The unpopular opinions thread (Hawaiian pizza is great)

I’m really crap at discovering new stuff but Bandcamp is my platform of choice as a punk/metal guy

What is it you don't like about Spotify?

I imagine that it's precipitated the systemic undercutting of artists, meaning touring is the only way they can make money these days.

And they have no policy of addressing misinformation so its become a mainstream carrier of covid myths too.

But mainly the fact it screws artists who aren’t already enormous.

Aunt Alison Well, seeing as how you nibbled my rather misshapen carrot, I'll tell you. You can find us here in fact: sovietblackoutfrequency.bandcamp.com/

I'm such a whore.

I've been too busy songwriting for the likes of Harry Styles, James Arthur and Adele to do any real promotion to be honest.

A lot of things. The people who own it are pretty despicable, and it gives a lot of money highly unpleasant individuals like Joe Rogan - it doesn't just air his nasty little podcast, it paid him $100m for the privilege of doing so. Their business model and way of doing payments to artists is also pretty shit, and certainly not better than other music streaming services (AFAICT) and yeah as noted it helped create a situation where music streaming is the only realistic option for a lot of artists. There's always the free version, but it's incredibly obnoxious in terms of frequency, length and type of adverts, I presume partly by design, to try and convert you to the paid model, and honestly I'd rather the artists get paid, but I just find the idea that they're using my money to onboard true scum, people are actually harmful to society, like Rogan, utterly unacceptable.

All it really has going for it is that it was an early mover and thus has a very high adoption rate (both by users and musicians), and it has a pretty decent algorithm (no doubt bolstered by data from an awful lot of users) for finding music you're likely to like.

Those are all good points. I now feel bad for using it

Just don't use Amazon Music. It's cheap, got the library and high bitrates. But the interface is awwwwwful. Like, so, so bad that I'm thinking of spending twice as much on something else when the sub is up.

Tidal is just a bit shit though.
Meh, I'm happy with spotify for my needs.

I don't mind amazon music although it seems to be that half the albums in my collection disappear on a regular basis.

I have mixed thoughts on streaming. I love the convenience of it, but hate the relationship and lack of connection it gives me to the music compared to when I used to buy tapes / CDs etc. Also, as someone who has used it for years to push music one way or another, it's great that there's a way to make your music instantly accessible, but bollocks that you'll never earn from it.

Weirdly, I find if I buy something I'm more likely to give it a chance. If I just pirate or even stream something it tends to be very disposable.

I also prefer albums to singles. If an artist has moved to only doing singles I'll wait until there's enough to make an "album" before I bother getting it.

I clicked quote and not edit. So now I like a twat quoting myself.

Yep, the move to streaming has made me very unforgiving. Same with films on tap - not grabbed me, bin it off. Had I rented it, I'd of course see it through

I've never trusted streaming music and I never will. I can never forgive them for the death of CDs.

I still listen to CDs.