Downtown Music Services (DMS) has signed five new labels to its LoFi roster.
Joining DMS is the UK’s Homework Radio and Lofi Bloom, Germany’s Effortless Audio, Canada’s Inner Oceans Records, and Sweden’s NINETOFIVE.
Downtown Music Services was formed earlier this year, after Concord acquired 145,000 copyrights from New York-headquartered Downtown Music Holdings, in a deal MBW understands cost around $400 million.
Collectively, says DMS, the five labels’ releases generate over 500 million streams a year.
DMS already provide distribution and artist services for an expansive roster of LoFi artists, including Glimlip, Jazzinuf, Louk, lōland, goosetaf, Kurt Stewart, and Oatmello, as well as over 50 Lofi labels, including Lofi Jazz Records, Chill Select, urbanundergrounds, Aviary Bridge, United Common, and Etymology Records.
The Lofi genre has boomed in popularity over the past few years, largely thanks to social media and video platforms.
On YouTube, channels such as College Music (1.2m) and Lofi Girl (9.05m) regularly attract tens of thousands of views on its 24/7 livestreams.
On TikTok, says Wired, Lofi tracks such as Death Bed surpassed 4 billion audio plays in a month, and helped the single peak at No. 23 on Billboard’s Hot 100.
DMS currently curates over 50 Lofi playlists on multiple DSPs, delivering millions of streams a month.
The company’s Apple playlist LoFi Chillhop Study Beats regularly exceeds 500K streams per day, while the company’s LoFi Rod’s ChillHop Lounge Spotify Tastemaker playlist has over 62K followers.
“a major reason why artists and labels choose DMS is because of the sense of community that we have cultivated.”
Rod Linnum, DMs
Rod Linnum, Vice President, Sales at DMS, said: “I think a major reason why artists and labels choose DMS is because of the sense of ‘family / community’ that we have cultivated.
“I’m really proud of the messages we receive from artists thanking us for our support and for making it possible for them to maintain their independent status as a musician.”Music Business Worldwide