The music industry Loudness War is over. Research into actual sales rankings, Radio Impact, Listener ratings and Hearing loss, all show better results for music with a higher dynamic range.
posted by Lanark on Mar 25, 2011 - 61 comments

Rappers I Know - FMJU presents 31 days of the "best shit you've never heard" for download. Featuring Talib Kweli, De La Soul , Oh No (Madlib's brother), J-Zone and the Kanye West "George Bush Doesn't Care About Black People" Gold Digger remix, a response to Hurricane Katrina from The Legendary Knock Out Boyz. ...and much, much more.
posted by SweetJesus on Sep 8, 2005 - 39 comments

Below Code. Comatonse Records has been around for a little over 10 years, and to celebrate, the owner, Terre Thaemlitz, put out a free best-of CD. The physical copies are all long-gone, but it's available for download (along with a bonus track that didn't fit on the original disc). Most of the stuff is relatively noisy (and some found sound stuff), but there's some cool electronic type pieces, rock and pop songs and solo piano pieces as well. Also of note is his own personal site, which has links to a lot of cool essays, typically about gender issues and music. (There's also links to images of graphical scores to some of his music.) [Poking around these sites are pretty much NSFW -- the only explicitly NSFW links are on "his own personal site" and "music", but there's quite a few naked people and suchlike around, including on one of the postcards that make up the main link, so, yeah -- take care!]
posted by Rev. Syung Myung Me on Aug 1, 2005 - 4 comments

"This, as never before, is Beethoven for free - a gift to the world, just as he might have wished." From Sunday, the BBC will broadcast Beethoven's entire musical output over a six-day period, with all nine symphonies offered as free (and DRM-free) MP3 downloads. By doing so, critic Norman Lebrecht argues that the BBC Philharmonic's cycle may become 'the household version to computer-literate millions in China, India or Korea who have never heard of Karajan or Klemperer.' What that might mean for the struggling classical recording industry is anyone's guess.
posted by holgate on Jun 2, 2005 - 42 comments

mp3 blogs galore Need some fresh new mp3s? John over at Tofu Hut has compiled what he thinks is "the most comprehensive list of musicbloggers yet available." There's dozens upon dozens of (vaguely) categorised mp3 blogs, which should keep you and your high-speed internet connection merrily ticking over for weeks... Happy listening.
posted by noizyboy on May 12, 2005 - 26 comments

Something ear-y for Halloween: Oddio Overplay gives you Ghouls With Attitude 2-CD compilation by Otisfodder, plus (from Martinibomb and Coconut Monkeyrocket), the Munster Beat mp3 (click below the image to listen).
posted by taz on Oct 31, 2004 - 8 comments

MP3 Blog Roundup • A far-flung variety of free mp3 singles posted almost daily. Without Sense's roundup I would have never stumbled across the excellent Enchanted Sounds of the Islanders. Equally worth bookmarking: Fat Planet, NewFlux, Pop77, ScissorKick, TangMonkey, TtIKtDA, Tofu Hut, Cocaine Blunts & Hip-Hop Tapes, Music for Robots, Soul Sides, MoistWorks, A Million LoveSongs, Copy Right?, The Big Ticket, TalkieWalkie, Bubblegum Machine, Fingertips, #1 Songs in Heaven, Mythical Beast, Fruits of Chaos, Moebius Rex...
posted by dhoyt on Jul 10, 2004 - 43 comments

The Leeching Never Stopped! Archive.org is adding the complete live catalog of the Grateful Dead. There are still a few gaps, but they already offer over 1,300 shows for download. Get early favorties, all-time classics, famous guests, the last show, and nearly everything in between, in lossless and mp3 formats.
posted by muckster on May 20, 2004 - 38 comments

Better Propaganda is a site with hundreds of free (and legal!) mp3 downloads by independent musicians. The range is pretty impressive, going from TV on the Radio to Dizzee Rascal. Good times.
posted by acornface on May 13, 2004 - 5 comments

The Netlabel Catalogue The Catalog is a list, index, directory of music labels which offer you free downloads from their pages.
posted by srboisvert on Feb 26, 2004 - 5 comments

Live Phish (for flame's sake, this is not a post about the band itself) is a new service created by Phish through which people can download SHN or MP3's of their upcoming new years eve shows and burn them themselves, for a fee of course. The recordings are due to be available two days after the shows are over. It will be interesting to see if the service is successful and profitable. Assuming it is, will there be an effect on the music industry and the RIAA? Might they realize they can make money on music downloaded on the internet? Only time will tell.
posted by kurtosis on Dec 20, 2002 - 15 comments

Music fans are being offered "the biggest ever official give-away of digital music" in a campaign to tempt them away from unofficial download sites. Visitors will be given £5 worth of free tracks, which will buy 500 streamed songs, 50 downloads or five tunes to copy, or "burn", onto a CD. (Via BBC)
posted by MintSauce on Oct 2, 2002 - 21 comments

mp3.com ordered to pay Universal $118 million for copying CDs to the Mymp3 service, a service designed for owners of those CDs (mp3.com made distribution agreements with the other record labels trying to sue). On the flip side, Yahoo scored a deal with the RIAA to let them webcast music. It's a wacky week in online music [via davenetics].
posted by mathowie on Sep 6, 2000 - 9 comments

Mötley Crüe offers their new single "Hell On High Heels" as a free MP3 download...promoting their upcoming album "New Tattoo", hitting stores, June 20th.

See guys...*that's* how it should be done.

posted by EricBrooksDotCom on May 23, 2000 - 8 comments

If you haven't heard of Napster yet, check it out. This is a killer tool, a combination mp3 player and file transfer client/server. While you play mp3s, other users can download songs from your library, while you do the same from their libraries. This is a great idea but must be a nightmare for the recording industry. This could be a really cool community tool, if everyone is generous with their music.
posted by mathowie on Oct 29, 1999 - 1 comment