Google Glass Will Expand Its Features Into Music

Google Glass Will Expand Its Features Into Music

Ben Sisario, writing for The New York Times:

“On Tuesday, Google will unveil a set of features for Glass to search for songs, scan through saved playlists and listen to music in high fidelity. This can all be done while a user is wearing the lensless frames, which respond to vocal commands and have a small computer and transparent projection screen above the right eye.

When Glass boots up, it will display “listen to” among its standard voice commands — like “take a picture” and search for a term on Google — and let a wearer name a song or artist and then stream that music through Play, Google’s media and apps hub. Users can link their Play accounts to have access to playlists and song recommendations based on what they have listened to in the past.”

It’ll be interesting to see whether Glass takes off and if Google can get people to start using Google Play Music All Access (seriously they have to do something about that mouth full of a crap name) over other music streaming services. I tend to think Google missed the music streaming boat. My money is on Spotify or Rdio integration within the next year.

Finally Friday…bits and pieces…a double dose

So I was a bit caught up in let’s say life last week and I missed my weekly wrap-up. So here’s a double dose. Happy Friday!

• Playlists.net Revamps iOS App To Focus On Music Discovery & Foursquare-Powered Location Playlist Sharing (techcrunch.com)
• Metallica’s Kirk Hammett Believes iTunes and Social Networking Have “Destroyed Music” (www.mxdwn.com)
• Cranky old men of rock continue war on Spotify (cnbc.com)
• The Beginner’s Guide to Spotify (Mashable.com)
• Steel wheels for Spotify as streaming music service gets iPad DJ app (theguardian.com)
• “Spotify of India” company Saavn moves into content, but in a different way than Spotify (pandodaily.com)
• iTunes Radio lagging behind Pandora for engagement so far (musically.com)
• Spotify to carriers: We don’t need to be enemies (news.cnet.com)
• Odd Future’s Mellowhigh Stream Album on Myspace (fortitudemagazine.co.uk)
• How Spotify and its digital music rivals can win over artists: ‘Just include us’ (theguardian.com)
• SoundCloud reaches 250 million active monthly users (all-noise.co.uk)
• Twitter #Music Will Live Despite Planned Demise Of Mobile App (hypebot.com)
• The Youtube Music Awards: Why Artists Should Care (forbes.com)
• Kia Motors America Announces Plans For Social Media-Fueled Live Music And Comedy Event As Part Of Exclusive Partnership With The YouTube Music Awards (digitaljournal.com)
• MTV launches mobile music app (www.chicagotribune.com)
• VEVO Relaunches Its Web And Mobile Sites To Streamline Music Video Search And Discovery (techcrunch.com)
• Pandora brings its personalized streaming radio to Chromecast (theverge.com)

What is “The Most Beautiful Sound In The World”?

In a press release today, BeautifulNow and The Sound Agency announce a new competition powered by SoundCloud to find the most beautiful sound in the word.

“Sound affects us all every day, but most people are unconscious of its power,” said Julian Treasure, chairman of The Sound Agency. “My vision is to make the world sound beautiful so I’m delighted to be judging this competition for the world’s most beautiful sounds – it will raise people’s awareness of sound and help us all to explore the aural beauty that so often goes unnoticed around us.”

100% PR stunt but an interesting and potentially really creative one.

Antonio Vivaldi – ‘Spring’ visualised (Image: http://beautiful-sound.mpacula.com/)

 

Spotify launches first Irish advertising campaign

Spotify launches first Irish advertising campaign

Karina Corbett, writing for Business & Leadership:

“Today sees the launch of Spotify’s first outdoor, radio, digital, social and mobile advertising campaign into the Irish market.

The nationwide campaign is themed around ‘Music Moments’, telling stories that strike a chord around music, and that Spotify can play a part in enriching.”

(Image: Business & Leadership)

What A YouTube Music Service Means For Spotify, iTunes Radio & The Others

What A YouTube Music Service Means For Spotify, iTunes Radio & The Others

Corey Tate, writing for Spacelab:

“The recent news that Google will be starting its own YouTube-branded streaming music service came as a shock that we really shouldn’t have been shocked at. I guess YouTube has always just been there … being YouTube, and now the idea of carving it up into smarter and more usable sections is a good idea.

Of course, all of the other streaming music services should be rightly terrified of a formalized YouTube Music streaming service … Apple’s iTunes Radio is enough of a competitor for Pandora Radio and Spotify and the other others. But YouTube Music? The 8 billion pound gorilla is about to drop and there’s nothing they can do about it!”

We can’t be surprised that YouTube is moving into music streaming. After all the most played videos on YouTube are music videos thus it is arguably already the world’s largest music streaming service.

Despite smaller startups trying to make a name for themselves and gain a foothold in what is becoming a seriously overcrowded market, it appears the big boys are set to dominate. YouTube owners Google are already in on the action with ‘Google Play Music All Access’, but that is one hell of a mouthful. As Forbes contributor, Bobby Owsinski put it “Imagine a kid trying to explain this cool new service she just found and then tries to spit out that tongue twister of a brand name. About the only thing you can count on her getting right is “Google.”” Regardless, Google will still have two decently sized pieces of the music streaming pie. It has also been reported that Twitter is shutting down their Twitter #music fail but most likely incorporating it into their main platform.

How long before Facebook buys the next Instagram of social music and music streaming? Will Spotify be able to compete?

SoundCloud Transforms Instagram Photos Into Album Art

SoundCloud Transforms Instagram Photos Into Album Art

Meg Wagner, writing for Mashable:

“Some album covers are as iconic as the songs they hold. Now, SoundCloud is re-imagining them for the digital age.

The online audio platform now allows its users to connect their Instagram accounts to their profiles and use their filtered photos as a new kind of album artwork.”

(Image: SoundCloud)

On its website, SoundCloud notes “Remember, your images are square, so think of them as modern day record sleeves.” Interesting. How many SoundCloud or Instagram users do you think have ever bought or even seen an actual record with a sleeve? But look at iTunes or Amazon and note that digital record ‘sleeves’ are square – imitating their probably not long for this world vinyl counterparts. Presumably record sleeves had to be square to cover and protect circular vinyl records and CDs. The familiar shape was then incorporated into digital music download programs. And it is a handy coincidence that Instagram pics are also square.

How much longer will we refer to record ‘sleeves’ or covers and not simply album artwork?

Music on the Web: Google, Facebook and Apple set to battle for your ears

Music on the Web: Google, Facebook and Apple set to battle for your ears

Heather Somerville, writing for MercuryNews.com:

“Silicon Valley is poised to upend the music industry — again.

From Napster to Pandora, from the iPod to the iPhone, technology innovation has made music easier to find and cheaper to buy than ever before. At the same time, it has destabilized the music business and left artists — at least those not named Justin Bieber or Taylor Swift — fearing for their livelihoods.

In this latest music revolution, companies like Google (GOOG), Apple (AAPL) and Facebook are eyeing the streaming and on-demand music business now dominated by smaller niche companies such as Pandora and Spotify. When they do — and most analysts agree it’s really just a matter of time — they could give nearly everyone the ability to listen to whatever they want, whenever they want — and mostly for free.”

YouTube Close to Launching Subscription Music Service

YouTube Close to Launching Subscription Music Service

Alex Pham, writing for Billboard:

“YouTube is preparing a premium on-demand music service — akin to a Spotify, but with video — to launch later this year, according to several sources familiar with the plans.

The service, designed with mobile listening in mind, will have a free component and a premium tier that offers unlimited access to a full catalog of tracks similar to what’s already available via YouTube’s parent company, Google Inc., via its All Access subscription music service. Premium features would include the ability to cache music for offline listening and removing ads.”

Related articles:

• YouTube tipped to take on Spotify with subscription music service (theguardian.com)
• YouTube eyes Spotify’s turf with mobile music streaming service (cable.co.uk)
• YouTube Will Launch Its Spotify Competitor Music Service Soon (tubefilter.com)
• YouTube plans to take on Spotify with subscription-based music service (brg.com)
• YouTube may launch phone-friendly ‘Spotify with video’ (techradar.com)

Tune in, eat up with the Supper app for Spotify.

The Supper app pairs meals with curated playlists to match the mood of the dishes.

Leah Gonzalez, writing for PSFK:

“Supper is a Spotify app that pairs recipes with carefully selected tunes to match the mood of the dishes. Each recipe comes with two playlists, one to listen to while you cook up your meal and one to listen to while you’re enjoying your freshly cooked dish.”

I actually really like this idea and I definitely will try it. That probably makes me a nerd but I think in terms of music discovery this could be a great tool, especially for more region specific genres and indigenous artists.

“The while you eat playlist of killer hits brings the experience to life and is the final ingredient for a lip-smacking and hip-shaking time.”

I think I’ll start with this:

Bon Appétit! 

 

 

The Music Experiment 2.0 grows: Arcade Fire join the Experiment

Arcade Fire join the Experiment via brand-e.biz:

“The Music Experiment 2.0 – the social media concert series from MTV Iggy and Intel – has signed up Arcade Fire to perform a special show at an as-yet-unknown outdoor location in Los Angeles at the end of this month. Fans can head to MusicExperiment.com to win tickets to the live performance by participating in The Music Experiment 2.0 across Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, Vine, Shazam and Twitter. The concert will also stream live on MusicExperiment.com and through The Music Experiment Windows app which enables users to choose camera angles as well as zoom in on band members and cut back for wide shots.”