Spotify Features

Have you tried using Spotify yet? It's a great app that lets you listen to all types of music. There are both free and premium accounts with more or less the same functionality. The main difference occurs in the ads that play for the free service.

So what can you do in Spotify? Well, aside from building your own collection of music you can also listen to the playlists that are automatically created. Why am I telling you this? It's been a great experience to find new artists, many of whom are independent. It's cool to hear from artists that in the past you may never have heard of!

Two features in particular that I wanted to mention are Discover Weekly and Daily Mix.

• Discover Weekly: This feature assembles a list of tracks every Monday that you might like based on your listening history. They may not always resonate, but sometimes you can find some amazing stuff!
• Daily Mix: This feature assembles 6 daily mixes for the user, loosely based around genre. It plays music you've saved in your library, and also adds in related tracks!

Aside from features found in the app, I think that streaming music services have been a revolution in the democratization of music. Not too long ago you might not hear a musician unless they were signed to a big label or, alternatively, if they were a local act. Using services like this (in addition to others like SoundCloud) has provided more power to artists!

Not only have services like this made the release of music more accessible for artists, they've also disrupted the industry in general! We could go further into the marketing implications of this such as the general adoption of new technologies (i.e. vinyl -> cassette -> CD -> .mp3 -> steaming), maybe in a future post!

At the end of the day it's about having fun finding music that you enjoy!

Music, Marketing, and Analytics

Music is produced through a combination of creativity, talent, and technical skill. In addition to the creative process, bands also stand out based on their brand. This becomes more apparent with some of the big names who likely utilize a lot of marketing resources.

With the advent of digital marketing tools, a lot of analysis can be done for the online presence of a brand. For example, determining how users engage with web site content including media and merchandise pages. Sonicbids Blog provides a good overview of the importance of analytics in the music business.

Google Marketing Platform

A lot of resources aren't required to conduct analytics using tools such as the Google Marketing Platform. You just need a Google account to access the platform where you can use several tools for free. Here are some of the products available:

• Analytics: Learn more about web traffic for your sites
• Data Studio: Combine data sources and generate reports
• Surveys: Gather audience insights
• Tag Manager: Set up multiple analytics tools

Google Analytics

We'll go into a bit more detail specifically for Google Analytics. This is a great tool that allows you to get insights to help your brand. Here are some examples of the data provided:

• Number of visitors to your site by day and time
• Demographics: Language, country, and city of visitors
• Platform info such as browser, operating system, and whether it's mobile
• Referral sites from where visitors reached you
• Bounce rate: When visitors leave your site without engaging

This just scratches the surface of the product. For more information there are courses available at Google Analytics Academy from beginner to advanced level. The tool will help to get a better picture of the audience and the effect of ad campaigns when utilized.

A couple of useful terms to understand when starting out with analytics:

• Metric: Numerical data like number of visitors to your site
• Dimension: A category such as country of origin for web traffic

A lot more resources for the tool can be found with an online search. More specifically for applying the tool to the music business is an explanation by The Hostbaby Blog. Hopefully this overview will be handy for independent artists to research further.

Music Venues and Lifestyle in Toronto

Toronto has a variety of music venues including arena scale, outdoor, and club setting. Here's my impression of a few venues:

Scotiabank Arena

Located in the heart of Toronto's Entertainment District, this venue hosts some amazing live music. I saw Muse perform there (seen below) and it was a great experience. Consider this venue if you want to see well known bands and large scale productions. Scotiabank Arena Concert Listings

NXNE - Various Locations

Held at various venues across the city, NXNE is a Toronto music festival that runs for over a week. One of the main stages is at Yonge-Dundas Square where free outdoor concerts are provided. It features a variety of artists with a few headliners so check the schedule to see who's performing. I saw Cadence Weapon and Chvrches (seen below) which were both decent shows. NXNE Info

King Street West

The King West area of the city is host to many bars and nightclubs. There are often DJ sets at the venues in addition to some live performances. Smaller scale sets than some mentioned above with lots of energy. One example is Uniun where I happened to see Wyclef Jean perform (seen below).

Resources for events and active lifestyle

There are lots of great things to do in Toronto including concerts, events, and restaurants. Keeping track of things can be difficult so I wanted to share a few resources:

• blogTO: This blog maintains an amazing list of events including concerts and other entertainment around the city.
• NOW Toronto: Another great site containing a list of music events in Toronto and info on local bands.

In addition to music events here are some blogs to complement an active lifestyle:

• How to Live Local in Toronto: Restaurants, entertainment, and shopping in Toronto.
• J Foodie Adventures and Reviews: Explore some places to eat around the city.
• Science for Muscle Up: Stay healthy and fit. 
• Meal Prepping Made Easy: Save time with these quick and easy recipes.
• Ana's healthy food blog: Tips on healthy food and lifestyle.
• Beyond the Blonde: Protecting your health and the environment.

Welcome!

The goal of this blog is to provide info on some interesting bands and songs. With so much amazing music out there a lot of quality gems can be missed. Through friends, playlists, Shazam, and Spotify algorithms, a lot of new music can be discovered. Follow along with the journey to learn about some unique artists!

Stay tuned for more info.