I’ve been toying with this idea for a while and I think I’m gonna do it. Anyone else done this? I know Keith303 did a while back.
I set up an account with Routenote which lets you put stuff up for free, and they take 15% of your earnings.
Not like I expect to earn anything anyway. I just think it would be cool/funny to have my stuff on there.
I was surprised when I saw the site expects mp3s as the source files though. I really would have thought they would use lossless. You want it to be as high quality as possible from the source, so it doesn’t get re-encoded upon streaming. That’s my logic anyway.
Apparently you can do lossless, but only on their pay accounts, which is like $10 per song.
I wonder if the other services do lossless.
Anyway. I’m just gonna do 320kbps mp3s. It’ll just be a compilation of some of my favorite songs of mine from over the years. Basically a “greatest hits”, if I ever had any hits, lol.
Anyone got any tips or anything? I heard it takes 3-4 weeks for the stuff to “aggregate” to Spotify. I’ll post a link later just for giggles
I used Tunecore, which takes lossless files, but they’ve become more and more expensive and obnoxious over the years. I’m gonna swap my stuff over to Distrokid soon:https://distrokid.com/
I would like to know about the loudness the songs require for those specific platforms… I read some that every platform requires different loudness levels.
I would like to know about the loudness the songs require for those specific platforms… I read some that every platform requires different loudness levels.
Also, is distrokid still the best way to go?
Thanks.
My understanding is that steaming services apply their own compression when playing.
I think with DistroKid you could select different sets of distribution services and upload different files each time. (I can imagine the tedium though.)
My own approach is to not master for maximum loudness, leave some head room and dynamics, and the results will be fine for most people.
This is largely a cost/benefit calculation for myself. I find I’m better served by devoting resources to creating more music than to finessing some (relatively) marginal gain in quality for this or that service. I get far more plays from Bandcamp and Soundcloud than any streaming service so at the moment there’s little incentive for me to pursue “Mastered for iTunes.”
Ok. So are you saying that itunes, spotify accepting any kind of loudness? I really not want to do some loudness war, but as far as I remember, it will be rejected if not match the required loudness… Maybe it is simply crap.
My songs usually have a DR around 11… I still have to measure LUFS…
Ok. So are you saying that itunes, spotify accepting any kind of loudness? I really not want to do some loudness war, but as far as I remember, it will be rejected if not match the required loudness… Maybe it is simply crap.
My songs usually have a DR around 11… I still have to measure LUFS…
What about your songs?
I’m unaware of any special audio test but I really don’t know. Seems odd; what if your music is just very quiet?
My DR often sits around 6 or so. Some songs have more range. I picked one that I think might be a “worst case” track (fairly dense and thrashy). I try to leave some room to account for side-effects of format conversion. I think I peak at -1.5 DBs
iTunes changes the audio to -16 LUFS, no compression or limiting applied. So ideally, your tune has -16 LUFS, so you can exactly hear how it will sound like.
Youtube -13 LUFS
Spotify -12 LUFS
Soundcloud doesn’t change anything, but converts to 128kbit MP3 (limitations occur)
I’ve been thinking about going the distrokid route, putting stuff on spotify etc, but not so much worried about loudness, rather how it would affect the creative commons character of the music I’ve also put on free music archive / bandcamp etc.
I don’t plan on becoming a member of some mcps-prs alliance kinda license maffia if that is obligatory(?). I like the idea of people being able to use my music on youtube without a copyright gestapo hammering it down and wonder if putting my music on streaming services would automatically flag the same music on youtube?
I’ve been thinking about going the distrokid route, putting stuff on spotify etc, but not so much worried about loudness, rather how it would affect the creative commons character of the music I’ve also put on free music archive / bandcamp etc.
I don’t plan on becoming a member of some mcps-prs alliance kinda license maffia if that is obligatory(?). I like the idea of people being able to use my music on youtube without a copyright gestapo hammering it down and wonder if putting my music on streaming services would automatically flag the same music on youtube?
You retain all rights. You can set the license as you see fit. But I don’t recall an option (when uploading to assorted distributors) to state that your music is CC or whatever. (I might be wrong.)
One Distrokid annoyance is that there’s no option to include additional digital material, such as a PDF where you can be more explicit about rights, copying, etc. I charge for my stuff but I tell my friends to feel free to make a copy for anyone they think would enjoy it. (I’m still up in the air on shifting to a pay what you want model. It kinda worked OK for an ebook I wrote, but even there I later moved to $5+. Pricing is tricky.)
I opted to get my music on most of the Distrokid options (Spotify, iTunes, Amazon, etc, but not the additional YouTube whatever service) primarily to increase access for anyone who might be interested. But I try to steer people to Bandcamp because they will get the included PDF “booklet”. And I get more of the mad profits[0].
You can always still upload your music to your own YouTube channel and set all the rights info as you like.
[0] I haven’t even earned back what Distrokid costs me. They say, “Do what you love and the money will follow”, but I’m getting a bit skeptical. ಠᴗಠ
Spotify has always been a great streaming tool and even though like apple music too putting stuff on spotify is more easier with musconv playlist converter
