We all know the concept of social media ephemerality: posts or messages that disappear after a certain time period rather than stay online permanently. Now a startup is applying that idea to music livestreams.
The company is Blast Radio, armed with a device called ‘Blast Box’ for musicians to connect to their turntable/mixer or recording kit. “Broadcast studio-quality, live audio with one button,” is its high-concept pitch. “All content expires after 24 hours so it’s a low pressure way to experiment and play what you love right now without worrying about it existing forever… from DJ sets to daily B-sides, sneak peaks of new material to live experimentation.”
Carl Craig, The Juan MacLean and Matthew Dear are among the artists already trying it out. The service is free for listeners, but they can tip the artists or DJs. And licensing? Well, that may a question that Blast Radio will be fielding from rightsholders in the weeks ahead, particularly on the DJ sets side.
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