From Spotify to Shibuya: A New Kind of Music App

Building Tools for the Next Generation of Music Makers

As artificial intelligence reshapes how we think about content creation, a new wave of startups is emerging to give people more control over their creative processes. One such venture is A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya, a company that sounds like it could be a band name but is actually a collection of experimental tools designed to democratize music creation.

The startup has raised $5.5 million in pre-seed funding from notable investors including Mantis VC, SV Angel, Boxgroup, Quiet Capital, and Remarkable Ventures, among others. A key figure behind this effort is Máuhan M Zonoozy, who served as Spotify's head of innovation before leaving the company in 2024 to pursue his own vision.

"I think when I looked at emergent behaviors and younger audiences, like everyone's growing up playing with culture through games, through filters, through creation tools. And I just felt like there was an opportunity to empower people to do something similar with music," Zonoozy told TechCrunch.

Reimagining Music Interaction

Zonoozy's approach focuses on shifting the narrative from passive consumption to active participation in music-making. While streaming services like Spotify have excelled at making music accessible, they haven't necessarily enabled deep interaction or creative involvement.

The company's products are released as "singles," similar to musical albums, each with a distinct theme around sound manipulation and musical expression. These apps offer users the chance to experiment in ways that go beyond what traditional music software provides.

Product Showcase: From Chrome Extensions to iOS Apps

One example is Speed Surfer, a Chrome extension that alters audio speed and filters sounds playing in your browser window. This allows users to quickly transform any audio into something new and unexpected—perfect for spontaneous creativity.

Another product, Usersound, lets you create an "audio" username where each letter corresponds to a musical note. It's a playful way to turn your name into music or compose melodies based on words.

Stacks, meanwhile, provides a stem player that lets you mix tracks by toggling bars in a 3x3 grid. The idea here is to give users the ability to build their own musical arrangements from existing pieces.

Drops offers an intriguing twist: users place plaques in patterns to deflect marbles falling down, creating musical notes along the way. It's not just about making sounds—it's about engaging with music as a physical and tactile experience.

The Sampler website enables YouTube videos to be turned into music samplers, breaking songs into beat-driven segments for remixing or composition. This demonstrates how even casual users can become content creators through simple tools.

The bop App: A Step Toward Collaboration

The most ambitious offering from A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya is its iOS app bop. This app lets users place musical instruments and effects on a grid to craft custom mixes of base songs. You can adjust tempo, apply one-time effects, and export your creations directly to social media platforms like TikTok or Instagram.

Notably, the team is also working on a multiplayer version that will allow users to collaborate with others in real time, opening up possibilities for community-driven music creation and sharing. In addition, recent updates have introduced prompt-based features that enable AI-assisted sound generation while maintaining user control over creative decisions.

AI as a Tool, Not a Replacement

Despite the growing popularity of generative AI in creative industries, Zonoozy and his team are taking a measured approach. They're not trying to build an AI-first music experience but rather a platform that uses AI where appropriate—especially for infrastructure support or enhancing functionality—but always keeping human creativity at the center.

"AI is obviously extraordinarily powerful, but I think we just don't necessarily believe that the future of music is simply generation, like song generation via AI," Zonoozy said. "And I think if AI starts to make that content more abundant, it actually makes taste and human perspective and interaction and participation even more important and even more valuable."

This philosophy underscores a broader concern in the digital economy: how do we ensure that powerful tools don't marginalize the very people they're meant to empower? By choosing to balance AI capabilities with intuitive interfaces and collaborative features, A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya positions itself as a bridge between technological innovation and authentic user expression.

Looking Forward

This year, the company plans to release what it calls a "musical sandbox mixer," a tool that will let users play with different elements of music-making—including crafting their own instruments. This aligns with Zonoozy's belief in fostering exploration rather than simply providing predefined templates.

As we look ahead, companies like A Vinyl Bar in Shibuya suggest a future where music creation isn't limited to professional producers or musicians with expensive software. Instead, it becomes a democratic, interactive experience accessible to everyone—anyone who wants to experiment, create, and share their musical voice.

In many ways, the journey from Spotify's innovation labs to Shibuya's creative startups mirrors the broader evolution of the digital music landscape: from one-size-fits-all streaming to personalized, participatory experiences. And if Zonoozy's vision takes hold, we may well see a new generation of music makers who are not just consumers but active creators.