Dolby Atmos music is here to stay. With more songs being released in the Dolby Atmos mix, streaming platforms seem to be slowly but surely starting to support Dolby Atmos. Apple Music’s Spatial Audio, Amazon Music HD, and Tidal have all joined the party.
If you’re wondering about how to experience your music in Atmos on any of these platforms, check out the video we made on How To Stream Dolby Atmos Music where we break it down even further.
We recently went through our Top 10 Dolby Atmos movies and told you our favorite scenes and movies to watch to experience Dolby Atmos in all its glory. Now, we want to share with you our Top 10 Dolby Atmos Songs. These songs will be great examples for showing off your new Dolby Atmos gear to all your friends. Unlike a movie, there is no visual to pair with the audio, so in theory, you end up focusing a lot more on the sound you hear all around you. This means using one of these songs is a smart way to test out your Dolby Atmos setup without worrying about the visual side of things. If you have satellite speakers for your atmos setup, it’s really easy to turn on one of these songs and test out new locations to get your theater set up just right. If you have a Dolby Atmos enabled soundbar, these songs will help you squeeze out every drop of performance and put all the upward firing speakers to work. We always recommend when testing out a new setup to play your favorite movie, then try out your favorite song. This way you get to experience two different types of audio.
For this test, we used Tidal, a high quality music streaming app. You must have their HiFi Plus subscription to access Atmos enabled content. Tidal does a good job of recognizing if you’re connected to a Dolby Atmos system and will automatically play the song in Atmos, and if a song is not mixed, it will switch back to the original version seamlessly. You’ll need to download the Tidal app to your streaming device. When you find a Dolby Atmos song, a module on the home screen will say “available in Dolby Atmos.” You’ll also need to make sure you have a Dolby Atmos enabled soundbar or AVR to make Dolby Atmos music work. For our testing, we used an Apple TV 4K plugged into an Anthem Receiver in a dedicated 7.2.4 theater room with B&W CCM 684’s as the atmos channel speakers. We do want to mention that some apps may allow you to listen to Dolby Atmos with a pair of headphones but that really only delivers a recreation and approximation of Dolby Atmos sounds. True Dolby Atmos requires dedicated up-firing speakers that bounce off the ceiling back down to you or in-ceiling speakers all above you that fire down towards you. This will allow you to truly hear all the hidden details in a true Dolby Atmos setup.
#10
Taylor Swift remade her hit 2021 song All Too Well in 2021. This album came with a Dolby Atmos mix and usually when Taylor does something, she makes sure it is done right. Her and her team hit this one on the head with a perfectly mixed album. We listened to All Too Well (10 minute version) in our theater with 4 atmos height speakers and after hearing this version, I don’t think any other way to listen to this song will do it justice. Taylor’s voice was extremely clear in the right center left and right speakers while the guitars strummed overheard in the background. When Taylor started the first chorus, instead of the backing vocals behind her voice, they played above and behind me. This filled the room with vocals and separated hers from the backing vocals. When the song slows in certain sections, her voice fills the atmos speakers to help immerse you in the emotional tone of her voice. This song doesn’t seem to do anything funky with the Atmos technology, but instead utilizes it in a beautiful way to draw you into the song more and more.
#9
With two different distinct voices, this song in Dolby Atmos has a very dynamic and different feeling than the original version. Camila's vocals fill every speaker to start off the song with crisp and clear presentation. At about 30 seconds in, Shawn enters the song and instead of filling all the speakers right away, he is in the height channels and behind you. The power of object based sound allows it to feel like he’s literally walking into the performance from behind you in a super cool immersive way. The separation of vocals really shined in this song. If you stand up and walk around during this song, you can literally walk to the front of the room and hear Camila more or walk to the back and hear Shawn more. The entire song felt as if it had a 3D effect on it that just surrounded you in sound instead of it all sitting right in front of you. What was really interesting was a few of Camilas backing vocals actually came out from the back behind Shawn and vice versa.
#8
Who doesn’t love a little extra bass? Throughout this song there is an infectious bassline thumping in the background. When switching to the Atmos version, this bass seemed to double up and fill both ears without overwhelming you. We really enjoyed this version of the song over the original. Norah’s vocals are beautiful and sit right up front loud and clear. It actually felt like we weren’t listening to a track but rather in a small theater sitting in the middle of the band playing a perfect rendition live in front of me. The separation of vocals and instruments placed all around you worked perfectly in this song. We thought it made it more lively and fun to listen to over the original. Kudos to the engineer who mastered this in Dolby Atmos!
#7
Olivia Rodrigo recently worked with Dolby to create a live version of this song that sounds great. Her entire SOUR album is mastered in Dolby Atmos and she was a big advocate of this. Most of the songs on the album deserve honorable mentions but a few others that stuck out to us were driver’s license, traitor, good 4 u, and deja vu. To us, it’s really cool to see new artists embrace the technology and be involved with the process. Rodrigo describes her music in Atmos to be “magical” and affects your body in such a unique way. We actually couldn’t agree more. Her song jealousy, jealousy opens with her vocal and a bassline sitting right up front with no other speakers involved. As soon as the backing vocals come in, they hit the atmos speakers and fill the room. The separation of her lead vocals and harmonizing vocals is a really cool effect that takes you by surprise the first time you hear it. Throughout the song, you hear these separate vocals in the atmos channels and it brings the song to a new level. A lot of her songs use this effect in the Atmos versions. If you want to jam out with Olvia and feel all the feels with this emotional song, we recommend trying the entire SOUR album in Dolby Atmos.
#6
Honestly, we had trouble deciding if Tom Sawyer or Limelight by RUSH should have made the list. They both are really good in Atmos. It’s really encouraging to see hits like this remastered and actually sound really good with this technology. It’s a really immersive experience. The synth and keyboards surround your head and travel across left to right, up and down. The drums at about 2:33 in the song even jump all around in a fun and interesting way. The instruments are the star of the show in this song. You never know where that synth is about to come in and it keeps you sorta guessing while you jam out. If you want some solid rock songs in Dolby Atmos, check out Tom Sawyer and Limelight by RUSH which are both great examples of remasterings done right.
#5
We were amazed at how cool this one was. The beginning starts out with the rain and thunder right above you and feels like you’re actually standing outside in the rain. The main vocals are sitting right in front of you and the backing vocals fill in the sides and height speakers along with the rain. Throughout the song, the rain persists, and even moves around the room a little bit giving you a feeling like you’re actually starting to travel through the storm. This was such a cool effect and such an awesome way to utilize Dolby Atmos on a classic song. It felt like it turned this from just a song to a full listening experience. You have to experience this one for yourself to understand how cool it really is.
#4
Do you need some help explaining to a friend what Dolby Atmos is? Just play BOOM by Tiesto in its original format. Then switch over to Atmos and tell them to picture a 360 degree soundscape and hit play. The beat sits in the background filling the whole soundscape while the vocals saying “boom” bounce around to the beat all around your head. There is a moment 1:36 in the song that feels like it is going up to your right ear, around the top of your head and over to your left ear and then around your chin and back to your right making a complete circle. We have to say, be ready for a crazy ride when you listen to this in Dolby Atmos because it really utilizes all the object based sound it possibly could. It almost left me feeling dizzy afterwards with all the movement of the sound. The dance/electronic lovers out there will absolutely love this one.
#3
Right away in the start of the song has vocals of a bunch of people talking to each other. When switching to the Atmos mix, it actually felt like I was the one walking through a crowded concert hall about to listen to Marvin Gaye live. Then Gaye’s smooth and crisp came through with his first line and we were blown away. It was probably one of the biggest differences of all the songs on this list. The original recording has a great classic feel to it that we love. However, the Atmos mix sounds like it was mixed sitting in the middle of a live recording in a theater. The chatting voices walk around you in such a cool way that it was easy to close my eyes and get lost in this song. It was the first Atmos mix that had me smiling the whole time while listening.
#2
We had a tough choice to make for this song. The first listen we loved. The second listen we hated it. Queen’s songs are so incredible that it’s hard to argue that they should be messed with at all so we were skeptical about mastering it in Dolby Atmos. If you start off with what we didn’t like – it would have to be that the Atmos version clearly muffles the instruments a bit. However, the placement of the voices was really well done and in a theater set up it is super cool! Once we got over comparing it to the original, we were really happy to hear this in Dolby Atmos and enjoyed it a lot.
#1
Billie’s latest album “Happier than Ever” is all mastered in Dolby Atmos. Her unique voice and style of music really suits the idea of immersive three dimensional audio. With such a soft and easy tone, to hear her vocals whispering or belting around the entire soundscape really brings her music to another level. Most songs off this album are really good to listen to in Atmos so we do recommend most of the album. However, the one we picked was the song Oxytocin. Billie’s soft-toned voice sits right in front of you while her whispering backing vocals fill the height channels and move left and right over your head. It’s a really trippy effect and feels like she's whispering in your ears from all angles in the room. Her softly sung vocals simply stood out much clearer in the mix, since the audio engineers had more spatial freedom to precisely position her voice in the Atmos version. Oxytocin is a must listen to if you want to experience Dolby Atmos technology used in a fun new way to make you feel like you’re part of a musical experience.
We do want to give an honorable mention to two more Dolby Atmos experiences. While this is actually an entire live concert and not just one song – the Hans Zimmer: Live in Prague is probably one of the best Dolby Atmos mixes ever recorded and produced yet. The entire concert is just outstanding and blows most Dolby Atmos movies or songs out of the water in comparison. Another great experience is one of the first Dolby Atmos concerts ever recorded, Roger Waters The Wall. We highly recommend watching these in a theater with dedicated height speakers to get the full effect and experience.
We aren’t here to judge your taste in music – we are fans of it all! Whether you enjoy the songs on this list or not, they are currently the top 10 we think are great to experience Dolby Atmos. As more songs are mastered in this immersive technology, these will consequently change since the mastering only seems to be getting a lot better. There are many other songs that could easily make this list so we are interested in what other songs you enjoy in Dolby Atmos. Please leave a comment on our YouTube video and let us know. A few of these choices arguably sound “better” in lossless 24 bit/ 44.1 kHz, but you can’t argue that the Dolby Atmos version is a very cool and unique option!
At Audio Advice, we build, design, and install personal home cinemas in homes nationwide. As more music streaming platforms start offering more content in Dolby Atmos, you’ll want to upgrade your home theater room or soundbar to be Dolby Atmos compatible to be ready for the new standard of audio. Or pick up a pair of high quality headphones to hear your favorite songs in Dolby Atmos today!
If you have any questions on these songs, or how your home audio or home theater gear can be set up to take full advantage of all the cool 3D Atmos features, just give us a call at 888.899.8776, chat with us on AudioAdvice.com, or stop into one of our award-winning showrooms.
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