Did you know that Beatport Link now allows DJs to bypass buying music and stream tracks to your directly to your laptop dj software paying a monthly service fee? It’s true – the service launched in March and became Rekordbox-integrated in September.
This isn’t a totally new concept, Spotify has operated this sort of music service for years. But we’re talking about Beatport so basically nearly all of electronic music for DJs. Well not quite all of Beatport is available, over 6.6 million tracks are anyway and according to Beatport, 90 of their top 100 labels.
This is kind of a big deal. Or is it? In theory, you have access to over 6 million tracks on Beatport for just 14.99 a month. That’s definitely less than I spend buying tracks in a month. But then I do own the tracks, rather than renting them
Supposedly there are features to prevent the obvious scenarios of wifi crash from interrupting your set by allowing you to put tracks into a ‘digital locker’ where you can access them during your set without need for Wifi.
But then I read that you have to have a Beatport Link Pro Account to have a 50 track locker $39.99/month) Or Pro Plus to have a 100 track locker ($59.99/month).
Now it doesn’t sound as great. But there’s more. It’s steaming at like 256k quality. This is maybe for wedding djs who need to come up with a request on the spot. But way under the quality expected at a club, festival or other event with a high end sound system
Granted maybe that will be fixed with time. So let’s say both the pricing and quality gets better. Would I ever switch to this format?
For me, I was willing to make the switch from a vinyl record I could hold in my hand to a digital file as long as I could control it well with the deck, see a waveform in lieu of vinyl grooves, and rebuild a digital collection that rivaled my vinyl one.
There were obvious advantages, a huge spending reduction vs shipping vinyl in after all my fave record stores closed down in LA, the ability to get new music instantly from anywhere, the desire to stay with the times, to not be a relic always talkin bout the good old days.
I don’t see the same level of advantages for a technology change of playing music from devices to streaming tracks. In fact, I don’t really see any advantages. Unless you are just starting out I suppose. It could be a good tool for learning, and for not spending as much money on new tracks when you don’t even know what you like yet. And then maybe you buy the ones you decide you really like. But to always stream, I don’t know
What about you? Anyone tried the free trial, even just for kicks? Or used it at a gig? Would love to know