years of limited offerings on their prime competitors electronic wristwatch device.

Spotify launched a music app on Apple Watches in 2018. The much requested official arrival of the music streaming service on Apple Watches wasn’t quite what people were after, however, as it allowed you to control playback through other devices but not stream music directly from it.

It now seems that, with Apple Watch Series 6 on the way, Spotify are working on their app to stream music straight from the device. The news comes from Germany where a number of users have reported a recent update bringing streaming to their Spotify app on Apple Watch.

Those who claim to have received the update say that they have been able to connect to Bluetooth headphones to stream from their Apple Watch. Spotify can now be streamed straight out of the Apple Watch’s in-built speaker for those with the update, however I can’t imagine it’s very enjoyable listening to music through it.

Spotify seem to be looking to build their music streaming services with a bunch of potential new features coming soon. A new job advert seems to show they’re looking to build their own audiobooks whilst a recent update seems to hide the potential for a karaoke function and music downloads for free users.

Discover Spotify’s new global RADAR hub for discovering new artists

Jacca-RouteNotein
Artist / Label News
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Digital Music News

Spotify want to break new and rising artists around the world with the release of their RADAR hub around the world.

It’s been half a year since Spotify launched their new RADAR initiative to put up-and-coming artists on people’s radars (get it!). Since launching in March they’ve promoted 115 artists through their program and their new global hub will bring their efforts from all over the world into one exciting place for music discovery.

The new hub will be integrated onto the Spotify platform to show off all of their emerging artists. So far Spotify claims over 2 billion streams, and more than a million hours listened to the artists they have helped to promote through their RADAR programs.

Spotify’s Head of Global Hits, Ned Monahan said: “The launch of the Global RADAR Hub is the perfect illustration of how our editorial teams collaborate to build up-and-coming artists from all over the world. We hope this will be an easy new way for fans to discover artists from outside of their home countries and for artists to begin to develop a global fanbase.”

With the launch of their new RADAR hub around the world, Spotify have also announced a new artist partnership in the UK. beabadoobee is the latest to join their roster, a 20 year old from London who has been building a strong following since 2017.

By partnering with her, Spotify are offering her the production of an immersive fan experience through Storylines, a printed zine offered exclusively to her top fans on Spotify, as well as features across Spotify’s top playlists and pages.

beabadoobee said: “I’m really excited to be picked for Radar: Spotify have been so supportive of me from the very start. From recording my first Spotify Singles at Abbey Road to my debut album, it’s been a crazy journey with them. We’ve worked on something really cool together that I hope people will love!”

Find Spotify’s hub for their RADAR artists and discover amazing new artists from around the world.

Deezer’s new Selector lets you pick the country your music, podcasts, and audiobooks are from

Jacca-RouteNotein
Digital Music News

Whether you’re learning a new language, interested in another culture, or visiting somewhere but want your home country’s recommendations back: Country Selector lets you pick.

Deezer have added a new toggle for users to select the region their content is based around. The Country Selector lets you choose the content that Deezer presents to you on their homepages and in recommendations by region.

The feature can be used in all 180 countries where Deezer is available on their web and mobile apps. Once you choose a country Deezer will tailor its music, podcasts, and audiobooks to content from the region you’ve selected. It’s ideal for language learners, particularly with Deezer’s large podcast library.

Deezer’s Chief Product and Growth Officer, Stefan Tweraser said: “We want our listeners to be able to hold onto a piece of their home or immerse themselves in a different culture, even if they’re a thousand miles away. It’s also a good way to pick up a new language, as our curated playlists and channels will introduce you to the best selection of tracks from any chosen country.”

All Deezer users can change their content using the Country Selector form their settings now. Your language preferences will still stay the same, it’s only the content that will be tailored to a new culture.