The rock legend, who died Oct. 2, charts highest with “Free Fallin’” at No. 4. Tom Petty populates 14 of the top 25 spots on Billboard’s 50-position Hot Rock Songs chart (dated Oct. 21), as the late singer’s sizable catalog grew in all metrics following his Oct. 2 death. On the streaming-, sales- and airplay-based…

In the coming weeks, the Guardian is embarking on a survey of the underground in music – asking if it still exists in a world where everything is visible online, and if so, where. Fifty years ago this month, the Guardian announced what it called “our autumn promotion for 1967… a ‘roving exploration’ into the…

Listening to music has rarely been easier… Facebook has unveiled the integration of Apple Music into Facebook Messenger, allowing subscribers to stream songs on the messaging service for the first time ever. Before the integration was announced, users were able to build collaborative Spotify playlists and receive song recommendations based on your conversations with friends,…

They say you should never meet your idols, but recording and mixing engineer Bruce Sugar would surely disagree. Growing up near Atlantic City, Sugar was a bright-eyed kid who was introduced to music early on and spent his childhood practicing piano. Then, one day in 1964, he heard a sound like no other on The…

Hit-making songwriters and producers reveal the ways they are tailoring tracks to fit a musical landscape dominated by streaming.   A romantic guitar unfurls a tender melody. Male voices bark shout-outs and then croon like they’re auditioning for “American Idol.” There’s an electronic whoosh. A rat-a-tat vocal phrase. And that’s all before “Despacito” even really starts….

To understand the power Instagram holds for the music industry, look no further than Beyoncé’s baby bump. If you were anywhere near the internet on February 1 of this year, you likely saw the now famous photo of the pregnant diva looking out behind a green veil. But the viral photograph wasn’t clandestinely shot for…

Have DJs finally found a way to create new mixes from high-quality stems? For years, DJs, producers, and remixers have had to rely on non-legal stems to create mixes of popular songs.  Now, music creators may finally have a legal way to create and legally distribute remixes. Following a landmark deal with Sony Music, Nashville-based…

Though YouTube wasn’t created to be a streaming music service, the Google-owned platform remains the single most-used website in the world to listen to music legally. While competitors like Spotify and Apple Music are growing by leaps and bounds, the majority of music lovers all around the world still prefer to head to YouTube to…

We are facing a firehose. Data spews at us from all angles, inundating us with ideas, culture, and creativity. We produce terabytes of information a year, changing the world as we know it. We are the most culturally aware generations in existence. Or are we? An interesting recent post on Marginal Revolution post gives lie…