By now, you may have noticed that there have been some changes to the Beatport site. A new look and feel for the music store was unveiled four months ago, as a beta for Beatport Pro. During that time, users were able to switch between the old and new site as needed. For now, at least, you can still access the old site via classic.beatport.com, at least until they shut it down or something changes to break it.
Not content to sit on their laurels, SFX (the company behind Beatport) is launching an online music streaming service. Think ‘Spotify for electronic music’. Now, with the storefront rebranded as Beatport Pro, the main site has become the home for the new service, at beatport.com. Right now, the site is little more than a splash page inviting you to sign up for the closed beta
The Wall Street Journal first broke the news late last year, and now it’s finally officially official: Beatport is a streaming service. Rumours actually started waaay back in June of last year, when T-Mobile US let slip mention of the future service in a keynote.
Details are still pretty scarce, so until we get our grubby mitts on an invite to the beta, we’ll just have to look at the bigger picture. Even the screenshot on the homepage doesn’t give much away. My guess is that they’re still ironing out the details.
My Take
Music streaming isn’t #thefutureofdjing, it’s the present. Not only is it in the hearts and minds of teenage music listeners around the world, it’s creeping into our workflow as well. Music hosting site Soundcloud has been a part of Mixvibes’ popular DJ app – Cross DJ – for nearly two years now. Spotify and Algoriddim have had a deal for nearly a year already, sticking the music streaming service in djay 2 for iOS (and now, Android).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_qQCZQPVG0
We’ve suspected it’s coming for a while. In the DJWORX team, it was bounced about back when there was talks of Spotify and Soundcloud getting integrated into DJ apps. It made sense for Beatport to leverage their catalogue for streaming. But for professionals, connectivity still isn’t there yet, and won’t be for a while. DJs need to know every part of their system works (lookin’ at you, Traktor). We can’t trust streaming, neither as an ideology, nor as a technology.
Streaming is nothing new to Dance music. Way back in 2001, I remember listening to various streaming radio stations on Winamp’s Shoutcast (then bought by AOL, now owned by Radionomy) at a blistering 56kbps bitrate… and I loved it. There’s even been a very recently launched dance music streaming service called BEATGASM. There were already plenty of options for streaming, with di.fm literally having a channel for everyone. Proton Radio and Frisky Radio are big names that have been around for a while, too.
And what of the slippery slope, further pushing customers away from ownership of digital media? There’s always a concern that services like this will be pushed on DJs, locking you in to a system you rely on where you’re at the mercy of the provider. If, somehow, DJ software started ONLY playing music from the partnered streaming service, we would have a problem. I can’t see that happening without alienating a large group of people. While moving to new software is a hassle, it’s something that happens all the time.
Realistically, there’s not a lot keeping DJs with Beatport, other than brand loyalty. There will be plenty of digital music stores to choose from, but as long as Beatport continues to cater to DJs as they currently do, with a good, easy to use site and plenty of current music to choose from, many of us will be happy to call it their go-to choice.
You can sign up for the closed beta over on the beatport.com homepage.
What do you think of this announcement? Would you use it?
I am looking forward to seeing this, The nicety to have a streaming service just playing music in the back ground and the option for me to purchase the songs as and when I like them, will save me a few hours tracking down tracks and may introduce me to tracks I may have missed. Or at least that’s what I am hoping.
I don’t think we will ever see a point where it will go streaming only and also have that locked down to software, the DJ market is far too open for that currently, which can only be a good thing.
Yeah. It’s only a matter of time before someone tries, but it’ll die a horrible death.
What would be nice is if there’s some way for Beatport DJs to get their mixes on there.
Which leads to the other bit, recording of mixes. As far as I know the apps/programs that have streaming capability do not let you record any mixes that use streamed tracks, this correct? What to do there….go old school and plug RCAs into a PC?
Not a huge fan of streaming, you keep shelling out for something you never actually own; fine for things like movies that you may never watch again, but music gets played over and over. Once the subscription stops, you lose all your music.
Yeah, if you can’t record in app, then just run into another device and record there. Nothing to stop that.
For Virtual DJ users, Atomix have been offering Content Unlimited for a while now. A monthly subscription gives you access to streamed (can also be cached) music, video or karaoke (three tiers of pricing).
It amazes me how many people subscribe and try to stream at gigs, then complain on the VDJ forum about how they were downloading track after track and then it stopped working at a gig, letting the client down.
Why? Why risk it? IMO if you’re out working as a DJ and being paid to provide a professional service, the last thing you should be doing is relying on streaming or downloading tracks live at gigs.
Like the Scouts, be prepared. Buy your music. Make sure it’s there ready on your hard drive (or on physical media) before you even start playing.
BTW @editor “leverage there catalogue” [facepalm]
Streaming the Spotify way that lets you cache makes complete sense for professionals, as long as the system is clear, and tells you how long each track is cached for.
For the consumer, streaming is great. It really is. I love having access to various services, like Xbox Music, Soundcloud, Bandcamp, Google Play Music, etc. But as a DJ I don’t think I’d really go near it, with one exception.
I’m using Spotify radio (as an example), and hear a song I really like. I download it to my phone and add it to a playlist. When I load my DJ software it recognizes I have flagged a new song to download and it downloads it to my machine, and places it in my collection. I can then load the song, grid it, line of cue points, do all the prep work.
Then I can go to a gig, disable wifi (cause I’m not that big of a risk taker) and spin it.
But the idea of going to a gig, risking WiFi being activated, risking a reliable wifi system at the club, risking the track not downloading properly, all live while spinning sounds insane to me. And I know there are mobile DJs who need every song ever, and maybe this appeals to them, but the risks associated with using this kind of service in a DJ app just don’t mitigate the risks, at least to me.
Yeah the less variables the better I think.
If a club provides the sound system, they can be expected to provide good WiFi, too. $70 a month for your DJs doesn’t sound like too much. Like every other business, its not the idea, its the implementation that will make or break it. Whether a company is content to work hard and make some profit, or if they choose to try and work a little and make lots of profit. Streaming is a good idea, for DJs. This is the one chance for algoriddim to swoop in and make itself pro software. Streaming is the future of dying. What is uncertain is which service will commit to it with software, hardware, support, and most importantly music content that pays artists.
I wasn’t trying to be cute by writing “dying” haha (new windows tablet, haven’t disabled auto-correct yet)
and I wasn’t trying to discount DJ Player app as not being in the running for a new pro software, it’s just that djay has the inside track with apple, who seem to be the only co. willing to truly make anything difficult happen. DJ Player DVS and streaming would be incredible :)
Streaming just seems like one of those things that require a LOT of field testing to iron out all the kinks and build in safeguards, and it doesn’t appear ANYBODY wants to do that. Which is weird because one or two people could do it. Lots of bars and clubs here in san diego have wifi. Have a beatport night where the people showing up kinda know what to expect, document the problems, and then address them. We also have “cartogo” it’s smart cars that can be rented right on the street, used and then parked anywhere. I don’t think they made a profit, yet, but the idea is sound and attractive. Even in the comments here, it looks like everyone wants streaming, but are just worried it won’t work. As with most things in life, doing it right will happen quicker than you think if you just get in there and get to work. But if they think they’re just going to make a software, drop it on the public and the magic of bits and bytes will make everything go perfectly, well they are wrong. It needs an actual face(s), with some documented trials and errors(and successes). That’s all it takes people. The computer can’t do everything for you. “Real” customer service begins with being an expert in your field, and knowing beforehand what our customers will want and need.
DJ Player has both DVS and streaming since 2013…
Oh yes my friend,I am well aware of that. As I have said many times, a quick, simple, reliable way to connect gear to an iPad would truly “change everything.” As you may remember. I bought an iPad mini and two separate camera kits, from the apple store, both of which displayed, just for the camera kit “device not supported” and after that I just gave up on the idea.
DVS with djplayer is really the only exciting software option out there.
What sort of sound quality do you get when streaming?
Seems very good, well didn’t bother me anyway it’s just for listening (it is not for playing out or stealing tracks using clever software)
Having been using it for all of about fifteen minutes, it’s almost certainly too early to give a sensible opinion… But first impressions are good. There are numerous things that need work, obviously. But given that this is a very early beta, it would be churlish to point them out now. Most importantly, it’s already left me feeling like this is something that I’m likely to use, albeit more as method of properly previewing tracks as opposed to in a live context.
Ok so I got my beta invite and this is just a very quick run down.
Well its certainly a beta (couple of issues but thats what these tests are for), but that aside it’s not got the full beatport catalogue or anything like that but it has some play lists built on whats hot form dj’s and on beatport and some genera playlists for you to just hit the play all button and it just streams all the songs very nicely. You can like tracks and then purchase them through beatport.
Basically it’s a way of listening to EDM through different playlists and then liking and buying tracks as and when you see fit, it plays the full tracks so very nice.
It also has some Shows being added so that probably means DJ’s recording a show or something like that (details to be advised when ready by the looks of things), looks good and also has some news as well.
All in all very nice.
FYI this is not, and i mean not ever going to be an option for DJ’s to play out live with but a nice service to play EDM at home (will try in car later), find music and just have what seems so far an enjoyable time. This may change but I don’t see it happening any time soon.
So all in all a nice experience so far, not so much music to choose from at present but hey it’s a beta after all.