Any Major Dude With Half A Heart

And so it has to come pass that my old friend Pandora.com has died on my doorstep. Perhaps not yours, if you live in the US. But where I live, Pandora is gone. Thanks to those idiots who run the recording industry and the judge of the Copyright Royalty Board. It isn’t the Internet that has resulted in dropping sales, but the stupidity of the recording industry which sees an opportunity, and kills it because it doesn’t know what better to do with it.

One attribute of Internet radio which the industry should have loved is that you don’t download the music from that source. You like what you hear, you go on to buy it (or download it, depending on your ethics and access to non-top 80 material where you live). It was free advertising, and a great way to introduce listeners to acts they might otherwise never have heard. I discovered loads of such artists through Internet radio (MP3 blogs likewise are a great source of discovering new material, but you knew that). Perhaps the recording industry wants to kill Internet radio for just that reason: why have independent outfits, hairy armpitted lesbians, ugly guys, clever wordsmiths, and raspy voiced poets detract attention from those mega acts we are supposed to spend our money on: Justin, Christina, Tim, Eminem, Carrie, Fiddy, and so on.

So, to commemorate the happiness Internet radio brought me, here are songs by some acts I do remember having been introduced to by Pandora.com. (more to come)

Ben Kweller – In Other Words.mp3
The original and superior EP recording (on Freak Out…It’s Ben Kweller), with the banjo.

Mindy Smith – Falling.mp3
Wonderful song from 2004’s wonderful One Moment More.

Catie Curtis – Troubled Mind.mp3
Curtis has been around since he ’90s. Never heard of her till Pandora. My point is made.

The Crimea – Lottery Winners On Acid.mp3
Again, the original, not the inferior Top 20 version

Matt Nathanson – Curve Of The Earth.mp3
With Kweller and Kevin Devine, he was the first “new favourite” artist I found on Pandora.

MoZella – Light Years Away.mp3
This became an office favourite when KP’s GF started to dig it. Not too long before that, KP’s GF had been a Bryan Adams (yes, Bryan) fan. Her taste of music, acquired at the feet of the master, is now nearly flawless.