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Kaytranada and Kehlani. “Lil Nas X”Old town road.” “Mo Bamba” by Sheck Wes. The commonalities that these artists and songs share are neither region nor genre, but platform. sound cloud It was its point of origin. “Once upon a time there was a boost for many careers,” he says stony blue, New York-based DJ and co-founder of BIYDIY Records. “Artists could upload their music directly to the community that would lurk there before the main focus was streaming. apple music either Spotify.” Since she joined the platform in 2012, she has met rookie artists such as Sango, Dream Koala, Yeek, and MÇHLS’s WOLFE. “SoundCloud,” she says, “always felt like the underground.”
The element of discovery has been SoundCloud’s secret ingredient since its launch in 2007. The Berlin-founded company has remained relevant by adopting a simple ethos: come as you are. That has made SoundCloud the platform for everyone, one that encompasses all genders, sexualities, religions and definitions of music and art. Establishing itself as a hub for community-oriented music streaming, it has become something of an incubator for cutting-edge sounds. SoundCloud is everyone’s underground.
That may change soon. SoundCloud has plans to chase a buyer this year, according multiple reports, a move the company has been working on for some time. In 2017, SoundCloud was nearly shut down when it was reported that the company would run out of funding within two months. Thanks to a last-minute cash injection of $170 million from investment firms Raine Group and Temasek Holdings, and A little help by Chance the Rapper, the company was saved from termination. Raine Group and Temasek are now reportedly seeking a $1 billion-plus payday. With the news of a possible sale, what is at stake is the possible loss of what has made SoundCloud such a unique platform, and the impact that loss will have on the future of the music business.
“It may sound dramatic, but it changed my life,” says Dede Ademabua, the Grammy-nominated producer known as IAMNOBODI. “I wouldn’t be where I am today if it weren’t for SoundCloud. I was able to make a name for myself by uploading songs and DJ mixes that people from all over the world connected with. I became part of the Soulection (music collective) through this platform.”
The spirit of the platform was inherent from the beginning. Ademabua, who has worked with Nipsey Hussle, Little Simz and Bryson Tiller, says the community was always at the center and what he stood for. “If anything, SoundCloud was about having fun and connecting with like-minded people around the world,” Ademabua says.
Those connections reached critical mass in 2015 when SoundCloud rap announced itself to the ears of the general public, when upstarts Lil Peep, Smokepurpp, XXXtentacion and Juice WRLD began making noise. Even for SoundCloud, a platform known for its exhaustive catalog of sounds, SoundCloud rap—rebellious, drug-friendly, and filled with tales of torment—was unlike anything else on the scene. The New York Times He dubbed it “the most vital and disruptive new movement in hip-hop.”
