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NCS

NoCopyrightSounds (Initialized as NCS) is a British record label owned by Billy Woodford which releases Electronic Dance Music (initialized as EDM) under a royalty-free license, allowing content creators to use their music in their work without having to worry about copyright. The label is currently managed by Daniel J. Lee along with Sam Mason managing NCS' social media accounts.

History

XDDrum&Bass

The XD face layout as used in Violin DnB.

Billy Woodford founded the NoCopyrightSounds (NCS) channel on August 14, 2011, to promote copyright-free music for YouTubers. The first track, Violin DnB, featured a pink XD face image representing Drum & Bass. As NCS uploaded new tracks daily, the XD face's color changed according to the genre: dark cyan for Dubstep and green for Hip Hop.

On September 1, 2011, NCS introduced a new layout with It Usually Goes, representing miscellaneous genres without specific colors. The XD face layout ended with Macklemore's Otherside on September 10, 2011. A new circular logo layout debuted on October 4, 2011, with Delilah (Diplo Remix), introducing colors for various genres, including yellow for Electro and red for Trailer.

NCS Circle Logo Layout Blue

The Circle Logo layout as in Deliah (Diplo Remix).

In late 2011 and early 2012, some songs used preliminary layouts or no genre indicators. On October 21, 2011, I'm On One (KillaGraham Remix) became the most viewed song of the year.

Over the next two years, NCS removed many songs due to copyright issues and transforming into a label. A new layout appeared on February 21, 2012, with Grey Skies, featuring multiple colored logos. By 2013, NCS started using their main circle layout that was bought from Rusted. Also in 2013, NCS transitioned into a record label, releasing their first official song, Time Leap by Aero Chord, on November 28, 2013.

In 2014, NCS updated their visualizer and released the NCS: Uplifting compilation album. They continued to evolve their layouts and visualizers, introducing new colors and designs throughout 2015 and 2016. The NCS: Colors and NCS: The Best of 2017 albums followed, featuring popular tracks from various artists.

RustedV2Circle

The circle visualizer.

By 2018, NCS added a black circle visualizer for Bass genres and released the album NCS: Alpha. In 2019, they simplified their logo for cover arts and released two albums, NCS: Reloaded and NCS: Elevate continuing to promote a diverse range of music.

In 2024, the label partnered with Geometry Dash, gaining access to the game's entire discography for incorporation into their gameplay.

Upload Schedule

NoCopyrightSounds releases a track on their primary channel every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, though they also release some tracks off-schedule occasionally. They also released on their sub-label, NCS Arcade every Wednesday and Friday, until September 2023 where the upload schedule screeched to a halt. After the release of Nunca by Wiguez, NCS Arcade's upload schedule was disorganized with tracks being irregularly released on Wednesdays, Thursdays, or Fridays, with occasional breaks between releases.

Genres (By Circle Color)

Note: This genre color spectrum is taken from NCS.io, the official website for NCS. Some colors they use on the site are not used anywhere else.
  • Maroon - UK Garage
  • Red - Drumstep/Electronic Rock (Formerly Trailer in 2011-2012)
  • Orange - Indie Dance/Synthwave/Nu Disco/Pop (Formerly Rock in 2011-2012)
  • Yellow - House (Formerly Electro in 2011-2013)
  • Dark Green - Jersey Club
  • Green - Trap/Wave (Formerly Hip Hop in 2011-2013)
  • Mint - Glitch Hop/PluggnB
  • Teal - Drift Phonk (Originally classified as Beats/Phonk)
  • Turquoise/Cyan/Light Blue - Melodic Dubstep/Chillstep/Colour Bass/Midtempo (Prior to the circle layout, anything Melodic Dubstep/Chillstep/Colour Bass/Midtempo was labelled as "Dubstep")
  • Blue - Dubstep
  • Purple - Future House/Deep House/Tech House/Bass House/Slap House/Future Bounce/Brazilian Bass/Techno/Latin House/Tribal House/Hypertechno (Future Bass used to be given the purple circle in 2014-2015, 2017)
  • Lavender - Future Bass (Future House/Deep House/Tech House/Bass House/Slap House/Future Bounce/Brazilian Bass/Techno/Latin House/Tribal House/Hypertechno used to be given the lavender circle in 2015)
  • Magenta/Pink - Drum & Bass (Glitch Hop/Moombahcore used to be given the pink circle in 2013)
  • Pale Mauve/Peach - Pop
  • White - Electronic/Hardstyle/Hardcore/Breaks/Chillout/Moombahton/Reggaeton/Industrial/Salsa/Moombahcore/Eurodance/Trance/Baile Funk/Midtempo/UK Garage/R&B (Was also used for Chilled in 2011-2012 and Chilled Dubstep in 2012-2013; often used for miscellaneous genres like Future Bass, Pop, and Techno)
  • Grey - Hardstyle
  • Black - Bass/Staff Choice (Usually used for miscellaneous genres)
  • Multicolour/Rainbow - Other, usually used in compilations or rare occurrences in which two or more genres are involved in a song (No longer used, most used in videos in 2011-2012)
Note: NCS does not always accurately label songs with the correct genre colour. For example: Tom Wilson - Be Myself was labelled as Drumstep, although it was a Future Bass track.
Most of these classifications were taken from NCS.io.

Subscriber Milestones

  • 1,000 subscribers: September 11, 2011[1]
  • 100,000 subscribers: May 7, 2013[2]
  • 500,000 subscribers: April 8, 2014[3]
  • 1,000,000 subscribers: November 16, 2014
  • 2,000,000 subscribers: June 15, 2015
  • 3,000,000 subscribers: October 10, 2015
  • 4,000,000 subscribers: January 8, 2016
  • 5,000,000 subscribers: March 17, 2016
  • 6,000,000 subscribers: May 20, 2016
  • 7,000,000 subscribers: July 26, 2016
  • 8,000,000 subscribers: October 4, 2016
  • 9,000,000 subscribers: December 20, 2016[4]
  • 10,000,000 subscribers: February 28, 2017[5]
  • 11,000,000 subscribers: May 12, 2017
  • 12,000,000 subscribers: July 22, 2017
  • 13,000,000 subscribers: October 5, 2017
  • 14,000,000 subscribers: December 24, 2017
  • 15,000,000 subscribers: February 26, 2018
  • 16,000,000 subscribers: April 30, 2018
  • 17,000,000 subscribers: June 30, 2018
  • 18,000,000 subscribers: August 28, 2018
  • 19,000,000 subscribers: October 27, 2018
  • 20,000,000 subscribers: January 7, 2019[6]
  • 21,000,000 subscribers: March 10, 2019
  • 22,000,000 subscribers: May 25, 2019
  • 23,000,000 subscribers: August 12, 2019
  • 24,000,000 subscribers: November 4, 2019
  • 25,000,000 subscribers: February 22, 2020
  • 26,000,000 subscribers: May 17, 2020
  • 27,000,000 subscribers: July 27, 2020
  • 28,000,000 subscribers: October 8, 2020
  • 29,000,000 subscribers: January 5, 2021
  • 30,000,000 subscribers: April 17, 2021
  • 31,000,000 subscribers: August 17, 2021
  • 32,000,000 subscribers: February 13, 2022
  • 33,000,000 subscribers: November 2, 2022

Video View Milestones

  • 1,000,000,000 views: March 29, 2016
  • 2,000,000,000 views: November 15, 2016
  • 3,000,000,000 views: July 9, 2017
  • 4,000,000,000 views: March 1, 2018
  • 5,000,000,000 views: September 24, 2018
  • 6,000,000,000 views: April 21, 2019
  • 7,000,000,000 views: November 29, 2019
  • 8,000,000,000 views: June 21, 2020
  • 9,000,000,000 views: December 22, 2020
  • 10,000,000,000 views: July 21, 2021
    • Dropped below 10 billion views on November 12, 2021 due to the removal of Alan Walker's releases.
    • Gained back 10 billion views on March 13, 2022.
  • 11,000,000,000 views: March 27, 2024

Channel Logos

Trivia

  • NoCopyrightSounds used to have more than 200 songs (not NCS releases) in 2011-2013, but they were deleted, either due to copyright issues or transitioning from a promotional channel to a record label in November 2013.
  • Billy Woodford, the founder of NoCopyrightSounds, had 2 personal test channels. Since Billy Woodford stopped rendering videos for the channel ever since March 2017[7], the channels are no longer used. They all were used for uploading test videos.[8][9]
  • NoCopyrightSounds added a new genre classification to their label, "Beats/Phonk", on July 1, 2022. Before that, the newest circle added was the black circle.
  • The circle visualizer is created using the Trapcode Form effect in Adobe After Effects CS6.[10] On February 20, 2014, William Woodford found a way to improve it by adjusting the disperse setting to 0.[11] The first release to use the improved visualizer was Steps.
    • Later, on November 19, 2014, with the upload of Alan Walker's Fade, William created the modern version of the circle in dedication to the channel hitting 1 million subscribers and implemented it into future videos.

References

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