Fans on the official Twitch game stream hoping to enjoy Metallica’s virtual performance at BlizzCon, Blizzard’s annual gaming convention, heard something on Friday that was definitely not Metallica.
As told by the edge, viewers on many platforms, including Blizzard’s Twitch and YouTube channels, successfully rocked the band ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls. “ However, for some odd reason, the official Twitch game channel decided to completely change the mood shortly after the song started. It cut Metallica and replace with… something else
See for yourself.
Now it took me a while to find the words to describe this non-Metallica song. At first it sounded like Christmas. Then I thought it was angelic, but not really. A fellow Gizmodo colleague cleverly suggested it sounded like a remix of Legend of Zelda music, which certainly made more sense. But that begs the question, isn’t it kind of weird play music that sounds like Blizzard’s competitors?
That still doesn’t solve the mystery of the song Twitch replaced Metallica with. After I scratched my head, I had an “aha!” moment and Shazamed it. According to Shazam, the number is in question “Toys in space” by Ecobel. A visit to Epidemic noise, who manages Ecobel’s music, soon tells me that this artist is ‘ambient’, ‘floating’, ‘dreamy’ and ‘hopeful’. It definitely doesn’t remind me of Metallica.
Now for the other question: why would Twitch do this? Seems like it was a problem related to it Digital Millennium Copyright Act
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“The forthcoming musical performance is subject to copyright protection by the appropriate copyright holder,” read a message on another stream of the full performance with an introduction from the band just before.
In other words, Blizzard probably has music rights to its own channels, but not Twitch’s channels. Gizmodo contacted Twitch to find out what had happened. We will make sure to update this blog if we hear back.
That seems like a pretty big hiccup from Twitch, which we imagine trying desperately to address the lack of rights by playing ‘Toys in Space’. I must say it was certainly memorable.