Music

Rdio lowers family subscription plans to $5 for each extra member

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 30, 2018

In a move designed to match Spotify, which last month launched all-new pricing scheme for family accounts, Rdio on Wednesday announced that up to four family members can be added to a single Rdio account at $5 per month per extra member.

Each additional Rdio listened on a Family Plan can stream more than 30 million songs and enjoy features like radio stations, You FM, playlists on a per-user basis and more.

The new pricing scheme for Rdio's Family Plans goes in effect across the globe starting today, said the firm.

YouTube unveils ad-free subscription service with background play, offline viewing and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 12, 2014

Google-owned YouTube on Wednesday announced a long-rumored service which lets you stream ad-free music, play tracks in the background through mobile apps for iOS/Android and on YouTube.com, mark individual music videos and other clips for offline playback and much more, in exchange for a flat monthly fee of ten bucks per month.

Dubbed YouTube Music Key, it's releasing in beta next week.

The service integrates with Google's existing subscription music service called Play Music (formerly Google Play All Access), which includes more than 30 million songs. If you'll be taking Music Key for a spin when it launches, Google will treat you to a promotional subscription fee of eight bucks per month.

All Foo Fighters albums are currently on sale on iTunes

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated October 19, 2018

To celebrate the release of their new album called Sonic Highways, all the Foo Fighters albums are currently on sale on iTunes, with most of them starting at just $6.99. If you want to complete your Foo Fighters collection, now is the right time to do so.

An old man like me tends to believe that the earlier Foo Fighters albums are the best, but the younger crowd might disagree. At any rates, these are some albums you should definitely consider.

SoundHound gets iPhone 6 support and fresh new look for faster music discovery

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 11, 2014

SoundHound's music-tagging iOS app has received a makeover Tuesday morning putting the software in line with the design aesthetic in iOS 7. New features are available for faster music discovery, with native display support for the new 4.7-inch iPhone 6 and 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus display sizes and other goodies.

The refreshed interface features swiping based navigation that tucks the Search button and other options under a left-side column revealed by swiping left.

You can also swipe right like you would in other iOS 7 apps to go back to the previous page and you'll notice a new nicely animated listening screen as well.

SoundHound is free in the App Store.

Artists now receiving more revenue from Spotify than iTunes in Europe

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 5, 2014

Spotify seems to have surpassed iTunes in Europe where royalty payments from the popular streaming-music service is now earning artists more revenue than Apple's stagnant music store, which to this date continues to sell music downloads and does not offer all-you-can-eat subscriptions.

At least that's the key takeaway from a survey conducted by Kobalt Music Publishing, which collects royalties on behalf of 6,000 songwriters and music makers in Europe.

According to the data cited Wednesday by The Wall Street Journal, Spotify in Europe brought artists an average of thirteen percent more revenue versus iTunes during the first quarter of 2014.

The data seems to corroborate recent findings by the Recording Industry Association of America which found that digital music sales on iTunes dropped between thirteen and fourteen percent globally since the start of this year, with Apple officially confirming the drop in its SEC filing.

Southwest Airlines brings free Beats Music streaming to in-flight entertainment service

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 3, 2014

Southwest Airlines on Monday announced an interesting partnership with Apple bringing Beats Music streaming music app to its in-flight entertainment service.

The subscription on-demand streaming music service, which Apple acquired as part of its $3 billion Beats buy in May of this year, is offered for free.

Beginning today, Beats Music is available onboard select Southwest Airlines WiFi-enabled aircraft featuring a library of hundreds of human-curated playlists.

MusiXmatch brings the lyrics of your currently playing songs to Notification Center

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated April 18, 2018

MusiXmatch isn't a new application by any means, although I must admit I had never heard of it until this past week when I read about it on French blog iGen. The app has been around for quite some time but it was recently updated to bring its lyrics engine to Notification Center, where it displays the lyrics of your currently playing songs so you can sing along or just try to finally understand what the heck this song is all about once for all.

Assuming you have an internet connection, musiXmatch allows you to have direct access to the exact lyrics that are being sung in virtually any song in your library. This works from the musiXmatch app, or from its Notification Center widget.

Google optimizes Play Music for iPhone 6 screens

Christian Zibreg ∙ October 31, 2014

Another day, another high-profile app receives its iPhone 6 focused update. After Apple optimized the WWDC app for the bigger iPhone screens, the Internet giant Google on Friday refreshed its Play Music iOS client with native display support for the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 and 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus screens. The refreshed application has additionally squashed several bugs and introduced “lots of little tweaks”.

Google Play Music is available free in the App Store.

Spotify for iPad overhauled with dark UI, gains Your Music feature

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 13, 2018

Spotify, the leading music-streaming service hailing from Sweden, gave its iPad app on Thursday a little love. For starters, the team has crafted Skype for iPad's user interface around an all-new dark look.

As a result, Spotify at last has consistent appearance on the iPad, iPhone and Mac — down to the same dark theme, precise typography and rounded iconography.

Moreover, the Your Music feature which debuted in the iPhone edition in April 2014 is now available on the iPad, too. Representing a better way to save, organize and browse your favorite songs, Your Music is a replacement to user-generated playlists. With Your Music, you can add tracks which sync across every device, without having to create playlists or use the starring feature that lumps all starred songs into a huge list.

Download Spotify free of charge in the App Store.

Pandora, Spotify beating Apple’s Beats handsomely on App Store

Jake Smith ∙ Updated April 18, 2018

Pandora and Spotify rank as the number one and number two music streaming apps in terms of downloads, analytics firm AppAnnie reports - no big surprise. However, where things become interesting is that Apple's Beats Music, which the company purchased for $3 billion in May, is placed ninth, below iHeartRadio, SoundCloud and Apple's GarageBand.

Shazam updated for iOS 8 with Today widget for tagged music and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 27, 2016

Shazam, a song-matching service that recently passed 100 million active users, on Tuesday released a major update to its free iPhone and iPad application.

Available free of charge in the App Store, the refreshed Shazam 8.0 has been optimized for iOS 8 and introduces a handy Today widget that lists tagged music recognized through the background-listening Auto Shazam feature.

A new Charts page in News Feed lists collates popular tracks other Shazam users have tagged and track lists now have a nicer looking layout.

Apple confirms iTunes has suffered a decline in digital music sales

Christian Zibreg ∙ October 28, 2014

It's official: digital music sales on the iTunes Store decreased sharply this year, Apple has now officially admitted in an annual filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission covering its just-ended fiscal 2014 year.

Although sales of apps and In-App Purchases generated more revenue year-over-year, going from $9.3 billion in net sales during 2013 to a total of $10.2 billion during fiscal 2014, this was “partially offset by a decline in sales of digital music”.

Apple's SEC filing serves as a confirmation of last week's report by The Wall Street Journal which claimed that sales of digital music on iTunes had decrease between thirteen and fourteen percent since the beginning of 2014.