Underwhelmed by Apple Music

[rayward]

I don't use Spotify, and I have a reasonably extensive music collection in iTunes, but I do use Pandora because sometimes I want to hear music of a particular theme that's outside of my collection. Pandora works fine in shorter time frames, but gets repetitive over a longer stretch, so I was hoping that Apple Music would give me a better option with its (supposedly) larger library.

Ignoring the cost difference (i.e. Pandora is free), I have found Apple Music to be underwhelming. The "For You" playlists are just 10 tracks long, which means that I have to fish my phone out of my pocket when I'm in the car to try and start a new playlist. Why can't it just continue on that theme until I change it?

Also, it has clearly read my music library, as about 90% of the tiles on the (virtually impenetrable) interface are offering me "deep dives" into bands for which I already own pretty much every album ever released. What's the point of that? Also, I don't need to be "introduced to" a band that I already own.

I have already stopped using it. I for sure won't keep the service once they start charging for it, unless there's a major overhaul between now and the end of the free trial.

It used to be that Apple innovated and others copied. Then Jobs died, and Apple devolved into a Microsoft-like giant that trades on past glories while churning out bad copies of other people's ideas.

 

[From A Buick 8]

For what it is worth the "For You" area does change based on songs that you "love". So yes at first it is based on your library but it gets better after a few days. From what I can tell the purpose of the "for you" is to maybe expose you to artist you may not know of and then you can use the hamburger button ... to create a station from that artist and then you have a station like what you are used to on Pandora.

 

[elektrizitat]

For what it is worth the "For You" area does change based on songs that you "love". So yes at first it is based on your library but it gets better after a few days. From what I can tell the purpose of the "for you" is to maybe expose you to artist you may not know of and then you can use the hamburger button ... to create a station from that artist and then you have a station like what you are used to on Pandora.

You're right. I was pretty sceptical about the 'for you' to begin with too. But since I've been liking it's changed dramatically. getting more interesting and obscure recommendations popping up now. I just wish the app wasn't so sluggish.

 

[MentalFloss]

I think the best music discovery tool are the "artist stations". To me, that seems to be the most underrated feature of Apple Music. I have listened to a few artist stations, and sometimes already the second or third song was something I saved to my "Discovered on Apple Music" playlist.

The usefulness of "For You" has also been limited for me. At the beginning, it seemed ok, but I went quite quickly through the playlists I cared about. I think Apple will have to work hard to add additional ones. But the artist stations seem to be a rather endless supply of interesting stuff.