Are you sitting down, readers? Because, well, it’s like this. You’re gonna want to remember where you were the moment when TMT’s own badass rogue renegade newsman extraordinaire delivered the news — after ever-so-slightly tweaking the content he ganked off of Hypebot — that Beats Music (a.k.a. the streaming music service founded by Interscope’s main man Jimmy Iovine and main money-men like Dr. Dre, Luke Wood, Trent Reznor, and Ian Rogers) will officially be having its non-terrestrial launch on January 21, 2014! Boom. Oh, shit… are you fainting???
…So yeah, welcome back! Good thing your co-worker had those smelling salts on him. Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah: according to a bunch of industry people that I’ve never met or even talked to firsthand, Beats Music will be launching “in a competitive sector as a premium service.” Basically, that means that there is no awesome “free” version like everyone else has, which I guess puts a rather strong emphasis on this thing being for serious pros like Diplo or whoever. Instead, they’ll offer a 30-day free trial, then start juicing $9.99 a month from you. Although there’s also some deals through AT&T where “Beats Music will be available to customers on a multiline account for $14.99 a month for up to five family members across 10 devices,” and for a limited time, “AT&T wireless customers who subscribe to the family offer of Beats Music get the first 90 days free starting January 24,” so that’s cool! Also, Target will reportedly give customers “30-day free trial cards with the purchase of select electronic items and Beats Music gift cards, and a 30-day free trial for all Target Red Card holders,” but who cares about Target, right? You’re an AT&T man, I can tell.
Anyway, let’s see, more details… it’ll be available on iOS, Android, and Windows, and it claims to pay out the same royalty rate to both major and indie labels and artists (unlike certain Spotify-ishly named companies who’s names I won’t mention). It also claims that it’ll “provide a platform for greater fan interaction” (thank gawd!) and include the following features, all of which promise to revolutionize the way music revolutions structure their revolts from here on out:
• Just For You: “A personalized selection of albums and playlists delivered at least 4 times a day to each user. Selections are delivered based on users’ musical preferences, time of day, activity, and additional cultural and contextual clues.”
• Right Now: “A continuous playlist compiled from users’ answers to four specific questions about their location, their activity, their surroundings, and their musical preference at that moment.”
• Highlights: “Beats Music editorial staff-recommend playlists or albums compiled based on time of year, news, cultural milestones, and new releases worth noting.”
• Find It: “An enhanced browsing function that lets users seek out playlists [and individual songs] by genre, activity or curator.”
But enough from me on this shit, right? You want to know what fucking TRENT REZNOR has to say about all this, don’t you? I know, I know. Here you go:
“Beats Music is based on the belief that all music has value and this concept was instilled in every step of its development. We want it to be just as meaningful for artists as it is for fans.”
—Trent Reznor, Beats Music Chief Creative Officer
You heard the man. Sign up now, or you hate music and aren’t a true artist.
• Beats Music: https://beatsmusic.com
