Spotify & "Song Radio" is Essentially Just an Echo Chamber & Doesn't Breed Discovery

[cawul]

This hasn't always been the case, and I don't know if this has to do with the amount of time I've had my Spotify account or if something about the algorithm has drastically changed - but whenever I start a radio based off a song or artist (which is with the intention to find a NEW artist or NEW music that is related to the song/artist I'm starting the radio off of) it just creates essentially a playlist of music I've been listening to - and not even within the same genre off the song.

I've realized that I haven't found any new artists or any new music, and just continuously listen to the same things over and over again which is quite depressing. The point of the song radio or at least how I use it is to discover new artists that are in the same realm of the artist I'm listening to, and I think you all at Spotify are putting everyone - artist AND listener - at a huge detrimental disadvantage by having it go that way because then there is no discovery for new artists and there is no way for listeners to get into new music without scouring the platform instead of giving good recommendations based off your algorithm. More than anything I want to be able to discover new artists based off song radio, not just hear the same songs I've been listening to. If I wanted to listen to those songs, I would just continue to listen to them. Especially since maybe when I start a song radio off something that is midwest-emo/indie, it'll still play hyperpop/rap in the same playlist which are two completely different genre's and moods.

[Ralek]

The fact that this is still a problem is absolutely atrocious. Radio is essentially just shuffle at this point. I created a radio today, and out of the first 20 songs, I had already liked and listened to 16 of them dozens or hundreds of times. And the 4 I didn't add to favs yet, I knew by heart because radio plays them so often. I had to go 56 songs into the radio to find one I hadn't heard before.

What is the point of paying for Spotify anymore? I've tried Pandora recently and I've found more new, awesome music in 3 days than I've ever heard before on a Spotify radio. Get you act together Spotify, holy **bleep**.

[owopeachy]

pandora eh? thanks for the tip because this**bleep** the comment is talking about is what annoys me the most about this service, its the same songs over and over and over and over again and i hate it

[Luan]

Updated on 2022-11-24

Hey!
We've been keeping an eye on this submission for an extended period of time, and it doesn't seem this will reach the votes necessary to put it forward for prioritization.
As such, we're marking this case as closed. This includes any similar suggestions that are received.

If we have any new information to share, rest assured we'll check back here with a new status. Have in mind that the idea will continue open for getting votes, so if you still feel strongly about it, continue sharing it with more users.

More information about it can be found here.

Thanks for your comprehension!

[Jest3rmusic]

Any update on this? I hate having to go to Apple Music to find new music I like. Spotify has always been awesome but this seems like a huge oversight

[ohwellwhatever]

Please do this i am so tired of being recommended the same songs on my radios+daily mixes

[Joe178]

Just commenting to leave my two cents -- I am really tired of hearing the same set of mostly unrelated songs when I discover a new artist or I want to listen to a particular genre using the radio features.

Even my Spotify year wrapped is 50% genuine ear-worms that I listen to quite often, and 50% songs that I find myself skipping again and again. Not songs I skip because I don't like them in their own right (several are among my Liked Songs) but because Spotify wants to insert them into every single auto-generated playlist (daily mixes, radios, etc.) I ever listen to!

My current workflow is: click "radio", go to the play Queue, and go through all the 'annoying' songs I've heard too much of already and remove them one by one. In reality that's typically 2 or 3 songs for every 10, but Spotify has conditioned me to become frustrated the moment I hear, for example, the electronic organ opening of Baba O'Riley (a song I used to like) because it and a handful of others find their way into nearly every radio I listen to, regardless of suitability, and makes it feel like I'm skipping 9 in 10 songs.

It also makes it feel as though the radio is random, in a bad way. Like a generic "shuffle of stuff I have listened to in the past". If I want to listen to a playlist radio or an artist radio, I want to hear similar music, which means similar cadence / genre / instruments etc. At the moment I'm getting upbeat 80s and 90s party tracks mixed in with 60s and 70s rock, or metal mixed in with classical (which in some ways makes sense since I think listenership tends to overlap, but not usually in the same listening session, surely?)

Out of curiosity I just tried play.spotify.com in an incognito window and the radio playlists are much, much better than the personalised ones I get when I'm signed in! When I first subscribed to Spotify, my favourite part of it - and the part that made me ditch all other streaming/music buying platforms - was discovering new songs via the artist / playlist / song radios. It was great at that! But after about a year of use, I found I'm being fed back the same songs I've already 'liked' and the same artists I've already followed, even when they are not relevant.

Essentially, the more I use Spotify, the more artists I follow, and the more songs I like, the worse Spotify becomes at helping me discover new music, and the less unique all of the radio playlists become.

Presumably the algorithm works for a lot of people that do listen to a lot of the same music day-in and day-out, but at worst I'd like to be able to turn it off and use the same generic algorithm as I get from a browser in incognito mode, and at best I'd like the option of controlling the weighting of 'already liked' (close to 5% please), 'already listen to a lot by choice' (close to 2% please) and 'usually skips these' (right down to 0%!), leaving the remainder a nice mix of 'already following / already discovered' with a sprinkling of 'not yet discovered'.

Signing off by saying, if I only ever wanted to listen to the same set of artists + albums every day, I would unsubscribe from Spotify and go back to buying music. The radio and the automatic download of daily mix playlists was the whole reason I subscribed. Recently I've been listening to actual DAB radio stations instead of using Spotify while at work, and I have heard good things about Roon's music discovery algorithms so I am considering leaving Spotify for Roon + Quobuz / Tidal. I don't really want to do that, I just want to get back the old Spotify suggestions from 3-4 years ago that were consistently good. But now that I've found this ideas thread with the "case closed" message above from Luan, I'm starting my trial of Roon today.

[T231]

How is this still an issue, after being flagged and supported by other users so much? The replies by Spotify employees I have read in these comments are very disappointing and a masterclass in making users feel like they are being heard without listening at all. The post/ idea submission is very clear about what this problem is. It's clearly not about "queue" or making a playlist. Radio used to be amazing, now it's useless. The summarize what we're all asking for: stop taking into account songs we have already listened to and liked when suggesting songs through the radio function, only put songs there based on the song/album/artist the radio should be based on. It's that simple. 

[MartinKingHUN]

It's still a problem lol. I hate this service.

[Fransois]

+1 ! So complicated to just listen to new song based on what we like !

[ayli_mukaddam]

It’s very disappointing to see that they have marked this idea as “case-closed” even though it has been upvoted by many people? Is 2716 votes not enough for you to take the idea into consideration?? I’m extremely dissatisfied with the way spotify handles problems, responding with the same “copy-pasted” answers for every question we have!