SAN FRANCISCO, APRIL 17 — For several months, remixes of well-known songs have been enjoying great success on music streaming platforms. This has prompted Spotify, the industry leader, to take a greater interest in this musical subculture, so that music lovers can get involved without penalizing the artists whose tracks are being altered.

Spotify is said to be developing new features that will allow users to create "sped up” or "slowed down +reverb” versions of famous songs, according to the Wall Street Journal. The American newspaper claims that paying subscribers to the streaming service will be able to use some of these features free of charge. The more sophisticated ones, however, will be reserved for users who subscribe to the Superpremium offer on which Spotify is currently working.

The Swedish giant hopes that these audio editing features will enable it to tap into the interest of music lovers, particularly those under 30, for alternative versions of popular songs. These remixes are ubiquitous on social networks, and especially on TikTok, where they represent 38% of the music available on the Chinese application, according to data from Plex. Internet users disseminate them via videos, often illustrated by scrolling lyrics, which serve no other purpose than to share their soundtrack with as many people as possible.

The creators of "sped up” and "slowed +reverb” tracks don’t capitalize on their musical creations. Their main aim is to ensure that they go viral on social networks, and are picked up by other content creators. Some variations are so popular that they become almost as big as the original. The sped-up version of Cool for the Summer was such a hit on TikTok in the summer of 2022 that its singer, Demi Lovato, decided to release an official remix of her track. This version has more than 81 million listens on Spotify, compared with 784 million for the original track dating from 2015.

Releasing a "sped up” or "slowed +reverb” version is a good way for artists and their record companies to capitalize on the public’s enthusiasm for these alternative remixes. Spotify hopes to do the same with its new audio editing features. It remains to be seen whether fans of the genre will use them, or whether they will continue to produce DIY variations of famous tracks on their own. — ETX Studio