There doesn't seem to be a whole lot on the page itself about what the thing actually is. The about page is about the developers.
Yeah, slightly more at wikipedia. Hasn't blown up my machine though; worth a download.
I like hype machine for finding new music/ listening to specific songs.
Can you give a example of what you mean by "[good] folksy"?
Are you thinking of Michelle Shocked, or Harry Robertson (very good, but very different)?
Obligatory link to Beefo Meaty on folk music.
Easy. Write your own web spider, which browses music blogs and automatically downloads mp3s that are either (a) by bands that you already know and like, (b) linked to by people who post music you like with a sufficiently high frequency, or (c) achieve a certain threshold number of links, either by band or by track. It should also keep track of which music you listen to most frequently, and use that to tune which blogs it pays the most attention to. It works better, too, when it tries not to download the same track multiple times (that one's a little harder).
"Easy" is doing a lot of work there, arthegall.
8: alternatively, just have pandora stream to itunes. With a decent set of rankings, effect should be similar.
The life of a modern internet addict is approximately 85% looking for new music.Denied.
You just aren't a modern internet addict, b. You're stuck in the past, spending 85% of your time looking for ascii pron.
I don't even know what ascii pron is.
Also, nice job, Tweety, making 8 explicit.
I assumed that arthegall had actually done 8 himself.
I'm a luddite, so I don't have any advice about web search tools.
I can recommend, for a sporadic and idiosyncratic list of singer/songwriters, Flip's pix (overly earnest description of Flip).
It's based around local concerts, which you wouldn't attend, but you can always look the people up online.
That will probably give you a very different list of names than you are likely to see on most music blogs.
I am surprised and appalled to find out that seminal Welsh punk band Yr Anrhefn are so poorly represented on the Web, with only a couple of crappy Peel sessions, the frankly lacklustre "Defaid, Skateboards a Wellies" album and a couple of execrable Margi Clarke tracks accessible no matter how hard I search. I might have to pay over the odds for a vinyl copy of "Dial y Draig" so you lot can listen to the nationalist classic "Rhedeg i Paris" (so good that a random Norwegian named his travel blog after it).
oh yes, by the way, 11km today chaps, slightly over an hour which is about eight and a half minute mile pace when you take into account that this was my journey home from work rather than sauntering about in the park, and thus plenty of time was wasted at traffic lights. The twin aims of this New Year's program are a) to get that time down and b) to weigh less than the sweaty Jock kickboxer by the end of March. It is a fight to the death (not literally).
NickodemuS, anything from The Be Good Tanyas to Cast King to, oh, other stuff, I'd call folk, or folksy. Rootsy? Americana? You know what I mean.
It occurs to me that ogged might like Califone.
Have you come across olabelle, ogged? Or Ellen McIllwaine (who is on emusic)? Old Crow Medicine Show?
Ogged, what about the whole Bloodshot Records scene, or does that for you veer too far from rootsy Americana and into Hee Haw?
the farting songbird reminds me this
milaya
I almost like all of those! (I do basically like Old Crow Medicine Show.) Bloodshot Records is new to me, I'll have to check that out. Thanks.
This local radio station seems promising.
NickodemuS
?Is that a reference to the leader of the rats of Nimh?
I did attempt a useful suggestion as well as being pedantic.
As far as labels go, I've had extremely good luck which everything I've heard on the Flying Fish label, but that's a small sample.
It occurs to me that ogged might like Califone.
That might well be true! Though they might be a bit too abstract in their recent stuff.
Other things ogged might like: Currituck Co.'s Unpacking My Library ("A Raga Called Nina" is brilliant), Spectral Light & Moonshine Firefly Snakeoil Jamboree (a bit heavy-handed, admittedly).
For that matter, I'm going to continue talking up Wayne Henderson's Made and Played (emusic).
It's one of the most impressive instrumental albums I've heard.
So you know what's surprisingly difficult? Finding places with free wireless. When I'm not looking for one they seem to be everywhere; when I am, not so much.
Public radio in NYC is the playing the Charles Ives "My Country 'Tis of Thee" thing right now and it rules.
So you know what's surprisingly difficult? Finding places with free wireless
Sites like this have helped me out in the past, before I figured out where all the coffee shops were.
Sites like that are indeed useful if one has a internet connection with which to consult them.
(I can occasionally pick up a wireless signal at the place where I'm staying; now is one of those times.)
Skreemr is an audio search engine. It's good at finding mp3s, but it also picks up those annoying 30-45 second sample files.
You can also load it into your firefox query toolbar. I've found everything from Shane MacGowan to Tuvan throatsinging. It's nice.
Today's Guardian has a survey of some download sites. Ogged is an assignments editor.
From that Guardian piece, here's a site that focuses on pre-WWII blues. The site's links to the downloads are non-obvious in FF. 50/50 Ogged knows about the site.