https://wearethemusicmakers.co/latest Music tech and AI in music: the news that matters, what we think about it, and a directory of the tools. en-us Sat, 24 Oct 2026 06:30:00 GMT https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/pre-save-campaigns-explained https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/pre-save-campaigns-explained A pre-save lets a fan add a release to their library before it exists, so it lands there on release day. Spotify and Apple now offer this natively for albums and EPs, third-party links still fill the gap for singles, and the only hard evidence that pre-saves help comes from the platforms themselves. Here is how each route works and what we would actually do. Sat, 24 Oct 2026 06:30:00 GMT We are the music makers release-strategypre-savespotifyapple-musicworkflows https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/sample-rate-and-bit-depth-explained https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/sample-rate-and-bit-depth-explained Sample rate and bit depth are the two numbers on every audio file, and the advice around them is full of folklore. Here is what each one actually controls, what Spotify and Apple ask you to deliver, and why the honest answer for most independent releases is "record at 24-bit, keep your native rate, and never upsample". Sat, 24 Oct 2026 06:30:00 GMT We are the music makers masteringworkflowsspotifyapple-music https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/release-timeline-checklist https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/release-timeline-checklist Spotify lets you pitch yourself a week before release, but Apple Music, Amazon Music and Deezer editors mostly hear about your song through your distributor, and distributors want weeks of notice. Here is a six-week plan built backwards from the deadlines distributors publish, as we read them on 24 Oct 2026. Sat, 24 Oct 2026 03:30:00 GMT We are the music makers release-planningworkflowsplaylistsdistributionspotifyapple-music https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/streaming-loudness-targets-2026 https://wearethemusicmakers.co/learn/streaming-loudness-targets-2026 Most "streaming loudness target" charts mix official numbers with figures nobody at the platform ever published. We went back to each service's own pages on 24 Oct 2026. Spotify publishes a full spec, Apple and Amazon describe the method but no number, YouTube says normalisation-style processing is off for music, and for TIDAL and Deezer we found no current artist-facing page at all. Here is what is documented, what is reported, and a target plan you can defend. Sat, 24 Oct 2026 03:30:00 GMT We are the music makers masteringloudnessworkflowsspotifyapple-musicyoutube https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/10/apple-music-live-london-venue-concerts-new-release-insights https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/10/apple-music-live-london-venue-concerts-new-release-insights Apple Music opened a 600-capacity venue in London, streamed its first festival on video and sells DJ mixes that pay the producers whose tracks appear in them. It has also put concert dates on artist pages and same-day release data in Apple Music for Artists. The venue is for stars. The ticketing and data plumbing is where independent artists can get value, as long as they set it up before release day. Fri, 16 Oct 2026 04:30:00 GMT We are the music makers apple-musiclive-musicdj-mixesartist-analyticsstreaming https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/08/2027-release-checklist-guides-in-one-page https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/08/2027-release-checklist-guides-in-one-page We spent a month writing practical guides on releasing music, from registering a song to reading the statement that pays for it. This is the short version, in the order you will need it, with each step pointing back to the guide and the official page behind it. Tue, 25 Aug 2026 04:30:00 GMT We are the music makers workflowsrelease-planningmetadatamasteringspotifyapple-musicroyalties https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/08/loudness-normalisation-explained-lufs-spotify-apple-youtube https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/08/loudness-normalisation-explained-lufs-spotify-apple-youtube Spotify plays music at -14 LUFS by default and turns louder masters down, so a -8 LUFS master buys you no extra volume, only less dynamic range and more risk of encoding distortion. Here is what Spotify, Apple and YouTube actually document, what they leave out, and how to make mastering decisions with that in mind. Thu, 06 Aug 2026 04:30:00 GMT We are the music makers workflowsmasteringloudnessspotifyapple-musicyoutube https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/08/apple-music-dolby-atmos-spatial-bonus-worth-it https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/08/apple-music-dolby-atmos-spatial-bonus-worth-it Apple Music weights plays of tracks available in Spatial Audio at 1.1 against 1 for everything else, whether or not anyone listens in spatial. The catch is that you can't fake the mix, and the maths only works for tracks with a lot of Apple plays. Sun, 02 Aug 2026 04:30:00 GMT We are the music makers workflowsapple-musicdolby-atmosspatial-audioroyalties https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/03/tiktok-apple-music-play-full-song https://wearethemusicmakers.co/news/2026/03/tiktok-apple-music-play-full-song TikTok and Apple Music launched Play Full Song on 11 Mar 2026, letting Apple Music subscribers hear a whole track inside TikTok through Apple's MusicKit, so the play is paid as an Apple Music stream. The 15-second clip in the feed still isn't a stream, the feature is exclusive to Apple, and Spotify listeners still only get a save button. Wed, 11 Mar 2026 04:30:00 GMT We are the music makers industrystreamingtiktokapple-musicroyalties