Taylor Swift’s ‘Reputation’ reportedly won’t be available on streaming services on its first week

To say Taylor Swift’s relationship with streaming services is tenuous is an understatement. And it looks like that’s just going to continue. A new report from Bloomberg claims Reputation, the pop superstar’s fifth album, won’t be on any streaming services at least a week after it goes on sale. The die-hard fans who want to get their hands on the record will either need to buy it online or if you live in the US, through Target. Taylor Swift has openly criticized the music streaming service industry for devaluing music.

The move might also be prompted by the importance to Swift of getting to the top spot of the charts with physical and digital record sales, which is also seen as a more lucrative endeavor. It hasn’t really been outright confirmed by Swift’s camp and she could change her mind. But we won’t be surprised of the likelihood of this happening. 

Report claims Tesla wants to build its own streaming music service

Rumour has it Tesla is currently in talks with music labels to build its own streaming music service in its cars. Why are they doing this? Because they can. According to music industry sources, the company is talking to labels to help create this music service that will be bundled with the cars. There are supposedly going to be multiple tiers of the service, starting off with a Pandora-like web radio offering.

Why they won’t just integrate existing services, we can’t say. A Tesla spokesperson told Recode, “We believe it’s important to have an exceptional in-car experience so our customers can listen to the music they want from whatever source they choose. Our goal is to simply achieve maximum happiness for our customers.

Study shows music streaming services are shortening musical intros

Music streaming services aren’t just disrupting traditional record labels. It seems they’re changing the way songs are made, too. A new study from Hubert Léveillé Gauvin, a doctoral student in music theory at The Ohio State University, finds that songs are getting shorter instrumental introductions to try and accommodate the shortening attention span of listeners. And it seems the streaming services—such as Spotify and Pandora—are to blame.

Gauvin listened to and analyzed songs that made it into the top 10 from 1986 to 2015 and found “a dramatic shift away from long intros” and “a marked increase in tempo.” Songs back in the mid-80s had intros averaging over 20 seconds, now they’re down to five seconds on average so they immediately get to the lyrics. Tempo has also increased by around eight percent.

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