Voice Command Feedback - Lenovo Clock and YouTube Music

[Fitch]

Voice Command Feedback - Lenovo Clock 1 & 2

There's an ongoing issue with Google Assistant on the Lenovo Clock 1 and 2 and Youtube Music playlists. 

We've reported the problem with Lenovo and they wanted us to come to you.

The command that we call directly, or put into Routines/automation, always fails for personal playlists in Youtube  Music. Note that personal results based on my voice are turned on, as it knows my Routines, can show personal pictures from my Google Photos, and can show my agenda from my calendar.

We like to say anything like

Play my Bedtime playlist

Play Bedtime playlist

Play my Bedtime playlist on YouTube Music

Play my Bedtime playlist on YouTube

These all work great on Google Home Mini, Google Nest Home, even Android Google Assistant. Having personal playlists play with Google Assistant has been an amazing feature that makes Google a great Home Automation platform. Assistant responds with something like "Sure, playing your YouTube Music playlist called Bedtime" as expected.

But doing this on the Lenovo Clock 1 & 2, which is a great fully-fledged Assistant hardware device, we can't get that to work. What happens instead is that Assistant chooses community playlists or Radio stations, saying something like, "Sure. Try this bedtime station on YouTube" and it plays a generic station/radio from YouTube music.

Personal playlists include uploaded MP3s/audio files which is a big draw for many who have personal collections of sound files that may not be available in the catalog.

Lenovo support posted here on their support website: 

It would be advisable to get in touch with the YouTube Music support or Google support for further assistance as they're the ones that can provide further recommendations towards this concern in order to have the playlist to play on the Lenovo Smart Clock even if the playlist itself plays on other devices.

So, we are looking for ways to continue to use the Smart Clock as a fully-compatible Google Assistant, but can't get this major part of functionality to be in parity with all other hardware that uses Assistant. 

Thanks!

[JillG]

Hi @Fitch 

That is really interesting that the Lenovo devices aren't responding with the requested music.  I will check with our Community Specialists and see if they can add any info.

Jill

[Juni]

Hi folks,
 

Thanks for the help, @JillG
 

@Fitch, Thanks for reaching out and for providing detailed information on your issue and the steps that you've done — these are of great help! Is the issue isolated to just YouTube music? Have you tried using another music provider so we can further isolate the issue? Also, what are the troubleshooting steps that you tried with the Lenovo support team?
 

Looking forward to your response. 

Best,

Juni

[Fitch]

Hi Juni - indeed, Spotify and Pandora playlists can be called up to play by name from the Lenovo Smart Clock. It seems to be just Youtube Music.

[Azarco]

Hey Fitch,

Got it. Make sure you're using the same Google Account with your Lenovo devices as the one you've used with your Google Home speakers. If possible, try resetting your Lenovo device to its default settings. If the issue persists, you can contact YouTube Music support for additional assistance. 

Keep us posted.

Regards,
Alex

[Juni]

Hi there,

I just wanted to follow up to see if you still need our help. Please let us know as we would be happy to answer any questions you may have.
 

Thanks,

Juni

[Azarco]

Hello Fitch,

One quick final check in here since activity has slowed down. We'll be locking the thread in the next 24 hours, but if you still need assistance, feel free to start a new thread in the Community and we’ll be happy to help.

Best,

Alex

[Fitch]

Here is youtube music's response:
"YouTube Music support is tthe support center for paid content on YouTube"
And then they said "try the support forums to get help from other users, or contact Lenovo, which I did.
Since this issue is clearly a bug with one of three systems, Lenovo, Google Assistant, or Youtube Music, and not something the community of other users can help with, can you get this escalated, please?

[Azarco]

Hey Fitch,

We understand that your issue is isolated with YouTube Music on your Lenovo Smart clock device. Please note that we have very limited support on third party speakers with built-in Google Assistant like Lenovo. It is best to report this with Lenovo support for better assistance. 

If you need help with your Google Home or Nest devices, please do not hesitate to reply on this thread otherwise, we'll lock this thread after 24 hours.

Kind regards,

Alex

[Fitch]

I appreciate your response. I have been quite patient, but if you knew already that you wouldn't support me with issues with Lenovo Clock, I appreciate you stuck with me for this long, trying to find out where I had made a mistake or using the product wrong.
What about escalation? Wouldn't some executives or top support teams who run Google Assistant like to be informed that there is a problem with Lenovo's Google Assistant implementation? 
When I call their support, they said it's not their problem, and they only support the Hardware, and blame Google Assistant software. So while you may have limited support, Google must want to be aware, right?

[Azarco]

Hello Fitch,

We hear you! While we love to help, we don't have access to Lenovo's software. You may want to contact YouTube to check your account. If the issue persists, we highly suggest Lenovo support. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Best,
Alex