Moody Music

A few weeks back I discovered stereomood.com. I've been using AOL Radio for many years, owing to the fact that I had been using AIM since the year 2000 A.D. Ancient history to many of you. But hey, I used AIM most of the time so it was only natural that I gravitate to something already there. I also listened to the listed radio stations on the native Yahoo Messenger client, but since I had a need to sign-on to multiple IM accounts, I mostly used Pidgin. Granted, it would have been easy enough to just go to Yahoo.com and listen from there. I just found it more comfy to use AOL Radio.

Recently though, AOL Radio had started restricting access for users outside the US. Most of the stations on it turned out to be CBS affiliates. Well you know how media companies are nowadays about 'enforcing' rights to use on their 'property'. Looking for alternatives, I played around with Imeem for some time. I left it after songs started getting taken down because of DMCA notices. This was before it was swallowed whole by MySpace  I also played around with MP3Tunes for a while too. It was good in the sense that I could listen to my music from anywhere. But the 2GB limit for the free account did mean I had to cycle what I had in my music locker from time to time. It wasn't big in discovering new music like radio traditionally is. Last.FM was great in that respect, discovering new music. You usually get good suggestions on new stuff to try based on the bands or singers that you've already chosen. However, if you listen to a very wide selection from different genres, it gets confused and the suggestions stray farther than you'd want at times.

I found an interesting alternative, stereomood.com. It does take some time to get used to the idea. There aren't any stations or genres to pick like in traditional radio. Instead you pick on a mood to get a pre-set playlists specific to that mood. Happy gets you happy songs. Relax gives you relaxing songs. Feel Like Crying gives you... well, feel-like-crying songs. It's hard to explain and better understood when you listen to it and try it. If you choose to login, you can actually vote a song so it stays in the playlist for that mood or 'heart' a favorite song. You can create your own playlist or add songs to your library if you want to customize. Options are there as well to buy songs from the iTunes Store and Amazon's MP3 Store.

Already I've discovered some artists I wouldn't have come across otherwise. Take for example Akira Kosemura who was in the Relax playlist. I liked the few songs that were there. I've never heard of him. So I searched the web and found he's actually released several albums independently and has a dedicated following. With every mood I try, I discover something I like -- a Pixies tribute in piano, a rare Stevie Nicks song,  . It's a nice site for exploring new music. Try something you've never heard before and discover stuff that would otherwise have been obscured by the information overload characterizing popular media today. Give it a go. You won't regret it, promise :-)