The Soundtrack to June 2011

How was June for you? Yeah, ours wasn’t too bad at all, thanks for asking. Partly because it’s been another ace month for new music. What better way to summarise all of the brilliant tunes June brought us than with a rummage through playlist institution, The Soundtrack to… The latest edition features bangers from Toddla T, Tom Vek, Foster The People, Booka Shade, Art Brut and more.

Americana

The Spotify revolution is currently sweeping the US, which is why we created this mixtape featuring all of our favourite American artists – and a few guilty pleasures thrown in for good measure: John Lee Hooker, Leadbelly, Howlin’ Wolf, Gil Scott-Heron, James Brown, Miles Davis, Ryan Adams, Jeff Buckley and far to many more to mention.

Funky USA - Welcome!

Our friends over at Acid Jazz Hispano make the best playlists, packed full of the coolest funk, soul, house, hip-hop and pretty much everything else in between. They’re also welcoming the US to Spotify with this little beauty; featuring Curtis Mayfield, The Salsoul Orchestra, Naughty By Nature, The Roots, Zhané and more. An amazing mixtape.

Continue reading… »

Wolf Gang, created and fronted by singer/songwriter Max McElligott has come a long way in the last few months. Wolf Gang has been out on the road since the beginning of May, touring all over the UK, with packed shows at Camden Crawl, Great Escape and most recently his headline date at XOYO. The tour also includes appearances at T In The Park, Secret Garden Party, V Festival, Wakestock and Underage Festival.

Wolf Gang will release his debut album ‘Suego Faults’ on 25 July. The debut album was recorded with producer Dave Fridmann (MGMT, Mercury Rev, Flaming Lips) and showcases just what everyone is anticipating – a ferocious pop record with an abundance of suave panache, punchy beats and heart-throttling melodies.

However, Spotify Premium users can listen to the album right now, by clicking here.

Not a Premium subscriber yet? You can sign up right away over here.

When we could tear ourselves away from the Knitting Tent and the multi-coloured sheep pen, there was some amazing music (and weather) to be enjoyed at Latitude!

Our friends at Absolute Radio have got fantastic interviews and stage performances for you to re-live. Paolo Nutini, Hurts, The National…the list goes on – check them out here.

If you’ve not already subscribed to the Absolute Radio Latitude playlists, don’t be shy - Absolute Radio.

We’re excited to let you know that today we’re bringing Spotify to the US.

This is a great day for anyone who loves music in the US and, of course, a real milestone for us at Spotify. I’m proud of the fantastic team who have been working tirelessly to bring what we think is the best possible music service to our friends in the US.

The Land of the Free, the Unlimited and the Premium

During our invite-only beta phase, we’ll be offering three great services - from absolutely free to paid subscriptions. The services we’re launching today are:

• Spotify Free – the unsurpassed free music service. With an invite, enjoy on-demand, buffer-free access to million songs on your computer and great social features. Manage your own music files through Spotify, and sync with your cellphone or iPod. Features occasional advertising.
• Spotify Unlimited – all the special features of our free service, but with uninterrupted, ad-free access to Spotify on your computer. All for only $4.99 a month.
• Spotify Premium - the top-of-the-range Spotify experience. Premium gives you access to all the music, all the time. Listen online or offline, on your computer, your cellphone and a whole heap of other devices. Enjoy enhanced sound quality and access to exclusive content, competitions and special offers. Premium costs just $9.99 a month. (That’s the equivalent of a couple of fancy coffees.)

We’re launching in partnership with some of the biggest and most pioneering brands in the world, who all want to help us spread the good word of Spotify. Our exclusive launch partners are Coca-Cola and Sprite, Chevrolet, Motorola, Reebok, Sonos and The Daily. These brands will be launching innovative campaigns in partnership with Spotify in the coming weeks and months.

We believe that music is the most social thing there is and that’s why we’ve built the best social features into Spotify for easy sharing and the ultimate in music discovery. Even if you aren’t a total music freak, chances are you have a friend who is and whose taste you admire. I’m looking forward to connecting with some of you guys in the US through Spotify and discovering some cool new tracks.

If you’re in the US and you haven’t already signed up for an invite, feel free to do so now - we’ll send one to you as soon as we can. Of course, if you just can’t wait, you can jump the queue by signing up directly for Spotify Premium or Unlimited starting at just $4.99 a month.

Here’s to our American adventure!

The new compilation from UK legend Paul Oakenfold will be available for one week exclusively on Spotify beginning Friday 8th July.

“Never Mind The Bollocks… Here’s Paul Oakenfold” will see a digital release on iTunes on July 15th followed by the worldwide release of the double CD version on 22nd July. However, Spotify Premium subscribers will have the world premiere for the full mix from July 8th. It’s the first time that Dutch record company Armada Music and Spotify collaborate on an exclusive release.

Paul Oakenfold: “I am thrilled that such a forward thinking service as Spotify is allowing my fans full legal access to my new music, they are changing the game, Never Mind the Bollocks…this is the future.”

Listen to the album here!

Not a Premium subscriber yet? You can sign up right away over here.

Hospital Records is a legendary independent record label from South London. Primarily releasing Drum+Bass, the label was started in 1996 by Tony Colman and Chris Goss, and has grown in recent years to become one of the most well known labels within UK dance music.

The label is home to artists such as High Contrast, London Elektricity, Danny Byrd, Mistabishi, Logistics, Nu:Tone and Cyantific, but also releases tracks from a whole host of other artists across the D+B genre. Check out their Spotify playlist now.

We have an update to our popular iOS app to let you know about. This update is version 0.4.14 and includes a number of improvements and features, including playlist folders. So if you’ve sorted your long lists of playlists into folders on your computer, you can now finally experience organizational bliss on your iPhone and iPod Touch as well!

The full list of improvements and features includes:

• New: Support for playlist folders.
• Fixed: Playlist name is no longer truncated when a playlist is loaded.
• Fixed: Opening links when the app is not open has been improved.
• Changed: Shuffle behaviour. Shuffle is now only turned off when you play from a new list if it was implicitly turned on by ‘Shuffle play’.
• Fixed: Some songs incorrectly ended a second early. This has been fixed.

Enjoy the update!

We’ve been championing rising Nottingham soul star Liam Bailey for some time now here at Spotify, ever since he released his first 2 EPs on Amy Winehouse’s Lioness label last year. Blown away by his impressive pipes and raw talent, we asked him to play for us at Koko on Sept 2010

Since then, he’s had Top 5 success on the massive Chase & Status hit Blind Faith which he co-wrote with the band, and has toured with not only Chase & Status, but has also hit the road since with both Plan B and Jessie J.

Liam now releases his new stunning 4 track EP It’s Not The Same. The accompanying video for the lead track was shot in Cuba, and is available to watch below, along with other great clips, such as a spine-tingling acoustic version with cello of Blind Faith (also on the EP), plus other live and acoustic clips of Liam. There’s also a brilliant clip of Liam record shopping in his hometown of Nottingham, where he talks of early inspirations from Michael Jackson to John Martyn.

If you happen to be lost in the woods of Sweden and stumble across a remote cabin you may come across a girl and boy duo making sweet ethereal music. They know each other as David Lehnberg and Elin Lindfors, but the locals know them as The Deer Tracks. Now Lehnberg and Lindfors have come out of their isolated, barely functional cabin to share with us the second installment of their trilogy of releases; a full-length album, The Archer Trilogy Part 2.

Having already teased us with the ethereal “Prologue” single & E.P “The Archer Trilogy Pt. 1.” - The first full length instalment of this epic story has an overwhelming sense of cellular fission as the delicate chemistry of the album unfolds like ice crystals forming. The elemental influences are plain to see: Dance/Rest, Dark/Light, Abstract/Plain, Esoteric/Pop, Vast/Microscopic, Gentle/Savage. It’s an album of beautiful opposites.

Discover the enchantment for yourself - as the band open this second installment early exclusively for Spotify users & catch up on the musical trilogy so far with the exclusive playlist.