Month: January 2026

‘James Bond’ Coming to Netflix

James Bond
Jason Tate

Variety:

Twenty-six James Bond films (the 25 Eon joints, plus the prodigal Never Say Never Again) are coming to Netflix this month. The deal was inked last year, with Bond making the streamer jump alongside other MGM films like Legally Blonde, Rocky, and series The Man in the High Castle. Sources told Deadline the movie is a “strategic business decision designed to broaden global reach and reengage audiences.” To put in less business-speak terms, it’s to remind people James Bond exists before Denis Villeneuve’s version comes to theaters.

Prince Streams Surge After ‘Stranger Things’ Placement

Prince
Jason Tate

Prince is having a surge in streams after being featured in the Stranger Things finale:

According to data released by Spotify, “Purple Rain” saw a 243% increase in global streams between December 31st (when the Stranger Things finale debuted) and January 1st, 2026. Additionally, the song saw a 577% increase in streaming by Gen Z users, who hopefully weren’t hearing it for the first time. “When Doves Cry” experienced smaller but similar results: a 200% increase in global streams, with a 128% increase for Gen Z specifically. The feature also brought an increased interest in Prince’s catalog overall, with a 190% increase in global streaming.

Napster Pivoting to Being an AI Platform

Headphones
Jason Tate

Digital Music News:

Napster is no longer a music streaming service. We’ve become an AI platform for creating and experiencing music in new ways. That means the streaming catalog and playlists from the old app won’t work here,” the splash screen reads. “We know this can be frustrating, especially if you spent years building your playlists. To make things easier, you can export all your Napster playlists in just a few clicks.

Josh Ritter Talks With Rolling Stone

Josh Ritter
Jason Tate

Josh Ritter talked with Rolling Stone about his latest album:

“I’m going through all the things that all of us are in this country right now,” he says. “All these enormous feelings and uncertainties. In inviting the muse in to experience that, I’m inviting it to be witnessed. It helps me to make sense of my own life and make sense of my own feelings.”

Chorus.fm Wrapped – 2025 Edition

Jason Tate

I’ve been wanting to build something like this for a while and used the last quiet days of 2025 to finish it. I needed to figure out a better way to handle a bunch of people hitting the page at the same time and better cache the results so it’s not calculating the big queries with each hit. And after a soft launch in the Q&A thread I think I’m relatively comfortable that the servers can handle it as built.

The feature is a supporter only perk and can be found here: forum.chorus.fm/wrapped

It will take ten to thirty seconds to render the first time and then should be instant after that when you return (same thing for past years if you go back in time). It will automatically update to the new year on January 1st each year, and when I come up with other stats to calculate I’ll update the script to include those as well. I went with the basics to start with.

I thought this could be something fun to start off the year with.