• Spotify Now Has 15 Million Premium Subscribers

    Spotify has announced that it has expanded its premium subscriber base to 15 million users. In a statement on the company's website, it revealed its year-end subscriber numbers for 2014. The company has grown to 15 million paid, premium users and 60 million active users in total.

  • Spotify Done with Topspin for Musician Merch, Don't Expect It to Pop Up at Beats Music Either

    Roughly eleven months ago your correspondent was excitedly working on a short article detailing Spotify's announcement that it would be teaming up with Topspin to allow performers to peddle their merchandise on the streaming service via their official band pages. It was at least a mild relief knowing that musicians could make money some other way via Spotify since the royalty payments-per-stream are on the low side. Eleven months later, your correspondent is back to let you know that Spotify is done with Topspin.

  • Apple Deletes White-Power Music from iTunes; Amazon, Google Have Yet to Respond

    Apple recently took down work on iTunes from bands that was deemed "white-power" or "racial-supremacy" music by the Southern Poverty Law Center in a new report. The company came under fire for offering the hateful music as well as giving customers more options with the "Listeners Also Bought" feature. According to "Rolling Stone" and "Noisey," Apple deleted 30 of the 54 bands last week that the SPLC pointed out in the report, but other online vendors like Amazon and Google have yet to do so. "The racist music industry, a once lucrative source of funding for the white power movement, is a shadow of its former self," the report reads. "Over the past decade, it has become increasingly fragmented and disorganized in the wake of the collapse of several major labels and distributors. Concerts have become scarce and those that remain have been driven even further underground. However, the ever-resilient white power music scene has found new hope and new profit amidst the wreckage of a once multimillion-dollar industry from an unlikely source: the world's largest music vendor, iTunes." Apple's Terms and Conditions page for iTunes restricts submissions of work that is "obscene, objectionable or in poor taste," but that apparently was not strictly enforced.

  • Spotify Reveals Most Popular Peformers Played in Ten Cities Where Uber Users Control Playlist during Ride; From New York to Singapore

    As Music Times reported a while back, streaming service Spotify has teamed up with taxi app Uber so that not only can you flag down a cab with minimal hassle, you can force the driver to listen to your music while you go. Spotify has released the data from the ten cities that are currently Spotify/Uber enabled and created short eight-song playlists to show what's been stuck in drivers' heads recently.

  • Spotify Launches Thanksgiving 'Time For Turkey' Playlist Generator [LISTEN]

    Spotify has a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. The Swedish music streaming company recently posted its financial statements, which showed a 74 percent increase in revenue in 2013. So despite negative headlines from artists against the streaming model, it looks like things aren't too bad for the company. In the spirit of giving thanks, Spotify has launched a new program to help you out this Thanksgiving called the Time For Turkey playlist generator.

  • Spotify Posts $80 Million Loss in 2013 As Revenue Rises

    Things appear to be looking up for Spotify. The Swedish music streaming giant posted their earnings for 2013 and the numbers are heading in the right direction. In its latest financial statements, Spotify reported that its revenue grew to 747 million Euros in 2013, or about $1.03 billion. That was up about 74 percent from 2012, the company said in its filings according to the NY Times. On the flip side, Spotify also had $80 million in net losses during 2013, down from a $115 million loss in 2012.

  • Apple Reportedly Set To Relaunch Beats Music In March 2015

    After Apple bought Beats for $3 billion earlier this year, industry experts wondered what the Silicon Valley giant planned to do with the company. Now according to a report in the Financial Times, there appears to be some clarity on what the intent of Apple is with Beats Music going forward. According to the report via Billboard, Apple plans to bundle a rebranded Beats Music into an upcoming IOS that will come standard on the update. Something like this was expected when Apple acquired Beats Music in May. Now it appears that there is a timeline for the new relaunch of Beats Music.

  • YouTube Subscription Service Music Key to Launch Nov. 17

    YouTube's new subscription music service, Music Key, is set to launch today, Nov. 17. The service will allow paying customers access to licensed music videos without the hassle of advertisements. Users will even be able to watch music videos without an Internet connection. MTV News points out that, like Spotify's pay model, users will pay a monthly fee of $7.99 — $9.99 after the promotional offer expires — for the service. It has been a long road for YouTube's streaming experiment, the company has been working on the project for more than a year. Many of the major labels signed licensing agreements early on with the music video giant, but indie labels were not as eager. Trade organizations representing the indies said that the deal was unfair because they were being offered less money than the major labels. Last week, the two parties reached an agreement, giving YouTube the last piece of the puzzle.

  • Video of Taylor Swift, 12, Belting National Anthem at 76ers Game Surfaces [WATCH]

    Taylor Swift had the makings of a star even when she was a 12-year-old. Old video footage of the young "Shake It Off" singer performing the national anthem at a Philadelphia 76ers game in Pennsylvania recently went viral. Swift, a native of Reading, Pennsylvania, is shown in the brief clip below belting the last few lines of "The Star-Spangled Banner," including the challenging "o'er the land of the free" part, "The Huffington Post" reports. The singer does a spectacular job, considering her age at the time. I am sure no one knew Swift would one day rule the charts after listening to her performance, but she had plenty of years to improve. The next T.Swift is out there, though, so do not disregard any youngster you see belting out the beloved song. In case you missed it, New Zealand singer Lorde was also an excellent singer at age 12.
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