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TikTok is ramping up a public relations campaign to fend off the possibility of a nationwide ban by the Biden administration, and it’s bringing some unconventional advocates to help: online influencers.
Dozens of TikTok creators — some with millions of followers on the video-sharing app — came to Capitol Hill on Wednesday to lobby in favor of the platform, one day before lawmakers are slated to grill the company’s chief executive about concerns over user data falling into the hands of the Chinese government.
Shou Zi Chew plans to tell Congress on Thursday that TikTok, which was founded by Chinese entrepreneurs, is committed to user safety, data protection and security, and keeping the platform free from Chinese government influence. He will also answer questions from U.S. lawmakers worried about the social media platform’s effects on its young user base.
At the heart of TikTok’s trouble is a Chinese national intelligence law that would compel Chinese companies to fork over data to the government for whatever purposes it deems to involve national security. There’s also concern Beijing might try to push pro-China narratives or misinformation through the platform.
At a media event coordinated by TikTok on Wednesday, some content creators acknowledged that concerns about data security are legitimate, but pointed to precautions the company is taking, such as a $1.5 billion plan — dubbed Project Texas — to route all U.S. data to domestic servers owned and maintained by the software giant Oracle.
TikTok has been attempting to sell that proposal to the Biden administration, but skeptics have argued it doesn’t go far enough. The administration is reportedly demanding the company’s Chinese owners sell their stakes or face a nationwide ban.
“I don’t know much about politics, but I know a lot about fashion, and I know a lot about people,” Ok said. “And just to be here and share my story is what TikTok has invited me to do.”
Tensions around TikTok have been building on Capitol Hill, reaching a boiling point late last year when a proposal to ban the app off of government phones passed with bipartisan support and was signed into law by President Joe Biden. House Republicans are pushing a bill that would give Biden the power to ban the app.
Other bills have also been introduced — some bipartisan — including a measure that would circumvent the challenges the administration would face in court if it moved forward with sanctions against the social media company.
The effort to target TikTok is part of a larger, tougher approach that Congress has taken in the past several months as China’s relationship with two U.S. adversaries — Russia and Iran — has come into focus. A recent incident with a spy balloon forced even some wary congressional Democrats to join Republicans in opposition, and there is now a strong bipartisan concern in Washington that Beijing would use legal and regulatory power to seize American user data or use the platform to push favorable narratives or misinformation.
TikTok’s response to the political pressure can be seen all around the nation’s Capitol, with the company putting up ads in area airports and metro stations that include promises of securing users data and privacy and creating a safe platform for its young users. Last year, the company spent more than $5.3 million on dispatching lobbyists to the Hill to make its case, according to Open Secrets, a nonprofit that tracks lobbying spending.
On Thursday, Chew will be sticking to a familiar script as he urges officials against pursuing an all-out ban on TikTok or for the company to be sold off to new owners. TikTok’s efforts to ensure the security of its users’ data go “above and beyond” what any of its rivals are doing, according to Chew’s prepared remarks released ahead of his appearance before the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce.
Chew pushed back against fears that TikTok could become a tool of China’s ruling Communist Party because its parent company, ByteDance, was founded in Beijing and also operates from there.
“Let me state this unequivocally: ByteDance is not an agent of China or any other country,” Chew said.
He distanced TikTok from its Chinese roots and denied the “inaccurate” belief that TikTok’s corporate structure makes it “beholden to the Chinese government.” ByteDance has evolved into a privately held “global enterprise,” Chew said, with 60% owned by big institutional investors, 20% owned by the Chinese entrepreneurs who founded it and the rest by employees.
It’s “emphatically untrue” that TikTok sends data on its American users to Beijing, he said.
“TikTok has never shared, or received a request to share, U.S. user data with the Chinese government,” Chew said. “Nor would TikTok honor such a request if one were ever made.”
Whether those promises will alleviate concern is another matter. TikTok has come under fire in the U.S., Europe and Asia-Pacific, where a growing number of governments have banned the app from devices used for official business. India, Afghanistan and Indonesia have banned it nationwide.
Chew, a 40-year-old Singaporean who was appointed CEO in 2021, said in a TikTok video this week that the congressional hearing comes at a “pivotal moment” for the company, which now has 150 million American users.
Chew said TikTok’s data security project is the right answer, not a ban or a sale of the company.
“No other social media company, or entertainment platform like TikTok, provides this level of access and transparency,” he said.
The company started deleting the historical protected data of U.S. users from non-Oracle servers this month, Chew said. When that process is completed later this year, all U.S. data will be protected by American law and controlled by a U.S.-led security team.
“Under this structure, there is no way for the Chinese government to access it or compel access to it,” he said.
He said a TikTok ban would hurt the U.S. economy and small American businesses that use the app to sell their products, while reducing competition in an “increasingly concentrated market.” He added that a sale “would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access.”
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew posted an urgent video on the app on Tuesday (March 21) that aimed to demonstrate how ingrained TikTok is in the lives of more than 150 million Americans at a time when the app is under threat of being banned (again).
Chew is set to testify before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on Thursday. His appearance comes as politicians and regulators repeatedly express concern that TikTok and its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, will turn user data over to the Chinese government. (TikTok has repeatedly denied these allegations.) Earlier this month, TikTok said the U.S. government had asked Bytedance to sell the app or face a ban, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Chew’s video started out celebratory and seemed couched in terms straight out of U.S. political debates, emphasizing the app’s reach and its potential economic impact. “I’m super excited to announce that more than 150 million Americans are on TikTok,” Chew said. The app had previously touted 100 million U.S. users in 2020. (It has over 1 billion active users globally.)
“That’s almost half the U.S. coming to TikTok to connect, to create, to share, to learn, or just to have some fun,” Chew continued. “This includes 5 million businesses that use TikTok to reach their customers. And the majority of these are small and medium businesses.”
@tiktok Our CEO, Shou Chew, shares a special message on behalf of the entire TikTok team to thank our community of 150 million Americans ahead of his congressional hearing later this week. ♬ original sound – TikTok
But this triumphant tone quickly gave way to a warning. “Some politicians have started talking about banning TikTok,” Chew added. “This could take TikTok away from all 150 million of you.” He called this a “pivotal moment” for the app and asked users to leave comments noting “what they love about TikTok” so he could pass those on during his meetings in Washington, D.C.
The U.S. government’s scrutiny of TikTok is not new; President Trump threatened to ban the app back in 2020. (India did ban the app that year.) TikTok has been in lengthy talks with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States to try to come up with a solution that allays fears about the way it handles users’ data, but these negotiations appear to have made little headway. The U.S. government recently banned TikTok from all federal devices.
TikTok spokespeople have described the threat of a larger ban as “little more than political theater.”
“If protecting national security is the objective, divestment doesn’t solve the problem,” a spokeswoman for TikTok told The Associated Press earlier this month. “A change in ownership would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access.”
TikTok went on a counteroffensive Tuesday amid increasing Western pressure over cybersecurity and misinformation concerns, rolling out updated rules and standards for content as its CEO warned against a possible U.S. ban on the Chinese-owned video sharing app.
CEO Shou Zi Chew is scheduled to appear Thursday before U.S. congressional lawmakers, who will grill him about the company’s privacy and data-security practices and relationship with the Chinese government.
Chew said in a TikTok video that the hearing “comes at a pivotal moment” for the company, after lawmakers introduced measures that would expand the Biden administration’s authority to enact a U.S. ban on the app, which the CEO said more than 150 million Americans use.
“Some politicians have started talking about banning TikTok. Now this could take TikTok away from all 150 million of you,” said Chew, who was dressed casually in jeans and blue hoodie, with the dome of the U.S. Capitol in Washington in the background.
“I’ll be testifying before Congress this week to share all that we’re are doing to protect Americans using the app,” he said.
TikTok app has come under fire in the U.S., Europe and Asia-Pacific, where a growing number of governments have banned TikTok from devices used for official business over worries it poses risks to cybersecurity and data privacy or could be used to push pro-Beijing narratives and misinformation.
So far, there is no evidence to suggest this has happened or that TikTok has turned over user data to the Chinese government, as some of its critics have argued it would do.
Norway and the Netherlands on Tuesday warned apps like TikTok should not be installed on phones issued to government employees, both citing security or intelligence agencies.
There’s a “high risk” if TikTok or Telegram are installed on devices that have access to “internal digital infrastructure or services,” Norway’s justice ministry said, without providing further details.
TikTok also rolled out updated rules and standards for content and users in a reorganized set of community guidelines that include eight principles to guide content moderation decisions.
“These principles are based on our commitment to uphold human rights and aligned with international legal frameworks,” said Julie de Bailliencourt, TikTok’s global head of product policy.
She said TikTok strives to be fair, protect human dignity and balance freedom of expression with preventing harm.
The guidelines, which take effect April 21, were repackaged from TikTok’s existing rules with extra details and explanations.
Among the more significant changes are additional details about its restrictions on deepfakes, also known as synthetic media created by artificial intelligence technology. TikTok more clearly spells out its policy, saying all deepfakes or manipulated content that show realistic scenes must be labeled to indicate they’re fake or altered in some way.
TikTok had previously banned deepfakes that mislead viewers about real-world events and cause harm. Its updated guidelines say deepfakes of private figures and young people are also not allowed.
Deepfakes of public figures are OK in certain contexts, such as for artistic or educational content, but not for political or commercial endorsements.
China accused the United States on Thursday of spreading disinformation and suppressing TikTok following reports that the Biden administration was calling for its Chinese owners to sell their stakes in the popular video-sharing app.
The U.S. has yet to present evidence that TikTok threatens its national security and was using the excuse of data security to abuse its power to suppress foreign companies, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told reporters at a daily briefing.
“The U.S. should stop spreading disinformation about data security, stop suppressing the relevant company, and provide an open, fair and non-discriminatory environment for foreign businesses to invest and operate in the U.S.,” Wang said.
TikTok was dismissive Wednesday of a report in The Wall Street Journal that said the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., part of the Treasury Department, was threatening a U.S. ban on the app unless its owners, Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd., divested.
“If protecting national security is the objective, divestment doesn’t solve the problem: A change in ownership would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access,” TikTok spokesperson Maureen Shanahan said.
Shanahan said TikTok was already answering concerns through “transparent, U.S.-based protection of U.S. user data and systems, with robust third-party monitoring, vetting, and verification.”
The Journal report cited anonymous “people familiar with the matter.” The Treasury Department and the White House’s National Security Council declined to comment.
In late February, the White House gave all federal agencies 30 days to wipe TikTok off all government devices. Some agencies, including the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and the State Department already have restrictions in place. The White House already does not allow TikTok on its devices.
Congress passed the “No TikTok on Government Devices Act” in December as part of a sweeping government funding package. The legislation does allow for TikTok use in certain cases, including for national security, law enforcement and research purposes.
Meanwhile, lawmakers in both the House and Senate have been moving forward with legislation that would give the Biden administration more power to clamp down on TikTok.
TikTok remains extremely popular and is used by two-thirds of teens in the U.S. But there is increasing concern that Beijing could obtain control of American user data that the app has obtained and push pro-Beijing narratives and propaganda on the app.
China has long been concerned about the influence of overseas social media and communications apps, and bans most of the best-known ones, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube — and TikTok.
Charlie Puth and Sabrina Carpenter shocked fans on Wednesday (March 15) by locking lips in the TikTok teaser for what appears to be a new collab.
In the clip posted to the “Charlie Be Quiet!” singer’s TikTok account, the two pop stars get flirty as she attempts to feed him a candy heart while they’re surrounded by candles. “I always knew you had a tiny, tiny heart,” Puth banters before piano notes play over the scene and they lean in for the kiss.
The TikTok sensation cryptically captioned the video “3.31” and tagged both Carpenter and Dan + Shay, but fans weren’t quite sure what to make of the whole thing. “IM SORRY DID I JUST WITNESS SABRINA CARPENTER AND CHARLIE PUTH KISS?!?” one follower asked in all caps in the comments, while a second wrote, “I DON’T KNOW IF I WANT TO BE SABRINA OR IF I WANT TO BE CHARLIE.”
Other fans expressed concern over Puth’s relationship with girlfriend Brooke Sansone, which he confirmed back in December on his 31st birthday. “EXCUSE YOU WHAT ABOUT BROOKE,” one demanded. Another joked, “SHAWN MENDEZ [sic] PUNCHING THE AIR RIGHT NOW” in reference to the recent online chatter that Carpenter could possibly be dating Shawn Mendes.
The Charlie artist didn’t hint at a song title or any other details regarding his collaboration with the “Nonsense” singer, but the latter is already dropping the deluxe edition of her 2022 album Emails I Can’t Send this Friday (March 17) containing four new bonus tracks. Meanwhile, Puth most recently announced he’ll be hitting the road this spring for The Charlie Live Experience.
Watch Puth and Carpenter canoodle over a candy heart while you brace yourself for what’s coming at the end of the month below.
TikTok was dismissive Wednesday of reports that the Biden administration was calling for its Chinese owners to sell their stakes in the popular video-sharing app, saying such a move wouldn’t help protect national security.
The company was responding to a report in The Wall Street Journal that said the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., part of the Treasury Department, was threatening a U.S. ban on the app unless its owners, Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd., divested.
“If protecting national security is the objective, divestment doesn’t solve the problem: a change in ownership would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access,” TikTok spokesperson Maureen Shanahan said. “The best way to address concerns about national security is with the transparent, U.S.-based protection of U.S. user data and systems, with robust third-party monitoring, vetting, and verification, which we are already implementing.”
The Journal report cited anonymous “people familiar with the matter.” The Treasury Department and the White House’s National Security Council declined to comment.
Late last month, the White House gave all federal agencies 30 days to wipe TikTok off all government devices.
The Office of Management and Budget called the guidance a “critical step forward in addressing the risks presented by the app to sensitive government data.” Some agencies, including the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and State, already have restrictions in place. The White House already does not allow TikTok on its devices.
Congress passed the “No TikTok on Government Devices Act” in December as part of a sweeping government funding package. The legislation does allow for TikTok use in certain cases, including for national security, law enforcement and research purposes.
Meanwhile, lawmakers in both the House and Senate have been moving forward with legislation that would give the Biden administration more power to clamp down on TikTok.
Rep. Mike McCaul, the chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee, has been a vocal critic of the app, saying the Chinese Communist Party is using it to “manipulate and monitor its users while it gobbles up Americans’ data to be used for their malign activities.”
“Anyone with TikTok downloaded on their device has given the CCP a backdoor to all their personal information. It’s a spy balloon into your phone,” the Texas Republican said.
TikTok remains extremely popular and is used by two-thirds of teens in the U.S. But there is increasing concern that Beijing could obtain control of American user data that the app has obtained.
The company has been dismissive of the ban for federal devices and has noted that it is developing security and data privacy plans as part of the Biden administration’s ongoing national security review.
To TikTok, or not to TikTok, that is the question.
Plus, many more regarding the app’s instrumental role in making hits — and how an artist can participate in the process meaningfully — were addressed during “The Fight for Artistic Authenticity on TikTok” panel at SXSW 2023.
Moderated by Billboard‘s Lyndsey Havens, the panel featured experts Ash Stahl, CEO of TikTok-first creative studio Flighthouse; Alana Dolgin, head of influencer strategy at independent record label and influencer management company Homemade Projects; and Mekaila Morris, senior manager of creators & content at Interscope Records.
The conversation opened with stories of successful TikTok campaigns each panelist had worked on. Stahl remembered working on Surface‘s “Sunday Best,” the electro-pop duo’s vibrant 2019 track that became part of the first crop of TikTok smash hits the following year. “We had a team member just add in a little ad-lib at the beginning that was like, ‘2020 rewind’ and then just put this song at the end of it,” she said. “You can see this huge spike of millions of new listens on Spotify that, one year later, really reinvigorated the song.”
Dolgin described SAINt JHN‘s “Roses” (which was originally released in 2016 and later remixed by Kazakh producer Imanbek at the end of 2019) as being in the “first class of viral hits on TikTok” and mapped out the song’s trajectory to becoming a global anthem, starting in Russia and then spending $2,000 — “which obviously now we know is absolutely nothing in this space,” she said — to move it through the U.S. and ultimately around the world.
Dolgin explained that part of the artistic authenticity element on the platform is knowing when it’s not the right move to have the artist behind a trending song hop on TikTok and participate in whatever fanfare is elevating its exposure through UGC (user-generated content) and streams. “You don’t necessarily need to be on TikTok if you’re an artist. There’s so many songs that are going viral constantly that have nothing to do with the artist that when you try to bring the artist in it truly doesn’t make sense, I think it does more harm than good,” she said.
Having also had success working Cardi B’s “Up,” Dolgin added: “We use her voice all the time with ad-libs that go viral. Sure, she posts on TikTok sometimes, but she approves every sound snippet.”
Morris continued that thought, speaking about Machine Gun Kelly‘s 2022 single “Emo Girl,” featuring Willow, and how she worked closely with him to determine the most authentic ways for him to be on TikTok. “[With] taking the artists’ vision and learning how they want to represent themselves online, you have to understand the nature of the platform and what makes sense.”
Compared to labels’ close working relationships with artists, Stahl described Lighthouse as being “two degrees separated” from them. “I prefer working with artists that aren’t really looking to get on platform because it’s kind of difficult when we’re so separated,” she explained. “We’re not looking to make content, we’re looking to create success with music.”
“You can do both,” she continued. “You can find avenues to create really successful content, and sure, there might be a song that’s a really good fit for the platform as is, or you might need to throw in an ad-lib or make a little mash up. You can do that with the artists where it’s coming from their profile, or you can do that from finding an influencer that has a good fan base and have them launch the sound from their page or from the DSP release on platform.”
Stahl gave a compelling example. During the pandemic, she got her client — EDM producer Said the Sky, whom she’s been managing for the last nine years — to practice making TikTok videos. The result was a now-viral snippet (featuring an ad-lib that goes, “Wait, I can do that better,” followed by dubstep music), which, despite Said the Sky never wanting to officially distribute it, has now soundtracked more than 100,000 TikTok videos, according to Stahl.
When it comes to knowing when’s the right time to invest in a TikTok campaign, Morris discussed tapping into one’s intuition. She recalled how client Gracie Abrams‘ performance of “I Know It Won’t Work” on Jimmy Kimmel Live! went viral on TikTok. “Instead of focusing on what the single is for the project, it’s like, ‘Hey, we’re seeing internet culture touch this track and really, really resonate with it,” she said.
“If it’s moving, put f—nig money into it. That’s the best advice I could give to someone,” Stahl added. “Don’t be like, ‘Oh well, it’s already moving. We’ll just let it ride out.’ My advice would be if it’s moving, take full advantage. We know that it’s working in this specific niche or community on TikTok, let’s take that and try to do it in another niche, or let’s go find that community on a different platform and go for it again.”
From Dolgin’s perspective as someone who works exclusively with creators, it’s all about pairing the right influencers with song campaigns and “never about making the song go viral,” she said. “But, I will always guarantee that you’re getting the best influencers possible for the song and for the sound.”
Morris ultimately compared working in TikTok to working in stocks because of they’re constantly watching how songs and sounds are peaking and falling on the platform. “But you have to take the whole market into account,” she said. When it comes to forecasting trends regarding TikTok and the future of artists and their music on the platform, Stahl predicted there will be more “made by, made for TikTok” independent artists like JVKE who have no barrier to entry, while Dolgin said TikTok will champion specific creators and give them more resources to become successful like Alix Earle. Meanwhile, Morris explained how TikTok is culturally shifting to a more community-focused place.
“As genres start to merge as well, we’re going to start to lose these like clear identifiers, which is going to require people to really hone in on what they like and who they want to be and who they want to speak to,” she said. “And as more people get on TikTok, I think we’re going to have less of those big, big moments, but we’re going to have really valuable smaller moments within the communities with these artists, where they’re truly deeply connecting with people. Then it’s our job to bring those forward and become more consumable to the mainstream.”
Billboard’s parent company PMC is the largest shareholder of SXSW and its brands are official media partners of SXSW.
Lady Gaga originally released “Bloody Mary” way back in 2011, but it only cracked the Hot 100 for the first time this January. The revival was due in part to a sped-up remix that careened around TikTok, soundtracking videos of users pairing up the track with an eccentric dance sequence from Wednesday, Netflix’s hit Addams Family update.
The surprise success of “Bloody Mary” in altered form presented Matt Kelly, operations manager and on-air personality for WVAQ in Morgantown, West Virginia, with a dilemma. “What version do we play?” he asks.
“The original is 100 beats per minute — so slow, relative to the new version that people are more familiar with,” he explains. “The sped-up is 130 bpm, but I hated that it sounded like Alvin and the Chipmunks.”
So Kelly split the difference by making his own 120-bpm edit to play on the air. “It appeases the ear like it’s the sped-up version,” he says, “but I kept the pitch correction — so it sounds like Gaga, not Alvin.”
Homemade remixes, often sped-up or slowed-down, have been a hallmark of the TikTok era. In recent months, they’ve helped rejuvenate years-old songs from Lady Gaga and Miguel and driven swarms of listeners to newer releases from Lizzy McAlpine and Raye. In some ways, the music industry has adapted — it’s become common to see artists release official tempo-shifted versions of songs that have started to bubble back up, for example. Streaming platforms, including Spotify and Apple Music, have playlists dedicated to these releases; SiriusXM launched TikTok Radio, which program director Marie Steinbock envisions as “completely reflective of exactly what is trending on TikTok.”
But much remains the same: Even if a sped-up remix is ubiquitous on TikTok, the original version of the track tends to get most of the exposure. There are no sped-up remixes in Today’s Top Hits, the most followed playlist on Spotify, for example. And even when labels decide to promote revived songs to radio, they push the original, so that’s usually what saturates the airwaves. The Weeknd’s “Die For You” topped Billboard’s Radio Songs chart in February, more than six years after its release, with the normal-speed version earned the overwhelming majority of its plays.
Can sped-up renditions thrive in the wild, or do they function primarily within the confines of TikTok? Homemade remixes will only become more prevalent in years to come, thanks to platforms that make it so easy to futz with audio. (Meng Ru Kuok, CEO of music technology company BandLab, is fond of saying that they “think everyone is a creator, including fans.”) In this environment, will the industry continue to prioritize originals?
Right now, the dominant school of thought in the music industry is that the sped-up versions are effective… as a conduit to drive listeners back to the version the artist released. “The sped-up versions are more attached to the medium in which people are consuming them than they are the actual song itself,” one senior label executive says. Listeners “are discovering a song through the sped-up version, but they’re consuming the original.”
And even as more acts put out sped-up and slowed-down reworks, there’s still a sense that the original version remains the truest reflection of artists’ intentions. “That’s their art and their creativity — that’s what they want the world to hear,” says Rich McLaughlin, program director at WFUV and a former executive at Amazon Music. “I’m focused on what the artists want to release to the world. That’s what interests me.”
That said, McLaughlin continues, “From a radio programming perspective, I want to be open to playing songs that our listeners want to hear. If there’s a version of a song that comes out that adds a dimension to the original that’s unique and something that I think our listeners are going to like, of course I would be open to playing that.”
Some radio stations are already experimenting with playing alternate versions. Josh “Bru” Brubaker, a TikToker (4.5 million followers) and radio personality for Audacy, often plays a mix stitching together songs that are trending on TikTok after his Today’s Top 10 countdown. The in-house DJs adjust the tempos to nod to the version that’s being incorporated into short video clips.
Kelly has been evaluating songs for WVAQ on a case-by-case basis. While he sped up “Bloody Mary,” he prefers to play the original version of Raye’s “Escapism,” not the faster rendition popular on TikTok. “I think that one loses some of what makes it a great song when it’s the sped-up version,” he says.
What about Miguel’s “Sure Thing”? Originally a hit for the R&B singer in 2011, it returned to the Hot 100 earlier this year after a sped-up remix took off on TikTok and has now climbed to a new peak of No. 28. “That’s one where I might gravitate towards the sped-up version if we needed it, because listeners are going to recognize that from TikTok,” Kelly says. “I could see making an edit where we can keep the timbre of his voice, what makes Miguel Miguel, but speed it up.”
It’s likely that no one is playing more sped-up remixes on the air than SiriusXM’s TikTok Radio, which launched in 2021. Steinbock currently has around a dozen uptempo reworks in rotation. “This has been my life lately: A song will trend on TikTok, and it’s sped-up,” she says. “And then I have to wait and see if the label is going to put out an official version or not.”
In some situations — she points to Justine Skye’s “Collide” and SZA’s “Kill Bill” — “people are consuming both [versions] at kind of the same rate,” so she can play the original without fear of alienating listeners. But when it came to The Weeknd’s “Die For You” and Mariah Carey’s “It’s a Wrap,” she waited until the artists released official sped-up remixes. “It’s kind of a dance,” she says. “Is the audience going to recognize it when it’s not that TikTok remix?”
The current iteration of remixes — the sped-up and slowed-down versions that can serve as rocket fuel for TikTok trends — is unlikely to be the last one. Ebonie Smith, in-house engineer at Atlantic Records, thinks fan-made remixing is only going to become more sophisticated and widespread in the years to come. Young listeners are “already changing expectations around what is normal to hear,” she says, pointing to the popularity of sped-up songs. But “once young people are able to parse out each element of a song, and that becomes somewhat gamified, we’re going to see remixing like we’ve never seen before.”
Jessica Powell, CEO and co-founder of AudioShake, an A.I. music software company, expresses a similar sentiment. “We’re going to see the same shifts in audio that have happened in video and image,” she explains. “There will continue to be really professional uses of tools like Photoshop, but you also have the other end of it — me turning myself into a fish on Snapchat. That’s all coming to audio.”
If this proves to be the case, it’s likely that streaming services and radio stations will have to change their relationship with tempo-shifted remixes, or whatever else young listeners decide sounds good a few years from now. Steinbock will be ready. She recently made room in her rotation for McAlpine’s “Ceilings,” a love-drunk acoustic ballad. It came out roughly a year ago but exploded recently on TikTok thanks to a high-speed rework.
“We’re playing the normal one just because it’s so big,” she says. But “I’m just waiting for an official sped-up version.”
Last fall, the 25-year-old English singer Raye was on the hunt for her first U.S. hit after several years of U.K. chart success. Initially, the loping hip-hop soul single “Escapism” seemed to bring her no closer. After the first week, streams of the track started to fall, according to Luminate. But in mid-November, its trajectory dramatically reversed, leaping from 185,000 streams one week to 500,000 the next to over 6 million two weeks later. “Escapism” went on to peak at No. 22 on the Billboard Hot 100.
What happened? The burgeoning popularity of a homemade sped-up remix of “Escapism” that captivated TikTok users, spurring them to incorporate it into their videos and driving streams of the original. Raye’s label, Human Re Sources, responded by releasing an official uptempo rework of the single that has over 114 million streams on Spotify alone.
“I wish that I could sit here and say, ‘We were in our marketing meeting, we decided that we were going to do a sped-up version of this particular spot in the song, and that’s going to ignite all the rest of it,’ ” says J. Erving, a longtime music manager, founder of the artist services and distribution company Human Re Sources, and executive vp of creative development at Sony Music Entertainment. “The kids are taking control of the songs, and they’re determining what part of the record is sticky and what version of it is sticky.”
Those “sticky” versions — often just sped up or slowed down, or a pair of tracks mashed together — can spark streams. “These remixes can really create careers and reignite careers,” Universal Music Group vp of A&R strategy Nima Nasseri says. “They’re great mechanisms for growth. Every label is putting them out,” often releasing official versions of the remixes that trend on short-form video platforms.
Sped-up remixes also spurred recent chart surges for Miguel’s “Sure Thing” (actually a resurge, as it first charted over a decade ago), The Weeknd’s “Die for You,” Lady Gaga’s “Bloody Mary,” and Mariah Carey’s “It’s a Wrap,” as well as boosting streams for tracks like Lizzy McAlpine‘s “Ceilings.”
Remixes — extended for club play, shortened and punched up for radio — are nothing new. And listeners taking control has been a hallmark of the shift to digital, starting with YouTube fan covers in the 2000s and progressing in the streaming era to fan response helping labels determine what tracks to focus on for promotion.
The difference today is the extent to which power has shifted to social media users. The process, says Erving, is no longer about label executives and managers deciding “this is our single, insert remix producer here, add rapper here, this is going to be the thing — those days are over.” In fact, according to a major-label A&R executive, “it’s not about the recording anymore. It’s about what you’re offering the user base to say, ‘Hey, you’re an intelligent consumer. Here are the stems [individual audio components] for our songs. Do what you want to it.’”
“Is anything in its final form now?” one major-label marketing executive asks. “Or are we just putting out clay for fans to mold?”
Part of this change is technological — it has never been simpler to manipulate audio. “These [remixes] are being made easily by fans in real time on their computer or phones,” says RCA Records COO John Fleckenstein.
Many in the music industry believe this remixing activity is also part of a generational shift. “Gen Z in particular has been raised online alongside meme culture,” says Scott Plagenhoef, global head of music programming at Apple Music. “They’re accustomed to content that is repeated but manipulated, and music is no different.”
While it’s common to encounter both sped-up and slowed-down remixes on short-form video platforms, Plagenhoef says “sped-up remixes seem considerably more popular and prevalent than slowed-down ones” at the moment. “Sped-up songs allow for more of a track to be heard within the time constraints of a TikTok video and mirror the pace at which users consume content online,” he adds. Increasing tempo can also “make the songs better — it brings out a different emotion,” according to Josh “Bru” Brubaker, a TikToker (4.5 million followers) and radio personality for Audacy.
Many remixes don’t replace or distract fans from the original track — they draw attention to it. “From a discovery standpoint, we see a large amount of referral traffic make its way back to original tracks from remixes,” says Roneil Rumburg, co-founder/CEO of Audius, a blockchain-based streaming service. For example, the original of Raye’s “Escapism” (304 million streams) is significantly out-streaming its sped-up remix on Spotify.
Since discovery is increasingly difficult to engineer in a time of content overload, the music industry is encouraging fan experimentation with songs and aiding the creation of remixes. “There’s a whole community of TikTok DJs solely making these sounds to try to make them go viral because you get so much exposure,” Brubaker says. Labels and marketers say they sometimes pay these DJs anywhere from a few hundred dollars to $20,000 to remix and post songs.
Labels have also worked to get officially released sped-up remixes visibility on streaming services. UMG started the Spotify account Speed Radio to highlight its sped-up tracks, according to Nasseri; it has more than 9 million monthly listeners. Another account, sped up nightcore, does the same for Warner Music Group releases. (A WMG representative did not respond to requests for comment on this account.) “Anytime we get one of these remixes that has traction, we tag it with ‘Speed Radio,’ and it just amplifies the growth,” says Nasseri. “That’s a very valuable tool for artists to use.”
The streaming services have created playlists for these remixes as well. Spotify’s Sped Up Songs, launched last June, now has over 1 million followers. Apple Music recently unveiled Viral Remixed. “Over the past year, the DSP partners have been really helpful,” Nasseri says. “Casey Compernolle at Apple and Lizzy Szabo at Spotify are people we work with closely who have a great understanding of the remix space.”
Even as these remixes have helped create hits, not every artist wants to participate in this economy. “I completely respect if an artist chooses not to release a sped-up version if it doesn’t suit the song,” says Ian Quay, co-manager of Cults, who have a popular sped-up version of their song “Gilded Lily.”
But much of the stigma around tempo-shifted remixes seems to be fading. “Two years ago, I’d say 5% or 10% of artists were receptive to this,” Nasseri estimates. “Now it’s probably about 70%.” Meng Ru Kuok, CEO of music technology company BandLab, adds, “rights holders understand that this process is inevitable, and it’s one of the best ways to bring new life to tracks.”
While sped-up and slowed-down versions run wild on TikTok, they haven’t penetrated the mainstream — yet. “It still feels more specific to the short-form platforms right now than ‘I heard a great sped-up version at the club last night,’ ” says Fleckenstein.
But this could change. The rock duo Cafuné broke out with “Tek It”; the sped-up version now has more Spotify streams (143 million) than the original (137 million). Fleckenstein points to young RCA act Ari Abdul, who has enjoyed streaming success with the synthwave single “Babydoll.” “Sometimes the sped-up version is actually outperforming the original,” he says.
Will these tempo-shifted remixes eventually reach all the way to radio? “If it’s good enough,” Fleckenstein adds, “you never know.”