If you’re a regular TikTok user, you’ll know sped-up versions of well-known songs and short-form vertical videos, for some reason, go hand in hand. Perhaps condensing a musical hook into a shorter time frame helps capture people’s attention in that all-important two-or-three-second window.
Whatever the case, sped-up songs seem to work, and thus the demand for features that allow creators to make them is increasing.
Spotify has identified this, and is reportedly working on tools that will allow users to “speed up, mash up, and otherwise edit” tracks on the platform, according to the Wall Street Journal.
According to The Verge, content analysis firm Pex recently found that 38 percent of songs on TikTok had their speed or pitches modified in 2023, compared to 25 percent in 2022, showcasing an increasing demand for tempo and pitch/changing tools.
While such tools could open new avenues for video creators, they could also open a new revenue stream for artists. Audio detection algorithms on TikTok – and YouTube, for example – often fail to accurately identify copyright infringement if the speed or pitch of the source material is manipulated enough. This leads to lost revenue for artists. Spotify’s new tools would, in theory, tie any remixes to their original song, meaning revenue would make its way into the pockets of copyright holders.
It’s unclear how much these new audio manipulation tools will be, and whether they’ll be included in a standard subscription tier or as an optional add-on. The Verge also reports that code snippets for recent Spotify builds for Android indicate a “Music Pro” add-on coming in the future, which would potentially include both these tools and Spotify’s long-awaited HiFi feature for lossless audio.
No launch dates have been confirmed yet, but stay tuned to MusicTech for more updates.
