Image credit: Deezer

Deezer Shaker is a new program for collaborative mixes with friends that gets people from other music streaming services in on the fun.

Deezer are looking to connect the divide between music services. There may be fierce competition between the likes of Spotify, Deezer, Apple Music, etc., but the music fans just want to listen to music. That’s what Deezer Shaker is for.

Shaker is a new feature from Deezer that allows you to create a collaborative mix of music with up to 14 people. What’s special about it is, if your friends are on a different service you can still share Shaker with them. They won’t even need to download the Deezer app to import their music library.

The feature pools together the tastes of everyone included and creates a mix tailored to your combined tastes. At first, Deezer will automatically generate 70 songs for your Shaker playlist using their taste-based algorithms. You can refresh the whole mix with a single click for a new playlist. Likewise, if you want to stay in control then Deezer lets you curate tracks yourself.

Deezer explain: “The Shaker experience is not just about playlists. You will also discover shareable insights, including your friends’ musical profiles, guilty pleasures and how compatible (or not!) you are with the rest of the group. You can even dive deeper into your compatibility with the individual group members and discover recommended artists and songs both of you might like.”

Deezer Shaker should work with a simple shareable link. Share the link with your friends and they can get involved, even if they’re using a streaming service other than Deezer. They state that it’s about connecting music fans without barriers, though it could be a clever ploy to get eyes on Deezer from other streaming services.

Shaker follows Deezer’s rebrand last week, which included an emphasis on the importance of music. I think we’re likely to see quite a few more features coming from Deezer, as they look to transform their image and presence in the music streaming world.

Deezer’s Vice President of Product, Alexandra Leloup said: “Shaker is designed to create a feeling of connection, encourage people to experience music more freely, erase the boundaries between friends, and create a space where you can discover new songs to fall in love with. To achieve this, it was key to not only include tailored playlists based on the musical tastes of users and their friends, but to make sure everyone can join in no matter which streaming platform they use.”

This week, it was revealed that Warner Music Group have joined Universal Music Group on Deezer’s new artist-centric royalty model. Two of the three major labels are now on board in France for Deezer’s experimental approach to royalty payouts that aims to reward engaging artists more whilst penalising non-musical tracks and fraud.