Modern mix tapes: the Guardian's new monthly playlist

As streaming becomes more popular, we want to help readers better navigate the huge number of new releases and make rewarding discoveries, writes the Guardian’s music editor

How can we better help our readers discover new music, in the places they listen to new music? I was recently appointed as the Guardian’s music editor, and this was one of the first things on my mind.

Increasingly, as CD and download sales wither, we listen to music on services such as Spotify, streaming high-fidelity music directly from centralised servers; in 2016 streaming jumped by 60%, while music downloads fell by 20%. Many of us are also willing to pay for these services that collate music simply and smoothly – the number of people paying for Spotify has increased from 50 million in March to more than 60 million at the time of writing.

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