Bobbyisms: Places to quench your daily music fix
I write about random things a lot. I write a lot about random things. This term is more than half over now (at least, I think it is for most students), and in the same way there was no new Interrobang for Reading Week, it kind of feels like any of these issues could be the last.
Not that it's all bad, since for a lot of you it means moving on to bigger and better things — graduation, careers beginning, moving to other areas of the province or country. Thing is, I want to make sure you have a few resources to find new music for yourselves, so I've thrown together a few links I've found to be reliable.
Bookmark the links you like, and don't forget about them the next time you feel like having something on in the background — there are definitely a few helpful sites among the mix.
MuchMusic's First Spin
muchmusic.com/music/firstspin/
This might seem suspicious right out of the gate, but it definitely belongs here on the list. Despite the fact that MuchMusic seems to have abandoned musical content as a television channel, their website is still loaded with lots of it.
First Spin includes entire albums for stream on the Internet, as well as a playlist of the most recent singles creating a buzz. You won't necessarily hear the most amazing records here, but every now and then there are gems.
AOL Music's Listening Party
music.aol.com/new-releases-full-cds/
Traversing a little further into the realm of what you want to hear is AOL Music's streaming site, the Listening Party. I visit this site quite frequently, and it offers a much wider range of music to stream online.
Even better is that AOL Music is far more consistent with their selection, religiously updating the albums and music available for preview on their site. If you made a habit of checking this site once a week, you'd hear a lot of new music that is about to be heavily favoured by the media.
Spinner Canada's Listening Party
spinner.ca/new-releases/
Okay, so at first glance this site looks exactly like the site on AOL Music. And it is, running the same firmware and interface, but with one key difference — this one merits mention for the sake of sheer volume.
The site boasts upwards of four or five times the albums to stream that AOL Music does, and without restricting it to Canadian content, like you might assume. Also, there's a bit of a focus on up-and-coming artists, so there is always going to be interesting new records for you to hear.
NPR Music's Exclusive First Listen
bit.ly/ex1stlisten
NPR is National Public Radio, a non-profit media syndicator uniting radio stations throughout the U.S., and they have music and streams of the highest quality for visitors to their website.
In my experience, NPR has the most appealing, interesting albums available to stream, and usually before the other sites. For example, on the site right now is the opportunity to stream the newest White Stripes album, a live album called Under Great White Northern Lights. I've no doubt we'll see it everywhere in 24 hours, but for now NPR is the only place to hear it.
Blip.fm
The last I'm going to mention is slightly different than the rest — Blip.fm is an online service that allows you to stream music and add it to a personal playlist. You can explore music in a number of different ways, and connect with your friends. For example, you can see my profile at blip.fm/mrbobbyfoley.
It's a great way to get some new music recommended to you; you can just go to the page and listen to songs as a continuous playlist as they get blipped, which is an effortless way to hear a lot of music you haven't before. You could get drawn into this in a huge way.
So please, check out those sites while I end this column - there's no band, no interview, no excuse for me to write so much this week. Thanks for reading, I'm out of words.
Not that it's all bad, since for a lot of you it means moving on to bigger and better things — graduation, careers beginning, moving to other areas of the province or country. Thing is, I want to make sure you have a few resources to find new music for yourselves, so I've thrown together a few links I've found to be reliable.
Bookmark the links you like, and don't forget about them the next time you feel like having something on in the background — there are definitely a few helpful sites among the mix.
MuchMusic's First Spin
muchmusic.com/music/firstspin/
This might seem suspicious right out of the gate, but it definitely belongs here on the list. Despite the fact that MuchMusic seems to have abandoned musical content as a television channel, their website is still loaded with lots of it.
First Spin includes entire albums for stream on the Internet, as well as a playlist of the most recent singles creating a buzz. You won't necessarily hear the most amazing records here, but every now and then there are gems.
AOL Music's Listening Party
music.aol.com/new-releases-full-cds/
Traversing a little further into the realm of what you want to hear is AOL Music's streaming site, the Listening Party. I visit this site quite frequently, and it offers a much wider range of music to stream online.
Even better is that AOL Music is far more consistent with their selection, religiously updating the albums and music available for preview on their site. If you made a habit of checking this site once a week, you'd hear a lot of new music that is about to be heavily favoured by the media.
Spinner Canada's Listening Party
spinner.ca/new-releases/
Okay, so at first glance this site looks exactly like the site on AOL Music. And it is, running the same firmware and interface, but with one key difference — this one merits mention for the sake of sheer volume.
The site boasts upwards of four or five times the albums to stream that AOL Music does, and without restricting it to Canadian content, like you might assume. Also, there's a bit of a focus on up-and-coming artists, so there is always going to be interesting new records for you to hear.
NPR Music's Exclusive First Listen
bit.ly/ex1stlisten
NPR is National Public Radio, a non-profit media syndicator uniting radio stations throughout the U.S., and they have music and streams of the highest quality for visitors to their website.
In my experience, NPR has the most appealing, interesting albums available to stream, and usually before the other sites. For example, on the site right now is the opportunity to stream the newest White Stripes album, a live album called Under Great White Northern Lights. I've no doubt we'll see it everywhere in 24 hours, but for now NPR is the only place to hear it.
Blip.fm
The last I'm going to mention is slightly different than the rest — Blip.fm is an online service that allows you to stream music and add it to a personal playlist. You can explore music in a number of different ways, and connect with your friends. For example, you can see my profile at blip.fm/mrbobbyfoley.
It's a great way to get some new music recommended to you; you can just go to the page and listen to songs as a continuous playlist as they get blipped, which is an effortless way to hear a lot of music you haven't before. You could get drawn into this in a huge way.
So please, check out those sites while I end this column - there's no band, no interview, no excuse for me to write so much this week. Thanks for reading, I'm out of words.
