Slashdot Mirror

Magnatune sells AAC files. It is true that they carry only independent artists, so no Britney or Garth for you there, but I suspect this will change. If not at Magnatune, elsewhere.

Even if it doesn't, though, that isn't the only format the iPod supports.

I've never understood the desire to pay $.99/song or $9.99/album for crapticularly compressed songs that are tied to a single platform. Sure, for a one-off piece of fluff that you want to listen to a couple dozen times it's not bad, but in any other scenario, it's nuts. Buy.com is at least offering 256K downloads (still DRMed), but unless you go to a dodgy site like AllOfMP3 (which is worse, it's quasi-legality or its crappy rips?), or happen to like one of the artists at Magnatune, you're SOL if you want lossless, archivable music.

I'd happily pay for downloadable music if it was cheap ($.25/song) and lossless and had no-DRM or very loose DRM. The business model can work (look at Magnatune), but it's going to require a different kind of music industry. Eventually, I think the music industry will get there, but it's gonna be a painful process, and we'll end up with crap like DCMA and the like on our backs forever. Bah.

If the purchase of physical objects from a physical store stops working for them, they could arrange something similar to Magnatune, where they would find and make non-exclusive deals with indy acts. They probably also sell mainstream stuff, which they'd have to deal with less conveniently (i.e., depending on shipment of things). I bet you'd be willing to pay their markup directly for their suggestions, and buy the music online.

These days, it's useful to let people know exactly why they should pay you, because the things they are nominally paying for in a traditional system are available with better deals elsewhere.

If these business models are so full of potential he should start one, with his own intellectual property, and prove that the old economy intellectual property businesses they are extinct.

I for one am a Magnatune customer and find that this is all music I need. Creative Commons doesn't mean it does suck. The fine folks over at Blender chose one Magnatune artist for their SIGGRAPH demo reel. The rest ain't shabby either.

Try Cargo Cult, Curl, Brad Sucks or their shoutcasts for starters.

If you chose to buy, you set the price. Money is evenly divided between artist and label. Download options include wav, flac, vorbis and mp3.

Sure, I still buy the odd CD. But I only do this after a concert right out of the hands of the performers. Prefer my media handsigned and not watermarked, thank you.

I haven't listened to the radio in years.

I for one am a Magnatune customer and find that this is all music I need. Creative Commons doesn't mean it does suck. The fine folks over at Blender chose one Magnatune artist for their SIGGRAPH demo reel. The rest ain't shabby either.

Try Cargo Cult, Curl, Brad Sucks or their shoutcasts for starters.

If you chose to buy, you set the price. Money is evenly divided between artist and label. Download options include wav, flac, vorbis and mp3.

Sure, I still buy the odd CD. But I only do this after a concert right out of the hands of the performers. Prefer my media handsigned and not watermarked, thank you.

I haven't listened to the radio in years.

I for one am a Magnatune customer and find that this is all music I need. Creative Commons doesn't mean it does suck. The fine folks over at Blender chose one Magnatune artist for their SIGGRAPH demo reel. The rest ain't shabby either.

Try Cargo Cult, Curl, Brad Sucks or their shoutcasts for starters.

If you chose to buy, you set the price. Money is evenly divided between artist and label. Download options include wav, flac, vorbis and mp3.

Sure, I still buy the odd CD. But I only do this after a concert right out of the hands of the performers. Prefer my media handsigned and not watermarked, thank you.

I haven't listened to the radio in years.

I for one am a Magnatune customer and find that this is all music I need. Creative Commons doesn't mean it does suck. The fine folks over at Blender chose one Magnatune artist for their SIGGRAPH demo reel. The rest ain't shabby either.

Try Cargo Cult, Curl, Brad Sucks or their shoutcasts for starters.

If you chose to buy, you set the price. Money is evenly divided between artist and label. Download options include wav, flac, vorbis and mp3.

Sure, I still buy the odd CD. But I only do this after a concert right out of the hands of the performers. Prefer my media handsigned and not watermarked, thank you.

I haven't listened to the radio in years.

" OK. lets get this out of the way. It is NOT theft. It is NOT a criminal act [yet]."

Another persistent Slashdot myth. In the US, copyright violation carries both civil and criminal penalties. This has been the case for some years now, and I think this myth survives around here largely because Slashdotters keep telling each other that there's no such thing as "criminal copyright infringement" rather than doing a bit of reading.

"Now. Why is it social protest? Its people realizing that they are being price gouged by large corporations involved in price fixing. Price fixing and unreasonable extension of copyright."

Of all the people I know who get their music via P2P, they do it for simple greed -- they'd really rather get it for free than pay the $0.99, simple as that. But they don't try to snow anybody by claiming that it's "social protest." The Montgomery freedom march was social protest. This is just piracy. Big difference.

"The problem is that the music companies are going to try and conspire to raise these prices I think."

Record companies are subject to the laws of a free market economy just as every other business. This is why record prices have dropped significantly over the past few years, and why record companies must operate on lower net margins than many, many other industries. If they could raise their prices, they could, but if the market doesn't let them, they won't.

"I think that the record companies are in for a shock. They are no longer needed. The internet has replaced them."

The impending death of the record industry at the hands of the Internet has been predicted for years now.

Record companies do a lot of things. They find talented (or at least marketable) artists and front them the money for engineering, producing, marketing, promoting and distributing their works.

The huge success of the iTunes Music Store and other services has shown that it's the traditional retail channel for old-fashioned plastic CDs that may go first (in fact, a recent industry report has given the CD as the primary music medium another six years, tops). The record companies probably don't mind this; iTMS is just another sales channel for them.

Music will still take money to produce. Setting up a recording and mixing rig and finding a skilled engineer and producer, or taking the time to learn how to do this yourself, all take time and money. The Internet doesn't change this.

While the Internet provides some absolutely great opportunities for self-promotion, effective promotion still takes skills, time, and money. Ripping your stuff onto MP3 and putting it on your web site or on the P2P networks is a good start, but it won't get your CD to every radio station in the country for airplay. It won't get you a video produced and shown on MTV. It won't get you in the Best Buy circular or on the home page of iTMS or other services. It won't get you booked on a concert tour and it won't get you in front of a stylist and professional photographer for PR materials. It won't accomplish the other squillion things that a record contract will do for you. This is why most musicians still want recording contracts and aren't flocking to Magnatune in droves.

Of course, there are plenty of indie musicians who frankly don't need or want any of that; folks who will be happy to distribute their stuff on a payment-optional basis via P2P and picking up the occasional local gig. The Internet will continue to be a tremendous enabler for these folks. The Internet is a truly wonderful thing, but it isn't the Great Equalizer that many Slashdotters see it as for many industries. In a buyer's market such as the music industry, there's still no substitute for talent and money, and the folks who have talent and money can use the Internet just as easily as anybody else.

"Adapt o

If I understand you correctly, you're advocating socializing the entertainment and software industries, two industries which hold lots of IP.

Naturally, many folks would like to see somebody else's career socialized while they continue to pursue filthy lucre on their own. A good test for anybody advocating that somebody else's revenue stream become socialized is to ask oneself if one would be happy if one's own industry went that way. Would you be satisfied with your income being converted to a fixed government wage, determined by law and subject to the whims of the political climate?

For such a change to occur, it's not enough that Slashdotters want musicians to relinquish the right to sell their stuff on their own terms and covert to a socialized, government-run compensation; the musicians will have to want it, as well. There are already clues to how musicians in general feel about this. Generally speaking, musicians still want recording contracts, and they have the same financial aspirations that you and I do. Compare the breadth and quality of material and the overall user experience of, say, the iTunes Music Store vs. Magnatune, an "open source" label.

Magnatune lets you stream their entire catalog in mp3 format, free of charge. They have a station for each genre.

It's good stuff. See 50 other posts in this thread about magnatune :-)

Admittedly, there's nowhere near as wide a choice of CC-licensed music right now as there is of RIAA-style proprietary music, but that doesn't bother me. There's been so much music recorded through history that there's no way to ever listen to it all, and everything I've downloaded from Magnatune has been excellent. There's enough selection there to keep me happy for quite a while. I've completely lost interest in RIAA music and haven't bought a CD from a record store in years. (I've bought a few directly from performers at live shows, but that's about it).

Magnatune.

MP3, Ogg, FLAC, you name it. Listen to entire albums before buying, if you like. Most artists allow some discretion in how much you pay, depending on how much you like it and/or how much you can afford. Artist gets 50% and, IIRC, they retain full copyright.

I'm not affiliated with them in any way, but these guys really do Get It. Give 'em a whirl, they deserve it.

I've said it before and I'll say it again!

The perfect online music store is already here, at magnatune.

Stream the entire catalog for free! If you decide you want to download something, you chose the format and the price. The artist gets 50%.

The quality of the entire catalog is extremely high. This is a feature, not a bug :-) (what, no Britney Spears?).

Check it out and enjoy :-)

-- a satisfied Magnatune customer

http://www.magnatune.com

I'm not affiliated in any way other than to love what they do. I've listened to lots of stuff, including their streaming mp3s of entire genres. I have bought a couple of albums from magnatune, and still listen to it today. It's been a long time since I've been into music this much.

-Jim

The web site implementation and staffing issues are problems with their business model in the sense that implementing those would take money, and Magnatune's "payment optional" system and their inability to fund the production of music (meaning that they can only distribute music from artists who have the means and talent to record and engineer their own stuff) limits their talent pool. By comparison, the iTunes Music Store is far more feature-rich and has better selection because they've gone the more traditional "payment required" route. Score one for Apple's accountants and analysts; perhaps they know how to run a business after all!

I think Magnatune is absolutely great and I wish them the best of luck. If the "music should be free, artists who expect payment aren't really artists" contingent of the Slashdot crowd wants to encourage this sort of model, then perhaps some of them can volunteer their time to develop and install the playlist / search features you described, or (better yet) volunteer their time as unpaid e-mail customer service staffers for Magnatune. If musicians are expected to use their time and talent free of charge for the greater good, then Slashdotters with this expectation can make the same commitment. Here's Magnatune's contact page to help everybody get started.

In summary, I agree with you. Slashdotters commonly chant about how the big record labels are pursuing a broken business model. Well, Magnatune's issues are evidence that the business model that many Slashdotters would like to see ain't that hot, either.

• Playlists: If you listen to music in the background while you work like I do, then you've come across this problem. You heard a song you liked, but didn't look at its name before the next one started playing. How do you find out what you heard so you can buy it? Magnatune doesn't offer a playlist of the stream on their site.
• Searchable Database: Since there's no playlist you decide to search for the song. But you can't. There is no searchable database on their site. You must listen to each individual song in whatever catagory you think the stream was in while crossing your fingers and hoping you'll find it within the first 50 or so... Too much work, IMO.
• Customer Support: You really want that song, don't know what it was called and can't find it on their site, so you send an email to Punky, the Emailclown. The problem is that he doesn't respond. Any email stating "I am looking for a song played at x:xxpm write before (name of song I did catch). I have money and and prepared to give it to you." should elicit some sort of response - even a canned one. I've sent several. Even followups weeks later. Nothing.

I see Magnatune praised a lot here. Some of you even rave about them. But do you just select music randomly and get lucky? Or do you go there with certain musicians in mind? Aside from using them as a proof of concept in the noble fight against the RIAA, I just don't see how anybody who doesn't have a lot of time on their hands can use their service..

I wouldn't assume so, I know Rocket City Riot (@magnatune) has thier own site. My bet would be that many of the artists don't have the time or desire to run their own website.

Magnatune and allofmp3 both support a lot more formats, including lossless and MP3's using known-good lame presets. 25c per track? I'd rather pay more for something good.. pretty please?

Magnatune and AudioLunchbox also provide non-DRM formats (ALB has your choice of mp3 or Ogg Vorbis). ALB also frequently has sales, or gives away free songs, and while single tracks are normally a buck, whole albums don't go above $10. As others have pointed out, $10 a month is only a better deal if you actually do download at least ten tracks in that month. There just isn't that much good music out there -- better to pay only for what you do get, rather than what you might get.

I am the last person to "promo" a record label, but I can't believe I haven't seen it on slashdot yet.

Magnatune
Free mp3 streaming of the entire catalog.

If you want, pay $5-$18 (you choose!) for an album download (40+ minutes) in mp3, ogg, wav, or whatever it is you like. Artist gets 50%.

If you want a physical cd, pay $15-$30 (something like that.. you choose!) and the artist gets 100%.

There is *no crap* in magnatune; all of their members are peer reviewed. It's solid.

I don't work for them or anything, I am just a very happy customer!

You might be interested in http://magnatune.com/ as well. It's also DRM free and half the money goes directly to the artist. Also there is no subscription fee.

Very reasonable prices (compared to buying CDs in Australia we are talking 1/4 to 1/2 retail price).

I first was magnatune plugged on slashdot and now I'm nuts over it.

"You forget that few copyrights are held by the person who has created the work."

In the case of music, the people who write the words and music typically own the rights to the music. Often (in the case of the "singer songwriter") this is also the performer.

When a record company pays for the recording, engineering, producing, distributing and marketing of a song, the record company often gets (or shares) copyright of that particular recording of the song. This is so the record company can try to recoup the expenses of making the recording a reality.

There are some record companies (Magnatunes comes to mind) which will license the rights to distribute your recording, but the catch is that you have to come up with the money for recording, engineering and producing your music.

It goes without saying that it would be great for artists and Slashdotters alike if there were record companies that would provide all of these services for free and ask for nothing in return. Likewise, I have a business idea for which I'll need $100K to really do right, and I'd love to find somebody to just give me that money without asking for an equity stake or some other way of recouping their investment. But, record companies, like you and me, have the need to make money. One person's greed is another person's need to put food on the table.

or http://www.magnatune.com/
50% of sales to artists, 50% of licensing to artists. All albums available in WAV, FLAC, ogg-vorbis, vbr mp3, 256k mp3, and even aac. Pay what you think the albums worth ($5 to $18). Pretty damn cool. I have only listened to some of their music, but what I have has been of high quality. I even found some I liked enough to have bought it (downloaded it in flac). Just take a look

Magnatune

Why don't you give Magnatune a try? They have a decent selection of music, you can download the albums as many times as you like in quite a few formats (including FLAC and straight up WAV), and best of all...they're not the RIAA.

But really, I prefer http://www.magnatune.com/ . Its uses allow for free download of music and yet still promotes licensing music (paying the actual artist for thier creations) It is a perfect blend of free for public consumption, and paying musicians royalties.

Sure. Magnatude http://www.magnatune.com/, GarageBand.com http://www.garageband.com/, emusic http://www.emusic.com/, and others. Just because sites with over 300,000 songs don't sell mp3s doesn't mean no one is.

Besides your mixing metaphors. First your comparing hardware, the iPod, to format or software. If you have an iPod, the question is when, where, and why would it make sense to buy wma files. If the files can be converted to mp3 or aac relatively easily, then sure go ahead and purchase. If they can't, then WHY would you purchase then complain.

The iPod plays an impressive, though not extensive, array of musical formats, including: mp3, wav, aac, apple lossless, and audiobook. I think I'm missing something else, but still. The iRiver is more extensive adding ogg, and wma. But if you exclude ogg and other marginal, but up-and-coming formats from the list, you could pretty much say the iPod plays EVERYTHING except WMA.

Microsoft licensed WMA DRM, Apple hasn't licensed FairPlay, but the have essentially licensed the iPod.

While not a fan of the WMA format, I can say sure its an okay format

Never? Don't use absolutes on /. - you'll have people lined up around the block telling you just how wrong you are. Anyway - for un-DRM'ed music, check out http://magnatune.com/ - no DRM, ever. They aren't evil. Music can be downloaded in almost any format you desire.

Just an unexplained dropoff in purchases will, as you suggest, be explained by the RIAA in such a manner as to demonize their opponents.

The RIAA however, may still realize the truth themselves, irregardless of what they put in their press releases. And more to the point, so may the labels that comprise it.

A boycott comes much more naturally however, when people can move to an alternative. I've started buying music from smaller labels more often. Have a look at Magnatune I also like being able to buy individual songs from iTunes. If the money stays in the public's pockets, that's one thing. If they see it going to someone else they'll change their tune pretty quick.

Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't spot that pun until I'd hit preview. Honest...

I agree that taking something without payment is unjust, but what exactly was taken here? I've checked out the music download scene off and on for a very long time now, and it hasn't changed my buying habits. Calling someone a theif for copying (not taking) a CD they weren't going to buy anyway is also unjust.

I like the idea of file sharing, but I also don't want to break the law, so I just listen to the radio or support Magnatune artists. I think that is more effective than this so-called civil disobedience I read on here.. I suppose I could also legally record tracks from my digital cable if I really wanted mp3s of stuff I hear on the radio, which should be considered stealing by your logic.

eMusic competes with iTunes by providing non-DRMed MP3 files. Of course they don't have as much major label stuff, but it's the only store I'd "buy" music from, aside from http://www.theymightbegiants.com/ and Magnatune.

magnatune.com

A growing, but very high quality collection.

Listen to everything for free in mp3 format.

If you enjoy it, pay for a download in wav, mp3 high bitrate, or ogg. You may pay from $5-$18 per album, your choice. Artist gets %50 of what you pay.

I am only posting as a fan.

magnatune.com

A growing, but very high quality collection.

Listen to everything for free in mp3 format.

If you enjoy it, pay for a download in wav, mp3 high bitrate, or ogg. You may pay from $5-$18 per album, your choice. Artist gets %50 of what you pay.

I am only posting as a fan.

If you're going to spend $5 on an album, you might as well do it at Magnaturne. As previously covered on Slashdot...

The artist gets 50% instead of OWING money.

But Magnatune has a lot of great music you can try before you buy, it's cheap (between $5 and 18$, it's for you to decide), you can choose your own file format once you have paid: Vorbis, mp3, FLAC, WAV... and the artists get 50% of the price.

...and they are Entry and (when the insane sports announcer comes on) Dilemma.

Both are off Alchemy.

I only wish the guy got his levels right, there is quite a bit of clipping...or the encode wasn't done very well.

...for me was not so much the graphics as the soundtrack. I followed the link to Magnatune to see what else the artist has produced and I was surprised by how good the other artists were on there too! You can play/download almost all the tracks by the artists (that I've tried) for free, although they also sell the music. I took a loot at the info page, and there's an interesting piece by the site's owner about why he started the site (after his wife went throught the grinder of the music industry).

Overall, I'm impressed, and if anyone else is on the lookout for something new, it could be worth a look (no I don't work for them, or have anything to do with the site!)

...for me was not so much the graphics as the soundtrack. I followed the link to Magnatune to see what else the artist has produced and I was surprised by how good the other artists were on there too! You can play/download almost all the tracks by the artists (that I've tried) for free, although they also sell the music. I took a loot at the info page, and there's an interesting piece by the site's owner about why he started the site (after his wife went throught the grinder of the music industry).

Overall, I'm impressed, and if anyone else is on the lookout for something new, it could be worth a look (no I don't work for them, or have anything to do with the site!)

One solution would be to get your music from Magnatune.

http://magnatune.com

All Magnatune music is licensed under the Creative Commons license with terms of Attribution, NonCommercial, and ShareAlike.

http://magnatune.com/info/openmusic

I just studied the "Licensing" page, and I think that playing music for your customers is a "commercial" use and you would need a commercial license from Magnatune. But they offer their whole catalog for commercial use, and if you license from them, you know that 50% of whatever you pay goes straight to the artist.

I'm not sure how much they would charge for a dentist to play music for customers, but the "Public Space" license (e.g. for playing music in the dining room of a restaurant) is $45 per year for one album.

P.S. I'm a happy customer of Magnatune; I admire what they are doing and I hope they succeed. I have no other ties of any sort to them.

steveha

One solution would be to get your music from Magnatune.

http://magnatune.com

All Magnatune music is licensed under the Creative Commons license with terms of Attribution, NonCommercial, and ShareAlike.

http://magnatune.com/info/openmusic

I just studied the "Licensing" page, and I think that playing music for your customers is a "commercial" use and you would need a commercial license from Magnatune. But they offer their whole catalog for commercial use, and if you license from them, you know that 50% of whatever you pay goes straight to the artist.

I'm not sure how much they would charge for a dentist to play music for customers, but the "Public Space" license (e.g. for playing music in the dining room of a restaurant) is $45 per year for one album.

P.S. I'm a happy customer of Magnatune; I admire what they are doing and I hope they succeed. I have no other ties of any sort to them.

steveha

I've come to the conclusion that until the RIAA makes some serious changes in the way they treat their artists and their customers I won't buy a thing from them. Does this mean I'm giving up music?

No, though it does mean I won't be buying some of my favorite artists. It also means I need to find some new ones and the place I've been looking is Magnatunes, they're true to their slogan, "We are not Evil", and have a fairly large selection of artists, not all of them are my taste but then again I don't like a lot of big label artists either. You're probably not going to find a Paul Simon or The Beatles here but I've found some nice music. No harm in checking out of course, no harm worrying that you'll buy an album that you won't like. You see all their music is available for listening right on their website so you can listen to a particular album as many times as you want before buying (in a good but lossy format though), then if you decide you want to buy you get to pay anywhere from $5-$18 US, the artist gets half of course. Of course you're wondering if people will actually buy when they can get the music whenever they want for free? Well I've bought two albums already and am quite close to buying a third. Go ahead RIAA, make as much trouble as you want, I don't need you anymore, whine until you end up on the street with the other crackheads, I'll be helping the good guys.

I've come to the conclusion that until the RIAA makes some serious changes in the way they treat their artists and their customers I won't buy a thing from them. Does this mean I'm giving up music?

No, though it does mean I won't be buying some of my favorite artists. It also means I need to find some new ones and the place I've been looking is Magnatunes, they're true to their slogan, "We are not Evil", and have a fairly large selection of artists, not all of them are my taste but then again I don't like a lot of big label artists either. You're probably not going to find a Paul Simon or The Beatles here but I've found some nice music. No harm in checking out of course, no harm worrying that you'll buy an album that you won't like. You see all their music is available for listening right on their website so you can listen to a particular album as many times as you want before buying (in a good but lossy format though), then if you decide you want to buy you get to pay anywhere from $5-$18 US, the artist gets half of course. Of course you're wondering if people will actually buy when they can get the music whenever they want for free? Well I've bought two albums already and am quite close to buying a third. Go ahead RIAA, make as much trouble as you want, I don't need you anymore, whine until you end up on the street with the other crackheads, I'll be helping the good guys.

I think the magnatune model could work. I can stream entire albums in decent quality for free and get a really good idea of whether or not I want to shell out for even better quality sound files. I think that's important when the artists aren't well known, and potential buyers might not take the chance based on a poor quality little snippet of a couple of songs.

...once they drop the axe on PVRs, VCRs, MP3 players, any type of recording, sharing or portable media devices that don't require retinal scans and call in activation...

They won't try this. People like all these things, and if the government tries to take them away, the people will vote to replace the government.

I buy CDs, usually most the songs suck, but theres a few on there.

I recommend you check out Magnatune. They let you listen to all the songs they sell, and then they let you decide how much you want to pay for an album (in the range of $5 to $18) and if you only like a few songs, just pay the $5. Then you download the music, in your choice of four formats (WAV, FLAC, Ogg Vorbis, MP3).

I'm not connected with them but I've bought several albums through them and I hope they prosper.

http://magnatune.com

steveha

If I were still brainwashing myself by listening to over-hyped, over-produced crap then I might actually care. I, however, listen to Free music or music from publishers who are not evil.

Can't we just flag the RIAA as damage and route around them?

Come on, /. musicians, submit your work under a Creative Commons licence and sell it somewhere like here or that other one whose name escapes me.

As I understand it, analog storage devices, like a magnetic tape, is not held down by copyright laws. Digital media is. Thats what the supreme court decided. I would imagine stream ripping would be illegal, because it's being both broadcast and recorded digitally.

PS Magnatune http://www.magnatune.com/ solves all of these problems.

Listen to independent (usually college) radio. I spent my formative years listening to KXLU and KALX.

Listen to indie internet radio stations. A lot of people like KEXP; check the directories at shoutcast.com and icecast.org or your mp3's builtin directory (eg iTunes) (shameless plug - I run punk stream if you like punk)

Read indie newspapers, if available. L.A. Weekly if you're in Los Angeles, for example.

Read web sites that cover indie (pitchforkmedia.com is a start). Download stuff at random.

Go to music buying sites like audiolunchbox and magnatune, and listen to samples at random.

Ask friends for recommendations. Borrow stuff from them.

Hit alt.binaries.sounds.mp3.indie. Download stuff at random.

Go to indie record stores and buy stuff at random. I actually used to do this, buy something based on the cover art. Discovered some great stuff this way. And this was on a high school allowance.

All you need is a seed, and it can open up a whole new microgenre to explore.

Once you find something you like, research them. You'll often find information along the lines of "if you like X, you might like Y". Maybe a band member used to be in another band.

Look up that band's label's site. Often, indie labels have a common "sound" across their lineup, so you might like some of their label mates. Indie label sites usually have downloadable sample songs- download them.

And so on.

I do all these things. I take music seriously, it's a big part of my life. Sometimes it feels like work, to tell you the truth. But I'm driven by the idea that, no matter how much I like the music I've enjoyed in the past, there's something even more incredible out there.

I have a lot of CDs and I continue to buy a lot. But I also have a lot of downloaded music. I have a fairly clear conscience though. I genuinely feel that most indie bands wouldn't hold it against me that I downloaded their music to give it a listen, to see what they are about.

Does all the above sound like "too much effort"? Then, perhaps, music doesn't mean as much to you as me. That's cool.

Me- I'm not content to be fed stuff by commercial interests whose agenda run contrary to my search for interesting music. And I have the time and desire to invest in this pursuit. I can appreciate that others may not. Or maybe you're out in the sticks, with no broadband. In which case, I think you to resign yourself to a certain lifestyle, anyway.

That's why I don't live in the sticks :).

-h3