If you’re a music lover, you’re familiar with the constant need to
discover new music. You already know lots of good music you like, but
the thirst for more is unstoppable. There’s lots of good music out there
most of us never even heard of – Indie artists and small bands that
haven’t yet made their way to the big websites or labels. But this
doesn’t mean they’re not worth listening to.
If you have access to Last.fm, Pandora or Spotify, you may find all your
new music needs there. But these services don’t include everything, and
more importantly, they’re geo-restricted - Spotify isn't available in Barbados4 So without further ado, here
are 4 great ways to discover cool music you’ve never heard before, no
matter where you are in the world.
Earbits is a fantastic website in which you can discover new music,
listen to it, learn about new artists, chat and comment about them, and
much more. To start, all you have to do is pick a station. Stations are
based on genres, but there are loads of them to choose from. Whether
you’re interested in experimental rock, funk jazz or street hop, you’re
going to find it in Earbits.
If you can’t even decide on a genre, you can choose a shuffle
station, or go for editor’s picks or listener’s picks stations. After
you choose a station, the music will immediately start playing,
featuring a huge image of the artist and a short bio and buy links on
the bottom.
You can log in using Facebook to rate songs and comment (unfortunately,
there doesn’t seem to be a way to so this without Facebook). You can
also download the Chrome app, and get the Earbits iOS or Android apps. This is an awesome way to listen to new music you’ve never heard of before.
Musicovery is another great service which helps you discover new
music. It’s not as eye-catching as Earbits, but it does the job well. To
start, you can either enter a name of an artist you like, or choose
your mood.
Musicovery will create a radio station for you, much like Last.fm or
Pandora, which should feature songs that suit your taste and/or mood.
You can listen to all the music you want this way. If you create a free
account, you can ban songs from appearing in your playlists and mark
songs as favorites. A paid account will get you some extra features.
Musicovery also comes as an iPhone app, and there are other goodies such as the widget and lab you’re going to want to check out.
Shuffler.fm
is a music discovery engine that is entirely based on music blogs. You
can listen to music by genre, by popular tracks, or by blog. Simply
choose your “channel”, and off you go.
If you choose to listen by genre, each song in the playlist will come
from a different blog. The page will change accordingly, and you will
get to view the actual blog post relating to the song you’re listening
to. You can create an account with the site, or log in using Facebook, to
follow specific blogs and more. Shuffler.fm also comes as an iPad app.
YouLicense is actually a site aimed at letting people license music,
but it also provides a pretty good way to discover some new music. The
website includes a tool which lets you browse for new music by mood;
there aren’t a lot of moods to choose from, but all the really important
ones are includes.
When you choose a mood, a new window will open with a set playlist
for that mood. In that aspect, there’s a limit to the amount of music
you can discover with YouLicense, but it does contain songs by artists
you’ve probably never heard of, and you can use it as a stepping stone
to discovering even more great music. If you create an account on the site, you can rate songs and create
playlists as well. The website is not meant to be a music discovery tool
per se, but it’s definitely useful as one.
Do you know of more cool ways to discover new music? Share in the comments!
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