The RPM Challenge
The challenge is for musicians (of all kinds) to record an album during the month of February 2008. In the 07 RPM Challenge, over 850 albums were produced and are available for listening on their Jukebox.
Link courtesy of Slashdot.
The Death of High Fidelity
In the age of MP3s, sound quality is worse than ever
Rolling Stone magazine's online article about music, and how the sound quality of music is getting increasingly worse because of advances in technology. Music producers are continuing to use audio compress to reduce subtleties in volume in music and make it LOUDER more exaggerated for radio and mp3.
Aboriginal Culture and Traditions Storytelling
June 21 is National Aboriginal Day in Canada.
In honour of this date, today's link has a collection of oral stories told by elders from Canadian First Nations perspectives, and include: First Nations Stories, Métis Stories, and Inuit Stories.
Today's Link source: Google Suggest
RELODA MUSIC DAILY
RELODA is another great mp3 aggregator for legal independent music. RELODA has albums, EPs, singles, demos, webmixes, Sessions, and compilations of miscellaneous material.
While some of the other mp3 aggregators such as elbo.ws and Hype Machine have more tracks available, RELODA is a bit more like a high output music blog. It has a good search feature and I really like that there are direct links to all the downloads. Grouping tracks by artists also helps keep things organized.
I think the coolest feature of RELODA is the mp3s of live concerts (bootlegs?), such as: Pixies in Melbourne 2007, Pavement - Peel Session, Kid Koala doing Solid Steel in 2000, The Police in 1979 and 1984, Wolfmother on XFM, Talking Heads - Demos 1975, David Bowie in Santa Monica 1972 and NY in 1976. New and old concerts are represented here.
Wu-Tang Corp - media downloads
It's Music Tuesday, and we have a little hip hop for you. Actually, there's a lot of free mp3s to download.
Hip hop juggernauts, The Wu Tang Clan, have posted 215 classic tracks on their website. There's hits, album cuts, live performances, remixes, alternate versions, freestyles, demos, mixtape entries, and more from 2003 to 2005.
It gives the die hard Wu fans new material. It's also a great way for new fans to check out the Wu and all the members, like: Method Men, Raekwon, ODB, Ghostface, RZA, GZA, U-God, Inspecta Deck and the rest, without downloading random tracks from other places on the net.
I wish more artists and labels posted parts of their back catalogue and alternate tracks on the web for free. It's good for promoting goodwill, and gives new and old fans the best of the old material, that they probably wouldn't have purchased anyways. While the rest of the RIAA is a lost cause, but I hope musicians and those internet marketing bloggers gurus like Seth Godin, Jason Calcanis, Robert Scoble and Steve Rubel are listening. Preach the Way of the Wu, brothers!
Today's Link source: Wired : Listening Post
NPR Live Concert Series
Wondering if that cool new band is any good live? Or are you an obsessive fan starved for anything by your favourite band?
Now there's even more free and legal mp3s to download from NPR to fill up your ipod.
The Live Concert Series has professionally-recorded, full length shows (often recorded at the 9:30 Club in Washington, D.C.) by the best indie bands on the circuit, including: Cat Power, hot Canadians The Arcade Fire, Damon Albarn's The Good, The Bad & The Queen, Belle & Sebastian, Vancouver's Neko Case, Bloc Party and tons more. My new favourites are Fujiya & Miyagi and Peter Björn and John, and there's a new show coming this week from Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie.
As a bonus, they also have other concerts available as streaming audio, including Bjork, Arctic Monkeys, Iggy Pop and the Stooges, Lilly Allen, Wilco, The White Stripes, The New Pornographers, and more.
The audio quality is excellent, and did I mention that they're free?
Today's Link source: NPR All Songs Considered
Ion Audio - iTTUSB Turntable
I've found this neat little gadget. It's a standard turntable that plays vinyl records, but it connects to your computer by usb. You can use the spin records live, digitize your vinyl, put some effects on your records and get new sounds for your recording project. The iTTUSB Turntable works with Mac and Windows computers, and includes basic Audacity software to digitally record your audio and clean it up.
I've even heard it suggested that new kinds of turntables are leading to an increase in sales of vinyl records. Increasing music sales, eh? Now there's something you don't hear everyday.
Has anyone used the iTTUSB Turntable? I haven't seen any real reviews, so if you have any opinions, please write something in the comments.
Load up your iPod with these great sites to download free audio books. Most of these are from older works, and are done under the Creative Commons license.
1. LibriVox
Open source comes to audio books, as public domain books are read by contributors from the public. There is a large selection of works here, but audio quality can vary. If you can't find what you're looking for, why don't you record your own version and upload it?
LibriVox also features a podcast.
2. ThoughtAudio.com
Has a smaller selection, but they feature classics from Kafka, Shakespeare, The Bible, Plato, Mark Twain, Ghandi and more.
3. Free Christian AudioBooks
A selection of classic books about Christianity from authors, such as: Brother Lawrence, G. K. Chesterton, and Charles Spurgeon.
4. Naropa Poetics Audio Archives
Features lectures and poetry readings by some of the greats, including William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, and is hosted by archive.org.
5. AudioBooksForFree.com
Has lots of books that are browseable by genre and read by voice actors. Genres include mystery, comedy, classics, science fiction and children's books.
6. Open Culture: Audio Book Podcast Collection
Links to lots of famous books that are available as podcasts through itunes.
7. Free Classic AudioBooks
The Classics as read by humans and computers, and available as mp3 or m4bs for ipod.
8. Podiobooks.com
Free serialized audio books available as podcasts. Lots of modern, but lesser-known books in a wide range of genres.
9. LoudLit.org
Collection of Classics, short stories, poetry and children's books. The cool thing is that some of the books have text that you can read on your ipod while you are listening.
10. Gutenberg: The Audio Books Project
Large collection of public domain literature, available in human- and computer-read formats. Good source of foreign language books.
11. Audio Poetry
This site has well known poems read by poetry fans, and is hosted by archive.org.
RIP Kurt Vonnegut.
Know any other good sites? Include them in the comments!
The Linkjockey has been getting a lot of links lately about remixes, so I decided to create a big list of resources for you if you're interested in manipulating sounds to create something new. Here are 19 places you can go to get started, or take your remixing skills further. I will publish and promote anything you create as a result of this post.
Digg this post!
Recording Software
1. Audacity
Open source, free digital audio editor and processor for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux
2. Ardour
Free multi-track software for MacOS X and Linux
3. Mixere
Free, open-source Windows NT/2000/XP application for mixing audio files
4. Pro Tools Free
Still available for older operating systems including Macintosh OS 9 (up to 40 MB total) and Windows 98/Me (up to 32 MB total)
5. Computer Music magazine (UK)
While the magazine is not free, it always comes with a CD-Rom or DVD of free software and samples that makes it worth the cover price
Audio Samples
6. ccMixter
Killer site with lots of tracks to remix, samples to download and remixes to listen to, all free and available under Creative Commons license
7. SampleSwap.org
Free audio samples
8. Real World Remixed Download
Download and remix tracks from Peter Gabriel's Real World label
9. University of Iowa Music Instrument Samples
Samples of orchestral instruments
10. SampleNet.co.uk download site
One of the granddaddies of free sample downloads
11. My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts
Download and remix tracks from Brian Eno and David Byrne
12. Internet Audio Archive
AMAZING massive archive of all sorts of free audio files, including: poetry, radio shows, live music, foreign language and spoken word. It's the best! Be aware that not everything is Creative Commons.
13. Beastie Boys A Cappella Download Page
Remix Beastie Boys tracks
13b. Splice - Meet. Mix. Mashup.
A remixing-specific community with sample exchanges, forums and finished remixes.
Killer Resources
14. OpenSonics - Open Music Community News and Copyleft Resources on Squidoo
A Squidoo lens promoting awareness of freely available music, audio services, video and software within the Open Music/ Creative Commons community.
15. Free Sounds: Legal Audio Samples, Loops, Freeware, Music and Video Downloads on Squidoo
Another Squidoo lens with links to some great sites for audio samples and software
16. Dave's Imaginary Sound Space
A long link list of more technical sites with free software, plugins, DSP and recording resources
Other
17. FreeCulture.org Manifesto
18. Creative Commons
The legal alternative to Copyright
19. sounds like silver : lcd soundsystem remixed
Unofficial remixes of LCD Soundsystem's "Sounds of Silver" cd, available for free download. Same people that remixed albums by the Prodigy and Chemical Brothers. Good stuff!
NHL.com - Radio
As the NHL prepares for the All-Star game today in Dallas, today's link lets you listen to every single NHL game live.
No matter where you live in the world, you can listen to your favourite team play every game over the internet. As so many sports leagues try to increase their "revenue stream" by gouging their fans for every penny they can get, it's uplifting that the NHL is doing something so right. The NHL is using this technology to make it easy and free to be a fan.
Through the miracle of Windows Media Player (also for Mac), every game's play-by-play is streamed live over the internet, using the same feed from each team's radio broadcast crew. If you're listening to a Montreal Canadiens game, you can even listen in French!
New for 2007, the 365 Days Project dishes up a slice of very obscure, unusual music every day of the year in the convenient mp3 form. Dug up from thrift store records, old broadcasts, and tapes forgotten in the archives, you’ll discover some old gems, some rotten stinkers, and very, very strange recordings.
Curated by Otis Fodder, the original 365 Days Project was done in 2003 with 1 track every day, and was a resounding success. With more server space available now, the only change in 2007 is that everyday can feature more then just one mp3, so look for single songs to full albums shared by a host of contributors.
This entry is the first of Linkjockey’s weekly Tuesday music theme.
