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Tired of Spotify’s new music suggestions not launching you out of your playlist comfort zone or simply done with paying however much a month for your music streaming service? I’ve fallen in love with this fantastic free alternative that everyone needs to have on their phone’s home screen: BBC Sounds.
Homescreen heroes
This is part of a regular series of articles exploring the apps that we couldn’t live without. Read them all here.
It’s the app that BBC Radio hosts won’t stop promoting in their shows, and if you’ve downloaded it, you’ll know exactly why it’s up there with the best music streaming services.
As you’d expect from a radio app, you can use it to listen to a live feed of any BBC radio station – this includes Radio 1 through 6, BBC World Service, or any local station, among many others. Alternatively, if you’re busy when a particular program you’re keen to hear is live, you can scroll through the archive of recent shows and tune in after the fact.
Catch up is how I keep up with my favorite shows: Future Artists with Sian Eleri, New Music with Jack Saunders, and the Official Chart – which is also usually hosted by Saunders. They’re fantastic motivators when I get up in the morning or a wonderful soundtrack for my commute or my chores to make the time fly by.
Replace or augment your paid subscription
And just like Spotify, if you’re worried about a poor connection disrupting your flow, you can download a show to listen offline later. It’ll stay downloaded until 30 days after they first aired, and you can listen to the whole thing (music and all) any time in that window.
If you aren’t yet ready to abandon Spotify – or Apple Music – completely, there’s still a great reason to use BBC Sounds. Every music show has a set list, and clicking the three dots next to a song lets you open the track in either of these two music streaming services. The only exceptions are exclusive Live Lounge covers or very new tracks that aren’t on streaming yet.
The three shows I highlighted above are especially good for discovering new sounds. Sian Eleri and Jack Saunders are music experts, with their song selection and commentary providing an in-depth understanding of why these are the best tracks to be listening to today – with Eleri’s program focusing on lesser-known musicians who are releasing fantastic new stuff. Saunders highlights the most popular tracks of the moment as well as the latest tracks from household names and artists who absolutely should be in his two programs.
Their shows will jump from genre to genre without giving you whiplash, and while I might not adore everything they play, I always add a couple of tracks to my ever-growing 2024 playlist on Apple Music, which I know I wouldn’t have discovered without their recommendation. These include artists like The Snuts, Antony Szmierek, Master Peace, Remi Wolf, and plenty more.
Humans beat algorithms
An algorithm would never make these bold recommendations – from my experience, I regularly just get recommended stuff that matches my playlist already – but humans who live and breathe music can find me something different that I still absolutely adore.
The human hosts can also give this additional context, like insight into how a track came to be or how Saunders plays select older tunes in his new music show because it shows the journey the episode’s featured artist took to get where their sound is today – this context then elevates my own understanding and enjoyment of a track, and give me an idea of what other tunes to explore from their repertoire if I’m unfamiliar with them.
If you’re a fan of more specific types of tracks and would rather stick in your lane, there are dedicated shows for pretty much every genre you could imagine.
I know I’m basically just describing radio in app form – that’s literally what BBC Sounds is – but I’ve spoken to so many people who hate being stuck in their set playlist and can’t stand the bland recommendations put out by an algorithm.
I’m writing this to mass inform everyone that there’s a fantastic free resource on the App Store and Google Play Store, which you can and should be using to get out of your musical rut. And maybe even save some bucks if you decide to have it fully replace your preferred choice of the best music streaming service.