Shibuya, Japan. Photo Credit: Jezael Melgoza
Self-described “music (software) label” A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya, founded by former Spotify head of innovation Máuhan Zonoozy, has scored a $5.5 million pre-seed raise.
That multimillion-dollar round came to light in a brief TechCrunch piece, and Zonoozy subsequently took to LinkedIn to provide additional color. According to both sources, about a dozen entities, among them the Chainsmokers’ Mantis Venture Capital, SV Angel, and Suno investor Quiet Capital, contributed to the funding blast.
Also aboard as pre-seed backers are Splice stakeholder BoxGroup, Remarkable Ventures, Tim Kendall’s Common Metal, Gold House Ventures, Joe Montana’s Liquid 2 Ventures, Breakers, Reddit investor Collaborative Fund, Systemic Ventures, and ex-Spotify higher-up Dawn Ostroff, who’s joined A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya as an advisor.
Regarding the nature of the startup’s operations, A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya’s website features a streaming-player interface, and the company says it specializes in developing “playful music products.”
At present, said products include a YouTube sampler through which one can modify music directly via Shibuya by entering a video URL; a “multiplayer music canvas app” called Jam, which is in beta; Stacks (“build a live mix by turning beats, chords, and vocals on or off across three stacks”); a “Usersound” option for username-based “musical telegrams”; and a Speed Surfer “music mixer browser extension.”
Put differently, there appears to be quite a bit going on at A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya, its website acknowledging that “there’s room to shape what this becomes, and a lot of it still needs to be figured out.”
“we drop apps like singles,” the business elaborated. “little instruments, games, and experiments that give people new ways to get their hands on music. but the ambition is the album. the next great consumer music app. a place where you can get inside a song, mess with it, and make something happen with your friends.”
As for what comes next, Zonoozy during a recent podcast sit down indicated that “engagement and interactivity” will guide the startup’s expansion as it looks to build this consumer music app.
“We’re really focused on participation,” Zonoozy noted. “And engagement and interactivity. Those are ways to empower people to participate in music in new ways.
“Shibuya is a music software label,” he continued. “That’s what we call ourselves. We focus on releasing playful, interactive experiences that turn music from something you stream into something you can play. We think of ourselves as a record label for software. As a way a label drops singles, we drop singles that are apps, or that are playables, or that are web experiences.
“Each of those releases, for us, is moving us towards an album, which will be hopefully the next great consumer music app.”