Just started free* trials of Qobuz and Tidal. They both offer up to 24-bit, 192 kHz streaming. Even so, I think I prefer Qobuz's quality.
The drawback is that Qobuz does NOT HAVE LYRICS. This is a major drawback for me as a hearing impaired person and also a songwriter (I want to know for sure what the lyrics are)! Qobuz is slightly cheaper if you pay annually rather than monthly.
*free but you give them payment info and the subscription kicks in if you don't cancel
@mibwright@KydiaMusic I subscribe to Qobuz. I believe they pay the most and their Sublime level offers significant discounts on Hi-Res purchases. #Qobuz
@evacide I was just noticing that everything has gone up. Of course, groceries have been too much for some time now, but even HiRes digital albums on #Qobuz have been more expensive, and I am supposed be getting a discount with my Sublime membership. Books haven't gone up too much, at least not in the last few years.
I've moved my streaming to Qobuz now that they're available in Canada. I now have a sound system capable of playing Hi-res and I really appreciate it. Only thing is there's no social aspect on the site but they have a member's forum apart. Still at least we have Last.fm and I'm happy to pay my dues for that to continue... #lastfm#music#qobuz
I played this record in the car 🚘 and decided to hear it in the lounge. I started in Apple Spatialize Audio but it was rubbish and switched to #qobuz#lossless via #roon. The haze cleared up. Apple compresses the main channels to make all the Dolby Atmos other stuff fit in an AirPods Pro pipe. The Maggies didn’t like it. Tubby bass.
This is a very slow, meditative music with a sonorous improvisational melody. Well the opener is. The second track is a lively piano opened #hardbop tune.
@verge @davidpierce Did your #streaming survey take into account sharing#music, and how annoying it is to want to send links to stuff when your friends are scattered across the Big Five (and maybe #Qobuz, if you’re that one guy)? (1/3)
Good news: Just got this e-mail from Tidal. HiRes FLAC audio quality will be available for every subscriber starting April 10. They are finally getting rid of the former "Hifi Plus" plan which costs almost twice as much as the regular sub.
This is great news for music lovers and brings the Tidal plans more on par with Qobuz HiRes. I've just been testing both streaming services and both are great Spotify alternatives but with slightly different pros and cons.
Declaring Apple Music bankruptcy; it has made me so unhappy with what's left of the music library I spent 25 years curating that there's just no way to fix it anymore. I've lost my algorithm-seeding play counts, hearts and stars many times over by now. cmd-A, delete 🫡
@stroughtonsmith the inconsistencies of stream services (no continuous play, weird audio quality and albums disappearing) actually made me consider buying vinyl for the first time ever. #tidal#qobuz#roon
Habe erstmalig den #qobuz Downloadstore ausprobiert da ein bestimmtes Album nicht (mehr) als CD erhältlich und leider auch nicht bei #bandcamp ist. Das Nutzererlebnis war nicht sehr überzeugend. Download Manager App funktioniert nicht und per Web muss man jeden Titel einzeln laden (bei eingeschränkter Auswahl des Dateiformats). 🤷🏻♂️
I think Metalhead.club has helped me reunite with the concept of album again, something that has been lacking for me since the 90s really. This applies across the board to any genre thankfully. Song titles are hard for me because the concept of album is a headspace like being drunk is different from being sober or depressed is different from mental balance. In the headspace, I remember and experience constituent parts or lines / webs of thought.
@jake4480 Seems I went down the same rabbit hole 😄 Looking for a #Spotify replacement. Personally, I liked #Tidal but the rest of family isn't on board. #Qobuz IS a weird name but it's the only streaming service that let's me download albums forever DRM-free for a reasonable price, often cheaper than used CDs on eBay (with their premium tier). I like to listen to a lot of new stuff but usually only have a few favorite albums or tracks per year, so this could be perfect for me 🤔
I've been a #Qobuz subscriber since last year, and in general I like it, though its Android app's performance has been wonky.
But today was the first time I tried to purchase and download an album. 18 tracks. After purchase, the site tells me if I want to download it, I need to use their "downloader app for #Linux". Grrr, but OK, that's better than downloading 18 files one-by-one.
You guessed it, Mac and Windows are the only options on the software install page. AAARGH
Why not JUST GIVE US A .ZIP with all the files in it? #Bandcamp does this, and for God's sake even the moribund eMusic, which used to force its customers to use a downloader (which BTW was available for #linux),
eventually forsook that practice and went back to just providing a .zip.
#NowPlaying Bach: Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violoncello Piccolo - Mario Brunello.
I will admit, until #Qobuz recommended this album, I was not familiar with Mario Brunello, despite his many accomplishments and my rather rich familiarity with #ClassicalMusic. I have dozens of recordings of #Bach's Sonatas and Partitas, but this is unique for obvious reasons. It is well performed, too.
From time to time I ask myself if Screamer's #Kingmaker should really be that high up my #AOTY list, but then I put it on and the intro riff to Kingmaker and and and.... man it's good 🤘
Just as an head up: Starting in #2024 , #Spotify will stop monetizing content that receives less than 1000 plays per year so basically I will no longer get anything in return for hosting my #music there (and will remove it outright if they start charging monthly fees to keep it online). While for the time being I still plan to keep my music on Spotify, I'd suggest instead using an alternate platform such as #TIDAL , #Deezer , #Qobuz , #Apple Music or #Bandcamp (no streaming revenues there but people can buy music) to listen to my music. As for #Youtube , their Premium plans seems to skyrocket in price so IMHO when ten song plays barely even give more than $0.01 on Youtube it's not worth it.
Was digging for #newmusic on #bandcamp and #qobuz yesterday and while I heard many really interesting tracks, I rarely felt touched by anything. 🤔️ Some of the compositions were absolute masterpieces of #production though! 🤯️ Lots of super bright, noisy, distorted, twisted sounds but (to me!) little harmony and/or emotional connection. Seems like especially in #electronic#musicproduction many producers are gravitating towards #sounddesign. Not a bad thing, just saying.
#Soundcloud for Artists has done its job and today my first song has been published on a bunch of platforms. Exciting!
Later I'll try to publish on #Bandcamp for the first time, I'll switch on Soundcloud, and I'll publish on Anartist.org 's platforms. I will "launch" when all this is done.
Meanwhile, could you search for "icaria36" wherever you listen to your #music and let me know if you find me there or not, please? I'll go wherever you go. :)
#NowPlaying
I’m listening to Ratt’s 1999 self-titled album for the first time. It’s not quite as “metal”, but still pretty decent. I recently bought their “The Atlantic Years 1984-1990” CD boxed set which is “all killer, no filler”. 👍 #Ratt#CD#Qobuz
This new track of Courtney Hadwin has such a nice vibe. I can't stop listening. There is something there that I cannot put my finger on, the voice, music, her unique style,... something is there that makes it super great.
I had a nice coding session listening to this #Monsters track and the Sucker track.
And for my DRM-avoiding friends here, I bought the DRM-free Flac from #Qobuz 😉