Tidal - Can it be used to random play?

Considering getting a Tidal subscription to replace my SiriusXM.

I currently have SiriusXM subscription with Home Streaming option. Being retired, I do not spend nearly as much time in the automobile as I used to, so we primarily use the Sirius at home through our Sonos speakers.

For the car, I am thinking that when we want, we could listen to pretty much anything via our iPhone...Pandora, Tidal, my own music. All I would lose is a bit of convenience, as Sirius is a part of the automobile radio...and I would have to physically plug in the iPhone to use it through the Aux input of the car radio system, and make song selections, etc. via the iPhone.

We listen to stations such as Coffee House, or The Loft...so, we hear songs much like playing a radio...randomly (at least until they repeat the three hour or so loop they seem to use).

We can also stream Pandora through the Sonos and use it much the same way. And, if so inclined, I have my home library available to stream from my computer to the Sonos....but, when the wife and I are together we very rarely go actively pick out a specific album or CD to play.

My QUESTION IS: If I get a Tidal subscription instead of Sirius...would I be able to stream random music of a particular style via Tidal? For instance, when listening to The Coffee House I hear mostly softer folksy style of music...and I am pretty sure that nothing like Metallica (not that they are bad ) is going to be played. Or, will it be that with Tidal I would always have to create a playlist or pick an album to listen to? While I certainly think that I, personally, would love being able to explore new and old music via Tidal, I know that my wife likes to be able to use it more like a traditional radio...and, I agree that sometimes it is nice to just turn on "the radio" and be surprised at what plays next.

Hopefully I have stated my question clearly enough and I look forward to your help!

 

Tidal doesn't have a true random mode that I'm aware of, but it has similar functionality with large pre made playlists. You can queue up a couple of these large playlists and have hours of music. This is how most of the streaming services work, and to be honest most do this better then Tidal. If this is the feature you're most interested in, I'd look elsewhere.

 

Wouldn't your current Pandora account be more what you are looking for? All the services have premade playlists that you could probably play on shuffle mode of some kind but it sounds like you either need to go with a radio option like Pandora or maybe Apple Music or make your own playlists and go with Tidal, Spotify. You could also try Deezer(if you pay for their hifi plan you'll get full fidelity through your sonos but not the car) Deezer has a function called flow which would automatically extend your playlist by automatically playing more songs similar to the songs from the playlist you created but not until all the songs in your playlist were played through. Pandora does this as well.

 

I'm totally open to any and all suggestions. My exposure to any streaming service is limited to the small amount of time that I have used the (free) Pandora app through the Sonos.

To be honest...the main reason I bring up Tidal is because of several threads here discussing Tidal / Roon usage. I have a large music collection (almost 6TB) on computer hard drive(s) (Yes, I do backups). My thinking is that while doing my own listening, without the wife, I might make good use of HiFi Tidal because I like new and old music and like to explore. And it sounds like Roon may be something that would be of use to me for my large music library. But, if I go that route, when my wife and I are spending quality time together, say on the deck or patio with a glass of wine, and want some background music the more "radio" type functionality of Sirius has served us well...I don't want to necessarily lose that easy way to have some background music.

 

Now you're talkin'!

Roon is the main reason I use Tidal. The integration is very well done and adds a tremendous amount of value to Tidal, more so then using it alone.

It sounds like if you had Tidal, you could use it + Roon for your "serious" listening, and maybe stream one of its playlists via the Sonos for more casual listening. It has a trial (as does Roon), so you could see how it works for you.

 

You can do “Track Radio” for any song. So pick a song that is similar to the music you want to listen to and it will automatically create and endless playlist for you.

All of the streaming services do this. Tidal’s seems to work as well as any of them for me.

 

Tidal does have "House Created" playlists and genres that may suffice for what you want. You can get a 90 day free trial through Groupon:

https://www.groupon.com/deals/tidal-music-streaming-3

 

THANKS SO MUCH!

I will likely give this a try soon...I just bought the Groupon. Now, I can keep wavering for three months or so as to whether or not I want to start my trial of Roon!

 

BTW...I should have put bought in quotation marks...."bought"....because the Groupon was free...I just had to request it!

Also...I am assuming that the free trial will be of the standard low bit rate Tidal...does the functionality of Tidal change any between the standard and HiFi versions?

 

Nope, full HiFi/Master on the trial. I am about a month in on the trial and loving it. I think that I will be going about 90% Tidal for all my listening and I do a lot.

 

To the OP's question, I looked at their interface within the Bluesound app. What I noticed in the Favorites area is that my albums were listed, but the songs from those albums didn't flow to the Songs section of my Favorites, so I suspect the answer is a definitive No.

 

Sorry to be asking what might be a fairly simplistic question.

If you have time, would you be able to expand a little please on how you integrate 'Roon' and 'Tidal'.

Best Wishes,
David

 

I'd go with Roon/Tidal, and as an extra you can tune in to Internet radio stations via Roon. I used to listen to The Loft on Serius all the time, and now get mostly the same music from Radio Paradise, a free internet radio station. Plus, they are starting to stream Flac quality music, and it shouldn't be too long before Roon supports the Flac stream. Check it out.

Don Ivey