General: Jamendo.com - Creative Commons Music

I've recently come across Jamendo.com, a music site where musicians can offer their music for free, if they wish. As you'd expect for free music, the standard varies a lot, but the design of the site makes it very easy to preview without downloading. You have the opportunity to donate if you like something, please do, this is a business model I'd like to see more of but I doubt I will.

Through the site, I've discovered a woman named Ruth Theodore whose style combines a lot of what I like, (Singer/songwriter, folk, blues and even a little rap), all sung in a very English accent. She's the antithesis of the contrived, over-produced, commercial rubbish that's difficult to avoid these days. Download her album here - http://www.jamendo.com/en/album/17052.

(I'm not saying all commercial music is rubbish, some of the written-for-the-singer-by-someone-you've-never-heard-of music is very good, it's just a lot isn't.)

I solved the crashing issue with this thread - I imagine I'll blog that later when I talk about Mint Linux.

The music is certainly unique - I don't know a lot like it. I haven't decided if I like it enough to want to listen to more than once though.

Music aside, the website seems pretty cool and I like the concept. I was going to be doing something similar with my album when it's finished. I might just put it straight on there!

Apologies to Crazy Pete - I've hijacked his thread and changed the title. An obvious downside to my BlogThis modification is the inability to have multiple titles per discussion.

Pete first bought Jamendo.com to my attention and I have been using it for a few weeks now. By far my favourite band on there has been "Brad Sucks" with their album "I Don't Know What I'm Doing". I haven't been able to stop listening to it since I picked it up. It has a bit of a grungy sound, but without the attitude. Indie is probably the closest approximation but there is definite electronic influence. I'm somehow reminded of Gomez! The first four tracks of the album are all quite unique, but indicative of style for the rest of the album. If you don't like those, I probably wouldn't listen to the rest.

As Pete originally said, there is a fair amount of music on there that isn't all that great - not bad, just not that great. Equally, there is some really good music just waiting to be discovered. What Jamendo lacks is some sort of Pandora-esque player that could introduce you to bands they think you might like - or simply throw random tracks at you until you find one you like.

I find tags never work - artists never know how to classify themselves, and I'm too open minded to pick a single category. So that leaves me feeling like a magpie, with artwork and names to go by. The site can only improve, so keep an eye on it.

My new album is coming along slower than I was hoping for, but I thought I'd give the old website a do over and put our Album up on Jamendo, in case anyone likes it. I wouldn't like to see the time I spent with the band wasted, so if one more person listens to it and enjoys it, I'd say job well done. I don't know if this is normal of all artists, but we all look back on the album and cringe - picking it apart entirely. I think that's why we never promoted it as much as we could have done. I guess if you stand back a little, it wasn't too bad and It was certainly an experience. In doing it all, we can make sure our new music is better!

You can see our website here where you can stream the album straight off it. Eventually, I'll update the page with links to the new bands we're all working on.