SHAURYA SINGH THAPA
Business As Usual :
Understanding the pandemic ’ s impact on streaming services
The year 2020 drastically affected the world of music , courtesy of the coronavirus pandemic . Online concerts became the norm with a lull in live shows . Even now as the year is drawing to a close , public gigs have resurfaced albeit with lesser audiences . Hence , in a scenario like this , people have increasingly turned to streaming services to get a taste of their favourite artists and their new ‘ lockdown ’ releases . But how has business been like for the streaming giants in India ? Here ’ s an inside look , with inputs from some of the topmost streaming executives in the country .
Soumini Sridhara Paul , Vice President ;
Hungama Artist Aloud
Handling New Releases
With artists being stuck at home , many came up with innovative methods to record their songs in limited environments . It ’ s interesting to note how streaming services dealt with this boom of releases .
‘ The lockdown resulted in music studios being closed and this slowed down the flow of new releases . However , independent artists are resourceful and were quickly able to create and release new music from their homes and home studios itself . They even leveraged social media to release new music and connect with their fans . As a platform that supports and promotes independent content , we created a number of avenues for artists as well , beginning with a property called # StayAtHome # StayEntertained .’ says , Soumini
Sridhara Paul who serves as the Vice President for Hungama Artist Aloud .
As Paul adds , digital concerts also became quite normal . For instance , on World Music Day , Hungama joined forced with Book My Show to deliver 4 simultaneous music concerts .
Spotify ’ s Editorial Head Sneha Singh feels that business ran as usual , with consumption being largely the same when it came to local playlists of different languages . A rise in indie releases can further be linked to lack of film music . ‘… owing to a lack of film releases , we did see a spike in the release of independent / non film music over the last few months , leading to a whopping increase in the streams of this category of music since March .’
A JioSaavn spokesperson mentioned the service ’ s biggest pandemic releases to be , Kya Karoon by Zaeden , Dooriyan ( a promotional track for Bumble ), and Jhalle Kalle by Nikhita Gandhi .
Artists , both independent or label-affiliated ones , are reaching out to listeners directly and entertaining them now . Independent music has seen a massive growth through Gaana Originals as well as initiative by leading labels to produce / release non-film music .’ Says Prashan Agarwal , the CEO of Gaana . He also adds that Gaana made a playlist called Launchpad India , exclusively for non-film releases .
Challenges In Releasing The Tracks
Artists often use social media to build up hype for their upcoming releases , sharing the teaser and releasee date weeks before the release . They also urge their listeners to pre-save the single or try their best to get enough streams on the first few days for the song to be featured on editorial playlists of several streaming sites .
As Sneha Singh from Spotify adds , ‘ One global best practice we encourage our artists in India to also follow is submitting their songs at least one week prior to the release date - this would mean a higher chance of being featured in Spotify ' s editorial and algorithmic playlists on the day of release and soon after .’
Paul says that there weren ’ t many technical challenges involved for the lockdown releases even though Hungama ’ s employees had started working from home post-Holi season . Setting up virtual processes way before the first national lockdown ’ s announcement proved to be quite a smart move for the company .
The aforementioned JioSaavn spokesperson further said , ‘ The challenge was to present content in a way that would not only
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