Tuesday, August 26, 2008

My New Toy!

At work today, I was listening to OUTLANDER, heart beating out of my chest when Jamie came to Claire's rescue at the witch trial. Just when she was on the verge of telling him the _truth_, my iPod went dead. Battery. GRRRR. Anyway, there were no plug-ins and I was forced to find another source of entertainment.

One of my friends at work pointed me to _the coolest_ thing on the internet.

www.pandora.com

Bookmark it. Trust me.

Honestly, I started playing around on the website and wondered how the heck I'd never heard of it. That said, I'll explain exactly what it is. It's basically an online music source...a radio, of sorts. Only YOU get to pick what you listen to. Erm, sort of.

When you start, the site asks you for a song/artist. Then it pulls up a song by that artist. From then on out, it's CRAZY. It starts pulling songs that are similar to the one you chose...basing the picks on all kinds of crazy comparisons -- instrumentation, tonality, harmony, etc. etc.

That's NOT the crazy part! The crazy part is that I started with "Guster." Love the band, thought it was as gooda place to start as any. When it started pulling other songs--from artists I've never even heard of--I found myself thinking, OH, this song is great! Who is that?" Blah blah blah. I can't say I disliked a single song that played, and LOVED most of them. It's like....MAGIC. :)

I'm like a caveman who just discovered fire. And it's gonna be kinda pathetic if y'all have heard about this a long time ago. (g)

But for those of you who haven't....go forth and play! You'll love it.

8 comments:

Tara Parker said...

We discovered Pandora about 2 years ago and still love it!

It's amazing what new music we've found through it.

Care to share your stations?

Deniz Bevan said...

Guster! Barrel of a Gun! Yay!
You really liked Pandora? I found they kept giving me c**p - just cos I like the divine comedy (http://www.thedivinecomedy.com/) doesn't mean I like every pop band that has an orchestra in the background... I don't know.. maybe I should give it another shot. Gotta remember my login...
Maybe if I share stations with you and Tara?

Deniz Bevan said...

aha! now I see what the problem is... They've probably improved Pandora whole heap, but I can't get in anymore!!
"We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative."

Deniz Bevan said...

aha! now I see what the problem is... They've probably improved Pandora whole heap, but I can't get in anymore!!
"We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative."

Deniz Bevan said...

oops, sorry for the double post :-)

Tara Parker said...

Deniz,

I do remember seeing that they don't provide it outside the US. That's too bad!

Well, here are my stations anyway:

Beatles Radio
Motley Crue Radio
Trans-Siberian Orchestra Radio
Fire on the Mountain Radio
Sultans of Swing Radio
Blue Oyster Cult Radio
Enigma Radio
Tool Radio
Enya Radio
Cowboy Mouth Radio
Godsmack Radio

Very different styles, depending on our mood. (g)

I'll have to look up Guster...

Jennifer Hendren said...

Ha ha! I knew I would be the last to know. (g) Well, no...apparently my aunt and uncle were clueless, too. (g)

Jen

Jennifer Hendren said...

Deniz,

My favorite so far is my Guster station. I also have Otis Redding, Van Morrison, a few country ones...even a Broadway one. (g) I'm still toying to see what I like...so far, Guster is definitely in the lead.

Jen