Streaming
Amazon Music Drops HD Tier to $9.99, Shaking Up Hi-Fi Streaming Market
Amazon’s success with its HD service, which has grown 100% year-over-year, has pushed Spotify to announce a Hi-Fi tier as well, with rumors of an Apple Music Hi-Fi plan possibly also priced at $9.99 a month. For years, the music industry was focused on using high-fidelity audio streaming as a means to raise the average revenue per user with higher-priced subscriptions. That would mean bigger payouts for rights holders and the streaming services. But with Amazon, Spotify, and Apple all getting in on the high-fidelity push, the labels have become more amenable to lowering the price of high-fidelity tiers in the hopes of increasing the overall number of subscribers across the industry. “The other services are coming around to the fact that this is really important.” Boom says. “And that ...
Apple Music Announces Hi-Fi Streaming at No Additional Cost
“Apple Music is making its biggest advancement ever in sound quality,” Oliver Schusser, Apple’s vice president of Apple Music and Beats said in a statement. “Listening to a song in Dolby Atmos is like magic. The music comes from all around you and sounds incredible. Now we are bringing this truly innovative and immersive experience to our listeners with music from their favorite artists like J Balvin, Gustavo Dudamel, Ariana Grande, Maroon 5, Kacey Musgraves, The Weeknd, and so many more. Subscribers will also be able to listen to their music in the highest audio quality with Lossless Audio. Apple Music as we know it is about to change forever.” Apple Music is also launching spatial audio (with support from Dolby Atmos) for music, which will allow artists to re...
Universal Music’s Spotify Stock Could Be Worth $2B
If it still holds the shares, their current value is $1.45 billion — which would yield a profit of nearly $1.4 billion if sold at Friday’s share price. UMG and the other major labels, Sony Music and Warner Music Group, each took equity as part of their licensing deals that allowed Spotify to launch in the U.S. in 2011. As of Dec. 31, UMG maintained a larger equity stake in Spotify than any of its competitors. Sony Music sold half its 5.707% stake for $768 million following Spotify’s IPO in April 2018, leaving it 5.082 million shares a 2.85% stake at the time — a percentage that would have been diluted since then. (Based on Warner Music, meanwhile, confirmed in August 2018 that it sold its full 4% stake for $504 million. In March 2018 UMG committed to givin...
Ciara, Russell Wilson Sign First-Look Amazon Deal
Wilson is heading into his 10th season as the quarterback with the Seattle Seahawks. He led the team to a Super Bowl win in 2013. Off the field, he launched a lifestyle brand, Good Man Brand, and has a number of endorsements. He formed the Why Not You Foundation, a nonprofit where Ciara is also a board member, to focus on motivating and empowering young kids. Ciara has sold more than 23 million records and 22 million singles worldwide. Her “Level Up” video has more than 300 million views and is certified platinum. She launched Beauty Marks Entertainment as a platform for music, media, film, fashion, philanthropy and more. “Russell and Ciara are a true powerhouse producing duo — both with extraordinary success in their respective careers on the field and the stage, their business ventures, ...
Streaming Wars 2021 Mid-Year Scorecard: How Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, Apple TV+, and HBO Max Stack Up
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-05-10T19:00:25+00:00“>May 10, 2021 | 3:00pm ET Q1 earnings for media and tech companies are now behind us, so it’s a good time to recap how Netflix and its four biggest challengers — Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, Apple TV+, and HBO Max — stack up and are trending for the rest of 2021. Just 18 months ago, Netflix largely played alone. What a difference those months make for the reigning champ in these “streaming wars.” Now, Netflix faces giant global competitors seemingly around every turn. Ditto for us consumers, as streaming became our activity of choice (frequently, our only activity!) during the past pandemic year’s global lockdown. While life during the COVID-19 pandemic has been...
Paramount+ Share Trailer for Rugrats CGI Revival: Watch
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-05-06T02:43:48+00:00“>May 5, 2021 | 10:43pm ET So far, Paramount+‘s lineup is anchored by nostalgic revivals. While we are still awaiting more details on the Fraiser and live-action Fairly Odd Parents reboots, the streamer is ready to unveil its reimagined Rugrat series on May 27th. Watch the newly revealed trailer down below. This beloved cartoon ran for nine seasons from 1991 to 2004, finding immediate success in Nickelodeon’s primetime roster and later birthing three theatrical releases and the sequel series All Grown Up. Thankfully, the new reboot features the same group of babies that audiences grew to love. Voiced by all the original cast members, Tommy (E.G. Daily),...
Spotify & Fellow Streamers Soared in 2020, But Expect Growth to Slow
Don’t put too much stock in how companies’ quarterly earnings compare year-over-year to 2020. The pandemic caused some services’ subscriptions to spike early in the year (Netflix) or build throughout the year (Spotify). Long-term trends have not changed. On-demand streaming will continue to erode linear programming like cable television and broadcast radio. An odd quarter here or there won’t change the course of technology in entertainment. Streaming video on demand (SVOD) is a battle of titans — AT&T, Comcast, Disney, Apple, Amazon, ViacomCBS — that requires big pockets to survive the war of attrition. Music streaming companies get to focus less on original content and more on technologies to create better user experiences. Un...
Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker Honored For Streaming Milestone
“During the recording session,” Parker told APRA AMCOS staff, “I was working myself up to tell him I was going to take it back.” There were no bad feelings from Ronson. The Brit Award-winning producer bestowed the songwriter of the year award to Parker during the annual APRA Awards, via video link. “You think of ‘The Less I Know the Better,’” Ronson explained during his speech, “it’s one of the most iconic basslines of the past 20 years.” Parker wrote, recorded, produced and mixed the song, which appeared on the Grammy-nominated album Currents and went to No. 1 on the triple j station’s Hottest 100 listener’s poll for decade. Currents went to No. 1 in Australia, and Top 5 on both side of the Atlantic. Today, the song is four-times platinum certified in Australia, double-platinum in t...
New Study Reveals Avicii’s “Wake Me Up” As the Most Valuable Song From Sweden
A new study by Australian finance blog S-Money has revealed the most valuable songs on Spotify by country. Some of the usual suspects like Ed Sheeran and Drake are featured of course, taking the cake in the United Kingdom and Canada, respectively. The United States’ most valuable song comes courtesy of Post Malone, whose influential “Rockstar” is the clear-cut winner. Late EDM legend Avicii‘s “Wake Me Up” is Sweden’s most-streamed song worldwide, worth well over $6 million from its staggering 1.25 billion streams to date. Alan Walker‘s “Faded” has become Norway’s most popular export, earning the DJ over $6.5 million off of nearly 1.4 billion streams. According to S-Money, who shared additional data with EDM.com, The Cha...
Spotify Stock Drops Over 12% on Softened Listener Forecast
That adjustment followed Spotify’s reported first-quarter monthly active users (MAU) of 356 million, falling on the bottom end of earlier guidance. There was good news too, though. First-quarter subscriptions were at the high end of guidance, and Spotify did not revise its 2021 guidance for subscribers (172 million to 184 million), suggesting it expects the dip to come from “freemium” listeners. Average revenue per month on those free listeners is 0.35 euros ($0.42), compared to subscribers’ 4.07 euros ($4.94) per month. (Subscribers account for about 90% of the company’s total revenue.) That MAU adjustment could have a larger financial impact in the future, as Spotify uses its freemium business model to acquire new subscribers. So, fewer free listeners this year means there will be fewer ...
Hi-Res Streaming Service Qobuz Launches In Australia, NZ
Australia’s recorded music is thriving right now, largely due to streaming platforms like Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube Music. Streaming powered the market to a sixth consecutive year of growth in 2020, according trade data published by ARIA in March. Subscription platforms, a category that includes Spotify and Apple Music, generated A$362 million in the calendar year 2020, up 14% from the previous year. The market is far from saturated at the high-res end, notes Fornay. Qobuz is “offering something uniquely different to the other platforms out there,” he enthuses, namely the ability to download or stream at CD quality or Hi-Res “studio quality” audio (24-Bit up to 192 kHz). In addition to its catalog of 70 million tracks, Qobuz also offers album reviews, artist biographies, music...
Boris Announce “Tour in Your Head” 360 Degree Streaming Performance
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-04-26T19:51:24+00:00“>April 26, 2021 | 3:51pm ET Boris have announced a stream of their NO private release party performance, which was shot with a 360-degree camera. The “World Tour in Your Head” stream premieres on May 1st at 11 a.m. ET and will be available for viewing through the 10th. Following the physical vinyl/CD release of their album NO, which landed on our list of the top heavy albums of 2020, the Japanese experimental band performed the record in its entirety behind closed doors at the Tokyo venue Fever in November of last year. A 360-degree camera captured the performance, which will finally be unveiled on May 1st. Similar to virtual reality, viewers will be able to adj...
