The Future of Music Management

General Area Tips, Tricks, & Tutorials
, , , ,
1

Hello all,

I am here to gain input on the use of TIDAL and any other online music streaming services any of you may have used. My main question is: are we going to soon rely on third-party media service providers to play music when DJing? I am typically subscribed to 2-3 music pools at any given time, but this new TIDAL integration has got me thinking- is manual music management (through the use of music pools and hard drives) a thing of the past?

It seems overwhelming to jump into solely relying on something like TIDAL. Being I’ve never used it, I can only imagine how much time it would take before you learn to work around their playlists, creating your own new playlists, and what if they don’t have the music you rely on? What happens if wifi cuts out? Can you have your harddrive integraded into 5000’s when also using TIDAL? Are Spotify and YouTube soon to be where we can stream all our DJ music from? I’m just trying to gain footing for how I can convert from these current time consuming methods to using a third-party app that has everything there for you. Over the last couple years people seem more shocked I can’t just connect to Spotify or the internet to stream my DJ music from.

Thank you!

2

Yes, but you switch sources. Think of Tidal like another virtual hard drive in standalone.

In software like serato though you can search both your drive and tidal.

Hopefully sometime in the future, they will allow offline storage of say 1000 - 2000 songs for DJ use.

For now, Prime will cache the entire single track

Spotify just pulled from Algorriddim Djay. Maybe they want to restructure the licence and allow other apps to be able to use

You mean YouTube music?

I did Pulselocker when they launched and used it for finding odd tracks at a day party.

they pulled the service overnight without warning. Not saying this will happen with Jay Zs Tidal but it happened.

Time will tell, i think we are on to a new direction in djing and sourcing music overall.

Because thats how music is consumed these days.

3

Thanks for the information- definitely agree we are in the midst of how we source music.

In regards to YouTube- I was referring to the main application, as you can create your own playlists under your profile…but in general I am curious about how any streaming app could be utilized as a source for DJing.

It is overwhelming to start considering using a music streaming app in addition to your main harddrive, or converting your entire music source over instead of using an external harddrive. Too many options!!

4

Let me add my comment here… As we - dj’s - are supposedly be professionally playing music, we cannot rely on unreliable music source. Usb stick/ssd drive for now are most reliable medium. If there is a gig in a very remote location (mountains, ice cave, Stonehenge, a desert (burning man), a cruise ship, yacht - there is no gsm, no wifi, no any signal at all. Then no one can use tidal, Spotify or anything like this. Also what if connection breaks. We can get one, 2, maybe 20 tracks and signal dies? You end the party and go home at 22:00, maybe 23:00? I think that using music streaming is more as a add-on not as a main thing to go for professional djing. We can look for strange requests or for some special extras, but never rely on it 100% Even I don’t trust a usb stick (always have one or 2 extra as backup with me), everything can fail. But You as a dj can’t fail your audience.

Second thing - I like to play unique tracks, that are not mainstream and many people don’t even know. These tracks are not even available on any streaming services… that holds me back from using them more often than just at home for my private usage to test and check how it goes and in what way it develops.

That is my way of thinking about the streaming services for djing. Of course You guys can think what You want I will not try to push anyone away from it. Even more I’ll say - use it to its maximum, let it develop further and let’s get the best out of it if possible.

5

It may be unreliable currently but what about in the future?

Off line storage of songs from stream services

That’s a valued opinion, but I highly doubt the generation of my 5 and 3 year old will have that. Remember DVDs, my kids think all movies are just on Netflix, my games are already in the PS4 etc

Private cloud service :cloud: or USB as usual.

Interesting times for sure.

6

Well, if You strip it to the individual sentences like this, You completely lose the point of my comment. Read it as a whole, then You will see, that the answeres You just made, are already there.

7

I suppose using something like TIDAL as an add-on is the way to go, at least for now. That may be what I end up doing. With all this downtime I currently have, I’ve mainly been pondering if anyone here solely uses a third-party online service for DJing, as I’ve never seen anyone using this method. Or maybe if anyone knew of an upcoming service that would be a no-brainier for usage.

Have either of you used TIDAL though? I’d be interested to hear some user experiences of it.

8

Im waiting for the BeatSource streaming service announced in 2018.

image
image1242×2070 387 KB

I have used Tidal both in Prime hardware and Serato, though not for gigs.

9

Hm I’ve never heard of BeatSource. Isn’t that similar to TIDAL, VDJ’s online music subscription, and most other music service providers?

I’ll have to research further, but how did you like TIDAL? Does it offer samples and DJ-tool type files? Or is it mainly just original tracks + music videos?

10

They will forever be unreliable, as long as there are wifi jammers (intentional or unintentional).

11

That is a very bold statement.

I’m sure same was said at different points of technological advances

Eg

  1. Landphone to mobile phones

  2. Horses to Cars

  3. Combustion engines to electric

  4. Pulling out to The Pill

  5. Vinyl to CDs

there is a solution for that - offline storage, pulselocker did have that.

12

Well, there are places where wifi will be always unreliable.

13

No, that’s a 15y experience as a DJ where I’ve seen people sabotage electricity in a venue let alone bring a pocket wifi jammer - and that is all that is required to frack up this idea that you can rely on streaming as a DJ

And btw, I do get your point - but examples you mentioned are manure.

14

I have never experienced such

What if the streaming service allows you to keep an offline copy of whatever song you want?

Just like Spotify allows you to listen with or without internet connection.

This is the most important bit.

Happy Easter to you too. :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:

15

So…you would download all songs on the drive before your gig? Maybe organize into crates? Put cuepoints/loops? You know…LIKE WE ALREADY DO? :joy::joy::joy::joy:

1 Like
16

Exactly. Finally you see a solution.

Think of streaming services as just another media source, but with more data mining by the suppliers.

17

You have to be blind to see that as a solution :see_no_evil:

1 Like
18

I like to have my files organised and with hot cues, correct name tags and beatgrids, so download the tracks on the fly is an option for one or 2 tracks, not for a full gig. 99% of my gigs I have the complete set prepared with exact track selection and arrangement. So offline storage media will be a long time with me.

19

It’s easy to identify a problem like you correctly pointed out earlier but what solution do you proffer? You reckon it’s never going to happen?

The current trend i’ve observed Pioneer, Denon, Serato etc to incorporate streaming services as a source of music. It may not happen in the next 5-10 years but seems to be the trend.

Regular consumers (non djs) are already using these services exclusively for accessing music.

DJcity is launching a streaming service for djs, Beatport is as well

I think it will happen sooner or later, i just hope it’s robust enough for working with on the road.

I used Pulselocker with serato. Beatport bought them out and rebranded it as Beatport Link.

You can save files offline, with the caveat that you have to go online (log in) at least once every 30 days. I think beatport link currently allows 50 - 100 tracks to be saved offline depending on your tier

If you have the storage for 10 millions tracks you can save it offline with Pulselocker.

For now yes.

What if they actually allow you to buy a copy of the same track via the streaming service or if you commit to say a 24 month contract you could actually keep the tracks you download forever eg similar to networks and contract phones.

With Pulselocker you could grid, add cues etc for the tracks (offline and streams).

With the current Tidal integration in Denon, Serato etc, you can do all that despite that you are streaming the track each time you want to play it. A metadata file is created for each file you stream and next time the track is loaded all the user generated stuff eg grids, cues, loops are there.

Streaming services does not necessarily equate to just online streaming only. They will obviously mature over time to cater for their customers.

20

Thanks for the podcast link, I’m going to watch that. This is where my original question came from- I know streaming services existed but I never actually looked into them. It’s interesting to hear the different opinions on the matter because it does seem we are headed in the direction of streaming, but maybe it could end up as one of those things that is not fully proficient?