Will bring Ninja Tune closer to the world’s 3.5 billion gamers and $125.7 billion global in-game economies.
New technology enables music rightsholders to reach audiences through personalised gaming experiences.
Reactional and Ninja Tune preview partnership with a unique in-game demo** featuring Coldcut, The Death Set and The Qemists
Tuesday 18th March 2025/….Ninja Tune, a global leader in independent music known for championing boundary-pushing artists, has announced a strategic partnership with Reactional Music, the pioneering music personalization platform that enables real-time interactive music integration in gaming, automotive and digital environments.
The partnership will see Ninja Tune’s labels — alongside its publishing division, Just Isn’t Music — license the rights to tracks from its catalogue for use via Reactional’s music personalisation engine and music delivery platform. This will allow Ninja Tune and its artists deeper and enhanced access to the 3.5 billion gamers and millions of games developers across the world, bridging the gap between the music and games industries, and unlocking new creative and commercial opportunities for music artists, game developers and gamers.
Reactional’s interactive music engine allows developers to integrate highly personalised music experiences inside their games, syncing user soundtracks seamlessly with gameplay. The music can be personalised in real-time by the gamer, with their favourite tracks, playlists and other sounds becoming part of the game, staying in key and in time with gameplay, and creating new types of immersive gaming experiences.
Reactional is pioneering commercial music to be enabled as an in-game purchase at scale for the first time. In a global games market worth $223.1 billion* in 2023, in-game purchases totalled $125.7 billion, of which $72.5 billion was spent on cosmetic content and in-game personalisation. However, music has so far accounted for less than 0.01 percent of this spend.
Changing consumption habits and an increase in personalisation in all digital worlds means that spending on in-game personalisation is predicted to grow to $100 billion by 2029.
Marie Clausen, Managing Director, North America, Ninja Tune, said: “Ninja Tune has always been at the forefront of exploring new ways to connect artists with audiences, and the gaming space presents an incredible opportunity to do just that. Reactional Music’s approach aligns with our commitment to innovation, extending the reach of our catalog to game developers and billions of gamers worldwide. With gaming playing a major role in music discovery, we’re excited to see how this partnership unlocks new creative and commercial possibilities.”
David Knox, President, Reactional Music, said: “In partnering with Ninja Tune we are bringing together some of the world’s leading innovators and creators in music with leading games developers, creators and technologists. The music fan wants new ways to experience their favourite music and to enjoy discovering new music. Bringing artists, creators and developers closer together is at the centre of our strategy to enable a new generation of music delivery and music consumption and a new way of bringing entertainment together with consumers on any device, anywhere.“
“We are delighted to have the opportunity to work with Ninja Tune, its artists and catalogue.”
Formed in London in 1990 by Coldcut’s Matt Black and Jonathan More, Ninja Tune has established itself as one of the world’s leading independent music companies, with a roster of labels that includes Brainfeeder — with whom Ninja Tune have a longstanding partnership to release, promote and distribute its incredible and ever-expanding catalogue worldwide — Counter Records, Technicolour; Big Dada and Foreign Family Collective. Having released music from the likes of Thundercat (Brainfeeder), BICEP, Bonobo, Nilüfer Yanya, Little Dragon, Hiatus Kaiyote (Brainfeeder), Run The Jewels, ODESZA, Peggy Gou and more, Ninja Tune is a bonafide global music institution, synonymous with diverse, uncompromising releases and equally visionary artists — from breaking to GRAMMY-winning acts — committed to pushing the boundaries of music and enabling new creative and commercial opportunities for its music artists.
Ninja Tune joins Reactional’s network of 50+ rightsholder partners, including Beggars Group, Defected Records, Cherry Red Records, Hopeless Records, Hipgnosis Song Management, APM and Naxos. Its platform is now live on Unity and Unreal Engine and is used by developers and creators in Europe, the US, China and SE Asia.
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Reactional Music and Ninja Tune – Personalised Music In-Game Demo
Interactive game demo showcasing the Reactional Music Engine and the delivery of commercial music from Ninja Tune into a live game setting.
In this Demo Game scene Reactional Music has been set up so that any track that is brought in will affect the scene in real time. Visuals and sound effects are all synchronized to the chosen track.
Any Game developer that uses Reactional Music can curate which type of music that is available in the game, and then the gamer can personalise their game with commercial music within the aesthetic confines of the game designer.
The Spaceship Demo from Unity Technologies is a AAA Playable First-person interactive demo reskinned to showcase the Reactional Music Engine and the delivery of commercial music into a live game setting.
Ninja Tune – Featured Tracks:
- Boogie Man – Coldcut feat. Amiri Baraka: Sound Mirrors
- It’s Another Day (instr) – The Death Set: Michel Poiccard
- Be Electric – The Qemists: Soundsystem (Mix CD)
ends.
Contact:
Elfie Lawson
Name PR
elfie.lawson@namepr.com
Tom Adcock
Ninja Tune
tma@ninjatune.net
Simon Harvey
Reactional Music
simon@reactionalmusic.com
About Ninja Tune
Ninja Tune — formed in 1990 by Matt Black & Jon More (Coldcut) — has established itself as one of the world’s leading independent record labels. A bonafide global music institution, synonymous with diverse, uncompromising releases and visionary artists, committed to pushing the boundaries of music.
Now in its 35th year, Ninja Tune continues to grow and innovate, working on breaking brand-new artists through to GRAMMY-winning, internationally acclaimed acts across its roster of labels — which includes Brainfeeder, with whom Ninja Tune have a longstanding partnership to release, promote and distribute their incredible and ever-expanding catalogue worldwide; Counter Records; Technicolour; Big Dada, a label run by Ninja Tune’s Black, POC & Minority Ethnic staff; and Foreign Family Collective, the label founded by ODESZA.
Recent highlights have included the continued meteoric rise of Barry Can’t Swim, selling-out every headline show to date including roadblock performances at status-making festivals like Glastonbury and Coachella; the launch of BICEP’s ambitious and ongoing new CHROMA project; the release of Jayda G’s feature-length documentary “Blue Carbon” (which was broadcast via CNN and streamed globally); and new signings and releases from the likes of Nilüfer Yanya; Glass Beams; Fcukers; Metronomy; Ebbb; Yukimi (Little Dragon) and many more.
In recent years, alongside many notable award nominations and wins for our artists across the GRAMMYs, BRITs, Mercury Prize,MOBOs, AIM and the A2IM Libera Awards, the label has also released Top-5 UK charting albums from BICEP; Bonobo; and Black Country, New Road; Top-10 albums from Maribou State and Young Fathers; seen multiple releases go gold and platinum including from Thundercat (Brainfeeder), ODESZA, Jayda G, BICEP, Bonobo and more; and overseen the release of nimino’s massively successful viral single “I Only Smoke When I Drink”, which has averaged over 600k streams a day since its release, with over 100-million total streams in just 5 months In addition to above, the label has also put out outstanding releases from the likes of Floating Points; Thundercat & Tame Impala (Brainfeeder); Yaya Bey; Hiatus Kaiyote (Brainfeeder); salute; Ben Böhmer; Machinedrum; yeule; LP Giobbi; DJ Seinfeld; Tycho; Louis Cole (Brainfeeder); I. JORDAN; Carlita; TSHA; Little Dragon; Coldcut and more.
Looking back further across its 35 year history you will also find celebrated releases from the likes of Kamasi Washington (Brainfeeder); The Cinematic Orchestra; Roots Manuva; Kelis; King Geedorah (MF DOOM); Sampa The Great; Run The Jewels; Diplo; Helena Hauff; Actress; Peggy Gou; Julianna Barwick; Jordan Rakei; Nabihah Iqbal; The Bug; Marie Davidson and many more.
Growing from the brainchild of a two-person team to an organisation boasting 70+ employees based across the world including a North American headquarters in LA — Ninja Tune continues to champion new technologies and innovative ways to develop each artist’s vision. Ninja Tune is also working to support the whole music business becoming carbon neutral by 2026. The label also continues to shape the conversation in the independent music sector, holding a Director Board seat on the Merlin Management Board in North America for several terms, and a longstanding seat at AIM in the UK.
About Reactional Music
Reactional Music is changing the way we can experience, interact with, create, share and enjoy music in games, automotive and beyond. As the world’s first scalable interactive music engine, Reactional allows any music to be brought into a game and for the entire game’s visuals and sound to react live to that music.
Procedural music technology allows composed music and audio to be generated live note by note in real time based on live data, in-game events, macro controls and developer managed parameters.
Reactional’s patented procedural music engine and music delivery platform open up a new era of music personalisation, interactive music, a faster and more efficient method to create and prototype music for developers, and for the first time, music as an in-game purchase. The Reactional Platform is live now on Unity and Unreal Engine and is used by developers and creators in Europe, the US, China and SE Asia.
*MIDiA Research Global Games Forecast 10/23
