Music Streaming Services

do you use streaming services like rdio, pandora or spotify? well, now there's also https://beatsmusic.com/

i have spotify (free account) and i've used it to check out some stuff (like if someone mentions some an artist/band and i actually want to check them out beyond simply hearing a few chunes off youtube). i used to like rdio because they have more of the kind of music i listen to, but their phone app was killing my battery so i said "fuck em".

i have pandora now on my phone but i never use it. i doubt i'll ever use beatsmusic but it seems to offer something different (like how about hearing a playlist put together by eminem's manager?)

oh yeah- i also hate thing that force you to sign in with your social media account because i don't have any

I use Spotify, signed up for monthly subscription which is handy for putting a lot of music offline for use when you're not accessing wi-fi. Never had a problem with it, recommendations are iffy but that's why I sync it to last.fm Only throw pandora on my tv sometimes, via a roku player.

Don't see the need for me to stream music.

Currently using their 7 day trial.

I've never used a streaming service and friends who did (free vers of spotify) had a lot of advertisements in it. Streaming seemed silly at first since my "music discovery" is done by me and is basically included in my internet bill. Why pay $10 for someone to do it for me? (I have a 120GB ipod that I keep a load of music on and usually carry with me. my phone only has 15GB which is mostly full of vids and pics and apps and about 10 classic albums of musics)

But BeatsMusic has been fun when I'm listening to a playlist and I pick one song out of it - and then immediately listen to the album that song came from. It was also fun being able to throw on "incunabula" while at a girl's place with only my phone in hand (I own it but don't have that album on the ipod.) Also fun are the website curated playlists. I wonder how often they are updated. I got to hear that Lee Bannon album in full (which I haven't been able to find to DL yet).

Only negatives for me are not being able to search their database by typing in an artist name (or am I missing this?). Also sometimes Ill use the "sentence" or one of their "activities" playlists and find that their selection does NOT reflect what I would want to hear in that specified situation. - I also wonder if it will let you search for other individual users and add those users to a list of your own?

:sleep:oh!@ found the search function.

I've heard good things about BeatsMusic so far actually

Spotify is awesome. It has almost everything I want to listen to.. including some of my friends' bands. I know it's bad for the artists, etc, but I justify it by buying the albums that I really enjoy, or listening to stuff I already own, or sticking with big name artists.

  On 1/29/2014 at 11:47 PM, joshuatx said:

I've heard good things about BeatsMusic so far actually

what i understand about this service is that the playlists are put together by dj's (or their managers) much like the tinymixtape mixtapes so i can see the advantages of this, but i also see it as a drawback since it's dependant on whether i enjoy that person's tastes (or whether they even know how to select music that goes well together).

on the other hand- i can see this being pretty popular with people in the industry "specially appearing" to put together playlists for special events/holidays/promotion

  On 1/30/2014 at 2:37 AM, Nebraska said:

 

  On 1/29/2014 at 11:47 PM, joshuatx said:

I've heard good things about BeatsMusic so far actually

 

what i understand about this service is that the playlists are put together by dj's (or their managers) much like the tinymixtape mixtapes so i can see the advantages of this, but i also see it as a drawback since it's dependant on whether i enjoy that person's tastes (or whether they even know how to select music that goes well together).

 

on the other hand- i can see this being pretty popular with people in the industry "specially appearing" to put together playlists for special events/holidays/promotion

 

Oh, ok, that makes sense. Well if done right it'll be like relying on a knowledgeable record store clerk or an eclectic DJ. Those things are invaluable and it's easily what's missing from all of these music streaming services (pandora clearly has payola songs, turntable.fm catered to big promotional firms, music stores like itunes, google play, amazon still favor big labels, etc)

If fact, the last part you mentioned is already such an inherent problem with a lot of online music services, not to mention music journalist sites. Spotify is pretty bad on this end (the Discover section for example), the "related artists" lists got a bit less dismal, but I still use last.fm for generated recommendations. If Beats Music seems to try to get the best out of many existing features, so it looks promising. Still need to give it a whirl. But distracted by...

this thing FACT Mag mentioned, forgotify, it's really neat, pulls from songs not yet streamed on Spotify. Already hooked. First thing I heard was off of this:

beats music is shutting down on nov 30th

French service Qobuz is on the ropes. Need a saviour by 16th of November I believe.

I use the 10 dollar Spotify plan. It's nice, but I was sad to see neil young leave. If it was because of the pay system I'd understand and respect his decision. But he said it was because of the Spotify sound quality being terrible. That hurt my feelings because Spotify's extreme setting, essentially 320 ogg vorbis, through my trusty koss Porta Pros sounds just as amazing as the Neil Young cds available to buy at the store and so much better than my dad's Neil Young 8 tracks that he bought at the store years ago that I would listen to on his old player. It even sounds better than the Neil Young songs played on fm radio everyday throughout rock and roll stations everywhere. I think the real reason was because of Pono. I'm sorry to yammer on about Neil Young, I just love Spotify and miss him there. But I must deal with it. Thanks for letting me vent.

  On 11/14/2015 at 6:46 AM, robotrobot said:

I use the 10 dollar Spotify plan. It's nice, but I was sad to see neil young leave. If it was because of the pay system I'd understand and respect his decision. But he said it was because of the Spotify sound quality being terrible. That hurt my feelings because Spotify's extreme setting, essentially 320 ogg vorbis, through my trusty koss Porta Pros sounds just as amazing as the Neil Young cds available to buy at the store and so much better than my dad's Neil Young 8 tracks that he bought at the store years ago that I would listen to on his old player. It even sounds better than the Neil Young songs played on fm radio everyday throughout rock and roll stations everywhere. I think the real reason was because of Pono. I'm sorry to yammer on about Neil Young, I just love Spotify and miss him there. But I must deal with it. Thanks for letting me vent.

yeah with him and other artists i check youtube for album streams or download them

i was bummed about neil b/c i had some of his songs on a roadtrip / office escapism playlist i play a lot

  On 1/26/2014 at 5:26 AM, joshuatx said:

 

recommendations are iffy but that's why I sync it to last.fm

since i posted this spotify's recommended artists features have improved a lot - real easy to get lost in niche electronic music or older genres/scenes from the 80s and 90s

r.i.p. rdio