Fed up with Spotify, suggestions for switching?

[Adamant11746]

So, a couple days ago I noticed Spotify once again removed an entire album from their service (this time it was Bad Animals, by Heart), and I'm tired of things like this happening. Another song I have favorited has had a couple skips in it for months. I want to switch to a different service, and am looking for suggestions.

I know Qobuz has every song I want to listen to, but the dealbreaker last time I tried it was lack of any sort of volume normalization. If there was a solution to this, Qobuz would be my first choice.

I don't know much about the other streaming services, and don't know how to check if they have the songs I want without signing up.

Here is a link to my current list of liked songs on Spotify, but I think you need Spotify to view it so I don't know how much help it will be: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3YUvQmkR2l51oAZnRPsNTc?si=a9bd4d4e91c8428c

Whatever I choose, I will need it to work well both on an android phone (via a usb dac to headphones, as well as bluetooth to my stereo) and a windows pc.

 

[SKBubba]

Tidal.

 

[Middle Earth]

It is not a streaming service but YouTube premium is what I prefer
I can listen to everything and it is stacked with great concert videos
I spend a lot of time on Band Camp as well

 

[JSmith]

CD's... FLAC downloads.


JSmith

 

[Middle Earth]

CD's... FLAC downloads.


JSmith

Yes big time
Band Camp does Flac

 

[bluefuzz]

I'm tired of things like this happening

In my experience it happens on every streaming service, often for the same albums or artists – I've seen the same album disappear from Qubuz and Spotify at exactly the same time. So switching services will rarely make much of a difference. It has more to do with where you live and what local rights agreements exist between publishers/distributors/record companies etc ...

 

[GD Fan]

If you're using a PC and an Android phone the interface may be OK. But I found Qobuz was shite with a Denon AVR, reluctantly returning to Tidal (which hiked prices).

 

[Adamant11746]

CD's... FLAC downloads.


JSmith

Not planning to go back to CDs after experiencing the convenience of streaming, but I was actually considering the FLAC option. I wouldn't be able to buy my entire playlist worth of albums at once, but I might be able to do it slowly. I'd have to find an inexpensive player on android and one on Windows that both have support for volume normalization though.

In my experience it happens on every streaming service, often for the same albums or artists – I've seen the same album disappear from Qubuz and Spotify at exactly the same time. So switching services will rarely make much of a difference. It has more to do with where you live and what local rights agreements exist between publishers/distributors/record companies etc ...

In this case I checked Qobuz and the album was still there, as was the other one that vanished over a year ago, but a friend with Apple Music said it was missing from there so you may have a point.

 

[Middle Earth]

I Heart CDs
I Love M-Disc
I am pushing 2k albums on Band Camp all downloaded in FLAC and ready for me to stream to boot

 

[LouB]

Qobuz, best I've used hands down.

 

[kekus]

I use both spotify and tidal. i just checked and heart - bad animals is available on tidal. You could try the 30 day trial.

 

[Room314]

Yes, I've seen albums disappear on Tidal too.

In my experience it happens on every streaming service

 

[Room314]

(Albums can disappear even from Bandcamp, but usually you can still download them from your account.)

 

[Chrise36]

So, a couple days ago I noticed Spotify once again removed an entire album from their service (this time it was Bad Animals, by Heart), and I'm tired of things like this happening. Another song I have favorited has had a couple skips in it for months. I want to switch to a different service, and am looking for suggestions.

I know Qobuz has every song I want to listen to, but the dealbreaker last time I tried it was lack of any sort of volume normalization. If there was a solution to this, Qobuz would be my first choice.

I don't know much about the other streaming services, and don't know how to check if they have the songs I want without signing up.

Here is a link to my current list of liked songs on Spotify, but I think you need Spotify to view it so I don't know how much help it will be: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3YUvQmkR2l51oAZnRPsNTc?si=a9bd4d4e91c8428c

Whatever I choose, I will need it to work well both on an android phone (via a usb dac to headphones, as well as bluetooth to my stereo) and a windows pc.

Try Roon for volume normalization. Apple music is cheap with big catalog.

 

[Jimbob54]

My experience, they all suffer from the disappearing album syndrome - Amazon being the worst one I have noticed.

For me personally, leaving aside the whole MQA "thing", Tidal probably ticks most boxes . Good Connect integration, volume levelling, decent curation / personalisation after you have used it for a while. It has the best "daily" playlist in the form of My Daily Discovery of 10 tracks per day (again, assuming you use it plenty).

If you stick to the Hifi tier it is competitively priced.

Its the one that feels most like Spotify in terms of the UEx IMHO. Qobuz is woeful in this regard. Amazon seems to be putting effort in but it still feels a bit "meh".

EDIT- oh and Tidal (and Qobuz) both work well with USB Audio Player Pro (UAPP) which is THE best player app if using a dongle dac. Few $ for full version and about $4 extra gets you a one time and good EQ solution built in.

 

[Room314]

Yes, features like My Daily Discovery and Because you listened to X work unexpectedly well, that's a big advantage of Tidal.

Good Connect integration, volume levelling, decent curation / personalisation after you have used it for a while. It has the best "daily" playlist in the form of My Daily Discovery of 10 tracks per day (again, assuming you use it plenty).

 

[Waxx]

Albums disappearing from streaming services are not by the streaming service itself, it's the artist or the label or the publisher who remove them, often because they think they are not paid enough (and i agree). Certainly in underground genres that don't want to be mainstream, streaming services are not fed with their music, and they do direct sales, physically or trough bandcamp (that pays a lot better). But even mainstream artists remove their catalogue partially or fully for that, and hope to get more physical sales where they earn a lot more, than on any streaming service. The streaming services want as much music on their systems as possible, and will not remove music, because the bigger and more complete their catalogue is, the beter the sales is.

 

[JCM800]

I’m very happy with Qobuz, first for their lossless digital download store and now their streaming service. If you buy a lot of digital music they have a tier that offers a hefty discount on hi-res titles. I don’t care about high-res but they’re usually cheaper than the CD quality download option.

 

[SlaughterX]

Tidal and Apple Music are probably going to be the best quality for streaming. I need to give Tidal a try so I can hear some spatial audio with out having to buy an Apple TV.

 

[Multicore]

@Adamant11746 this thread arose from the dead. So, what did you do and did it help?