Music and social media are coming together in the form of the new music-sharing app Trebel Music.
Originally launched in April of this year, Trebel Music offers users a unique experience that, according to CEO Gary Mekikian, can’t be found on other apps such as Spotify or Pandora – specifically, its university and high school campus social media aspect.
Mekikian said that by releasing the social media aspect at Cal State Long Beach and other universities, the development team is hoping to receive feedback from students.
“We want Long Beach kids to download the app and start using the social features,” he said. “We’re going out reach out to them and ask for their advice on how we make it more useful and fun.”
In setting up the free app, the user can select which college campus they attend. This then allows the user to see what songs and artists are popular on campus and which other students are using it.
When a user selects a song, they will then watch a 30 second advertisement before listening to the chosen song. The song can then be downloaded and saved to their music library and will be available to play offline, advertisement and data free.
After listening to a song, users can “like” it by tapping on a heart icon or comment on it the comment section.
“We want college students to have a conversation about the songs, about the music,” Grace Mekikian, a co-founder of the app, said.
Aside from talking about songs within the app, users can also create playlists with specifics tags. Other users can then search for playlist genres under the “moods” search filter. For CSULB, some of the “moods” to search for are “chillin,” “study,” “pregame” and “weights.”
Providing a legal, free way to stream music without using data was what Mekikian said drove him to create the app with the help of his daughters Juliette and Grace.
“The product is for millennials,” Mekikian said. “It’s for young people, it was designed by young people.”
Corey Jones, chief product officer for M&M Media, said that free, off-line streaming is what sets Trebel apart from other apps such as Spotify, 8tracks and Pandora.
“The Spotify the model, at the end of the day, is very different… the goal is to get people to pay $10 a month,” he said. “The truth is… when you’re on a college budget every dollar matters… instead of paying per month, [with Trebel] you just watch an ad before you download a song.”
In addition to not using data, Mekikian said that Trebel uses about 90 percent less battery than other apps such as YouTube.
“For a lot of kids, listening to music and using data is a big issue,” Jones said. “We take feedback very seriously and we’re developing this thing in hand with our audience.”
For the future, Mekikian said that he and his team are working on two new features. The first is an interactive feature that will pair with ticketing and artist merchandise sites. An alert will come through the app when a user’s favorite artists are having a concert near them.
The next update, dubbed “music mates,” is a social feature that will allow users to see who on their campus listens to and likes the same type of music as them.
“When you get together with someone, one of the first things you talk about is what kind of music you like,” he said. “Through Trebel, you’ll know what kind of music they like and that’s a terrific ice breaker.”
Trebel Music is available to download from the App Store. Currently, Jones said it is only available for iPhone, but an Android version is being released within the next few weeks.