A new streaming service has launched in the UK, with the US soon. Currently only IOS but Android coming soon. £4.99 per month, first month free.
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Thanks for posting. It has an interesting concept. I like it. I think we’ll enter a period where labels segregate. It feels inevitable that music streaming will go the way of TV streaming.
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Yeah, I’m all onboard this type of thing. Currently playing a Floating Points LP and it sounds pretty great. I get their concept that less is more, but unless I’m missing something there are not many albums there at all at the minute.
Anything that gets artists more money and more exposure is all good in my book.
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I emailed them with regards to what quality the streams are. It’s a good concept to introduce folks to artists/albums that they may never come across.
The library currently available is small, and I could see some folks getting bored of what’s available wasn’t to their taste.
Early days maybe.
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I’m on my 2nd LP now, and both have been 16 bit 44.1k using my iPad.
I’m guessing that due to the type of service it is that they are providing they will probably think CD quality is more than enough.
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A reply from the folks behind the service
Thanks so much for your email. The bit rate on the majority of tracks is 256+ and the sample rate 44.1khz. Like Spotify we use the AAC format. Down the line, we’re interested in providing users with high quality FLAC and including this in our settings. For now, however we’re focused on making sure the basic product works before adding these kinds of features.
Not quite sure why they’ve said Spotify uses AAC 
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Interesting. I would think they need to go down the FLAC route asap. The average music fan probably couldn’t give a toss, but most audiophiles would probably want at least CD quality. Got to say the stuff I played certainly sounded very good, and the display on my K17 DAC showed 16 bit 44.1k.
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The idea is lovely and you can kind of see how it grew out of a SubStack where a someone is recommending good music (assuming your tastes align, which admittedly is a big if) and you’re simply donating a few of dollars a month to support them / keep the newsletter going.
And I can see how they could expand it with label exclusives and pre-releases etc.
But I do wonder how well it will make the pivot from a newsletter to a streaming service. I expect there’s a mental barrier where people are happy to support someones personal SubStack. But once it becomes a commercial concern and sells itself as a streaming platform, you mentally start making cost / benefit comparisons with the major streaming platforms, one of which you’re likely going to keep paying for anyway.
I do think there is room for better manual curation, the fact that no platform is doing it really well is probably and indication of how expensive it is compared to using algorithms.
Have always been a bit surprised Roon haven’t lent more heavily into curation / picks of the week and built a network of freelance editorial staff to make weekly recommendations / editorial content inside Roon. In someways it would feel like a natural evolution to me. ie. they’re a world of music on modern streaming services, Roon helps you navigate it. But I expect cost comes heavily into it and you’d problay need a fairly large team to cover all the different music genre Roon users listen to. It’s not as if music magazines are springing up left right and centre nowadays either, quite the opposite.
Back to Cantilever, it reminds me a bit of how MUBI started out ie. 30 hand selected films and a 30 day window and while that was a lovely model in principle and possibly got them off the ground, they soon had to pivot to providing a bigger catalogue to justify the subscription price.
TBF they seem to be doing pretty well nowadays so maybe wasn’t a bad place to start.
btw. I can’t see anywhere on the site that is showing me the current / past selections… am I just being dumb?
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