Spotify’s reserved ticket sales to music superfans are now going live

Spotify is launching “Reserved,” a new system that will hold two concert tickets for an artist’s superfans before they’re on sale to the public.

How Musicians Can Get Paid for Training AI
How Musicians Can Get Paid for Training AI

Musicians are accustomed to getting paid each time their creative work is used. Across vinyl/CD sales, streams, radio, cover versions, and those numerous niches like karaoke, there are agreements in place about what “use” means. Underlying this is a s…

Conclave is the sound of a NYC summer block party
Conclave is the sound of a NYC summer block party

I have this vivid memory of walking to pick up my oldest from school in June of 2022. For a variety of reasons, I was in a very bad place mentally. And to make matters worse, it was brutally hot. I was depressed, angry with the world, sunburned, and soaked through with sweat. But as […]

Spotify is adding editor-hosted videos to New Music Friday so you can meet the people behind the playlist
Spotify is adding editor-hosted videos to New Music Friday so you can meet the people behind the playlist

Spotify is adding short-form videos from its editorial team to New Music Friday, its flagship weekly playlist for new releases. The videos feature Spotify’s curators sharing their picks, spotlighting rising artists, and explaining the stories behind so…

From AI deals to streaming fraud, the music industry is wrestling with four existential battles at once
From AI deals to streaming fraud, the music industry is wrestling with four existential battles at once

The music industry descended on New York this week for Indie Week and a flurry of parallel gatherings. The conversations kept circling back to the same handful of anxieties: generative AI, streaming fraud, underpaid songwriters, and the organisations m…

I’ve found the Goldilocks of portable MIDI controllers
I’ve found the Goldilocks of portable MIDI controllers

I have tested more portable MIDI controllers than I can keep track of, and I will tell you right now: 37 keys is the ideal size. While Arturia’s 25-key MiniLab MK3 is a solid controller that easily fits in a backpack, it feels a bit claustrophobic. The new $149 MiniLab 37 adds another octave, giving […]

Deezer’s new free tool scans your Spotify and Apple Music playlists for AI slop
Deezer’s new free tool scans your Spotify and Apple Music playlists for AI slop

Deezer has built a free tool that will tell you how much of your music was made by a machine, even if you stream it somewhere else. The French service has opened its AI-music detector to the public, letting anyone scan their playlists on Spotify, Apple…

Deezer launches an AI music detector for other streaming services
Deezer launches an AI music detector for other streaming services

Deezer will now scan your playlists on other streaming platforms to detect AI-generated music. Deezer was the first of the big streaming services to start labeling AI-generated music. It even offered its tech to other platforms, but it doesn’t seem like it had many buyers. Qobuz launched its own detection tech, while Apple and Spotify […]

Google won’t just admit it’s feeding YouTube creators to its music AI
Google won’t just admit it’s feeding YouTube creators to its music AI

If you’ve uploaded a song to YouTube, Google almost certainly considers your video fair game for training its Lyria music AI, it just won’t admit it right now. A group of independent musicians is suing Google, claiming that it illegally used songs they uploaded to YouTube to train its Lyria 3 model. Google has filed […]

A jazz label covered an AI-generated hit to make a point the music industry has been avoiding

A jazz label turned a faceless AI song into a statement about human creativity and built a tool to back it up.