To many listeners, one benefit of purchasing physical music is the ability to learn who was responsible for the behind-the-scenes production, like the names of songwriters, background vocalists or song producers and engineers. Unfortunately for those music fans, often-used digital players today now only include basic information like song title, artist name and album.
Now, though, Rhapsody will be offering much more.
In support of The Academy’s “Give Fans The Credit” initiative, the Seattle-based streaming music company will be the first music service to offer liner notes within their platform.
“Rhapsody listeners are avid music fans who value the craft of musicianship and recording, and they want to know who was involved in bringing a song to life,” Jon Irwin, Rhapsody president, said in a press release. “We have a responsibility to our listeners to back this initiative, and further, view the inclusion of more complete credits as a truly useful feature that will only deepen our listeners’ connection to their favorite artists and songs.”
Rhapsody will roll out the new feature in the coming months and has already started to curate music collections based on songwriters and producers. But, it’s not clear exactly where and how the liner notes will show up and we’ve asked the company for more details. We’ll update the post as we hear back.
Rhapsody has been in the streaming music space since 2001 and saw its revenue rise nearly 13 percent in 2012, to $143.7 million, while the company reduced its annual loss to $12.3 million, an improvement over its $13.6 million loss the previous year.
The larger revenue comes despite tough competition from rivals like Spotify, Pandora and Rdio. It follows deals including Rhapsody’s MetroPCS partnership and its acquisition of the Napster music service from Best Buy in late 2011.
Both Google and Apple have been rumored to be building their own streaming music services as well. It makes sense, as global music sales rose 0.3 percent last year to $16.5 billion for the first time since 1999. That’s largely due to the subscription-based services.
Previously on GeekWire: Rhapsody exec advises Spotify, Rdio: You’re doing it wrong
