Category Archives: Music

Ideas, Music

Me and my iPod

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Yes, I recently purchased an iPod. Yes, that means I am a big music nerd. Yes, that means I will further bore you with iPod minutia:

  1. I would really like it if, after I sync my iPod with iTunes, it would submit any unaccounted playcounts to Audioscrobbler. I would suspect alot of people’s music consumption happens on their iPod instead of iTunes…
  2. I would be a much more studious tagger if it wouldn’t keep switching away from the “rating” mode. I very rarely change the volume or fast forward into songs. All I do is rate. I want it to never leave that screen.
  3. This is more of a product design thing, but I would really like to have the a more tactile option than the touchwheel. Sure, it’s nice and smooth, but I might favor a knob or thin disc with a little finger indent like on a home stereo. The main benefit would be to have it notched so that you “feel” the equivalent of a click as you browse menus or rate things. (I often select something wrong if I don’t squarely lift my finger off the touchwheel.) Success would mean being able to navigate/rate without ever having to look.
Music, Work

Mixmatcher rolling along

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Mixmatcher is rolling along quite smoothly. The Belgians and Brazilians have begun to take over. Playlists are being made, and descriptions are being written. The XML feed of songs is isn’t showing every new song added in Bloglines, although the XML file has all of them in there. (Anyone know why? What is it checking to tell if there were changes? Is it reading a particular date? Is it expecting a certain type of date?)

Music, Work

Mixmatcher open for business

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I don’t know if I’m feeling masochistic or something, but for some reason I am going to open up Mixmatcher to you all, right now. Possibly for only a limited time, possibly forever. We’ll see how it goes. (Sorry, no circa 1998 launch party.)

What is Mixmatcher? Mixmatcher is part mixtape database, part playlist generator, part contextual music metadata database, part new way to discover new music, and part human collaborative filtering. Mixmatcher is a collaborative playlist environment, where people give meaning to songs by adding them to playlists. The more playlists that a song gets added to, the more meaning, contexts, and potential uses it gives that song. You’ll see when you get there. All comments and such should go to ben@magnetbox.com.

Music

Apple iMixes

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You can now publish your own playlists in the iTunes Music Store! (Examples: 1, 2, 3) iTunes will save your mix for one year, and you can rate mixes, e-mail the mixes, and (of course) buy all the songs in a mix. (Ben shuffles back into secret laboratory.)

Music

The Playlist Meme

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The Playlist Meme (load entire library, shuffle, list first 20 songs no matter how embarrassing):

Pussycat Trash – Tattoo

The Halo Benders – On A Tip

Fugazi – Recap Modotti

The Beatles – Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

Tegan & Sara – Underwater

Hey Mercedes – St. James St.

Sparta – Echodyne Harmonic

Killsadie – 1000 Deaths

Walls of Jericho – Moment of Thought

The Ramones – She’s A Sensation

Avail – Swing Low

Ugly Casanova – Pacifico

Modest Mouse – BMX Crash

Murder City Devils – Dance Hall Music

Elton John – Bennie and the Jets

Tracy Chapman – Behind the Wall

The Weakerthans – My Favourite Chords

Rocket From the Crypt – Ball Lightning

Weezer – Space Rock

Converge – Shingles

I guess one thing I can say is that I’m not embarrassed by any of my music. There are several music “party fouls” in my collection, and I am quite proud of having them.

Ideas, Music

Get rid of the security stickers on CDs

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I would like to propose an idea to the record industry: I am willing to pay $0.25 to $0.50 more per CD if you quit putting that stupid security sticker across the top of a new CD case. This “security tax” would basically make up for the loss of revenues from theft that the sticker supposedly helps guard against. Removing one customer frustration in the CD-purchasing process might win you some customers.

(Side note: That sticker is sometimes useful, like looking at a row of new CDs from the top and being able to see all the albums’ information at a glance. So maybe the “security tax” might be a temporary campaign where the money raised goes towards funding the research and propagation of a new kind of sticker/system that is still secure, yet easier to be removed.)

Music

Why I am reluctant to try working with interfacing and programming into iTunes

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Concerns with Apple’s poor track record of openness/transparency: I have been reluctant to try working with interfacing and programming into iTunes, using things such as the iTunes Link Maker, because it just seems so slapped together, and feels somehow temporary. (Is ax.phobos.apple.com really where it will always live? Why does that seem so odd to me?) Also, they have basically no information for developers, or what is happening behind the scenes (which is what talking to developers is all about). They obviously have this open window, but it appears only partially opened (or perhaps those kind of windows that you can open then lock in place so burglars can’t get in.) Can someone relieve me of my worries? Is it worth bothering to work with it right now, or can I expect it to get a little more open in a little while? Anyone know?

Music

New features in the RIAA Radar

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New features in the RIAA Radar: Top 10 charts by genre! The new charts (from genres such as alternative rock, country, rap, blues, and everything in between) not only show you the top 10 best-selling albums, but also matches it up with the top 10 best-selling albums that were not released by the RIAA. The charts, along with the new “find similar RIAA-free albums” feature, should leave you with plenty of alternatives and no more excuses. Stop supporting the RIAA!

Music

New RIAA Radar features

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The post-sliced-bread era has arrived!

There have been two new features added to the RIAA Radar. The Amazon Top 100 gives you the RIAA results of Amazon’s top 100 albums by sales rank (useful for realizing just how much the RIAA controls, and finding the diamonds in the rough,) and then there’s the Indie 100: the Billboard chart for smart people. Find good and popular independent artists without having to wade through garbage!

Ideas, Music

Ranks albums by how many people still own them

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Data I would love to have: albums sold to used music stores. Even if it was just a few charter stores as sample data. What I want to have is a sort of “staying power” index; a list that ranks albums by how many people still own them, not by how many were originally sold. I am never amazed at how many new albums are in the used bins, because they all contain 1 popular song and 11 other crocks of shit. I want to see what the albums are no one would ever part with. You could use the actual sales data to make a ratio vs. how many were sold back. Anyone run a used record store?