The Radiohead Public Library is the just-launched latest incarnation of the official primary Radiohead internet home page. It was announced by the official Radiohead Twitter account with a message that read "Radiohead.com has always been infuriatingly uninformative and unpredictable. We have now, predictably, made it incredibly informative."
Apple recently teamed up with the National Basketball Association and United Masters to launch a new Apple Music playlist called 'BASE:LINE' that currently contains 40 songs from independent artists. The playlist is available for everyone to stream; it is intended to highlight the best indie and emerging hip-hop songs of the past week, helping listeners discover new music to enjoy.
When you're browsing through Steam's store, you'll often see game soundtracks available for their respective games as DLC. If that kind of branding struck you as odd, you certainly weren't alone there. After all, one key drawback of designating a soundtrack as DLC is that it meant you had to purchase the game before you could buy its soundtrack.
Despite the PR and legal tussle with Apple, Spotify remains the world's biggest name in the music streaming business. How it got there, however, is the subject of much scrutiny, criticism, and debate. It definitely didn't get there by being a social network itself, something its own users have been wishing for years. Spotify may finally be ready to give in, probably not out of charity, and is testing a new feature called Tastebuds that will let users get some insight into what their friends have been listening to, perhaps repeatedly even.
Once upon a time, social interaction between users seemed to be part of Spotify's strategy, but in recent years, we've seen the company pare back some social features in favor of discovery by way of curated playlist. If you're one of the users who laments those disappearing social features, there may be hope yet, as a newly-discovered prototype suggests that Spotify may be looking to bring back music discovery based primarily on what your friends are listening to.
No Man's Sky has already enjoyed a big 2019 thanks to its Beyond update, which launched over the summer and served as a major expansion for the game. Even with that, it seems that the team at Hello Games wants to end 2019 on a high note. That's quite literally the case with a new update that's landing today.
Billboard 200, the record chart that ranks the 200 most popular music albums in the US, will start factoring in the number of times a video has been streamed on YouTube and other music streaming services, Billboard has announced. The change will take place on January 3, after which point the new data will have an effect on the Billboard 200 chart's rankings.
YouTube Music, the service that has largely replaced Google Play Music, finally offers gapless audio playback on Android and the web. The new feature is only available to Premium subscribers, according to YouTube, which has been rolling out the new gapless experience over the past several weeks. Some YouTube Music users will have to continue waiting for the feature, namely those on iOS.
Analogue has teamed with electronic music record label Hyperdub to offer music on a unique medium: game cartridges. Specifically, Analogue is producing 1,000 units of music-packed Sega Genesis cartridges that feature a total of 11 songs composed by various Hyperdub artists specifically for the new collaboration. Each cartridge will come with a substantial price tag.
TIDAL has launched 'My Video Mix,' a new discovery feature that offers algorithm-generated video playlists featuring various content based on genres, popularity, and artists, according to the company. The app's interface has been updated to include a dedicated 'Videos' tab on mobile, desktop, and the Web, as well.
Only days after the same support arrived on Sonos speakers, Spotify has announced that its Free service is now accessible through Amazon's Alexa personal assistant. This marks the first time users have been able to access the free version of the service using Alexa, including on smart speakers and the Fire TV platform. The move follows Amazon's recent expansion of its own free music availability.
There's a market out there for music companies that wish to get a piece of the retail sales market pie. Apple Music is now a part of that market. If you head into your local department store, you probably won't hear a brand new track from your favorite hardcore metal band - but you might soon hear something delivered by Apple. A report this week suggests that Apple Music has been piloting a "a version of Apple Music" for use in businesses for a time with businesses like Levi Strauss & Co. and Harrods stores.