🎵 /music discovery/

📌 Written by Dan 📅 Last updated: 22nd August 2026

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Streaming platforms make music abundant, but abundance does not automatically produce discovery. Recommendation systems are useful for convenience; they are less reliable at supplying context, challenging established habits, or showing how artists, scenes, labels, and histories connect.

This guide presents practical alternatives: critics, DJs, radio stations, communities, record shops, databases, labels, credits, and musical lineages.

Who This Guide Is For

This guide is for listeners who:

• Keep receiving variations of music they already know.
• Want to understand genres and scenes rather than collect isolated tracks.
• Feel overwhelmed by the amount of music available.
• Want to rely more on identifiable human perspectives.
• Need a practical way to save and revisit discoveries.

Read the starter routine first, then use the table of contents to choose a route that matches your goal.

Table of Contents

• Start Here: A Simple Discovery Routine
• Choose a Discovery Route
• Journalists and Critics
• DJs, Radio, and Mixes
  • NTS Radio
  • BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix
  • Soma FM
• Communities and Music Databases
• Bandcamp, SoundCloud, and Mixcloud
• Follow Credits, Samples, and Collaborators
• Explore Labels and Distributors
• Offline Discovery
• Human Curation and Algorithmic Discovery
• Every Noise as a Genre Map
• Build a Discovery System
• Reference Directory
• Final Thoughts

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Start Here: A Simple Discovery Routine

You can begin without signing up for another service or reorganising your entire music library.

1. Pick one trusted source: Choose a critic, DJ, publication, label, shop, or community.
2. Select one unfamiliar release: Choose an album, EP, mix, radio show, or artist that genuinely interests you.
3. Listen with attention: Avoid shuffle and, where possible, read the credits or accompanying notes.
4. Follow one connection: Investigate a collaborator, label, sample, influence, venue, or scene.
5. Save selectively: Keep only what you genuinely want to hear again.
6. Return later: Revisit promising music before adding more to your backlog.

Repeat this once or twice a week. The goal is not to consume more music, but to develop stronger pathways through it.

Choose a Discovery Route

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Journalists and Critics

Music journalism can provide something a recommendation feed rarely supplies: an identifiable perspective. A publication's tastes, writers, audience, and history influence what it covers.

The objective is not to find an infallible critic. It is to find writers whose interests are clear enough that you can understand their recommendations, including the occasions when you disagree.

Publications by Area of Interest

Pitchfork

Pitchfork helped shape online music criticism through its reviews, features, lists, and coverage of independent music.

• Best for: Following widely discussed new releases and exploring retrospective lists.
• How to use it: Begin with Best New Music or Best New Reissues, then follow individual writers whose interests match yours.
• Limitation: Its coverage reflects editorial priorities rather than a complete picture of contemporary music.

Hearing Things

Hearing Things was founded by former Pitchfork staff as an independent music publication.

• Best for: Criticism, reported features, interviews, and a publication with a smaller independent structure.
• How to use it: Follow specific contributors rather than treating the entire publication as one taste profile.

The Wire

The Wire covers experimental, improvised, electronic, contemporary classical, and other music outside conventional categories.

• Best for: Finding artists, scenes, and practices that receive little attention from mainstream publications.
• How to use it: Browse the Audio section, then investigate labels and collaborators connected to anything that stands out.
• Limitation: Its scope and terminology may initially feel demanding to new listeners.

The Quietus

The Quietus covers experimental music alongside rock, metal, electronic music, reissues, and cultural criticism.

• Best for: Long-form writing and releases outside the usual review cycle.
• Starting point: Album of the Week.

Bandcamp Daily

Bandcamp Daily covers artists, labels, genres, and regional scenes represented on Bandcamp.

Its recommendations also provide a direct route to artists' Bandcamp pages, where you can listen, follow, and purchase music.

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Video Curators and Educators

Video channels can combine recommendations with musical history, scene reports, interviews, and visual context.

Types of Music Channels

• Reviewers primarily assess new releases.
• Curators and educators explain scenes, connections, and listening pathways.
• Genre specialists concentrate on one musical tradition or community.
• Historians focus on how music developed and changed over time.

Anthony Fantano and The Needle Drop

Anthony Fantano reviews music across hip-hop, pop, rock, electronic, metal, and experimental traditions.

• Best for: Keeping up with widely discussed releases and hearing a clearly expressed critical position.
• How to use it: Treat a review as a lead rather than a verdict. Listen before allowing the score or reaction to determine your opinion.
• Limitation: A highly visible reviewer can unintentionally concentrate attention around an already narrow group of releases.

Deep Cuts

Deep Cuts creates introductions to genres, artists, and musical movements.

• Best for: Structured entry points into unfamiliar music.
• How to use it: Choose one genre introduction, save two releases from the video, and investigate the labels or scenes surrounding them.
• Related resource: Deep Cuts playlists.

Derrick Gee

Derrick Gee covers music, listening culture, technology, scenes, and creative work through interviews and commentary.

• Best for: Broader discussions of how people find, experience, and contextualise music.
• How to use it: Follow guests, artists, publications, and cultural references mentioned in each discussion.

Evaluate Curators Carefully

A useful curator should help you understand why something is interesting. Warning signs include:

• Treating celebrity disputes as music criticism.
• Repeating consensus without adding context.
• Presenting every recommendation as a definitive verdict.
• Using outrage or scores as the main attraction.
• Failing to distinguish sponsorship from independent recommendations.

Popularity does not necessarily indicate expertise, and obscurity does not necessarily indicate quality.

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DJs, Radio, and Mixes

Human-curated radio is valuable because tracks appear in sequence and context. A DJ can connect genres, periods, places, and moods in ways that an automatically generated queue often cannot.

NTS Radio

NTS Radio combines live channels, archived broadcasts, resident shows, guest mixes, artist retrospectives, genre guides, and music-only streams.

• Best for: Hearing adventurous selections in context.
• How to use it: Search for an artist you already enjoy, play a guest mix or related show, and investigate three unfamiliar tracks from the tracklist.
• Limitation: Its archive is enormous, so beginning with a familiar artist, genre, or mood is easier than browsing without a goal.

Ways to Explore NTS

Selected NTS Shows

Discovery exercise: Find an NTS guest mix by an artist you already enjoy. Choose one track from the beginning, middle, and end, then investigate each artist's label and collaborators.

NTS Guide To...

The NTS Guide To... offers introductions to genres, regional scenes, and musical movements.

Useful subjects to search for include:

• Memphis rap
• Japanese city pop
• Amapiano
• Krautrock
• Lovers rock
• Library music

Treat each programme as an entry point rather than a definitive history. Follow it with reading from a specialist source or historian.

NTS In Focus

NTS In Focus concentrates on one artist, producer, arranger, or cultural subject. It can help when an extensive discography makes it difficult to know where to begin.

Suggested starting points include:

BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix

The BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix is a long-running programme built around extended DJ mixes. Its two-hour format allows selectors to develop a musical argument, introduce unreleased material, or connect influences across decades.

• Best for: Electronic music history and long-form DJ programming.
• How to use it: Choose a mix associated with a genre or period you want to understand, listen without shuffle, and consult the tracklist afterwards.
• Limitation: Unofficial archives may be incomplete or contain inaccurate metadata. Prefer official BBC pages when available.

Suggested Essential Mix Starting Points

SomaFM

SomaFM is an independent, listener-supported internet radio network built around hand-programmed channels.

• Best for: Continuous genre- or atmosphere-based listening without relying on a personalised recommendation feed.
• How to use it: Choose one channel, note any track that interrupts your attention, and follow that artist through the station history or their label.
• Limitation: Concept streams and external audio feeds may change over time, so check current channel descriptions.

Selected SomaFM Channels

Community and College Radio

Independent and student stations can provide local knowledge, specialist programmes, and archives that commercial radio does not offer.

Two established examples are:

• WFMU for freeform and experimental programming.
• KEXP for live sessions, interviews, and a broad range of independent music.

Search for stations in your own region, particularly those connected to universities, community organisations, or local scenes.

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Communities and Music Databases

Communities are valuable when they contain knowledgeable participants, useful archives, and clear moderation. They can also develop narrow canons and repeat the preferences of their most active members.

Use community consensus as evidence of enthusiasm, not proof of objective quality.

Rate Your Music

Rate Your Music combines ratings, reviews, charts, lists, and detailed genre classification.

• Best for: Finding consensus classics, exploring custom charts, and seeing what niche communities currently value.
• How to use it: Filter a chart by year, genre, country, and descriptors. Open a release you recognise, then inspect its genres, lists, and related releases.
• Limitation: Ratings can reflect hype cycles, canon formation, and the demographics of active users.
• Starting point: Browse the New Music page or create a chart around one unfamiliar genre.

Reddit

Genre-specific communities can be more useful than large general music forums.

Look for recurring recommendation threads, primers, archived discussions, and contributors who explain their choices. Check each community's rules before posting.

Niche Forums and Small Communities

Dedicated forums, Discord servers, mailing lists, and local groups still exist, though many are difficult to discover through ordinary search results.

Prioritise communities that have:

• Active moderation.
• Detailed discussions rather than constant link dumping.
• Respect for artists and other participants.
• Searchable archives or maintained recommendation lists.

Some historically influential spaces, including 4chan's music board, can contain offensive or poorly moderated content. They are better understood as parts of internet music history than as universal beginner recommendations.

Discogs

Discogs is especially useful for release histories, personnel credits, label catalogues, and relationships between different editions.

• Best for: Researching who worked on a record and tracing a label's catalogue.
• How to use it: Open a release you enjoy, select a producer or musician credit, and examine their other work.
• Limitation: The database is community-maintained, so unusual or poorly documented releases may contain incomplete information.

Useful Discogs pathways include:

• Label discographies.
• Artist and producer credits.
• Release versions and pressings.
• Compilation appearances.
• Mastering and engineering credits.

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Bandcamp, SoundCloud, and Mixcloud

These platforms can expose you to music, edits, mixes, demos, and independent releases that are poorly represented by mainstream streaming services.

Bandcamp

Bandcamp combines direct artist sales with tags, label pages, fan collections, editorial coverage, and social discovery.

• Best for: Exploring independent labels, regional scenes, and direct artist catalogues.
• How to use it: Start with one artist, inspect the label and tags, then look at public collections belonging to listeners who supported the same release.
• Limitation: Tags are entered by users and artists, so their accuracy and usefulness vary.

Useful Bandcamp Features

• The Feed: Follow artists, labels, and listeners whose purchases interest you.
• Genre and location tags: Combine sound and place, such as ambient Japan or black metal Finland.
• Label pages: Follow a label to see its releases as a connected catalogue.
• Fan collections: Explore what other supporters purchased.
• Bandcamp Daily: Use editorial features as a route into unfamiliar scenes.

Bandcamp exercise: Choose an album you enjoy and inspect its label, tags, credits, and supporters. Follow one listener whose collection overlaps with your taste, then choose one unfamiliar record from that collection.

SoundCloud

SoundCloud remains useful for electronic music, hip-hop, remixes, DJ sets, works in progress, and tracks not distributed elsewhere.

• Best for: Following producers, local scenes, edits, and informal creative networks.
• How to use it: Inspect reposts, playlists, comments, and following lists around a trusted artist.
• Limitation: Metadata and rights status can be unclear. Avoid assuming that every upload is authorised.

Mixcloud

Mixcloud focuses on DJ sets, radio programmes, podcasts, and long-form audio.

• Best for: Hearing tracks selected in context and following individual DJs or radio hosts.
• How to use it: Search for a genre plus a city, station, label, or artist. Use tracklists to follow any selection that catches your attention.

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Follow Credits, Samples, and Collaborators

Artists rarely exist in isolation. A favourite record can become an entrance to a network of musicians, producers, engineers, labels, studios, samples, and influences.

The Discovery Trail

Start with one album or artist and follow this sequence:

1. Context: Read one review, interview, or scene overview.
2. People: Check featured artists, producers, engineers, and session musicians.
3. Organisation: Explore the label, distributor, venue, station, or collective.
4. Lineage: Investigate samples, influences, associated genres, and historical predecessors.
5. Community: Find where knowledgeable listeners discuss that scene.
6. Direct support: Follow or buy from the artist or label where practical.
7. Reflection: Save a short note explaining what caught your attention.

Guest Features and Collaborations

When a guest artist appears on a track you enjoy, investigate:

• Their solo work.
• Other collaborations with the same artist.
• Their collective, label, or local scene.
• The producer responsible for the track.
• Live performances or radio appearances featuring both artists.

Samples

Use WhoSampled to trace samples, interpolations, remixes, and cover versions. Samplette can also help generate sample-based exploration pathways.

Sample research can lead from hip-hop or electronic music into:

• Soul and funk.
• Jazz.
• Library music.
• Film and television soundtracks.
• Rock and psychedelic music.
• Regional and traditional recordings.

Check the available evidence before treating a sample identification as definitive.

Producers and Engineers

Production and engineering credits can reveal recurring sonic relationships. If you admire the sound of a record, investigate who produced, recorded, mixed, or mastered it.

Useful names to follow might include:

• Brian Eno
• Madlib
• Nigel Godrich
• Sylvia Massy
• Steve Albini
• Rick Rubin

These figures have worked across different genres and periods, so focus on the credit relevant to the record rather than assuming one unchanging signature sound.

Side Projects and Associated Acts

Musicians often participate in several groups, aliases, solo projects, or collectives. Check:

• Earlier and later bands.
• Production aliases.
• Split releases.
• Collaborative albums.
• Touring line-ups.
• Compilation appearances.

Liner Notes

Physical liner notes and digital booklets may contain:

• Personnel credits.
• Recording and mastering information.
• Studios and locations.
• Sample acknowledgements.
• Acknowledgements and thank-you lists.
• Label and catalogue information.

Thank-you lists can reveal friends, influences, local bands, venues, and organisations that ordinary recommendation systems miss.

Learn the History

A small amount of historical context can create many discovery paths. For example, understanding post-punk's relationships with dub, funk, electronic experimentation, and krautrock makes it easier to recognise connections that a broad genre label may conceal.

Look for specialist histories, documentaries, oral histories, and scene-focused books rather than relying on a single simplified timeline.

Example: Following Burial

Begin with Burial, then:

1. Explore the Hyperdub label.
2. Read about UK garage, 2-step, jungle, and dubstep.
3. Listen to related NTS programmes and DJ mixes.
4. Investigate production references and identifiable samples.
5. Follow artists connected through labels, compilations, and specialist communities.
6. Save only the releases you want to revisit.

Instead of receiving ten vaguely similar tracks, you build a contextual path through a scene.

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Explore Labels and Distributors

Independent labels often develop recognisable identities through their founders' tastes, visual design, local relationships, distribution networks, and recurring collaborators.

That identity may change over time. Treat a label as a trail to explore rather than a permanent genre category.

How to Explore a Label

1. Begin with one artist you already enjoy.
2. Open the label's official website, Bandcamp page, or Discogs catalogue.
3. Listen to a compilation or recent sampler.
4. Compare early, middle, and recent releases.
5. Note recurring producers, designers, musicians, and locations.
6. Follow any connected sublabels or distributors.

Labels with Recognisable Histories

Examples of Catalogue Pathways

• Stones Throw: Madlib, J Dilla, MF DOOM, and Knxwledge.
• 4AD: Cocteau Twins, Pixies, The National, and Big Thief.
• Sacred Bones: Zola Jesus, Molchat Doma, and John Carpenter.
• Kranky: Stars of the Lid, Grouper, Tim Hecker, and Labradford.
• Touch: Fennesz, Biosphere, and Chris Watson.
• Brainfeeder: Flying Lotus, Thundercat, and Hiatus Kaiyote.
• Warp: Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, Oneohtrix Point Never, and Brian Eno.
• Ninja Tune: The Cinematic Orchestra, Floating Points, Kamasi Washington, and Bonobo.

These examples represent catalogue associations across different periods, not necessarily current rosters. Use official label pages for present-day artist information and Discogs for historical catalogues.

Distributors and Specialist Shops

Distributors and online shops can also act as curators. Boomkat and Forced Exposure are useful examples because their catalogues, descriptions, and staff selections can connect labels that share an audience or musical approach.

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Offline Discovery

Offline discovery adds physical context, local knowledge, and conversations that are difficult to reproduce through a feed.

Record Shops

Record shops are curated spaces as well as retailers.

• Browse without a target: Adjacent records, cover art, reissue series, and staff displays can produce unexpected connections.
• Read staff recommendations: Staff picks often reflect local expertise or specialist interests.
• Ask focused questions: Mention two artists you enjoy and describe what you like about them.
• Check used sections: Used stock can reveal forgotten scenes, compilations, and influences at a lower cost.
• Look for flyers: Shops often advertise local shows, labels, record fairs, and listening events.

Useful question: "I like the atmosphere of Artist X and the production of Artist Y. What would you recommend?"

This gives staff more information than asking for something that merely "sounds similar."

Live Music

Live music can reveal artists before they appear in major editorial or algorithmic systems.

• Opening acts: Investigate unfamiliar supporting artists rather than arriving only for the headliner.
• Venue calendars: Follow venues whose bookings consistently match your interests.
• Specialist festivals: Genre-specific, experimental, and local festivals often provide more focused discovery than broad commercial line-ups.
• Conversations: Other listeners, promoters, musicians, and merch sellers can provide local recommendations.
• Posters and bills: Repeated names can reveal an emerging scene or collective.

Libraries and Archives

Libraries may provide:

• CD and vinyl collections.
• Music books and biographies.
• Magazine archives.
• Local music histories.
• Institutional database access.
• Sheet music and recorded performance archives.

University libraries and local history collections can be especially useful for researching regional scenes.

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Human Curation and Algorithmic Discovery

Finding trusted tastemakers can deepen music discovery. These might include critics, DJs, labels, record shop staff, librarians, community members, or knowledgeable friends.

The benefit is not that humans are infallible. It is that their selections can often be traced to a perspective, history, scene, or set of values.

Human Curation Has Limitations Too

Human curators can:

• Reproduce established canons.
• Favour prestige, access, or audience expectations.
• Overlook cultures outside their experience.
• Converge around the same heavily promoted releases.
• Allow commercial incentives to influence coverage.
• Become demographic or social bubbles.

The healthiest discovery practice combines several sources rather than trusting any single gatekeeper.

Use Algorithms as Leads

Spotify, YouTube Music, Apple Music, and similar platforms can still be useful when used deliberately.

Features such as related artists, artist radio, personalised mixes, and listening histories can supply leads. Treat those leads as questions to investigate rather than definitive recommendations.

A balanced routine might be:

1. Use an algorithm to identify one unfamiliar artist.
2. Open the artist's album, credits, and label.
3. Read or listen to a human perspective on the work.
4. Explore one collaborator or influence.
5. Decide independently whether to keep it.

Common Limitations of Recommendation Systems

Recommendation systems may:

• Reinforce existing habits.
• Prioritise low-skip or passive listening.
• Flatten distinct genres into broad moods.
• Remove cultural and historical context.
• Encourage isolated track consumption over albums or scenes.
• Promote music according to platform incentives that are not visible to listeners.

These tendencies vary by platform, feature, account, and listening behaviour. They should not be treated as universal outcomes.

Mood Machine

Liz Pelly's Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist examines Spotify's business model, playlist culture, artist compensation, platform incentives, and the growth of functional background listening.

Pelly's central arguments include concerns about:

1. Profit and platform power: Streaming platforms can prioritise listener retention and commercial growth over artistic context.
2. Royalty distribution: Pro-rata royalty systems and industry contracts can concentrate revenue among already dominant rights holders.
3. Homogenisation: Mood-based playlists may favour unobtrusive music suited to passive listening.
4. Creative pressure: Artists may feel encouraged to adapt song structure or release strategies to platform incentives.
5. Perfect Fit Content: Commissioned or stock-like recordings can reduce transparency about who created playlist music and why it was selected.
6. Automation: AI-generated and heavily automated music may further separate functional audio from identifiable artistic communities.

These are arguments within a wider debate rather than uncontested facts. For more detail on streaming compensation, see the companion Music Streaming Royalties Comparison.

Anthony Fantano's interview with Liz Pelly is available here.

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Every Noise as a Genre Map

Every Noise at Once is a genre-mapping project created by Glenn McDonald. It used Spotify-derived data to arrange genres according to musical characteristics and relationships.

Following changes to McDonald's access to Spotify data, the project no longer functions as the same continuously updated map it once was. Its existing pages remain useful as a historical and exploratory resource.

What Its Features Represented

Some linked playlists or data-dependent functions may no longer behave as originally designed.

Map Versus Filter

Every Noise and a standard mood playlist answer different questions.

Why the Difference Matters

Broad categories such as chill, focus, or workout can be useful, but they often remove information about place, community, history, and style.

A detailed genre map may reveal categories such as regional jazz scenes, national metal traditions, local rap movements, or hybrid club genres. Those labels are imperfect and sometimes disputed, but they can provide search terms and historical pathways that broad mood categories conceal.

Use Every Noise as a source of questions:

• Where did this genre emerge?
• Who uses this name?
• Is it a community term, a journalistic label, or a data-generated category?
• Which artists are central, and which appear only at the boundaries?
• What histories are hidden by the classification?

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Build a Discovery System

Discovery loses value when every interesting track enters one enormous playlist and is never heard again.

A simple system should help you distinguish curiosity from lasting interest.

Use Three Listening States

• Inbox: Music you have not yet heard properly.
• Revisit: Releases that deserve another attentive listen.
• Keep: Music that has earned a lasting place in your library.

Move music between these states instead of allowing the inbox to grow indefinitely.

What to Record

You can keep this information in:

• A spreadsheet.
• A physical notebook.
• Rate Your Music lists.
• Last.fm tags or listening records.
• Streaming playlists.
• A personal notes application, like Google Keep or Obsidian.

The tool matters less than returning to what you save.

A Weekly Routine

1. Add no more than five releases to your inbox.
2. Listen to at least one release without multitasking.
3. Move promising music to the revisit list.
4. Delete anything you saved only from obligation or hype.
5. Follow one contextual trail.
6. Revisit one older discovery before adding another.

Broaden Your Sources Deliberately

Do not treat "global music" as one genre. Search by specific place, language, period, instrument, community, or movement.

Useful starting methods include:

• Bandcamp location tags.
• Regional radio stations.
• Labels based outside your country.
• Specialist publications and historians.
• Local festival archives.
• Genre communities with contributors from the relevant scene.
• Recordings recommended by artists from that tradition.

Whenever possible, seek perspectives from people who participate in or closely document the culture you are exploring.

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Reference Directory

This section preserves additional recommendations without interrupting the guide's main path.

Additional NTS Shows

Additional NTS In Focus Episodes

Additional Essential Mix Starting Points

Key

• ⭐ Programme recognition: Associated with an Essential Mix of the Year selection.
• 🤎 Personal favourite: A personal recommendation rather than an objective ranking.

Award designations and archive metadata can change or be inconsistently documented, so verify them against current BBC programme information before publication.

Useful Databases and Tools

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Final Thoughts

Good discovery is not measured by how many tracks you save. It is measured by the connections you learn to recognise: between artists and collaborators, records and labels, sounds and places, genres and histories.

Algorithms can supply leads, but critics, DJs, communities, shops, libraries, liner notes, and artists provide context. Use several sources, notice their biases, follow the trails that genuinely interest you, and support the music you value when you can.

For more detail on streaming compensation, see the companion guide: Music Streaming Royalties Comparison.

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If you feel that there are errors (or you just want to give general feedback), please feel free to reach out.
💬 Discord: danxyz7