Spotify and its Discontents

[richardfinegold]

I am now able to ascend the stairs in my house, and spend time in my two channel music room, where most of my collection and the gear to play it on is housed. While in the Hospital and for the first few days at home when I was confined to my ground level I was relying quite a bit on Spotify, either just listening direct from the phone, or streaming it from the phone or ipad to a bluetooth dac in an HT system.
My previous Spotify use had been. well, Spotty. I would screen recordings for purchase on it, either at home or on the car as I drove, or use it for the occassional 2 day vacation. It has also become my source for non classical listening, which is mainly a social thing. This has been what I consider my first heavy duty use of a streaming service. Some observations.

1) I hate the interface. It is designed for 12 year olds
2) I really dislike the search engine for classical music. It doesn't work remotely as well as say Amazon's will. Many times it advertises a work only to find you get one movement.
3) Tracks would advance on my android phone but not from the ipad, where it has to be done manually. This was a non trivial issue, as I was receiving so many calls from wellwishers that the music was constantly interrupted, making the ipad the streamer of choice, but having to advance each track is really a pain
4) I find the selection choice limiting
5) Sound quaity--not bad for a compressed format. I am finding my main system a balm to my ears after relying on Spotify for as long as I have, but there are worse.

So overall if this was to be as good as streaming gets, I would not imagine that I would be able to chuck my collection and go that route.
I haven't tried Quobuz or Tidal, which are just getting going here, but I wonder if the issues for classical music would persist.

[BBMmk2]

I get a lot of pleasure from Spotify. Without ads its £9.99 per month. Well worth it, when you think, the time on it you be spending, as I do more and more.

What I do, I either search for an artist or composer, individually, as opposed to a much general search for a genre, such as classical music. The amount I get is fabulous! Can't wait to do more exploring. Especially, if your thinking of buying a cd, a great way of try before you buy, imo.

[richardfinegold]

The search engine is workable, but I find that it takes multiple tries to bring up what I want.
Spotify did save my bacon musically during my recent stretch, and it was nice that I could stream it to my Bluetooth DAC .
it is even chaeaper here, at $10/month. Still I welcome it as adjunct, rather than as a replacement , to traditional listening

[Dave2002]

The Spotify interface is different on different devices, such as an iPad and various other iMacs. I find it useful and affordable, despite its faults. I've not yet tried Qobuz, which may be better, but most of the others aren't any better - different perhaps, and occasionally they turn up other material which Spotify doesn't have/can't find.

[BBMmk2]

I do find though if I put in artists names/composers etc, per se, yu come up trumps everytime. I find with the desk top version is fine and my mobile phone version is good too.

[Jonathan]

I use Spotify - I started using it a few weeks ago and, playing music via the Kindle with an added speaker, the sound is fine. I tend to listen to it when I am washing up! It is a good way to preview CDs prior to buying them (or not...). I'm still using the free version and the adverts are rather irritating so I might upgrade at some point.

[Dave2002]

Re msg 6: I believe the sound quality is supposed to be better with the paid for service. I often play through a DAC. My feeling is that CDs and other "better quality" sources do sound better, but for many purposes Spotify can be good enough. It used to be said that the compression method used by Spotify is better than MP3. It's difficult to assess - it may be, but not necessarily better than aac.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Especially, if your thinking of buying a cd, a great way of try before you buy, imo.

It is a good way to preview CDs prior to buying them (or not...). I'm still using the free version and the adverts are rather irritating so I might upgrade at some point.

This is how I use Spotty, too - I haven't caught the streaming bug yet, and just use the free facility to sample potential purchases a few times. The Ads annoy, but I don't use it for "serious" listening, and they're a price I'm prepared to pay - a tenner a month isn't.

[Pianoman]

I have Premium and the sound quality is excellent (320 ogg vorbis) and no ads. I have a discount through the uni, so get it for 4.99, which is worth every penny. The search engine does get fooled on occasions, but you get to know how to use it. A good instance is the latest Ivan Fischer Mahler 9 - doesn't show up if you put 'Mahler 9 Fischer' etc., but if you do as BBM says and put Ivan Fischer and look under 'artist', it suddenly shows up in the drop down list - very strange! I find I can't now live without it (as it were) so would have to think very hard if the price went up...

[richardfinegold]

I have been using it as many others here--to screen CDs, have something to play in the car and public transport, etc. thanks for the search engine instructions. I just had found that if it was my primary means of obtaining music, I would find it a bit wearing, especially with the pre pubescent interface. Won't be tossing the cd collection just yet

[BBMmk2]

Never do that RFG! I would never replace my cd collection, like I had my LPs! :(

[richardfinegold]

Never do that RFG! I would never replace my cd collection, like I had my LPs! :(

Although, BBM, the idea of having one's collection "in the cloud" has it's attractions. I have two fully stocked rooms in my small house with Physical Media (CDs, lps, blu rays, etc). Wouldn't it be nice to reduce clutter?
I know that I am to attached to my collection to ever go the streaming route. It will be interesting to see in coming generations how much Physical Media they possess.
I still love going to second hand stores that sell CDs, lps, etc and just browsing. We have several in our areas that are just tantalazingly out of my current walking idstance and I am not allowed to drive or cycle for a while. (sigh) And the weather is so fine now...

[umslopogaas]

There are always people calling on us all to reduce clutter - I just saw somewhere that the average UK household has four thousand quid's worth of unwanted items - but I rather like it, and since I live by myself, I have no-one nagging me to get rid of stuff. In particular I have a lifetime's accumulation of LPs, about eight thousand in all, which is why I live alone in a four bedroom house: every wall that can bear the weight has shelves of discs. I still buy LPs when I can find anything worth buying, but that is very rare these days. I also buy CDs at a steady rate, mostly on the recommendation of Gramophone magazine, but sometimes as a result of what I hear on R3. At the moment I am working through several bargain boxes of CDs that, per disc, are astonishingly cheap. Three boxes of Mercurys, the complete Toscanini, the complete commercial Callas, the complete Columbia (Sony) Boulez, the complete Messiaen and two boxes of Decca, one mono and one stereo. This may seem like over indulgence, but at about two quid a disc I couldnt resist. All these are recordings issued several times before, on LP and then CD. This is the companies' last attempt to squeeze a bit more revenue out of them before the younger generation takes over and abandons CDs in favour of downloads.

That list amounts to getting on for five hundred discs, which would form a decent core collection, even without all the others I have. Last time a friend of mine visited she said "you dont need any more records!" but she doesnt understand the collecting urge ...

[Jonathan]

I agree umslopogaas - as a conchologist with over 15000 shells in my collection (and lots more following our holiday last week) and over 1000 CDs some people just don't get the collecting thing...

[richardfinegold]

I agree umslopogaas - as a conchologist with over 15000 shells in my collection (and lots more following our holiday last week) and over 1000 CDs some people just don't get the collecting thing...

Those shells can't be digitalized, either