After almost a decade of being subscribed to Spotify, I’ve unsubscribed. Why? Because Spotify ruined how I consumed music.
Spotify is one of, if not the biggest music streaming platforms in the world. Its stranglehold on the music industry, especially the past few years, has started to affect just how much influence this platform has had on music consumption and composition, and in my opinion I don’t think it’s a good thing.
A quick history lesson: Back in the late 90s to early 00s, the music industry was in turmoil due to piracy, from people ripping and burning CDs to the rise of Napster, Limewire, and The Pirate Bay. The music industry needed saving, and along came Spotify. After several changes in direction, Spotify quickly gained traction and became what it is today, now claiming to have “saved the music industry” or in their most recent blog, “getting the world to value music“. Along the way, the company realised how it could commodify music in a way that almost made it disposable.
As a massive music data nerd, I’ve been tracking my music listening habits via Last.fm since 2008. Last.fm keeps track of what you’ve listened to and also gives you regular reports about your habits. Think of it like Spotify Wrapped but it arrives weekly, monthly, and yearly. You can also use a series of third-party websites to generate grids of your listening habits to share across social media.
Now, the reason I went on a little bit of a tangent is because for the longest time my Last.fm reports were a mixed bag of artists and albums. I tend to shuffle music a lot. During my tenure on Spotify I’d amassed a whole bunch of playlists, some around genres, others around moods, and others were my own jumbled concoction of music. I even utilised Smarter Playlists to consolidate all of my Daily Mixes, Release Radar, Discover Weekly, and a few other personalised playlists into one massive playlist that I’d shuffle regularly.
Cut to the past few years and I started to notice something weird. Despite shuffling playlists that often had over 1000 songs, my weekly Last.fm 5×5 grids began to feature the same albums week after week.
It’s no secret that Spotify has been pushing algorithmic nonsense on its users for the past couple of years under the guise of music discovery or giving you music you didn’t know you wanted to listen to. But with that came the force-feeding of the same music week after week and soon, I’d had enough.
Transferring to a new streaming service wasn’t easy, and a bit like an addict I tried several times to quit Spotify but nothing matched up. What I did have was a hard drive full of local files which was fine when I was at my PC, but what if I wanted to listen to music on my phone or in the car? Sure, I could subscribe to Apple Music and have my local library sync, but I find the UI so clunky.
Then I discovered Plex.
For those who don’t know, Plex is a media streaming platform that allows users to host their own media servers. This means those of you with a big collection of digital movies, TV shows, and music can host and stream your own library from anywhere. In addition to the Plex app available on almost every device, for Plex Pro subscribers they can also access the Plexamp app, a dedicated app for streaming music from your media server.
Plexamp is really where I was able to break free of the Spotify shackles. Featuring many of the things Spotify offers, from artist and song radios, playlist curation, and more, Plexamp – for the most part – doesn’t rely on algorithms to serve you music. There are also a couple of unique features for Plexamp users, too, like the Random Album Radio which picks albums at random from your library and if you really want AI features, you can link your Open AI account for some more advanced features.
Now, considering I’d been on Spotify for almost 20 years, I had discovered a lot of music and had many new favourites that weren’t in my local library. Cue the slow but satisfying process of seeking out and purchasing this music, combing through all of the vinyl records I’d collected over the years for any digital codes that are usually slipped in, and building up a hefty wishlist on Bandcamp.
While I may not have all of the music I want to hear just yet, I’m happy to be free of Spotify, they’re doing so much that’s just so anti-music nowadays that I’d rather take my money elsewhere and support artists directly.