Soul Strutter

Showing posts with label Announcement. Show all posts

Tuesday, 7 May 2024

Site Navigation Tips

We've updated tags/labels today (which was long overdue) so that the blog search options are now bang up-to-date. Therefore, we thought it timely to give a few tips about the best way of navigating the site to find what you're looking for.

The easiest way of finding material by artist is via the 'Search by ..' drop down list in the menu. You can start typing the first few letters as a shortcut. i.e. no need to scroll all the way.

If you can't find what you're looking for there, then the next option is the 'Search this blog' box on top left or in the right hand column.

To see what's been posted most recently there's the nested menu in the right hand column but perhaps easier to use is the Archive menu option which lists all posts in reverse chronological order by date/time.

The Menu

Row 1

Home

Goes to the latest post. You can also click on the SoulStrutter logo at the top of the page to return to Home.

Playlists

Spotify playlists.

Mixes

Selects our own Mixes.

Selections of the Week

Returns posts all our SoulStrutter Selections of the Week in reverese date order i.e. newest first.

Row 2

21st Century Soul

Spotify playlists of the best songs for each year of 21st Century. We've only got from 2000-2009 so far.

Best of 2023

Spotify playlists of our selections of the best of 2023.

SA Top 30

Soul Associates weekly Top 30. Now defunct

Row 3 Drop Down Lists

Search by...

Search labels/tags, generally (but not exclusively) artist names.

Artist Profiles

List of artists we have profiled. Many, sadly, are tributes when they died.

Rating

A quick way of finding posts by our rating which helps find the better releases perhaps (based on our rating of course which you may or may not agree with!)

Date

Various criteria to find releases by date i.e. Decade, Year, Year and Quarter, Year and Month

Row 4

Radio Podcasts

Nested menu to access radio show podcasts

Dirty Dozen

Needs updating, but these are our weekly/monthly/quarterly playlists or podcasts of the best of each week, month or quarter.

Monday, 2 October 2023

10,000th Post

On 14th of August 2023 we reached 2 million hits and today we've reached another milestone as we have surpassed our 10,000th post.

The vast majority of these have been made since March 2020, so that's on average approx. 240 posts per month, 55 per week and 8 posts per day. Given that 99.9% of all posts have at least one music track attached, we would estimate that with EPs, albums, playlists and podcasts we must have posted approaching close to 100,000 tunes in that time.

Monday, 14 August 2023

A Big Thank You ... as blog reaches 2 million hits

On Friday the blog surpassed 2,000,000 hits, with 920k of those being in the last 12 months as, if you recall, we posted on 30 Jun '22 when we hit the first million.

We'd like to thank regular and new visitors alike for your continued support and here's to the next million which, at the current hit rate, may be only six months away.

Thanks to Lorraine Winser for providing the (unsolicited) graphic.

Friday, 4 August 2023

Spotify Embed Issue - only playing samples

It seems that Spotify, in their infinite wisdom, in the last few days has made some modifications to embedded links so that now, even if you're logged into the Spotify web app, only 30 second samples can be played from Spotify embeds from websites.

Spotify seem to change code 'willy nilly' without testing the implications, we recall spending days with their technical support last year over an issue which 'miraculously' rectified itself within a few days.

So, hopefully within a few days it will be back to normal, if not we'll escalate.

A work around, which we know is a pain in the butt, but if you wish to listen to full songs, is to click on the song title on the Spotify embed to take you to the Spotify web player which, if you are logged in, will play the full song.

It may be that they are trying to drive listeners to their web app to listen which, if the case, will have a severe impact on websites that embed links, which in turn will limit traffic to Spotify, so we shall see if sanity prevails!

If it isn't sorted tout suite then we will revert back to embedding from YouTube and that will be Spotify's loss and YouTube's gain.

As a matter of interest, we wonder if artists get any streaming fees for playing only 30 seconds? We very much doubt it, so artists/labels may wish to take this up with Spotify as well.

Friday, 21 July 2023

Click Bait Warning Update

Further to our 'Click Bait Warning' earlier in the week, we have already come across 'fake' releases this morning by artists such as Rufus, Linda Jones, Michael Wycoff, Howard Johnson and Mary Wilson.

Whoever is responsible is obviously targeting listeners looking for vintage/traditional soul. Three of the above artists are deceased (Jones, Wycoff & Wilson) so they are hardly likely to be making new music. Rufus hasn't recorded anything since the 80s although Howard Johnson is still active.

Perhaps those responsible are hoping that 'clickers' will be tempted by the promise of previously unreleased material?

So if you come across other music by 'vintage' artists treat them with suspicion.

Wednesday, 19 July 2023

Click Bait Warning!

A few months ago releases were abundant with fake artist names i.e. songs using famous artist names to induce listening.

It seem to have reared it's ugly head again as we found one released yesterday credited to Roy Ayers, which surprised us, and when listening of course it most certainly was not Roy Ayers.

We have just found another, why it was in the R&B section is a mystery, so we were intrigued as it was billed feat. Billy Idol, Spandau Ballet & Tears For Fears, and of course none of the above were anywhere to be heard on the recording.

So we assume that it is click bait to generate streaming fees out of curiosity, so don't be fooled (like we were!).

We thought about embedding them but then chose not to as that is exactly what whoever is posting them wants (i.e. streaming fees) but here are the Amazon links:

Roy Ayers - Paper In The Soul

FENON MIKEL feat. Billy Idol, Spandau Ballet & Tears For Fears - Back To Moon

Tuesday, 20 June 2023

The SoulStrutter Effect!

Having just checked the latest Amazon UK Hot New Releases we couldn't help but notice that the Top 5 were all tracks found and posted by SoulStrutter on day of release (some actually posted the day after as we don't like to post too many each day) and passed to our radio partners Roger SoulSorts Williams and Steve Aggasild. Roger played all of them, and Steve some of them, on their shows this weekend (their shows were posted earlier today).

So how has SoulStrutter influenced Amazon? For all posts, where available, we provide links to Amazon on cover images. This month the site is having it's best hit rate to date and is on schedule to exceed well over 100k hits as in only 20 days so far this month we have received over 95k. The majority of our visitors are from US and UK but have visitors worldwide.

Promoters, labels and artists may perhaps wish to consider this when they send promos to radio stations and DJs and not to websites!

1 - Courtney Cooper "Sweet Escape" [9 Jun]

2 - Manuka Groove "Whatever it takes" LP [15 Jun]

3 - Gina D'Soto - "The Way" [9 Jun]

4 - Kiara "Dance" [9 Jun]

5 - ADIV feat, India Shawn "Perfect Time" [5 Jun]

Click to enlarge

Friday, 12 May 2023

Acantha Lang [2023-05-06] - Live on US TV (CBS Saturday Morning) 7am-8am Eastern Time

We've just received some terrific news from Acantha Lang. She will be making her debut on US TV on 'CBS Saturday Morning' tomorrow morning (6 May '23) at 07:00-08:00 Eastern Time (USA timings vary from station to station so check your local listings).

She will be performing songs from her forthcoming debut album "Beautiful Dreams" due on 20 Jun '23 which we posted tracks from a couple of weeks ago which you can pre-order from HERE.

As an unsigned independent artist she is very excited at this opportunity and says that this is one of the biggest opportunities of her career so far.

For those of us outside of the US, the performance will be uploaded to CBS's YouTube channel and we will post links when available.

Click on image below for link to where you can buy from.

Click icons below for further information or to connect with the artist.

Wednesday, 15 March 2023

PizzaExpress Live to launch PX Records

Hot on the heels of Jarrod Lawson's four shows there at the weekend, Pizza Express has announced that it is launching its own record label in conjunction with its live music arm Pizza Express Live. Named PX Records, they will release albums from new and established jazz and soul artists as well as a selection of music from PizzaExpress Live's extensive archive of live recordings.

PizzaExpress Live was conceived in London's Soho in the late 70s and has built a reputation as one of the UK's leading venues for live music, having presented over 50,000 concerts from an array of artist which includes Tony Bennett, Amy Winehouse, Diana Krall, Van Morrison, Bill Wyman, Benny Carter, Brian May, George Shearing, Charlie Watts, Mose Allison, Anita O'Day and Melody Gardot.

Artists such as Jamie Cullum, Norah Jones and Gregory Porter held their very first UK concerts at the venue and have gone on to become international stars.

The next chapter is the launch of PX Records and the release of a selection of live albums recorded across its venues such as PizzaExpress Jazz Club in Soho, PizzaExpress Live in Holborn and The Pheasantry in Chelsea featuring live performances from a broad mix of established artists and the very best emerging talent from across the worlds of jazz, soul, blues and beyond.

The first releases will feature live albums from US jazz saxophonist Scott Hamilton, and the UK's Mamas Gun (due on 14 Apr), multi-instrumentalist and producer edbl (Ed Black) and one of the most hotly-tipped new bands on the UK scene Native Dancer. All releases will be available as digital downloads as well as on both CD and vinyl

The label will, additionally, release a series of legacy recordings sourced from PizzaExpress Live's archive dating back over 45 years featuring previously unreleased performances from some of the acts to have graced its stage.

Wednesday, 8 March 2023

New Mixcloud Rules

Up until recently uploading podcasts to Mixcloud was free, one of the only remaining free services. However, a few months ago they have limited this to ten shows. If you upload a new show (and already have ten) then you must deactivate or delete one of the previous ten shows, or alternatively subscribe to a professional account to retain more than ten shows.

In addition, new SRPC rules governing Mixcloud uploads comes into force worldwide. The rules only previoulsy applied to the US but now affect all uploads. It makes it difficult to post a tribute show as the restrictions are:

Maximum 3 songs from one album (and no more than 2 consecutively)
Maximum 4 songs from one recording artist (and no more than 3 consecutively)
Maximum 4 songs from one compilation (and no more than 3 consecutively)
Shows that have more than 4 songs from one recording artist but fewer than 8 songs from one recording artist will only be available to Premium subscribers, channel subscribers or you as the creator.

Further information HERE.

So if you experience one of your older shows being no longer available it may be due to these new restrictions. I noticed a few we've posted now being blocked i.e. a couple of Luther Vandross tributes.

Saturday, 25 February 2023

Gary Van Den Bussche - Promotion Person of the Year 2023

Daytime Starpoint Radio presenter Gary Van Den Bussche runs a radio promotion company called DSG (Disco Soul Gold) and has just been awarded 'Promotion Person of the Year' in the 5th Annual Indie Soul Awards run by Chris Clay's Soul Cafe Radio in the US.

Gary started collecting records from the age of 9 in the early 70s, so that's 51 years ago to our reckoning as he was 40 plus VAT last year! His love of soul music was influenced by early UK soul radio pioneers Greg Edwards, Peter Young and Robbie Vincent. At 17 he ran a record shop beneath a book shop called Baker Street Record in London's West End which Gary tells us had many celebrity customers such as Paul Weller, Edwin Starr, Randy Crawford.

Through another customer, Fitz Brown (who was a DJ at Tramp Nightclub), Gary got his first shot at DJ'ing at the plush Tramp Nightclub in London's West End where he DJ'd at many celebrity events for the likes of Tony Curtis, The Stones, Rod Stewart, Joan Collins, Georgie Best, Royalty, Tony Hall, Mel Brooks, in fact everybody who was anybody.

When the record shop closed it's doors he started plugging records during the day and DJ'ing at night. Some of his successes included plugging #1 hits for Phyllis Nelson with "Move Closer" and Amii Stewart "Knock on Wood".

His first stint on radio was given to him by Tony Monson on Solar Radio which was a pirate station in those days.

After a few years at Tramp Gary left and worked at various other venues around the south, Club Musique (Croydon), Sunset (Maidstone), Samantha's (London) and Piccadilly Theatre (London) supporting The Foundations for three weeks.

He eventually opened his own club at Kent Hall in Maidstone and built up a large following which resulted in opening nights at various other venues around the South East in Orpington, Gravesend, Ashford, Cheam, Weybridge, Town & Country London, plus many others. Many celebrities attended.

He was introduced to the recording studio by Noah Johnson who taught him how to write and produce songs. Gary's first record release was "Young Free & Single" under Dee Gee (Disco Gary) (a cover of Sunfire) which reached #1 on John Leech's radio show and several record deals were offered but the first label closed down before pressings started and it was taken by Upfront Records who after promoting it also closed down.

Not deterred, Gary set up Wizz Records and released around thirty singles. He also set up a distribution company, Empire, initially from the back of his car driving around the South East creating a buzz distributing records received and his own white labels and progressing to vans and telesales.

Gary changed direction and bought a Free House Pub in Hever (Kent) which he ran with his ex-wife and family and taught himself to become an award winning chef and eventually sold the pub and bought a restaurant which grew into a chain.

After a brief 'spell' as a hypnotherapist Gary returned to music and set up DSG. He discovered Newcastle group SouLutions after hearing a demo of "Listen" which they sat on for 8 years before arranging to have it remixed and released.

DSG promotes new releases each week sending them to a mailing list of around 860 which includes radio stations, DJs and media outlets, most end up on radio playlists which results in them entering the UK Soul Chart.

In addition Gary does a lunchtime radio show on Starpoint Radio between 11:00-13:00 GMT as well as his "Get Down Saturday Night Show" geared to the dancefloor which moves to a new time slot of 19:00-2100 GMT from this evening.

Join us in congratulating Gary for the work he does promoting independent soul music for artists and labels.

Wednesday, 1 February 2023

Soul Music Radio - A new 24/7 soul radio station launches TODAY (Wed, 1st Feb 2023)

Launching TODAY (Wed, 1 Feb 2023) is a brand new soul radio station, Soul Music Radio (SMR), playing the finest classic soul, funk, northern soul, jazz, 80s groove, jazz funk, rare groove, disco, house, hip hop, lovers rock, brit funk, re-edits, & 80s electro along with many specialist shows.

The station will broadcast music of black origin 24/7, across the board, regardless of the flava, to appeal to a broader age range than just the traditional soul boys and girls who are now 50+. Live shows will be aired from 7 a.m. through to 11 p.m. with "The Music Box" through the night.

The station is the brainchild of Riggsy (Paul Wrigglesworth), born out of the success of the inaugural Cyprus Soul event held in Paphos 7-13 Nov 2022, who has got the station up and running within a matter of only seven weeks.

This year's event is being held on 4-11 Nov 2023 at the 5 star Venus Beach hotel in Paphos and is selling fast, so further details head over to Cyprus Soul website. DJ's already lined up include: Dennis O'Brien (Solar Radio & ex-Kiss FM), Tony Mac, Andy Edwards (Solar Radio), Nigel Fox (Starpoint Radio), Riggsy & Brandon Block (Zero Radio), Robbie J (SMR), Martin Gray, Paul Fawsitt and Eric Owenson.

Riggsy has 40+ years of experience spinning tunes, working for Capital Radio & Kiss FM on their outside broadcasts and being a resident at some of the biggest clubs in the UK.

Soul Music Radio's USP is that they will be offering free advertising for artists and labels to help promote their music to a wide audience. Let's face it, if these artists can't get their music promoted and heard then they don't make money (and may even lose money) and we won't have fresh new music to listen to and radio will become a staple of oldies around the clock.

The website Soul Music Radio is live now, currently programming "The Music Box" until it launches fully on Wednesday, 1st Feb.

So far 27 presenters have been recruited and if you think you have what it takes and can add value and want to join the station then send an email to soulmusicradiouk@gmail.com

The schedule is shaping up as follows (subject to change):

For up-to-date details check Schedule

Meet some of the presenters

Mon

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - DJ Fish - "Soul Therapy"

11-01 - GTs - " Brunch to Lunch"

01-03 - Craig Jardine - "Soul Directions"

03-05 - Gary James - " Back Trax 1"

05-07 - Gary Moore - "Classic Disco"

07-09 - Mark Johns "Footprints"

09-11 - DJ ALI

11-07 - "The Music Box

Tue

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - DJ Fish - "Soul Therapy"

11-01 - GTs - " Brunch to Lunch"

01-03 - Craig Jardine - "Soul Directions"

03-05 - Terri Green - "The Terri Green Project"

05-07 - Riggsy - "The Re-Edit Show"

07-09 - Robbie J - "House Nation"

09-11 - Malcolm Aubrey - "Soulful Vibes"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Wed

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - DJ Fish - "Soul Therapy"

11-01 - Elaine Saunders - "Lainey's Boutique"

01-03 - TBC

03-05 - Nigel Waymark - "The Network Show"

05-07 - Mogsy - "Neo Soul To Gospel & R&B"

07-09 - DJ Confirmed Awaiting Details

09-11 - Gary James -" Back Trax 2"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Thu

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - Rob Lynch

11-01 - TBC

01-03 - TBC

03-05 - Angie 'D" - "Solitary Soul"

05-07 - Mike Russo - " La Dolce Vita"

07-09 - Rochie One - "Soul Food To Go"

09-11 - Angel Faye Russell - "Southern Soul Breakout"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Fri

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - Rob Lynch

11-01 - Bob Christie -" Elements of Soul "

01-03 - TBC

03-05 - Gary James (TBC)

05-07 - Robbie J - "Friday Drive Time"

07-09 - Vinny Ryan - " Groove Addiction"

09-11 - Steve Aggasild - "Jazz, Funk & Soul"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Sat

07-09 - TBC

09-11 - Kevin O'Brien - The Saturday Morning Cafe"

11-01 - Rochie One - "Soul Food To Go"

01-03 - DJ Confirmed Awaiting Details

03-05 - DJ Robbie J - Soul Motion"

05-07 - "The Tricksta Mix Show"

07-09 - Bob Christie - Elements of Soul "

09-11 - Mick Fuller - " Soul Shyne"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Sun

07-09 - DJ Fish - "Sunday Soul Revival"

09-11 - DJ Confirmed Awaiting Details

11-01 - Mogsy & Mel - "The Gospel R&B Show"

01-03 - Angela D N Crowe - " Reggae & Lovers Rock Show"

03-05 - Mick T - "Too Darn Soulful"

05-07 - "Sarah Jane Rundel - "Groove Candi"

07-09 - Riggsy - "Dance Anthems"

09-11 - Craig Jardine - "Up Club Soul"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Sunday, 29 January 2023

Soul Music Radio - A new 24/7 soul radio station launches Wed, 1st Feb 2023

Launching on Wednesday, 1 Feb 2023 is a brand new soul radio station, Soul Music Radio (SMR), playing the finest classic soul, funk, northern soul, jazz, 80s groove, jazz funk, rare groove, disco, house, hip hop, lovers rock, brit funk, re-edits, & 80s electro along with many specialist shows.

Riggsy has 40+ years of experience spinning tunes, working for Capital Radio & Kiss FM on their outside broadcasts and being a resident at some of the biggest clubs in the UK.

The website Soul Music Radio is live now, currently programming "The Music Box" until it launches fully on Wednesday, 1st Feb.

So far 27 presenters have been recruited and if you think you have what it takes and can add value and want to join the station then send an email to soulmusicradiouk@gmail.com

The schedule is shaping up as follows (subject to change):

For up-to-date details check Schedule

Meet some of the presenters

Mon

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - DJ Fish - "Soul Therapy"

11-01 - GTs - " Brunch to Lunch"

01-03 - Craig Jardine - "Soul Directions"

03-05 - Gary James - " Back Trax 1"

05-07 - Gary Moore - "Classic Disco"

07-09 - Mark Johns "Footprints"

09-11 - DJ ALI

11-07 - "The Music Box

Tue

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - DJ Fish - "Soul Therapy"

11-01 - GTs - " Brunch to Lunch"

01-03 - Craig Jardine - "Soul Directions"

03-05 - Terri Green - "The Terri Green Project"

05-07 - Riggsy - "The Re-Edit Show"

07-09 - Robbie J - "House Nation"

09-11 - Malcolm Aubrey - "Soulful Vibes"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Wed

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - DJ Fish - "Soul Therapy"

11-01 - Elaine Saunders - "Lainey's Boutique"

01-03 - TBC

03-05 - Nigel Waymark - "The Network Show"

05-07 - Mogsy - "Neo Soul To Gospel & R&B"

07-09 - DJ Confirmed Awaiting Details

09-11 - Gary James -" Back Trax 2"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Thu

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - Rob Lynch

11-01 - TBC

01-03 - TBC

03-05 - Angie 'D" - "Solitary Soul"

05-07 - Mike Russo - " La Dolce Vita"

07-09 - Rochie One - "Soul Food To Go"

09-11 - Angel Faye Russell - "Southern Soul Breakout"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Fri

07-09 - Riggsy - "The Breakfast Show"

09-11 - Rob Lynch

11-01 - Bob Christie -" Elements of Soul "

01-03 - TBC

03-05 - Gary James (TBC)

05-07 - Robbie J - "Friday Drive Time"

07-09 - Vinny Ryan - " Groove Addiction"

09-11 - Steve Aggasild - "Jazz, Funk & Soul"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Sat

07-09 - TBC

09-11 - Kevin O'Brien - The Saturday Morning Cafe"

11-01 - Rochie One - "Soul Food To Go"

01-03 - DJ Confirmed Awaiting Details

03-05 - DJ Robbie J - Soul Motion"

05-07 - "The Tricksta Mix Show"

07-09 - Bob Christie - Elements of Soul "

09-11 - Mick Fuller - " Soul Shyne"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Sun

07-09 - DJ Fish - "Sunday Soul Revival"

09-11 - DJ Confirmed Awaiting Details

11-01 - Mogsy & Mel - "The Gospel R&B Show"

01-03 - Angela D N Crowe - " Reggae & Lovers Rock Show"

03-05 - Mick T - "Too Darn Soulful"

05-07 - "Sarah Jane Rundel - "Groove Candi"

07-09 - Riggsy - "Dance Anthems"

09-11 - Craig Jardine - "Up Club Soul"

11-07 - "The Music Box

Sunday, 18 September 2022

State Funeral of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (21 Apr 1926 - 8 Sep 2022)

As a mark of respect to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (21 Apr 1926 - 8 Sep 2022), with a nation and commonwealth mourning her passing on the day of her state funeral, there will be no posts on Monday 19 Sep 2022.

Thursday, 1 September 2022

Spotify Embedding Issue - RESOLVED?

Despite telling me they would, Spotify hasn't contacted me yet to inform me that the embedding issue was now fixed, but it appears now to have been.

So spending almost 6 hours of my time dealing with them wasn't completely wasted! They originally told me it could be weeks and then I told them that traffic on this site had been reduced by 75% owing to the issue and that time scale wasn't acceptable. They initially would not accept that it was their software change that was causing the problem, which it clearly was as there was no issue before that.

However, fair play to them as it seem to be fixed now within 24 hours.

Spotify embedding Issues Pt3!

Well having spent yet another hour with Spotify technical support this morning (that's almost 5 hours in total!) it seems that the penny has finally dropped that they might have an issue with their embed code change yesterday. No sh*t Sherlock!

"Thanks for waiting. I checked backstage and it looks like we're aware of the issue so our teams are on the case as we speak. Hopefully we'll have a fix soon!"

In the meantime, until this issue is resolved, I will only post if the track is available on YouTube or doesn't require Spotify. Unfortunately there is nothing I can do with all the earlier single track posts from Spotify but hope they will find a fix quickly.

Spotify Embedding Issue Pt.2 - Individual Tracks

I was up very late last night on chat with Spotify trying to get a resolution to the issue which seems to be only affecting Google Chrome users (on Windows 10 I believe) which is probably the large percentage of blog visitors (and Firefox also seems to be impacted).

The visitor rate to the blog was significantly reduced by around 75% yesterday so I can only assume that it is due to others suffering the same problem and have left the site as they cannot listen to embedded Spotify tracks. If you are experiencing the same issue I would appreciate you leaving a comment (or email soulstrutter@gmail.com) so that I can escalate with Spotify as they are claiming that there isn't a problem! So the more messages received the better so that they can begin to understand the scale of the problem. Conversely if you are not experiencing the same issues, then a message with what operating system and browser you are using may also be useful.

This is what I am experiencing: If you are logged in to Spotify then embedded single tracks give a 'content not available in your country' message. I you then log out of Spotify and refresh the blog page the embedded single track is displayed but only plays a 30 second sample. To listen to the track in full it would appear that you then have to click on the Spotify icon (or link on track name) to go to the Spotify player and log in. Once you log in and go back to blog and refresh the page you are back to where we started i.e. 'content not available in your country'.

This only started happening around 16:00 BST yesterday which coincided with a change to their single track embedding interface and they cannot seem to be able to link the two events as it can't simply be a coincidence?

Therefore, the end result of whatever change they have made to the embed code is that, it now works like a link and not embed code as you have to go to Spotify to listen to the full track and I have explained this to them at length .. why bother using embed code as it works like a link so I may as well just put in a link!

Perhaps it is deliberate so that you are not able to listen to a full track, only a sample, outside of Spotify in an endeavour to force you to sign up for Spotify, I don't know for sure as they have not confirmed that, but that is what it seems like to me. Please be aware if you are not already, you can sign up for a free account and listen to tracks in full, the only 'drawback' is that every now and then you will be interrupted with audio adverts. Personally, I have not found this a big deal!

A work around until this is resolved is either to use Chrome in Incognito Mode (which you can do by clicking the three dots in top right corner of window and selecting 'New Incognito window' (or Ctrl+Shift+N). Alternatively use Microsoft Edge browser. I have found that it also works with Tor browser and the issue seems isolated to Google Chrome in standard mode but have received reports that its is also not working in Firefox.

Wednesday, 31 August 2022

Spotify Embedding Issue

Sometime this afternoon Spotify has changed their embedding code. The play button is now on the right and does not seem to want to play!

I have tried this in raw html with the same issue so it is not a Blogger issue. Oddly albums and playlists are not affected it only appears to be a problem with single tracks. I don't know whether this is a temporary glitch owing to their change to code or signs of things to come so will have to try and contact Spotify to find out.

In the meantime to listen to a track, click on the Spotify icon in top right hand corner of the player you will be taken to the Spotify web application and can play the track.

UPDATE: I've been on to Spotify and the issue isn't resolved yet ... however it must be an issue with Google Chrome as it works in MS Edge and Tor Browsers and Chrome Incognito Mode. So I suggest trying one of those until Spotify resolve the issue!

It only seems to be an issue with single tracks .. albums and playlists still work fine!

UPDATE 2: I have spent several hours on chat with Spotify and thus far no resolution has been found. So I am very sorry but until they fix whatever they have 'broken' by changing their embed interface I can only suggest using Edge or Chrome in incognito mode until the issue is rectified. Believe me I will keep on at them until it is! In the meantime I will post from YouTube wherever possible moving forward.

Wednesday, 10 August 2022

Happy Birthday USMAN47!

Regular blog visitor and contributor Yves Lambert (aka USMAN47) from the south of France is celebrating his 75th birthday today. We wish him a great day and thank him for his continued support and contributions.

Thursday, 30 June 2022

Thanks A Million!

Today the blog has reached a landmark ... a million hits, 650k of them in the last twelve months. We're also approaching the 6,000th post, the large majority of them (5,428) since Jan 2021.

I'd like to thank all our visitors, regular readers and followers and hope you will stay with us and spread the word to increase the figures further. I think it would be fair to say that much of the material posted here does not feature on the majority of other soul music websites, nor do many others post the same volume or arguably as varied material. Neo soul in particular tends to get left behind in favour of R&B/Hip-hop, traditional soul or jazz.

The blog was started back in 2009 along with another called Modern Soul originally posting only vintage material. Both blogs were dormant for many years as work pressures didn't permit spending a lot of time on them. At the commencement of Covid lockdown in March 2020 I reactivated SoulStrutter and merged the posts from Modern Soul which remains live but dormant.

At the beginning of 2021 a decision was made to focus on mainly brand new releases, including reissues, but still posting occasional vintage material. The blog has gone from strength to strength, vindicating the decision to primarily focus on new material.

Obviously, as the saying goes, you can't please all of the people all of the time, but the aim is to highlight the best of what's been released (or at least found) each day. The site is completely independent meaning that everything posted is at my sole discretion without any external influence or interference.

Suggestions on how to improve the site are welcome at soulstrutter@gmail.com

Artists, labels and PR people are encouraged to submit material for consideration at the same email address, but please ensure that it is soul related only.

Likewise, if you know about something good that hasn't been posted then let us know about it so we can share and you'll get a name check.

Tuesday, 7 May 2024

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