Amazon launches voice-driven on-demand music service

NEW YORK--"Alexa, take on Spotify and Apple Music." But Amazon on Wednesday launched Amazon Music Unlimited, an on-demand streaming service powered by the Alexa voice familiar to Echo owners, and a service primed to muscle in on an already congested streaming market for music. Amazon Music Unlimited debuts with a catalog of "tens of millions" of songs--Amazon won't reveal a precise number-- as well as curated playlists and personalized stations. That promises to makes it more of a viable competitor against Apple Music, Spotify and any number of other streaming services than the company's existing Amazon Prime Music service, which has a far more limited catalog of some two million songs and will remain available at no extra cost to Amazon Prime members. All too often when you request a song on Echo, Prime Music only plays a sample.