Amazon Music today announced it is officially rolling out “activities” via Alexa, its smart speaker system which will be made exclusively available to the service’s Prime Music and Amazon Music Unlimited listeners.
The service says it has built new voice controls for music and over 500 activities utterances that for example can include meditation, partying, eating and more. The to-dos were selected based on Alexa users’ most requested activities.
With the new features, Alexa users can also pair their activities with genres that for now include pop, country, jazz, classic rock or classical.
According to the digital retailer some of the more unusual requests for the smart speaker include, “Alexa, play hooking up music,” “Alexa, play music for naptime,” or even “Alexa, play music for getting pumped.”
Amazon issued a number of fascinating metrics that seemingly indicate its users need to unwind—especially on the weekends. Meditation is the number one requested activity followed by spa, party, dinner and focus. More than a quarter (27%) of all activity requests come from “listeners using music to de-stress or find their zen.” Saturdays saw the highest requests for activities on Amazon Music.
The company also put out data on “sexy” music, which apparently happens more often in the early evenings. The most requests for “sexy” music were logged between 5-6 p.m. and the most requested “sexy” music playlist on Amazon Music Unlimited by name via Alexa was Sexy Country.
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“We launched Amazon Music Unlimited with the ability to ask for music by genre, era, mood and lyric with the intention of making the listening experience on Alexa as effortless and natural as possible,” statedAmazon’s release on the new features. “It’s working—we now see Amazon Music listeners ask for even more specialized requests — like music for activities.”
Amazon’s move towards activities would seem to mirror the ascendance of mood and activity playlists on all the music streaming services. Having Alexa as a conduit to these lists should more than likely increase the spins on these playlists.