I might have a music addiction

Winwood!

So, you don't have to pay for music anymore.

OK, that's not news. Stay with me.

For a long time I had been relying on this Google search algorithm to find free music online. Replace "Judas Priest" (...shut up) in the quotes at the end with whatever band you're looking for and let Google do the heavy lifting for you.

Lately, though, that's gone to crap. Nothing but links to long-dead FTP sites and spam.

Then, today, I found Elbo.ws. It aggregates MP3 blogs, a class of blog that I understood to exist but, clearly, vastly underestimated. MP3 bloggers are, on the aggregate, crazy willing to save me some money.



Seriously. Give their blog search a try. Search for your favorite band or song on there. You can refine by album, artist, or song on the results screen to clear out some of the unrelated crap.

I'll wait. ...

...

I KNOW, RIGHT?! How hadn't I heard about this site before?

I seriously just "saved", what?, $50 bucks or so by scanning my long-neglected iTunes shopping cart, searching on Elbo.ws for those same tracks, and relying on the kindness of strangers to get the MP3s that I otherwise would have paid a buck for.

Pretty much any major single from the past 60 years? It's out there for the taking. Especially if your tastes run indie.

This isn't going to save you if you're an album lover. But if you need to hear Steve Winwood's "Valerie" right this second? You're set.

The question no one asked: what did I download tonight? Be happy to tell you! It starts with a sampling from some upcoming and recent releases and then gets, um, less reputable... then swings back to this blog post with half of the Big Lebowski soundtrack. Shouldn't be hard to track down the MP3s yourself, but have some music videos while you're here. The Cloud Cult and Wisely ones (with Pam from The Office) are especially cool.

• Cloud Cult - "Everybody Here is a Cloud"



• My Morning Jacket - "Evil Urges"


• Fleet Foxes - "White Winter Hymnal"



• Fleet Foxes - "Ragged Wood"


• Fleet Foxes - "Mykonos"


• House of Pain - "Jump Around"



• Mungo Jerry - "In The Summertime"


• Hanson - "Mmm bop"


• Loverboy - "Working for the Weekend"


• Nena - "99 Luftballons"


• Marc Cohn - "Walking in Memphis"



• Wisely - "Through Any Window"



• The Stranglers - "Golden Brown"


• Deee-lite - "Groove Is In The Heart"



• Donna Lews - "I Love You Always Forever"


• Sonic Your - "Superstar" (Yes, the one from Juno)


• Carpenters - "(They Long To Be) Close To You"


• Peter Bjorn & John - "Young Folks"



• Steve Winwood - "Valerie"



• Mark Ronson f/ Amy Winehouse - "Valerie"


• ? and the Mysterians - "96 Tears"


• The Crests - "16 Candles"


• The Commodores - "Three Times A Lady"


• Paul Simon - "50 Ways To Leave Your Lover"


• David Bowie - "TVC 15"


• Dusty Springfield - "I Only Want To Be With You"


• Harry Nilsson - "Everybody's Talkin"


• Elvis Costello - "My Mood Swings"


• The Gipsy Kings - "Hotel California"


• Kenny Rogers & The First Edition - "Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)"


• Bob Dylan - "The Man in Me"

The lesson, as always: I'm hopeless. The Fleet Foxes and My Morning Jacket albums coming out in June sound like they're going to be really awesome.

And can I say a hearty "SCREW YOU!" to people that disable embedding of their videos on YouTube? What the hell is the point if I can't embed the damn music video?? How am I supposed to share Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up"?? Yes, that's the first time anyone's warned you about being Rickroll'd. You're welcome.

Music died for your sins

Great article on Slate today reviewing a book about the parallel Christian pop culture that has exploded in the past 15-20 years.

The whole article is fascinating, but the part about the stresses that Christian rock bands face was most interesting:

The Christian rockers Radosh interviews are always torn between the pressure not to lead their young audience astray and the drive to make good music...

They want to make good, authentic music. But they are also enlisted in a specific mission which confines their art.

Here's where I have to disagree. When I'm wearing my graphic and information design hats, I always have to be aware of constraints. Whether it's audience or media or choice of colors or word counts or legal requirements or whatever, constraints define my work. And here's the thing: limitations make it better.

How? Constraints force you to focus your work. If a few aspects of your project have already been decided ahead of time, you have to work around them. You have more time to be creative with other aspects of the project. You find clever ways to turn those limitations into advantages. You aren't paralyzed by limitless choice. You have to think. You have to work harder! And your work will overall be better for it.

As this article from Wired points out, Hemingway thought his greatest story was only six words long: "For sale: baby shoes, never worn."

This music blogger did a similar trick by reviewing almost 800 MP3s but limiting his thoughts to six words for each. Most of them are pretty clever.

This cartoonist forced himself to write 200 comics in under 12 hours, and I don't think he would improve on the tight, clever, stream of consciousness humor if he took 12 months.

Back to design, these guys made a fairly beautiful webpage/flyer for a conference with only Times New Roman, the much-maligned default font. Hell, some of the greatest typographers who ever lived only had one typeface available to them. They worked with what they had.

This applies, of course, to music as well.

Only a few truly, absurdly gifted musicians can get away with doing whatever they want. Radiohead comes to mind. Beck can almost pull it off.

Remember OutKast's split double album Speakerboxxx/The Love Below? Andre, set loose to fulfill his every wacky fantasy on his half, created "Hey Ya!," which was undeniably perfect but was sadly surrounded with 9 relatively crappy, aimless songs.

Me First and the Gimme Gimmes have made an entire career out of their self-imposed restraint: they only do punk covers of popular songs from other genres. And they're awesome at it.





I always wondered how good the Smashing Pumpkins could be if Billy Corgan would have just lived with, say, 2 guitar tracks per song instead of arguably wasting his time laying 64 guitar overdubs in pursuit of perfection. Such excesses worked for a while:



I always thought they did their best when they briefly lost their drummer and Corgan had to write better songs to make up for it:



Ryan Adams is another great example: he's clearly absurdly talented, but his genre hopping dilutes what he's capable of. He's pretty good at rock and roll:



He's even better when he sticks to alt country (whatever that means) and focuses on the songcraft a little more (not that he has to that much; like I said, he's ridiculously good):



The Magnetic Fields' stock in trade has always been arbitrary limitations, like their triple album 69 Love Songs, which hops genres constantly but the songs are all love songs (albeit with a variety of definitions of 'love song'). Here's one example:



Or their latest album "Distortion" where all instruments and vocals were arbitrarily drenched in, you guessed it, distortion. All the better to focus on the delightful lyrics:



They also had an album ("i") where every song started with "i". Why? Why not? Now you don't have to decide what letter your songs will start with. Get cracking on making every other aspect of the album better.

So what's the point? If Christian pop music groups can't work within their arbitrary constraint (ie, every song is about loving Jesus instead of a lady), they're doing something wrong. This limitation should force you to be more creative in every other aspect of your songcraft. It should make you better.

The expectations of your Christian audience aren't holding you back.

You just suck.

Mock Draft: Albums that never get old!

After today's relatively disappointing Kissing Suzy Kolber commenter draft (Topic: Restaurants where you would like to eat your last meal), Scott (who posts under Hats for Bats on his group baseball blog) and I decided to start our own diversion:

Mock Draft: Albums that never, ever get old

Rules: Not a lot to explain here. One album per round. No repeats of artists.

Round 1

BiweeklyBrilliance: Who's up first?

HatsForBats: I'll give you first pick since I proposed the topic.

BwB: I would stick it to you and take The Verve: Urban Hymns, but I'm not that cruel. (Yes, he is--ed.)

H4B: I wondered if you would try that. I was going to take it with a lower pick since it's too obvious for me.

BwB: I figured. OK, I'll start with Ted Leo and the Pharmacists: "Hearts of Oak".

H4B: Good one. I'll go with Counting Crows: "Across a Wire Live in New York City".

BwB: Ooh, a fine choice. I could listen to the 10-minute version of "Round Here" forever.

H4B: I love both discs separately.

BwB: Related: you should pick up the live Wilco double album, "Kicking Television: Live in Chicago". It's like a greatest hits, but they added this wicked awesome 3rd guitar player (Nels Cline) who really adds some bite to a lot of tracks.

H4B: Nice. I'll check it out. You're still on the clock, by the way :-P

BwB: Sue me.

Round 2

BwB: AC[lightning bolt]DC: "Back in Black".

H4B: Good one. All right, I'm hitting you where you live: Smashing Pumpkins: "Siamese Dream".

BwB: Ass. But for the record I would have taken "Adore" before "Siamese Dream."

H4B: I knew you would. ... we know each other way too well in this regard.

Round 3

BwB: Led Zeppelin: Houses of the Holy.

H4B: Hmm. All right, I'll swing it back newer. Postal Service: "Give Up".

Round 4

BwB: Hmm, I'll go a little out there. Eminem: "Marshall Mathers LP".

H4B: Interesting choice.

BwB: It still amuses me to this day. I never expect it either.

H4B: Okay, I should have taken this one earlier. The Refreshments: "Fizzy Fuzzy Big and Buzzy".

Round 5

BwB: You're going to hate me: Jeff Buckley: "Grace".

H4B: Oh, that's so good, it should have been mine. ALl right, The Verve: Urban Hymns. I gotta protect now.

BwB: Yeah I knew Jeff Buckley would get you sweating.

H4B: Big oversight on my part.

Round 6

BwB: Nirvana: "MTV Unplugged in New York".

H4B: Radiohead: "The Bends".

BwB: Wow. Monster pick. Lot of upside potential. Big wingspan... etc.

H4B: I had to recover from Grace.

Round 7

BwB: Ozomatli: "Ozomatli".

H4B: Damn. OK, you hit me where I live now.

BwB: Know what? I stole album from you. Call the RIAA. (He did not steal. Please do not call the RIAA--ed.)

H4B: Miles Davis: "Kind of Blue".

BwB: Nice. By the way, I think my favorite part of "Kind of Blue" is how every single "best albums of all time" lists always places it at, like, #6.

H4B: "We need some jazz on there, but it doesn't need to be first."

BwB: There's always a pissing war between "Pet Sounds" and "Revolver" and "Sgt. Peppers" and "Blood on the Tracks"... but there's "Kind of Blue" at #6 every single time. I think that qualifies it for #1 ever.

H4B: By the way, I'll just say it: I was happy for that Thriller video this morning, because I had the Beatles in my head, and I didn't want them there. Stupid deli radio. "Let it Be." Ugh.

BwB: That's how I respond to "Are you a Beatles or a Stones guy" questions. I say I'm in MJ's court :-P (Hopefully not in his bed!--ed.)

Round 8

BwB: Oh, you're going to want to reach through the series of tubes and murder me: Over the Rhine: "Ohio".

H4B: Ahh! I knew it was out there.

BwB: I admit that's a mean-spirited pick. Thanks for turning me on to Over the Rhine, by the way.

H4B: Grrr, and you've already got Ted Leo off the board. Okay, fine, you wanna play that? Sufjan Stevens: "Illinois"

BwB: Oooooooooooooooooh! You MONSTER. It cuts like a knife!

H4B: You brought this upon yourself!

BwB: Damn you for taking away one of my favorite songs, "Casimir Pulaski Day."

H4B: Ditto, "Suitcase."

Round 9. Final round!

BwB: Drive-By Truckers: "Decoration Day"

H4B: Now you're just doing this out of spite. I commend that. My last pick: Arcade Fire: "Funeral"

BwB: I hadn't considered that. Nicely done.


OK folks, let's hear what yours would be in the comments.

Reasonable? Music? On the internet? I don't believe you

The parts of me that get excited by economics, consumer law, and music got all a-tinglin' when I was reading this moderate proposal to solve music piracy.

Yes, I realize he actually references Swift's famous piece of satire, but I think his argument is honest.

First, he talks commodity to me about the nature of "selling" music:

When someone “purchases” Windows Vista, or the new Arcade Fire CD, is it really a “purchase,” no different than buying a hamburger, a car, or a t-shirt? No. Burgers, cars and T-shirts are “rival goods.” There are limited numbers of them, and there are significant production costs attached to both the creation and duplication of such goods. If you take a burger, or a Mercedes, that is one less burger/Benz for everyone else.

...

This is why everyone who has ever said “stealing music is exactly like stealing a car” or anything similar to that, is fundamentally incorrect. They are trying to inject their morals into what is, at this level, an economic discussion.

Next, he takes the music industry to task for their catastrophic blundering re: Napster

If they had vision, they could have thought something like this:

Wow, 60 million people in less than a year? Downloading how much? That’s amazing. If we do this right we can eliminate all of our production and distribution costs and become a pure profit business. How can we profit from this?

Instead, they thought something like this:

EEEK! Hippies are stealing my money! Assemble the lawyers!

...

The worst part of the success of the Napster litigation, is that it legitimized a new revenue stream — a revenue stream that, pre-Napster, no one would DARE utter aloud.

Suing your customers.

Then, he addresses faces the new reality of music consumption:

This is my thought: The Internet + P2P + Napster has completely blown up everyone’s concept of how much music someone can possess. Pre-Napster, very few people had 1000 CDs worth of music, or even 300 CDs worth. Very few people had the money and storage space to amass such a collection, or the wherewithal to seek it out. 300CDs used to be A LOT of music.

Now? Who do you know that doesn’t have a few thousand songs in their collection?

And, the best idea I have ever heard:

Now that the technology is available, what if the labels started to offer unlimited DRM-free downloads of their catalog for an up-front annual license fee of $240, or if they were brave, a $20 dollar a month fee with a cap on per-month downloading (let’s say 3000 songs per month)?

(Mass hysteria in the crowd.)

I would definitely pay $20 to have reasonable access to MP3s that you get to keep without all the DRM caveats of current subscription-based services like Napster. Obviously. Who wouldn't? Even with my extreme album fetishism--yes, I still like to actually hold the fragile, scratch-prone CDs, deal with flimsy jewel cases, read worthless liner notes, and reorder my albums to Icy-Hot my OCD tendencies a la High Fidelity--that'd be a hell of a deal.

First, I'd wipe out my 200+ album wish list, then immediately cancel the music subscription. Then, in a few weeks, I'd come crawling back with a whole new list of music I want. Then cancel again. Then come back in a few weeks. Repeat until I realize that it'd just be easier to keep paying the money and have access to music when I want it for a reasonable price.

And why should the music industry do this?

Do the labels (and film studios and software producers and etc.) want to foster a friendly, mutually beneficial relationship with their customers, with pricing and valuation of licenses for their products that reflect current technological realities and new cultural norms?

or,

Do they want to desperately cling to outmoded prices and valuations in the hopes of fictional trillion dollar profits?

Do they want to clog the courts with ridiculous, frivolous lawsuits?

Do they want to continue making an entire generation of kids think that “RIAA” and “Copyright” are curse words?

Enough said.

[Of Lattimorists, Goddamn Hippies, and the (possible) future of copyright law.] - Jefitoblog, courtesy of Idolator.