Muse Blocks Are Commercially-Made NFC Music Trigger Tags

Anyone who is being honest with themselves knows that our modern digital music libraries and streaming services are better than the physical media of yore — at least if you’re using a lossless source. But many of us still have a fondness for the vinyl records, cassette tapes, or compact discs that we grew up with. It’s probably just nostalgia, but it’s difficult not to enjoy the feeling of carefully dropping the needle onto vinyl or flipping a cassette tape over to the B side. Senic’s Muse Blocks are NFC tags that trigger music in order to replicate the feel of playing physical media.

The idea of using NFC tags to play music is nothing new, and we’ve seen many projects on Hackster that do exactly that. These are usually intended for kids or older folks who have a difficult time navigating streaming apps like Spotify. They also make it easy for guests to play albums without having to touch your phone or figure out your specific streaming service. Muse Blocks aren’t really any different, except that Senic is planning to actually sell them. This is the first time we’ve seen this done commercially, as the previous projects we’ve covered have been DIY builds.

Each Muse Block is a small palm-sized square that has an image you choose printed on one side. That’ll likely be a particular album cover or the title of a playlist. Inside each Muse Block is an NFC chip that can be used to trigger an action, like playing an album, when you touch it to your phone. Compatibility is great with Android devices, but is hit or miss with iPhones. If your iPhone is compatible, there is a free app to use with your Muse Blocks. Android users are advised to use the Trigger app. The “Special Introductory Price” for three Muse Blocks is $15. You can also get a set of seven Muse Blocks and a cool wall display bar for $79. But if you’re a little bit crafty, you can easily purchase a bulk pack of NFC tags and make your own Muse Block knockoffs for much less money.