With all the technological advancements to keep us abreast of our friends’ lives (Twitter), the best restaurants and recipes (Chowhound), even online shopping consolidation of our favorite brands and styles (Shopstyle), the one thing that hasn’t gotten any easier is figuring out how to sift through the endless of array of good (or atrocious) music. If you’re a college student, then yeah, you can listen to your school’s radio station, spend hours at the record store (since college towns still tend to have those), go to random shows just for the hell of it, or burn your roommate’s playlists. But what about the rest of us? Well it seems that the times are beginning to catch up with us. Hype Machine (http://hypem.com/) which has been around for a few years now, let’s you listen to online radio, web streams of the most popular artists, and constant updates of threads with new songs. Then there's Largeheartedboy.com that keeps track of the latest album releases and features free downloads. There’s also musicforbusypeople.com that has a slightly different model—instead of you checking their web page daily, they periodically notify you via email with a list of the best and most interesting new music that recently has just come out (currently, this is a member only site but you can still sign up for the waitlist).
While there’s no ideal way to find out about the latest and greatest new artists without risking your 99 cents on iTunes, at least these and other sites are a start. Even Apple has noticed that their customers are anxious for a different way to try and experience music before they commit their hard earned dollars to it and will soon be offering a season pass feature (details to come). But for now, we can at least have some options before we click “Buy.”
