John Whittingdale: Culture Secretary gives backing to music streaming service Electric Jukebox

The Electric Jukebox promises to “revolutionise the way we listen to music at home

Whittingdale said: “This is a very exciting idea for consumers. It gives people the ability to access music on a scale never heard before with simplicity" (PA)

If your idea of “cool” is a television-locked music streaming service endorsed by John Whittingdale then the Electric Jukebox is here for you. The Culture Secretary is backing a new “plug-and-play” device, targeted at mainstream music lovers left disenfranchised by the digital revolution.

Created by British technology entrepreneur Rob Lewis, the £179 Electric Jukebox promises to “revolutionise the way we listen to music in the home.”

Endorsed by Robbie Williams, Sheryl Crow and Stephen Fry at a launch on Wednesday, the jukebox is a dongle which plugs into a HDMI television socket, and when connected to WiFi, allows users to search, cue and play their selection from an online catalogue of millions of songs.

Pop star is among the musicians who have given the backing to the new system (Getty)

Users control their selection from a voice-operated Wii-style “magic wand.” The Electric Jukebox only works via a television set and cannot be used to build a music collection on mobile devices, flying in the face of current digital music trends.

By publicly endorsing a commercial product, John Whittingdale has joined the fraught lineage of ministers “picking winners.”

The Culture Secretary’s former boss, Margaret Thatcher, became an evangelist for technology entrepreneur Sir Clive Sinclair in the early 80s when his ZX Spectrum became the most successful British home computer ever made. The PM personally presented a Spectrum to the Japanese Prime Minister as a symbol of British technological prowess.

A free-market evangelist, Whittingdale would not go so far as Tony Benn, who as Technology Minster poured government funds into the creation of International Computers Limited, an attempt to create a national champion to compete with the Japanese, the creation of Concorde and the rescue of British Leyland.

Whittingdale declared his support for the Electric Jukebox, saying the arrival of the “internet of things” was creating great opportunities for high-tech British entrepreneurs. He is however yet to join Robbie Williams and Alesha Dixon in curating a personal  music playlist for users.

Lewis, who founded the digital music platform Omnifone, said the jukebox was a simple, fun solution for the millions of music fans who used to buy CDs but found Spotify and Apple Music too complicated to navigate.

“Why have only 8% of music buyers converted to streaming subscriptions after a decade?,” Lewis asked at a Bafta launch for the device. “We’ve made the experience too complicated and too painful. The complexity of digital is depriving people of the right to listen to music at home.”

According to Lewis, it takes two hours and 21 steps to set up a connected streaming system through Sonos speakers at home, whereas the Electric Jukebox is ready to play within two minutes. “There’s no monthly subscriptions, no downloading an app and no passwords.”

Tracks on the television jukebox are represented by spinning CD-style discs rather than digital files. Songs are accompanied by artistic “visualisations” created by Getty Images, recreating the effect of staring at a Pink Floyd gatefold vinyl sleeve.

Lewis and his team of backers, which include former chief executives of EMI and Warner Music, as well as Paul McGuinness, the manager who turned U2 into a £1bn business, believes his device will appeal to families and revive the social experience of music.

“We want everyone to be able to listen to music they want and to be able to listen together,” Lewis said. “TV is still the number one bit of kit in the living room, and we’re going to fill it with all the music so you can listen to the music you love, with the people you love.”

Stephen Fry says that the system simplifies music streaming to a more accessible level (Getty)

However Google’s Chromecast Audio (£30) and Amazon’s Fire Stick for (£35) already perform a similar service at a far cheaper price.

Mr Whittingdale gave the initiative his enthusiastic backing. The minister, who was impressed with Lewis’s vision after meeting him last year, said: “This is a very exciting idea for consumers. It gives people the ability to access music on a scale never heard before with simplicity. You don’t need an electronic engineering degree to do so.

“We are very strong in IT in this country. We are an entrepreneurial nation and no-one more so than Rob. I wish him and his company every success for the future.”

Stephen Fry, an early adopter of Apple’s consumer devices who is compiling a playlist for the Electric Jukebox, said: “There are technical difficulties behind some music systems. The Electric Jukebox is a fireplace around which the family can gather and play music in a very simple way. It’s a terrific breakthrough.”

Although the jukebox does not require monthly subscriptions, users must pay £60, after an initial 12-month period, to retain the “music pass” containing their playlists, for a further year. These premium subscribers will avoid advertisements which will appear on screen after a year.

The jukebox could prove a success, said Mark Mulligan, a leading music industry consultant. “There is a clear opportunity for the mainstream music consumer and the living room is probably the right place to start. These are not consumers that are streaming music to their phones or building big playlist collections,” Mulligan wrote on his Midia Research blog.

Although the Electric Jukebox cannot be transferred to mobile devices, the TV-based music system’s annual £60 subscription, which applies after one year’s free use, compares favourably to Apple Music and Spotify’s £9.99 monthly charge. Tidal, Jay-Z’s high-quality audio streaming service, remains the most expensive at £19.99.

The Electric Jukebox will update with new songs but its owners are yet to announce licensing deals with major labels and independents. Demos suggest artists including Coldplay, Bob Dylan, Katy Perry and some Taylor Swift tracks will be present. Spotify boasts a catalogue of 30m songs.

The Electric Jukebox is targeting people who find the Sonos wireless sound system, which links speakers across multiple rooms and allows users to control music, audio books or digital radio using a smartphone app, too complicated.

It faces competition from cheaper solutions such as the Amazon Fire Stick and Google’s Chromecast Audio, which allows any speaker to connect to a wireless internet connection.

But Mulligan questioned whether sufficient consumers would pay £179 for a music-only device and warned: “TVs are designed for viewing content on (whether that be TV, online video, photos or games). This is not to say consumers cannot be educated into entirely new behaviours but music is always at an inherent disadvantage when it relies on a TV as its home.”

Robbie Williams, who is also “curating” a playlist for the service, said: “Everyone deserves music in their lives and this makes streaming music so easy everyone can do it. You don’t need a manual to work it – just pick it up, plug it in and start playing.”

The launch, hosted by Pointless presenter Alexander Armstrong who is to release a Christmas crooning album, was also attended by Alesha Dixon, the singer and Britain’s Got Talent judge and the broadcaster Paul Gambaccini. The celebrity turn-out did not quite match the launch of Jay-Z’s Tidal streaming service which was backed by Beyoncé, Madonna, Rihanna and Kanye West.