"Failed to parse json" using ytsearch

[rgabbo]

• I'm reporting a broken site support
• I've verified that I'm running youtube-dl version 2020.09.20
• I've checked that all provided URLs are alive and playable in a browser
• I've checked that all URLs and arguments with special characters are properly quoted or escaped
• I've searched the bugtracker for similar issues including closed ones

Description

Running the command youtube-dl ytsearch:elvis -g -x --verbose to extract audio url of a query. However I get two different outputs from the same machine.

Output when command works as intended

[debug] System config: []
[debug] User config: []
[debug] Custom config: []
[debug] Command-line args: ['ytsearch:elvis', '-g', '-x', '--verbose']
[debug] Encodings: locale cp1252, fs mbcs, out cp850, pref cp1252
[debug] youtube-dl version 2020.09.20
[debug] Python version 3.4.4 (CPython) - Windows-10-10.0.17763
[debug] exe versions: none
[debug] Proxy map: {}
https://r7---sn-45nufxc-4jvl.googlevideo.com/videoplayback?expire=1602956216&ei=WNeKX_DHIIyR1gLJ777gCg&ip=2001%3Ab07%3A6466%3A8092%3A611e%3A40b8%3A8278%3A8a8d&id=o-AGv2i6dJeweZrwyNoFoKaJAgG0DXIT12ucdvMwQnIEXx&itag=251&source=youtube&requiressl=yes&mh=zU&mm=31%2C26&mn=sn-45nufxc-4jvl%2Csn-hgn7rn7k&ms=au%2Conr&mv=m&mvi=7&pcm2cms=yes&pl=47&gcr=it&initcwndbps=1253750&vprv=1&mime=audio%2Fwebm&gir=yes&clen=3124753&dur=180.661&lmt=1582667918893951&mt=1602934477&fvip=1&keepalive=yes&fexp=23915654&c=WEB&txp=5431432&sparams=expire%2Cei%2Cip%2Cid%2Citag%2Csource%2Crequiressl%2Cgcr%2Cvprv%2Cmime%2Cgir%2Cclen%2Cdur%2Clmt&lsparams=mh%2Cmm%2Cmn%2Cms%2Cmv%2Cmvi%2Cpcm2cms%2Cpl%2Cinitcwndbps&lsig=AG3C_xAwRAIgTfDXwz0Jhxd8kBD_MJ4hP36TERcXSuJiXuVBv6_r-XUCIAWNfqIGFeYBdN6MDUUVdYw52_h8dE4c3T5Kftpqmxlq&sig=AOq0QJ8wRAIgUzQC27Hi-Js1AHyKAo7P1_hSjuXaZO379jVZmwbxy7kCICCHStpyOz_vOGdgKxjqAHtQyvBHWauf0dDqocaqb7y5&ratebypass=yes

Output with error:

[debug] System config: []
[debug] User config: []
[debug] Custom config: []
[debug] Command-line args: ['ytsearch:elvis', '-g', '-x', '--verbose']
[debug] Encodings: locale cp1252, fs mbcs, out cp850, pref cp1252
[debug] youtube-dl version 2020.09.20
[debug] Python version 3.4.4 (CPython) - Windows-10-10.0.17763
[debug] exe versions: none
[debug] Proxy map: {}
ERROR: query "elvis": Failed to parse JSON  (caused by ValueError('Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)',)); please report this issue on https://yt-dl.org/bug . Make sure you are using the latest version; type  youtube-dl -U  to update. Be sure to call youtube-dl with the --verbose flag and include its complete output.
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\common.py", line 904, in _parse_json
  File "C:\Python\Python34\lib\json\__init__.py", line 318, in loads
  File "C:\Python\Python34\lib\json\decoder.py", line 343, in decode
  File "C:\Python\Python34\lib\json\decoder.py", line 361, in raw_decode
ValueError: Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\common.py", line 904, in _parse_json
  File "C:\Python\Python34\lib\json\__init__.py", line 318, in loads
  File "C:\Python\Python34\lib\json\decoder.py", line 343, in decode
  File "C:\Python\Python34\lib\json\decoder.py", line 361, in raw_decode
ValueError: Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\YoutubeDL.py", line 797, in extract_info
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\common.py", line 532, in extract
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\common.py", line 3004, in _real_extract
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\youtube.py", line 3204, in _get_n_results
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\common.py", line 897, in _download_json
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\common.py", line 881, in _download_json_handle
  File "C:\Users\dst\AppData\Roaming\Build archive\youtube-dl\ytdl-org\tmpksi3o1r1\build\youtube_dl\extractor\common.py", line 908, in _parse_json
youtube_dl.utils.ExtractorError: query "elvis": Failed to parse JSON  (caused by ValueError('Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)',)); please report this issue on https://yt-dl.org/bug . Make sure you are using the latest version; type  youtube-dl -U  to update. Be sure to call youtube-dl with the --verbose flag and include its complete output.