Jay-Z Unveils New “High Fidelity” Streaming Service TIDAL

–Written by Kevin Madert

Shortly after midnight on Monday, the social media profile pictures of artists from Deadmau5 to Kanye West turned a uniform sky blue without explanation, often accompanied by the hashtag #TIDALforALL. The viral move turned out to be the final marketing push before the launch of TIDAL, a new high-fidelity streaming service promising to provide music “the way artists intended.”

The project is being spearheaded by Jay-Z, who purchased the service for $56 million last month. After a 7 day free trial, TIDAL will offer listeners unlimited access to high-quality audio for $19.99 a month, plus an array of “high definition music videos and expertly curated editorial.” An official announcement event featuring Jay-Z himself is set for Monday at 5 pm EST and will be live-streamed here.

Whether or not the service will truly be the next chapter in global streaming is up in the air, as TIDAL will join an already overcrowded market of mainstays (Spotify, Pandora) and relative newcomers (Amazon Prime Music, iTunes Radio). That being said, the court of public opinion is a powerful force, and endorsements from a wide array of artists could go a long way. We’ll keep you updated as events unfold.

s/o Forbes (What Jay-Z’s New Streaming Service Says About The Future Of Music) and USA Today (Jay-Z Set To Make Play In Dynamic Music Streaming Game)