Stevie's Grammy Submissions

[HejiraNYC]

Originally Posted by KarmaContestant

I agree with you wholeheartedly! I *love* discovering new bands, and even old bands that I'm not familiar with. I'd say that nearly 50% of my music collection is stuff that iTunes recommended to me in the past 5 years, mostly new artists from the same time period, and almost everytime I've been amazed at how good it is in detecting my tastes - and equally amazed that I still listen to music very few others ever bother with even though it was an iTunes promoted band/artist/album.

I also will buy the album playing in my local record store when I go in if I like the mood/vocals. That's how I discovered Neko Case. And Art Brut as well, though I don't usually publically admit to loving his music!

Although I do see the benefit of music being more DIY these days, I have to admit that there is so much putrid garbage out there. Discovering interesting music really is like finding a needle in a haystack. And it's great if you have time to sift through multiple sources to discover the next great thing. But for the rest of us, being spoonfed new music (via mainstream media like radio) is the only practicable way to discover new music whilst having some semblance of a life.

One unexpectedly good source for new music that I have discovered is the Palladia channel. In between programs they usually play 2 or 3 music videos to fill the void, and usually they play pretty interesting stuff. That's where I first heard/saw La Roue's "Bulletproof," which is one of my all-time favorite guilty pleasure singles.