Clubhouse Adds Music Mode, A New Audio Setting For Musicians And Creators

Clubhouse has introduced Music Mode on its app, which will first roll out to iOS devices and later on Android soon after. While its name sounds like an entirely new mode, the addition is actually a new audio setting that is tailored specially for musicians and creators who use the platform to broadcast their music. 

According to Clubhouse’s recent blog entry, activating Music Mode will optimise the platform’s audio streaming capability to deliver “high quality and great stereo sound.” In addition, enabling it will also allow musicians and creators to hook up professional equipment such as a USB microphone or a mixing board to be used during their broadcasts. 

To enable the mode, simply tap on the three dots at the top right corner, select Audio Quality, and then choose Music from the list. Keep in mind that this Mode is only for broadcasters, and regular users and audiences are not required to tweak their settings in order to enjoy the “high quality” music streaming.

In fact, Clubhouse had added a much appreciated audio enhancement feature for all users earlier this month. As we’ve reported prior to this, the platform previously introduced spatial audio support to its app, adding a sense of depth to its overall sound delivery – which is great for chat rooms, presentations, and also live music performances.

Being the pioneer of audio-only broadcasting, Clubhouse continues to face steep competition from its rivals such as Twitter, Facebook and even Spotify. All of which had only recently jumped into the scene after realising the fledgling platform’s ever growing success. Ever since, Clubhouse has vigorously been introducing improvements and new features to its app in order to be a step ahead of its numerous competitors.

Spotify Launches Website To Explain How It Pays Musicians

Under frequent criticism for exploiting artists, Spotify has launched a new website called Loud & Clear to better explain how it pays musicians – or in fact, how it doesn’t, not directly anyway.

Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek said the website is intended to “increase transparency and shed light on the complicated economics of music streaming.”

He claimed that, last year alone, Spotify paid over US$5 billion (~RM20.5 billion) in royalties and makes up about 20% of global recorded music industry revenue – more than any other streaming service.

Where does all that money go?

The website and nifty accompanying video makes it very clear that Spotify doesn’t hand money directly to artists, but rather to rights holders like record labels, distributors, aggregators, and collecting societies.

Spotify explained that it makes agreements with those right holders and pays them roughly two-thirds of the revenue it gets from subscriptions and advertising. Then the right holders will pay artists according to their contracts.

It sure looks like Spotify is saying, don’t blame us, go blame greedy record companies instead – an argument that has so far failed to convince many irate artists.

On Monday, artists and other music workers protested at Spotify offices around the world under a campaign organised by the Union of Musicians and Allied Workers (UMAW), Pitchfork reported.

Spotify was recently in the news due to a brief licensing breakdown with Korean music distributor Kakao, which caused K-pop songs to be temporarily yanked from the platform. Whether that confirms the case made by Spotify or its critics is hard to say.