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Spotify Artist - Combining Plays

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Spotify Artist - Combining Plays

Hey all,

My band will be releasing a new album in November, but starting in August we would like to begin releasing singles. I've noticed other bands in our demographic, (Tiny Moving Parts, Real Friends, etc.), releasing singles, but when their album drops all of their singles are taken down and the plays from the singles are now combined with the album version of the song. My question is if I wanted to release singles and then combine the plays when the album releases would I contact Spotify about this or is this something you can do with specific online distributors? (Tunecore, CDBaby, etc.)

To paint the picture a little more clear, using what I've seen occur,
a band releases "Song A" as a single and receives 18.000 plays. When the album drops, the single version and it's corresponding artwork are completely taken down, but the song is still in the top 5 played for the artist, which I'm assuming is the album version, and it is still listed as having 18,000+ plays.

Any help on the topic would be greatly appreciated. I understand that regardless of which version it is the song will still receive plays, but it'd be great to keep the number of plays when the album drops instead of having to start from 0 again on the album version.

Thanks everyone,
- scottienoonan

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Marked as solution

Hey @scottienoonan,

 

Spotify will automatically attempt to link tracks that match already existing content. If a match is found, the play counts for the linked tracks will be aggregated and the total amount of plays will be displayed on both tracks. Spotify is not able to manually track link content by request.

 

The following criteria must be identical for an alternative track to be considered:

  • ISRC code
  • Artist name & track titles
  • Version titles
  • Track length

 

In order to ensure no gaps in content coverage, please ensure the new content has been redelivered and is live on Spotify, before taking down the old content.

MaximSpotify Star
Help others find this answer and click "Accept as Solution".
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Note: I'm not a Spotify employee.

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5 Replies
Marked as solution

Hey @scottienoonan,

 

Spotify will automatically attempt to link tracks that match already existing content. If a match is found, the play counts for the linked tracks will be aggregated and the total amount of plays will be displayed on both tracks. Spotify is not able to manually track link content by request.

 

The following criteria must be identical for an alternative track to be considered:

  • ISRC code
  • Artist name & track titles
  • Version titles
  • Track length

 

In order to ensure no gaps in content coverage, please ensure the new content has been redelivered and is live on Spotify, before taking down the old content.

MaximSpotify Star
Help others find this answer and click "Accept as Solution".
If you appreciate my answer, maybe give me a Like.
Note: I'm not a Spotify employee.

Thank you so much, @Maximapple
This was exactly what I needed to know.

Regarding this being the criteria: 

The following criteria must be identical for an alternative track to be considered:

  • ISRC code
  • Artist name & track titles
  • Version titles
  • Track length

What if everything is the same but the the track title on previously released single is called "Song A" and on the album, the track is called "Song A - Bonus". Will it still match?

Hey @Art8,

 

Just so you know, track linking is never 100% guaranteed. When attempting to track link two versions of a recording, the metadata should be as identical as possible (i.e. duration, title, version, artist, ISRC), and the audio used should be the exact same.

 

Chances of track linking are decreased with each differing piece of metadata between the two recordings. New audio fingerprints create new Spotify recording groups, which have a unique play count. This is calculated for each different recording of a composition.

 

Hope this helps.

MaximSpotify Star
Help others find this answer and click "Accept as Solution".
If you appreciate my answer, maybe give me a Like.
Note: I'm not a Spotify employee.

Hi! I have a similar question. Will the new track, if linked properly, remain in any playlists that the single version had been added to? Thanks

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