David Pogue
Upload, Store, Play and Share in a Few Clicks
Glide Effortless users can create "containers" at the bottom of the screen into which items can be sorted.
Published: December 1, 2005
IN Hollywood, young screenwriters have "elevator pitches" always at the ready - pithy descriptions of their screenplays, intended to capture the imagination of passing movie executives. You know: "It's 'Titanic' on a spaceship." "It's a female 'Harry Potter.' " "It's 'Raising Arizona' meets 'Leaving Las Vegas.' "
Most of the time, high-tech companies can describe their products with equal efficiency, but not always. Take, for example, Glide Effortless, a new Web service that went live yesterday. "What is Glide Effortless?" its news release asks. "It is a compatible browser-based online solution with integrated software and service environments, providing powerful file management, creation, communication, sharing and e-commerce capabilities."
Which leaves only one question: "What is Glide Effortless?"
Here's another stab: it's a personal Web site (www.glidedigital.com) to which you can upload your favorite photos, MP3 files, video clips and even Word, PowerPoint or PDF documents. (A separate companion program speeds the uploading process by letting you drag and drop big batches of files at once.) Once everything's posted on the Web site, you can do two things with it: manage it or share it.
TransMedia, the company behind Glide, has some legitimate gripes about the way you have to perform these tasks on a Mac or PC. For example, you have to learn and use a different program to work with each file format: one to play music files, another to display photos, a third to play videos, and so on. Sending your masterpieces to other people is a drag, too. If you attach your photos or videos to e-mail, you usually wind up overflowing the recipient's in-box and causing headaches for everyone. Posting your files on a Web site or a blog (Web log) is a better solution, but that requires more geeky knowledge than average people care to acquire.
Glide avoids all of these problems. It treats each file type - photos, songs, videos, documents - nearly identically, representing each file as a thumbnail icon in your personal stash. You use a menu to switch from one "environment" (say, photos) to another (like music). At the bottom of each environment is an area where you can create "containers" - that is, playlists (for music and video clips), albums (for photos), address book groups (for e-mail), and so on. You fill up these containers by simply dragging the appropriate thumbnails from the top part of the screen. You can even drag music files into photo or video containers, thereby creating musical soundtracks.
When you want other people to see your stuff, you can send invitations by e-mail. (Glide can import your address book from Outlook or Entourage.) When your recipients click the link in your message, they arrive at a Glide Web page, where they can view or play the files.
THIS system means that you never actually send any files, so you don't clog anyone's in-box. More important, you now have total control over the material. From the moment you upload a file to Glide, it's converted into an online preview. Your visitors can listen to one of your songs or watch one of your videos, but they can't download it, keep it, or even replay it without returning to the Web site.
As a result, you can limit how many times somebody plays or watches something, or specify a window of opportunity (say, Dec. 5 to 20) for people's access. You can even play Big Brother by tracking how many times each person has viewed or played a certain goody.
With just a few clicks, you can also publish one of your containers as either a Web page, complete with embedded pictures and videos, or a blog entry. It's almost automatic, although you have no control whatsoever over the layout of the result.
All of this is fun to use, thanks to a full-blown online operating system that Glide designed itself. After all, thought TransMedia, why make the site look like Windows or Mac OS X, when a custom design could be simpler and better tailored to Glide's functions?
In the Glide OS, each object on the screen - thumbnails, containers and so on - bears a tiny "badge" that resembles a pie chart. When you point to it, a round menu sprouts at your cursor tip. It lists commands pertaining to that object (Delete, Edit or Publish, for example), arrayed like colorful slices of a pizza.
Here's where you first get an inkling that for all of Glide's genius, it's also tainted by some profound problems.
For example, you quickly realize that a circle is not a very good shape for a menu. Because each command's name must be squeezed into a triangular wedge, the number of commands and the lengths of their names are severely restricted. As it is, some of Glide's command names (like "Download") barely fit on their slices.
Then there are those rows of thumbnail images. They make it easy to see what you're dealing with; video thumbnails play a snippet of moving images, and music files bear album-cover art. But once your collection grows beyond one screenful, those horizontal rows of icons present an infuriating challenge. You can't resize them to fit more on a page, and you can't view them as a scrolling list; you can only page through them as you would with results of a Google search. They take their sweet time to appear, too.
Worse, although thumbnails excel at conveying visual information, they fail miserably at conveying text information - like their names. Only a few characters of each file's name fit beneath each Glide thumbnail; on song names, all you get is "12 Rolling Th.." and "10 It's Too L.." The only way to see the full names of your songs is to double-click their icons one at a time, opening successive Info panels.
In spots - notably the e-mail and chat environments - the Glide online operating system gets in its own way, requiring ridiculous multistep procedures for what, in Windows or Mac OS X, would be the work of a few keystrokes. For example, addressing an outgoing e-mail message and attaching a file requires switching back and forth between multiple screens.
Figuring out how to do some simple tasks, like backing out of a photo container to your full collection, are challenges for puzzle lovers only. In rejecting the traditional operating-system elements, TransMedia has thrown out significant bits of baby along with the bathwater.
You can sign up for any of three different Glide Effortless plans. There's a free service with a 100-megabyte storage limit for your files; a $5-a-month plan with 1.5 gigabytes of storage; and a $10 monthly plan with three gigabytes of storage, along with video and audio conferencing. (Discounts are available if you pay for a year up front.) Right now, Glide is for Windows only; according to the company, Mac fans can sign up starting on Dec. 25.
The Glide of today is already a vast collection of tools, integrated into a software ecosystem that's half genius and half nuts. But it's nothing compared with what the company says is on the way: a full-blown Internet music store; an online store that lets you order products by dragging their icons into a shopping-cart "container"; a Unix version; a timeline calendar module; a built-in photo-editing suite; playback of music file formats beyond MP3; and even a corporate version "for the sale, promotion and distribution of media to consumers" that will offer a project-scheduling screen, among other perks.
Furthermore, TransMedia says that soon you'll be able to share one of your songs with friends - and if they like it, they can buy a copy-protected version of their own. The company will profit from the sale, of course, but so will you; you'll get a discount on your next music purchase.
Then there's the cellphone version of Glide, the set-top TV boxes and the customized versions the company hopes to sell to cable, phone and entertainment conglomerates.
All this from a company of only 24 people?
It's a little hard to believe. And sure enough, there are some telltale signs that the company may have bitten off more than it could chew. The company acknowledges, for example, that when the Glide music store opens, it won't offer music from the Big Four record companies - only the smaller independents. There's still no user manual or online help screens. And only 48 hours before the grand opening, big chunks of the service were still being snapped into place.
Still, Glide's core idea is unassailably fresh and useful: a centralized, Web-based scrapbook of so many kinds of files, with the ability to share it without actually giving up control of the files. If TransMedia's plans for world domination fall into place, maybe it won't need an elevator pitch. Maybe "you gotta try this" will be the only pitch it needs.
E-mail: Pogue@nytimes.com
Thursday, December 01, 2005
Monday, August 15, 2005
Saturday, August 13, 2005
New Image Steel Orchestra
My son Andrew plays the Tenor Steelpan here in Miami with the best steelband in Florida, the New Image Steel Orchestra. They have palyed at various events in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach Counties, including City of Hollywood Mardi-Gras, Miami-Dade County Employee Picnic and Broward Caribbean Carnival 2005 Launch. That's Andrew with the Jamaican colors performing at the Palm Beach Carnival this June.
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Really cool picture of Bob Marley
I don't think I've seen this one before. His locs look like a mane.
Wednesday, May 04, 2005
Got Soca?
IslandMix - powered by Soca/Calypso
Check out Island Mix. Lots of soca songs to listen to, cd's to buy and plenty ole talk!
Check out Island Mix. Lots of soca songs to listen to, cd's to buy and plenty ole talk!
Monday, April 04, 2005
Download free music - a primer
The New York Times > Arts > Music > Critic's Notebook: No Fears: Laptop D.J.'s Have a Feast
CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK
No Fears: Laptop D.J.'s Have a Feast
By JON PARELES
Published: September 10, 2004
OWNLOADING music from the Internet is not illegal. Plenty of music available online is not just free but also easily available, legal and — most important — worth hearing.
That fact may come as a surprise after highly publicized lawsuits by the Recording Industry Association of America, representing major labels, against fans using peer-to-peer programs like Grokster and EDonkey to collect music on the Web. But the fine print of those lawsuits makes clear that fans are being sued not for downloading but for unauthorized distribution: leaving music in a shared folder for other peer-to-peer users to take. As copyright holders, the labels have the exclusive legal right to distribute the music recorded for them, even if technology now makes that right nearly impossible to enforce.
Recording companies have tried and failed to shut down decentralized file-sharing networks the way they closed the original Napster. (That name is now being used for a paid-download service.)
Courts have ruled that the services can continue because they are also used to exchange material that does not infringe on recording-company copyrights. At the same time, a bill before Congress, the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004, seeks to restrict the way file-sharing programs are constructed.
While the recording business litigates and lobbies over music being given away online, countless musicians are taking advantage of the Internet to get their music heard. They are betting that if they give away a song or two, they will build audiences, promote live shows and sell more recordings.
As with the rest of the free content on the Internet, there's no guaranteed quality control. Lucas Gonze, whose webjay.org lets music fans post playlists that connect to free music and video, describes free Internet music as "a flea market the size of Valhalla."
The first place to look for free music online is at musicians' own sites. Many performers, from Bob Dylan (www.bobdylan.com) to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs (www.yeahyeahyeahs.com), post hard-to-find songs for listening: some as free downloads, some as streaming audio (which can be recorded with a free program like StepVoice at www.stepvoice.com). A next place to look is the labels, particularly independent rock and electronic labels like Matador (www.matadorrecords .com/music/mp3s.html), Vagrant (www.vagrant .com/vagrant/audio/audio.jsp), Barsuk (www.barsuk .com), Saddle Creek (www.saddle-creek.com) or Tigerbeat6 (www.tigerbeat6.com/html/catalogue.htm).
Many public radio stations also maintain music archives for streaming or downloading. Among them are the classical-music station WNYC (www .wnyc.org) and eclectic stations like WFMU in Jersey City (www.wfmu.org) and KCRW in Santa Monica, Calif. (www.kcrw.org), all of which have troves of live performances. MTV (at www.mtv.com) presents an entire album each week as an audio stream.
Following is a selection of sites offering free music online. Most of them are best used with a either a broadband connection or nearly infinite patience. While major-label recordings are largely (but not entirely) off limits, there's more than enough available music to satisfy every listener.
Epitonic
The first and best place to look for any band with an independent recording is www.epitonic.com, a superbly organized site that is likely to have music from nearly everyone heard on college radio. It includes not only downloadable songs but also biographical information and links for hundreds of acts, grouped under genres and subgenres. And it has an invaluable "Similar Artists" feature that can direct fans of one band to dozens of potential new favorites. Within Epitonic's huge roster is at least a song or two from some major-label acts, among them the New York band Secret Machines, the Texas band Sparta and the English bands Radiohead and Spiritualized. But independent bands like Bright Eyes or Godspeed You Black Emperor are every bit as good.
Webjay
At www.webjay.org, music fans share their Web finds with the world. There's no music on the site, just lists of links that allow users either to play entire lists or to download items directly one by one; it also includes links to videos and news sound bites. Webjay is something like the lists submitted by customers at www .amazon.com, but with connections to the music itself. As such, it's only as good as the widely varied skills of its contributors, and its links aren't always dependable. But it is a way for musical obsessives like bigwavedave to share his fondness for garage-rock or for OddioKatya to point listeners toward a wide assortment of Brazilian songs.
Furthurnet
Before the Internet became ubiquitous, the Grateful Dead's fans built up their own network to exchange concert recordings, a network that expanded as other jam bands sprang up. The logical extension of the process is Furthurnet (www.furthurnet .com). It is a peer-to-peer network that trades only recordings of bands that encourage listeners to record concerts: not just the Dead but Phish, Gov't Mule, Dave Matthews Band, Los Lobos, Wilco and David Byrne as well. Users need to install a program available on the Web site. Most of the available concert recordings don't use MP3 files, but a better quality audio format, SHN, which also requires some software installation. It's easy; information on the site explains all the technicalities.
Another connection for jam bands is www.etree.org, which points listeners toward recordings stored online and is equally fastidious about high fidelity. Meanwhile, concert recordings of all sorts, from vintage 1960's bootlegs to music only a few days old, have been traded at www.sharingthegroove.org, although the site is currently undergoing maintenance.
The Library of Congress
Through the years, tax dollars have supported researchers like Alan Lomax on excursions to collect music from every nook and cranny and tradition they could discover across the United States. The Library of Congress has made a considerable amount available free online. A place to start is the American Memory Collection (http://memory .loc.gov/ammem/audio.html), with fiddle tunes, American Indian music, border music from the Rio Grande, Dust Bowl songs and more.
Folkways Records
In 1987, the Smithsonian Institution bought the catalog of Folkways Records, which had set out to document every sound in the world and continues to support projects like a 20-disc collection of Indonesian music. Many of the Folkways recordings can be heard on the Web at www .folkways.si.edu, from "Classical Music of Iran" to "Creole Music of Suriname" to "Music of Indonesia Vol. 1: Songs Before Dawn."
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive (www. .archive.org) has set out to preserve material that might otherwise disappear from the Internet, including Web pages, documents, books and video clips as well as audio, and it includes a Live Music Archive with more than 10,000 concerts via etree.org. Most are from jam bands, but there is plenty to choose from. (More than a million people have downloaded Grateful Dead music from the archive.) The archive also includes an assortment of other audio under All Collections, which has 131 songs from 78-r.p.m. discs, and more than 3,000 songs on what it calls netlabels, most of them releasing electronic music. Try the exotica-tinged selections from Monotonik.
Iuma
The Internet Underground Music Archive (www.iuma.org) was a pioneer of free Internet music. It was founded in 1993 as a place for musicians to post their own music online, and it just keeps on expanding. Unfortunately, it is both overwhelming and overwhelmed; finding a good song requires extraordinary luck, and downloading it will take a while. Like the other send-it-yourself sites noted here, Iuma can make a user appreciate what record company scouts do.
Garageband
Hopefuls face Darwinian competition at www.garageband.com, where musicians are encouraged to rate 30 songs before submitting one of their own (or pay a $19.99 fee instead) and other listeners are also assigned tracks to rate. The songs that rise to the top of the charts have a chance to be heard on Garageband's radio outlets or collected on its compilation albums. Garageband demands original songs, not cover versions, and its top-rated ones tend to sound more professional, if not always more distinctive, than those at other mass upload sites.
CNet
The computer experts at CNet include an extensive selection of music among their software downloads at http://music.download.com. A vast bulk of the music is submitted by musicians themselves, so there are a lot of derivative sounds to wade through, but the well-organized site also includes worthwhile bands as Editor's Picks, currently including Dios and Ex Models.
Vitaminic
A huge site based in England, www.vitaminic.co.uk, offers tens of thousands of aspiring bands and a smattering of better-known acts, although brand-name bands like Franz Ferdinand tend to offer only streaming audio rather than downloads. But the site is well organized and also includes video clips from the likes of Nick Cave.
BeSonic
A European site where musicians can place their songs online, www
.besonic.com has a slightly more international perspective than the other newcomer sites. Rankings and recommendations help visitors sift the material. Registration is required for downloading.
Pure Volume
More than 76,000 songs are available at yet another site for aspiring musicians, www.purevolume.com, which is strongly weighted toward rock. To winnow the site, try the Pure Picks column or look under the category Music for Top Artists (Signed).
DMusic
Musicians can also post their own songs on DMusic (www.dmusic .com). It helps users wade through more than 17,000 acts — an overwhelming majority categorized as alternative or rock — by listing DM Picks and by having users give songs a thumbs-up or thumbs-down and append comments. As with Iuma, most are amateur submissions, with plenty of jokes, but there are some enjoyable tracks scattered among the picks.
Smart-Music
Dance-music experimenters dominate at www.smart-music.net, a selective site that draws its downloadable MP3's from hard-to-find small labels. Dipping into the genres and subgenres of electronica, Smart-Music has about 300 songs available from (relatively) well-known groups like Mouse on Mars and Zero 7 as well as basement laptop obsessives, and a high percentage of them turn out to be worthwhile.
Ragga-Jungle
Slow, deep reggae bass lines are the foundation for whole families of dance music represented at www.ragga-jungle.com. It's an outlet for amateur and professional producers and toasters (rappers), and the downloadable songs, available free after registration, include echoey dub-reggae vamps, sparse dance-hall productions and frenetic jungle tracks. Each track has ratings and comments, and quick streaming allows users to sample tracks before committing to a download. Contender for best title: "A Waste of Half an Hour of My Life, and Four Minutes of Yours" by the Archangel.
Classic Cat
With so much classical music in the public domain, it's a surprise that there aren't more free downloadable sites offering it, although the length of classical compositions can make them inconvenient to download. At www.classiccat.net, it's possible to search by composer, from Monteverdi to Messiaen. The selection is spotty and links don't always work, but it's a start.
Asian Classical
Need some Indonesian gamelan music? On the Internet at www .asianclassicalmp3.org, a dedicated collector of Asian music has transferred recordings from cassettes to downloadable MP3's. The site includes music from nine countries, including 28 minutes of gamelan music from Java.
Iraqi Music
The straightforwardly named www.iraqimusic.com is a resource for both the classical Iraqi improvisations called maqams and more recent Iraqi recordings based on traditional (and thus noncopyrighted) songs. "Sister Sites" provides links to other sites with Middle Eastern music.
Trama
A Brazilian record label, Trama (www.tramavirtual.com), offers about 10,000 MP3's, primarily from local Brazilian bands. The site is in Portuguese and requires users to sign up, but after that, it is fairly easy to navigate. "Baixar" means download.
Micromusic
The Internet is home to countless obsessives. The ones gathered at www.micromusic.net make their electronic music from the sounds of the first primitive video games. Proud of what they can generate from eight-bit gizmos, they have placed hundreds of blipping, buzzing ditties online, garnering the attention of Malcolm McLaren, the Sex Pistols' manager, among others. Registration is required, but it's a modest inconvenience on the way to tunes like "How Bleep Is My Love."
CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK
No Fears: Laptop D.J.'s Have a Feast
By JON PARELES
Published: September 10, 2004
OWNLOADING music from the Internet is not illegal. Plenty of music available online is not just free but also easily available, legal and — most important — worth hearing.
That fact may come as a surprise after highly publicized lawsuits by the Recording Industry Association of America, representing major labels, against fans using peer-to-peer programs like Grokster and EDonkey to collect music on the Web. But the fine print of those lawsuits makes clear that fans are being sued not for downloading but for unauthorized distribution: leaving music in a shared folder for other peer-to-peer users to take. As copyright holders, the labels have the exclusive legal right to distribute the music recorded for them, even if technology now makes that right nearly impossible to enforce.
Recording companies have tried and failed to shut down decentralized file-sharing networks the way they closed the original Napster. (That name is now being used for a paid-download service.)
Courts have ruled that the services can continue because they are also used to exchange material that does not infringe on recording-company copyrights. At the same time, a bill before Congress, the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004, seeks to restrict the way file-sharing programs are constructed.
While the recording business litigates and lobbies over music being given away online, countless musicians are taking advantage of the Internet to get their music heard. They are betting that if they give away a song or two, they will build audiences, promote live shows and sell more recordings.
As with the rest of the free content on the Internet, there's no guaranteed quality control. Lucas Gonze, whose webjay.org lets music fans post playlists that connect to free music and video, describes free Internet music as "a flea market the size of Valhalla."
The first place to look for free music online is at musicians' own sites. Many performers, from Bob Dylan (www.bobdylan.com) to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs (www.yeahyeahyeahs.com), post hard-to-find songs for listening: some as free downloads, some as streaming audio (which can be recorded with a free program like StepVoice at www.stepvoice.com). A next place to look is the labels, particularly independent rock and electronic labels like Matador (www.matadorrecords .com/music/mp3s.html), Vagrant (www.vagrant .com/vagrant/audio/audio.jsp), Barsuk (www.barsuk .com), Saddle Creek (www.saddle-creek.com) or Tigerbeat6 (www.tigerbeat6.com/html/catalogue.htm).
Many public radio stations also maintain music archives for streaming or downloading. Among them are the classical-music station WNYC (www .wnyc.org) and eclectic stations like WFMU in Jersey City (www.wfmu.org) and KCRW in Santa Monica, Calif. (www.kcrw.org), all of which have troves of live performances. MTV (at www.mtv.com) presents an entire album each week as an audio stream.
Following is a selection of sites offering free music online. Most of them are best used with a either a broadband connection or nearly infinite patience. While major-label recordings are largely (but not entirely) off limits, there's more than enough available music to satisfy every listener.
Epitonic
The first and best place to look for any band with an independent recording is www.epitonic.com, a superbly organized site that is likely to have music from nearly everyone heard on college radio. It includes not only downloadable songs but also biographical information and links for hundreds of acts, grouped under genres and subgenres. And it has an invaluable "Similar Artists" feature that can direct fans of one band to dozens of potential new favorites. Within Epitonic's huge roster is at least a song or two from some major-label acts, among them the New York band Secret Machines, the Texas band Sparta and the English bands Radiohead and Spiritualized. But independent bands like Bright Eyes or Godspeed You Black Emperor are every bit as good.
Webjay
At www.webjay.org, music fans share their Web finds with the world. There's no music on the site, just lists of links that allow users either to play entire lists or to download items directly one by one; it also includes links to videos and news sound bites. Webjay is something like the lists submitted by customers at www .amazon.com, but with connections to the music itself. As such, it's only as good as the widely varied skills of its contributors, and its links aren't always dependable. But it is a way for musical obsessives like bigwavedave to share his fondness for garage-rock or for OddioKatya to point listeners toward a wide assortment of Brazilian songs.
Furthurnet
Before the Internet became ubiquitous, the Grateful Dead's fans built up their own network to exchange concert recordings, a network that expanded as other jam bands sprang up. The logical extension of the process is Furthurnet (www.furthurnet .com). It is a peer-to-peer network that trades only recordings of bands that encourage listeners to record concerts: not just the Dead but Phish, Gov't Mule, Dave Matthews Band, Los Lobos, Wilco and David Byrne as well. Users need to install a program available on the Web site. Most of the available concert recordings don't use MP3 files, but a better quality audio format, SHN, which also requires some software installation. It's easy; information on the site explains all the technicalities.
Another connection for jam bands is www.etree.org, which points listeners toward recordings stored online and is equally fastidious about high fidelity. Meanwhile, concert recordings of all sorts, from vintage 1960's bootlegs to music only a few days old, have been traded at www.sharingthegroove.org, although the site is currently undergoing maintenance.
The Library of Congress
Through the years, tax dollars have supported researchers like Alan Lomax on excursions to collect music from every nook and cranny and tradition they could discover across the United States. The Library of Congress has made a considerable amount available free online. A place to start is the American Memory Collection (http://memory .loc.gov/ammem/audio.html), with fiddle tunes, American Indian music, border music from the Rio Grande, Dust Bowl songs and more.
Folkways Records
In 1987, the Smithsonian Institution bought the catalog of Folkways Records, which had set out to document every sound in the world and continues to support projects like a 20-disc collection of Indonesian music. Many of the Folkways recordings can be heard on the Web at www .folkways.si.edu, from "Classical Music of Iran" to "Creole Music of Suriname" to "Music of Indonesia Vol. 1: Songs Before Dawn."
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive (www. .archive.org) has set out to preserve material that might otherwise disappear from the Internet, including Web pages, documents, books and video clips as well as audio, and it includes a Live Music Archive with more than 10,000 concerts via etree.org. Most are from jam bands, but there is plenty to choose from. (More than a million people have downloaded Grateful Dead music from the archive.) The archive also includes an assortment of other audio under All Collections, which has 131 songs from 78-r.p.m. discs, and more than 3,000 songs on what it calls netlabels, most of them releasing electronic music. Try the exotica-tinged selections from Monotonik.
Iuma
The Internet Underground Music Archive (www.iuma.org) was a pioneer of free Internet music. It was founded in 1993 as a place for musicians to post their own music online, and it just keeps on expanding. Unfortunately, it is both overwhelming and overwhelmed; finding a good song requires extraordinary luck, and downloading it will take a while. Like the other send-it-yourself sites noted here, Iuma can make a user appreciate what record company scouts do.
Garageband
Hopefuls face Darwinian competition at www.garageband.com, where musicians are encouraged to rate 30 songs before submitting one of their own (or pay a $19.99 fee instead) and other listeners are also assigned tracks to rate. The songs that rise to the top of the charts have a chance to be heard on Garageband's radio outlets or collected on its compilation albums. Garageband demands original songs, not cover versions, and its top-rated ones tend to sound more professional, if not always more distinctive, than those at other mass upload sites.
CNet
The computer experts at CNet include an extensive selection of music among their software downloads at http://music.download.com. A vast bulk of the music is submitted by musicians themselves, so there are a lot of derivative sounds to wade through, but the well-organized site also includes worthwhile bands as Editor's Picks, currently including Dios and Ex Models.
Vitaminic
A huge site based in England, www.vitaminic.co.uk, offers tens of thousands of aspiring bands and a smattering of better-known acts, although brand-name bands like Franz Ferdinand tend to offer only streaming audio rather than downloads. But the site is well organized and also includes video clips from the likes of Nick Cave.
BeSonic
A European site where musicians can place their songs online, www
.besonic.com has a slightly more international perspective than the other newcomer sites. Rankings and recommendations help visitors sift the material. Registration is required for downloading.
Pure Volume
More than 76,000 songs are available at yet another site for aspiring musicians, www.purevolume.com, which is strongly weighted toward rock. To winnow the site, try the Pure Picks column or look under the category Music for Top Artists (Signed).
DMusic
Musicians can also post their own songs on DMusic (www.dmusic .com). It helps users wade through more than 17,000 acts — an overwhelming majority categorized as alternative or rock — by listing DM Picks and by having users give songs a thumbs-up or thumbs-down and append comments. As with Iuma, most are amateur submissions, with plenty of jokes, but there are some enjoyable tracks scattered among the picks.
Smart-Music
Dance-music experimenters dominate at www.smart-music.net, a selective site that draws its downloadable MP3's from hard-to-find small labels. Dipping into the genres and subgenres of electronica, Smart-Music has about 300 songs available from (relatively) well-known groups like Mouse on Mars and Zero 7 as well as basement laptop obsessives, and a high percentage of them turn out to be worthwhile.
Ragga-Jungle
Slow, deep reggae bass lines are the foundation for whole families of dance music represented at www.ragga-jungle.com. It's an outlet for amateur and professional producers and toasters (rappers), and the downloadable songs, available free after registration, include echoey dub-reggae vamps, sparse dance-hall productions and frenetic jungle tracks. Each track has ratings and comments, and quick streaming allows users to sample tracks before committing to a download. Contender for best title: "A Waste of Half an Hour of My Life, and Four Minutes of Yours" by the Archangel.
Classic Cat
With so much classical music in the public domain, it's a surprise that there aren't more free downloadable sites offering it, although the length of classical compositions can make them inconvenient to download. At www.classiccat.net, it's possible to search by composer, from Monteverdi to Messiaen. The selection is spotty and links don't always work, but it's a start.
Asian Classical
Need some Indonesian gamelan music? On the Internet at www .asianclassicalmp3.org, a dedicated collector of Asian music has transferred recordings from cassettes to downloadable MP3's. The site includes music from nine countries, including 28 minutes of gamelan music from Java.
Iraqi Music
The straightforwardly named www.iraqimusic.com is a resource for both the classical Iraqi improvisations called maqams and more recent Iraqi recordings based on traditional (and thus noncopyrighted) songs. "Sister Sites" provides links to other sites with Middle Eastern music.
Trama
A Brazilian record label, Trama (www.tramavirtual.com), offers about 10,000 MP3's, primarily from local Brazilian bands. The site is in Portuguese and requires users to sign up, but after that, it is fairly easy to navigate. "Baixar" means download.
Micromusic
The Internet is home to countless obsessives. The ones gathered at www.micromusic.net make their electronic music from the sounds of the first primitive video games. Proud of what they can generate from eight-bit gizmos, they have placed hundreds of blipping, buzzing ditties online, garnering the attention of Malcolm McLaren, the Sex Pistols' manager, among others. Registration is required, but it's a modest inconvenience on the way to tunes like "How Bleep Is My Love."
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Socafm.com - The home of Soca on the web
Socafm.com - The home of Soca on the web
Listen to Soca Live on the Web!!
Listen to Soca Live on the Web!!
Tuesday, March 22, 2005
Wednesday, March 16, 2005
The Hottest item on TV
Turn Up the Heat with G.Garvin
Check out G. Garvin on TV One on DirecTV channel 241 Wednesdays 8:00 PM. If you don't already have DirecTV, go get it now. This brother is finer than fine. And he can cook too!!! Ladies, It's worth the price of the subscription just to watch this man handle his VERY large pepper mill every week. Umm, Umm, Umm sizzling hot!!!!!!
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Who Knew!! WWW.MachelMontano.com
Xtatik Ltd.
Now I can listen to "You" my favorite song for 2005 on demand. You done know Machel Montano wrote that song especially for me!!
Well you can also listen to other tracks as well, and even view the music video for Music Farm.
Be sure to check out the MadMan Karaoke in the games section.
Now I can listen to "You" my favorite song for 2005 on demand. You done know Machel Montano wrote that song especially for me!!
Well you can also listen to other tracks as well, and even view the music video for Music Farm.
Be sure to check out the MadMan Karaoke in the games section.
Soca Pulse Radio Station > Listen to soca music & calypso music 24/7 FREE SOCA MUSIC RADIO
Soca Pulse Radio Station > Listen to soca music & calypso music 24/7 FREE SOCA MUSIC RADIO: "SOCA PULSE. 24/7 soca music "
My latest favorite online radio station, 24/7 COMMERCIAL-FREE SOCA!!! No Deejays, no puull-upppp!! Just All Soca-All de time!!
I'm listening to Onika Bostik (RIP, Sista!) and Bunji Garlin sing Get on Bad!
My latest favorite online radio station, 24/7 COMMERCIAL-FREE SOCA!!! No Deejays, no puull-upppp!! Just All Soca-All de time!!
I'm listening to Onika Bostik (RIP, Sista!) and Bunji Garlin sing Get on Bad!
Carnival Costume Wishlist...
GVIDirect / IslandEvents Online Shop: Female - HC Madame
...Or what I would be at Trini Carnival 2005
Shurwayne Wins Road March Again
Shurwayne Winchester's "Dead or Alive" won him the title of Road March King as Trinidad's Carnival wrapped up on Tuesday. Shurwayne has won the competition for the 2nd year in a row as his song was played the most on the road by the big trucks on Carnival Tuesday.
Source
Dead or Alive
Source
Dead or Alive
Sunday, February 06, 2005
World Carnival Schedule
Date City / Country
Feb 19-20 , 2005 Aruba
Feb 7-8, 2005 Trinidad & Tobago
Feb 7-8, 2005 Rio de Janiero
Feb 7-8, 2005 New Orleans
Feb 7-8, 2005 Dominica
Mar 27-Apr 3, 2005 Jamaica
Apr 2005 St. Maarten
May 7, 2005 Cayman Islands
May, 2005 Pt. Fortin Borough Day
May, 2005 St. Thomas (VI)
May 21st, 2005 San Francisco
May 20-22, 2005 Oaklahoma
May 21, 2005 Honduras
May 20-22, 2005 Los Angeles
May 23-25, 2005 Oakland
May 27-30, 2005 Orlando
May 27-30, 2005 San Francisco
May 27-30, 2005 Atlanta
May , 2005 Bermuda
June 3-7, 2005 Berlin (Germany)
June 11-12, 2005 Tampa Bay
June 12, 2005 Hartford
June 18, 2005 Philadelphia
June 18-26, 2005 Washington D.C.
July, 2005 Puerto Rico
July 54-5, 2005 St. Vincent
July 9, 2005 Syracuse
July 18-20, 2005 St. Lucia
July , 2005 St. John (VI)
July 1-3, 2005 Houston (Caribfest)
July 2, 2005 Montreal (Carifest)
July, 2005 Vancouver
July 22-24, 2005 Baltimore
July 24, 2005 Jersey City
July 30, 2005 Toronto
Aug, 2005 Anguilla
Aug, 2005 Manitoba
Aug, 2005 Tortola (VI)
Aug, 2005 Winipeg (Caripeg)
Jul 30-Aug 1, 2005 Barbados
Jul 30-Aug 1, 2005 Antigua
Aug 5-7, 2005 Hamilton
Aug 5-7, 2005 Edmonton (Cariwest)
Aug 5-7, 2005 Detroit
Aug 7-9, 2005 Grenada
Aug 20-22, 2005 Chicago (Carifete)
Aug 13, 2005 Ottawa (Fete Caribe)
Aug 27, 2005 Boston
Aug 20-23, 2005 Notting Hill (U.K.)
Sept 5, 2005 New York
Sept, 2005 Las Vegas
Sept, 2005 Belize
Sept, 2005 San Diego
Sept 17-19, 2005 Baltimore
Sept, 2005 Long Island
Oct, 2005 Costa Rica
Oct, 2005 Key West
Oct , 2005 Bahamas
Oct 8-9, 2005 Miami
Oct 22, 2005 Sydney (Australia)
Nov, 2005 Jacksonville
Dec, 2005 St. Kitts
Dec, 2005 Monserratt
Dec 24-Jan 2 St.Croix (VI)
Feb 19-20 , 2005 Aruba
Feb 7-8, 2005 Trinidad & Tobago
Feb 7-8, 2005 Rio de Janiero
Feb 7-8, 2005 New Orleans
Feb 7-8, 2005 Dominica
Mar 27-Apr 3, 2005 Jamaica
Apr 2005 St. Maarten
May 7, 2005 Cayman Islands
May, 2005 Pt. Fortin Borough Day
May, 2005 St. Thomas (VI)
May 21st, 2005 San Francisco
May 20-22, 2005 Oaklahoma
May 21, 2005 Honduras
May 20-22, 2005 Los Angeles
May 23-25, 2005 Oakland
May 27-30, 2005 Orlando
May 27-30, 2005 San Francisco
May 27-30, 2005 Atlanta
May , 2005 Bermuda
June 3-7, 2005 Berlin (Germany)
June 11-12, 2005 Tampa Bay
June 12, 2005 Hartford
June 18, 2005 Philadelphia
June 18-26, 2005 Washington D.C.
July, 2005 Puerto Rico
July 54-5, 2005 St. Vincent
July 9, 2005 Syracuse
July 18-20, 2005 St. Lucia
July , 2005 St. John (VI)
July 1-3, 2005 Houston (Caribfest)
July 2, 2005 Montreal (Carifest)
July, 2005 Vancouver
July 22-24, 2005 Baltimore
July 24, 2005 Jersey City
July 30, 2005 Toronto
Aug, 2005 Anguilla
Aug, 2005 Manitoba
Aug, 2005 Tortola (VI)
Aug, 2005 Winipeg (Caripeg)
Jul 30-Aug 1, 2005 Barbados
Jul 30-Aug 1, 2005 Antigua
Aug 5-7, 2005 Hamilton
Aug 5-7, 2005 Edmonton (Cariwest)
Aug 5-7, 2005 Detroit
Aug 7-9, 2005 Grenada
Aug 20-22, 2005 Chicago (Carifete)
Aug 13, 2005 Ottawa (Fete Caribe)
Aug 27, 2005 Boston
Aug 20-23, 2005 Notting Hill (U.K.)
Sept 5, 2005 New York
Sept, 2005 Las Vegas
Sept, 2005 Belize
Sept, 2005 San Diego
Sept 17-19, 2005 Baltimore
Sept, 2005 Long Island
Oct, 2005 Costa Rica
Oct, 2005 Key West
Oct , 2005 Bahamas
Oct 8-9, 2005 Miami
Oct 22, 2005 Sydney (Australia)
Nov, 2005 Jacksonville
Dec, 2005 St. Kitts
Dec, 2005 Monserratt
Dec 24-Jan 2 St.Croix (VI)
2005 Panorama Finals Results - Large Band Phase II Wins!!!
PETROTRIN PHASE II PAN GROOVE 478 1
SAGICOR EXODUS 458 2
WITCO DESPERADOES 454.5 3
BP RENEGADES 437.5 4
BWIA INVADERS 433 5
RBTT REDEMPTION SOUND SETTERS 431 6
NEAL & MASSY TRINIDAD ALL STARS 429.5 7
SKIFFLE BUNCH 427 8
SAGICOR EXODUS 458 2
WITCO DESPERADOES 454.5 3
BP RENEGADES 437.5 4
BWIA INVADERS 433 5
RBTT REDEMPTION SOUND SETTERS 431 6
NEAL & MASSY TRINIDAD ALL STARS 429.5 7
SKIFFLE BUNCH 427 8
WOW!!!! What a Performance!!!
Phase II Wows the crowd!! I think they should definitely win Panorama 2005. Fantastic performance. Clearly a great arrangement by Len "Boogsie" Sharpe.
Trindad Carnival 2005
I'm listening to Panorama finals Live on Radio i95.5 FM in Trinidad. Wish I was in Trinidad. Earlier, I was listening to Machel Montano's Alternative Concept 3 on BBC 1Xtra Live. Great coverage. Machel is truly an innovater in Soca music.
Man, Exodus is gonna be harrrddd to beat! Sounds like they tearing up de stage!
Although I'm rooting for Phase II. De underdog and all dat.
Here's the Playing Positions for the Large Bands
Saturday 5th February 2005 Queens Park Savannah, Port of Spain - 7 p.m.
1 SKIFFLE BUNCH
2 SAGICOR EXODUS
3 BWIA INVADERS
4 NEAL & MASSY TRINIDAD ALL STARS
5 BP RENEGADES
6 WITCO DESPERADOES
7 RBTT REDEMPTION SOUND SETTERS
8 PETROTRIN PHASE II PAN GROOVE
Man, Exodus is gonna be harrrddd to beat! Sounds like they tearing up de stage!
Although I'm rooting for Phase II. De underdog and all dat.
Here's the Playing Positions for the Large Bands
Saturday 5th February 2005 Queens Park Savannah, Port of Spain - 7 p.m.
1 SKIFFLE BUNCH
2 SAGICOR EXODUS
3 BWIA INVADERS
4 NEAL & MASSY TRINIDAD ALL STARS
5 BP RENEGADES
6 WITCO DESPERADOES
7 RBTT REDEMPTION SOUND SETTERS
8 PETROTRIN PHASE II PAN GROOVE
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Favorite Soca Sites
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