Apple demonstrated last year how it can embed Shazams music identification capabilities even deeper within iOS 14. Now, Apple Music is taking another step forward. Apple Music introduced DJ mixes and remixes in 2016 as a result of a partnership with Dubset Media Holdings. This partnership allowed Apple Music to identify and pay licensed music within mix mixes.
Apple Music now claims that it has the tools to compensate creators, event promoters and labels by using the Shazam tech they acquired in 2018. Subscribers can also see individual track names, skip tracks within the mix, hear lossless audio on most mixes and save them to their library to view offline.
The same fingerprint ID tech that can tell you the name and genre of a song in the mall can also identify which festival it's from, what DJs mixed it, and pick out the different sounds they mix together. This information is quite detailed, as it relies on matching across Apple Musics database, which has about 75 million songs, to allow for recurring revenue streams for both the clubs hosting sets and the DJs who make them.
The Apple Music app has a DJ mix page. Engagement has increased by three times in the past twelve months. There have been over 300 million DJ mixes streamed so far.
Apple has been adding mix mixes to iTunes for the past year, including some from Tisto and Charlotte de Witte. Studio K7! Horst Weidenmueller, the founder of Studio K7, stated in a statement that the partnership with Apple has finally allowed us to celebrate DJ-Kicks in a space with 14 additional editions that haven't been on the market in over 15 years.
Apple Music has announced that it is commissioning more mixes, following series earlier this year to celebrate Black Music Month and Pride. It also works closely with DJs to obtain additional content for the service. This new route will allow DJ mixes to be added to Apple Music, alongside older Dubsets content. You can still enjoy the existing Apple Music mixes, even though they don't have all of the new features. It is not yet available for bedroom DJs and lesser-known artists posting mixtapes on SoundCloud. There is still some time between that and Muxtape.
