My experience with Tidal - w/o Roon.
When using Tidal’s app on a laptop, I loved its automated functionality for discovering similar/new music. The automated functionality displayed artists and songs without the need for a manual search. Tidal automatically did it for me. I found an enormous amount of new-to-me music this way. It was very simple & very easy. (Described below.)
These benefits changed when I switched from a laptop to a streamer. I went from the Tidal app to the streamer’s app. I immediately appreciated the superior SQ of the streamer. But, the streamer’s app didn’t offer the same automated functionality. I was limited to a manual search. I realized that I wasn’t saving as much similar/new music as I did before. This is with the Lightning DS app on a Auralic Aries.
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Tips for discovering similar/new music using the Tidal app.
- With the Tidal app on a laptop, Tidal’s automated recommendations really shine when you create your own playlists. After you manually populate your own playlists (such as: ‘Electric Blues’ – ‘Big Band’ – ‘Show Tunes’), Tidal automatically populates and displays similar music after your list ends. No need for a manual search. These automated additions will refresh and change every week or so. If you like a cut from their list, you need to manually save it to your own playlist. This automated programming also tosses in a few cuts of very different music just to mix it up.
- After you create your own playlists, this allows the Tidal automated algorithm to create more relevant ‘Mixes and Radio’. This is really nice!
- Tidal’s ‘Artist Radio’ is also excellent for finding similar/new music. IME, it’s better than Tidal’s pre-built playlists. If you click on the ‘Radio’ button for a particular artist, Tidal automatically generates a new playlist of many different musicians for that genre of music. It’s not just music by the same artist.
- Tidal’s home page with new releases is targeted toward the younger generation. Just skip it if it doesn’t appeal to you. Tidal is pretty good once you figure it out.
Some streamer apps, don’t off as much feature-rich functionality as Tidal’s own. It would be so much better if they did since a streamer’s SQ is far superior than a noisy computer.