What is the real reason Spotify nixed Musixmatch?
According to Spotify, the lyrics feature is now unavailable due to ‘big improvements to the feature’, and they promise they will share the ‘updates soon’ with their users. According to one source ,that could be a blown-out replacement by Genius, the well-financed, wiki-style lyrics site that start in rap.
Sounds interesting, though the ‘why’ remains mysterious. According to chatter picked up by DMN, Spotify didn’t want to set the precedent of publishers and songwriters for the lyrics, instead offloading it onto Musixmatch. All for the simple reason that lyrics usage could be massive, with costs further eroding Spotify’s troubled margins.
After the cancellation, Musixmatch released a statement with a strange zinger at the end:
“Musixmatch is no longer available within Spotify desktop. It was a great partnership and there is mutual respect between both companies as our business strategies move us each in different directions. We regret the end of this partnership… we will not allow anybody to ignore our business model.”
Musixmatch was that little button located next to the play bar on Spotify desktop which once allowed users to access lyrics to the songs they are playing. That feature is no longer available, regardless of the button still being present. It simply doesn’t actually populate any results.
Many Spotify users took to Twitter to share their disappointment of the lack of the feature, though it’s not clear that Spotify is doing away with lyrics entirely. Exactly what happened behind closed doors is anyone’s guess, though it looks like the terms of the agreement were simply not what Spotify, so they simply wiped it out.
(Image by sammynetbook, Creative Commons, Attribution 2.0 Generic, cc by 2.0)
Hopefully Spotify has another partnership in progress or is trying to create its own lyrics feature. I have little patience to read lyrics and rarely do so, but I know it’s an important feature to many users.
Spotify removing a feature with promises to bring it back improved and never following up on that promise. This wouldn’t be the first time.
I think you may be impressed by DigiRAMP.com – includes all rights and stakeholder IP’s interested party info, making it easy to determine who controls what rights and how to compensate fairly and in real time to all creatives and owners.
I’m sorry Charlotte, but did you or an editor even proof this article for readability?
“According to chatter picked up by DMN, Spotify didn’t want to set the precedent of publishers and songwriters for the lyrics”
Set the precedent of what?
“Exactly what happened behind closed doors is anyone’s guess, though it looks like the terms of the agreement were simply not what Spotify, so they simply wiped it out.”
Were not what Spotify…?
EXACTLY what I was going to point out, thank you!
suger balle
First they close the spotify appstore then leaves us with nothing, then add an awesome lyrics feature but lets take that away too, awesome move…
Hopefully, they fix the Errors in the lyrics system, sometimes there wouldn’t be lyrics, or they would be off timing, or it would have the wrong lyrics.
The lyric system is ditched for now.
very dissapointing.
I am also very disappointed with the loss of the lyric feature – it was so helpful, for the obvious reasons, but in my attempt to learn spanish, I really loved listening to spanish music and following along with the lyrics. PLEASE bring it back, Spotify!
Both Spotify and Musicmatch work perfectly on my Tablet. Musicmatch has a floating icon. Click to start and hurray the lyrics for the current spotify-song are displayed.
The app for win10 is still missing!
Wow, to replace musixmatch with Genius.com is a dream come true
except the genius implementation is garbage. And 75% of my songs (i listen to mostly hip hop too) don’t have lyrics. And the ones that do, I can’t follow along because it shows you the “behind the lyrics” crap.
This small tool works a decent solution for the time being. Hopefully spotify brings back the lyrics feature in the near future.
https://np.reddit.com/r/spotify/comments/4s9beo/getting_by_with_missing_lyrics_feature/
Sad, I really miss that lyrics feature
I miss the feature so much! It was essential!
there is a way to still get lyrics with musixmatch to work. here it is: install the musixmatch app on your phone. it still works with spotify. i listen to spotify on my home computer and still can get the lyrics on my phone by using the remote devices feature in spotify where you can control your home system from your phone (but still have spotify play through your computer with the better sound card). this solution will only give you the lyrics on your smart phone. the windows version of musixmatch doesn’t work for me at all.
first they remove add on, and now this? WTF
Come on Spotify – you have my email address and I have been paying for Spotify Premium for over 2 years. So why couldn’t you send me a message to explain your reasons for ditching Musicmatch.
I loved Musicmatch and used it often. I think my next move is to ditch Spotify.