Vancouver-based startup Songspin.FM has acted on its New Year’s resolution to revamp its service, which takes a minimalist route to discovering music that might otherwise get lost in the undergrowth of Internet radio.
Users start by choosing from one of 12 channels, 11 of which are genres with the last one being the most popular tracks overall. As each song plays, listeners are offered four optional actions – favorite, hate, share or download – which then shape what they hear in the future. Listeners can also choose to read the artist’s bio, look at photos, or view upcoming live performance dates (which browsing around reveals aren’t always available).
The major change since Songspin.FM’s September launch is under the hood. The service uses SoundCloud’s music library and API, but soon noticed that SoundCloud’s tags and genre descriptions weren’t accurate enough for what Songspin.FM is trying to do. In retrospect that’s not surprising, since artists supply SoundCloud’s information and musicians are famously reluctant to pigeonhole themselves, even when it comes to metadata. So Songspin.FM now factors in chart and track information it gathers from other music APIs, online charts and other indicators.
“With an abundance of mainstream music services like Spotify and Rdio, it’s easy to hear the music you already know about. But it’s still difficult to discover great new music and bands,” said James Gagan, Songspin.FM co-founder. “We want to introduce people to all the awesome music they aren’t hearing on the radio and traditional streaming websites. This is great for listeners and great for bands hoping to get their music heard.”
Related links:
http://blog.songspin.fm/new-year-new-look
Songspin.FM’s current top ten most popular songs:
- Robyn – Call Your Girlfriend
- Tercer Cielo – Lindo Viaje
- Foo Fighters – Arlandria
- Medicine – We Were Promised Jetpacks
- Big – Sneaky Sound System
- Nickleback – When We Stand Together
- Daniel Lee Kendall – Hold Me Now
- Plug In Stereo – Nothing to Something
- James Morrison – I Won’t Let You Go
- Taylor Swift – Sparks Fly
