I’m not sure how I missed this one.
The Dresden Dolls live album A is for Accident (Collected live recordings 2001-2003) is available to download on a pay-what-you-want model from here. In this case “what you want” can also mean free, so you really have no excuse if you like their music.
You can also download their eponymous debut album under the same model from here. This one is definitely worth paying something for.
Artist embeds USB file-sharing network into walls.
An interesting idea, if nothing else. It would make a good distribution model for free music, free software, or free anything else really.
Various freely available MP3s by Portugal. The Man – I’d not heard of this band until about 3 hours ago, but am actually quite taken with them now. It’s American indie with a strong side order of psychedelia, and I think I could handle a whole album of this easily.
The Butcher’s Ballroom by Diablo Swing Orchestra – Another great name, and an album that I can only describe as a cross between Opera and thrash metal. Except it is a lot better than I’ve made it sound, and is the sort of thing that should be made into a musical.
Before We Stand… We Crawl by Hungry Lucy – Interesting trip hop, with a female singer who can sing, and some killer melodies to go with it.
All are freely available to download.
I may get round to reviewing The Mars Volta, Dinosaur Jr, Sonic Youth and Placebo, but as you can read about all of these in a fair few other places I thought I’d concentrate on a couple of months worth of free music (all licensed under Creative Commons so download away).
The Sound of Music by Pinkle
I like this a lot. It’s lazy, charming and creative indie music, and fits the mood of a summer week off work perfectly. I’ve just downloaded two more albums in the hope that they are at least half as good (see http://www.jamendo.com/en/artist/Pinkle for a full catalogue of releases). I’d buy “The Sounds of Music” and will certainly be trying to find out more about the artist (EDIT: I’ve now found a website at http://www.pinklemusic.com which explains more).
Dinner for One by Amity in Fame
Quite heavy, in a largely acoustic way (in the same was the new Mars Volta album is). I like this, and have found that it has got better with each listen. The only downside is that I’ve not wanted to play it from end to end for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on. Certainly a burn it, although the title track in particular I’d pay for.
Animals are People Too by The Wind Whistles
A record I waited over a year for, and one which has not disappointed. The songs are shorter than the last album, but there are more of them and they have a more indie rock feel to them. None of these are a bad thing, and I would gladly file it next to “Window Sills”, which has been played a very large number of times over the last year.
A British melodic indie group who come from Birkenhead, and sound a lot like Muse to my ears. This is not a bad thing as such, and they certainly have a sound (and in particular a singer) that could take them places. I like this, but it doesn’t tell me anything new about the world or myself, but I’m more than happy to listen to their songs when they appear on my playlist.
2 Days a Night by The Liquid Kitchen
I downloaded this a while ago, and listened to it a fair bit on my way to and from work. To my ears they sound a lot like Neil Young fronting a bar band, and I really have to remind myself on occasions that I’m not actually listening to Neil Young. Great if that is what you are after, but it seems like this really is their only trick and I’m not sure it would stretch to a second album without an input of new ideas. Worth a download though.
Born in the USB by William Doyle
I downloaded this for the title alone, but the music itself is rather fine too. It’s indie with a slight psychedelic edge, and opening track “Beneath the Soil” is possibly my favourite song of the last few weeks. It tails off a bit towards the end, but still warrants a good few listens.
I reviewed the first Abscondo album a while ago, and actually still listen to it a fair bit. So I was actually quite nervous about downloading the second one in case it didn’t live up to my expectations. Thankfully Stages builds on Midnight Snow, whilst at the same time not deviating too much from the style that made the first album so enthralling. It’s mainly all about the lyrics, which make me think a lot, and which are both political and personal without making me feel uncomfortable. There are also a couple of melodies that stick in my head like glue, which makes me think I’ll be dipping in to this album over and over again.
It’s availabe for free from Jamendo, and from the artist’s website, and available to buy from iTunes.
Albums I’ve enjoyed over the last couple of months include:
I’d love to write about each one at some point, but I never seem to have the time.
So where do you start? There are obviously thousands of hours of recorded sound available legally for free, but it is quite easy to get lost, and to end up with a large amount of downloaded music that is not representative of what is out there.
These are the places I go when I want something new to listen to and don’t have any credits left on eMusic:
I’d like to recommend iTunes singles of the week, but they need to strip the DRM off first. Although I should say that I did buy something on iTunes this week which plays fine in Rhythmbox, so the claims of trying to make their music more accessible to non iTunes/iPod users are not just an empty promise.
I’ve just mixed a whole load of previously unheard music from Jamendo in with my usual playlist in Rhythmbox. I’m not going to try and describe any of these (apart from calling them indescribable), but I think there are things here that people will like.
As promised, a top 20 just including freely available music released under a Creative Commons license.
I’ve just stumbled upon this net label, whilst trying to determine which year the Wind Whistles album was actually released in (the answer being 2007 and 2008 in different places).
The label has so far only released three albums, but two of them happen to already be on my list of favourite freely available music for this year, which makes me think I’m likely to like anything they put out.
New Adventures in Technology 