Nightlife Music develops venue app with Spotify

Streaming company Spotify has signed a deal with Nightlife Music, a Brisbane-based company specialising in background music.

Nightlife Music, originally founded in the late 1980s by business partners Mark Brownlee and Tim De Souza, will collaborate with Spotify using an app called CrowdDJ that allows Spotify’s users to listen to their favourite songs in restaurants, bars, gyms, casinos, pubs etc.

CrowdDJ will interactively operate with Spotify users’ accounts and will act in a similar way to a jukebox is public areas. Patrons can request songs in the venue providing that the user and that particular venue’s playlist share the same songs.

Over 5,000 venues around Australia have playlists developed and curated by Nightlife Music. The list includes a diverse range of venues including pubs operated by Woolworths and Coles, gym chains operated by Snap and Fitness Anytime, as well as two of the country’s largest casinos, The Star and Crown.

Mark Brownlee, Managing Director of Nightlife Music said “This technology is the most significant innovation for commercial music in decades.

“Once upon a time you would walk into a pub and put money in a jukebox. Now you simply open our app and choose one of your Spotify songs to play in the venue.

He added: “Consumers have so much choice through Spotify, but playing music in public venues is much harder and that’s where Nightlife comes in.”

The app is currently in its beta phase, having already been put on trial in over 250 Fitness Anytime gyms. According to Nightlife, over 600,000 tracks have been selected since the app was first rolled out and is showing positive signs in regard to user engagement.

The deal will increase Spotify’s stake in commercial venues across the nation. The deal with Nightlife marks the first time ever that people can decide on what songs are played in public venues through the use of their Spotify accounts. 

Michael Richardson, Head of Spotify’s Business Development Asia-Pacific, pointed out the benefits that the technology will bring for music fans.

“CrowdDJ offers the most personalised public listening experience possible,” he said. Not only are fans able to choose music from their existing Spotify favourites to play in-venue, but they’ll also be able to save any venue playlist they’ve loved so they can listen to it later on Spotify.”

While Nightlife Music already generates a substantial amount of revenue through licensing, the CrowdDJ app is set to increase that number even further. Further collaborations between Nightlife and Spotify are expected in 2017.