Think that Spotify is the only thing buzzing in mobile music?  Not quite.  Universal Music Group, Orange UK, and Channel 4 are now joining forces on an unconventional mobile music offering in Britain.  Instead of a mobile-screen menu and an exhaustive song selection, the ‘Monkey’ service will allow Orange pay-as-you-go customers to dial up playlists and stream music over the wireless network.  Another partner is mobile advertising specialist Blyk, and Channel 4 will curate the playlists as part of its broader 4Music brand.

Monkey goes live Thursday, and from the beginning, younger users are the target.  The younger demographic typically has less money for high-end phones, and less money for expensive plans.  Instead, Monkey will reward users that top up their monthly talk time by at least £10 pounds ($16.44), a pay-as-you-go, pay-to-play type of arrangement.  That is part of a plan to woo a group supposedly less wed to ownership, though the streaming access is hardly free and unconditional.

And, to keep things exciting, Monkey will dish hundreds of thousands of songs, free competitions, news, gossip and exclusive access to artist content.  That will mostly be powered by early-mover UMG, though users could start craving content from competitive labels.

Story by Alexandra Osorio.