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Playing music

What /play accepts, how Orpheus finds the song you meant, and how to pick a result yourself with /search.

What /play accepts

  • A song name, such as /play query: firefly. After three letters, /play suggests up to 10 songs with their artist and length. Picking a suggestion is the surest way to get the exact song.
  • A link from Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube, YouTube Music, Amazon Music, Deezer, SoundCloud, Bandcamp, Audius or Vimeo, or a direct link to an audio file. Song links from Audiomack, Shazam, JioSaavn, Genius and Last.fm work too, and so do short links such as amzn.to and smart links such as lnk.to, which Orpheus follows to a service it can read.
  • A link from a service Orpheus can't read, such as Qobuz, Anghami or Pandora, is recognised by name. Orpheus tells you it couldn't get the song from it and suggests the name and artist instead.
  • A playlist or album link. Orpheus queues up to 200 tracks. An Apple Music playlist gives the first page of songs, about 50. To keep a longer playlist, import it.

How Orpheus picks the right song

A search turns up plenty of near misses: sped-up edits, loops and covers. Orpheus checks each result before it queues one:

  • Title. It's the same song, not a medley or a longer title that contains it.
  • Artist. The artist matches.
  • Length. It's within 20 seconds, or 20%, of the real release.
  • Version. It isn't a version you didn't ask for (see below).

If nothing passes, you get "Nothing found". Troubleshooting has the fix.

Asking for a different version

Orpheus passes over these unless your request includes the word: remix, sped up, slowed, reverb, nightcore, cover, karaoke, instrumental, acoustic, live, 8D, bass boosted, extended, loop, mashup, bootleg, a cappella and "10 hours" style lengths.

So /play query: heroes tonight plays the original, and /play query: heroes tonight sped up plays the sped-up one. "Live" only counts when it describes a recording, so a song called "Live Forever" is fine.

Orpheus plays the same song the link points to, matched by title, artist and length. If it can't confirm a match, it queues nothing and tells you. Searching by song name and artist often works instead.

How to play Spotify music in Discord compares this with Spotify's own Listen Along.

/search query: shows up to 10 results in a menu only you see. You can search Everywhere, which is the default, or only SoundCloud or Spotify.

Orpheus queues the result you pick as it is, except a Spotify result, which gets the same checks as a Spotify link. Pick from a voice channel within 5 minutes, before the menu expires.

Adding from the dashboard

The add box on the dashboard works like /play: the same checks, and the same 200-track limit for playlist links. As you type, it suggests songs you've played or liked. See the dashboard.

When a track won't play

If a song can't play, you see "Could not play" and the queue moves on. After several failures in a row, Orpheus pauses and keeps your queue. Press play to carry on.