Well, not that kind of change. As predicted by virtually everyone who has ever lived in our modern age, the world is rapidly changing. Of course, I see the change being reflected in the music that I play, as well as in the ways that I listen to it. As you may have noticed, a major change took place in my streaming habits. For the last four years, I streamed via TIDAL, flawlessly and effortlessly. Now, I am a Spotify customer. I was always looking, with an upturned, snobbish nose, at all of those who made claims that Spotify was lightyears ahead of TIDAL. While that’s still not true (imho), I am slowly but surely embracing Spotify and have found that it has more than a few awesome features to which I was totally oblivious. One such feature is the ability to listen to music as a group, even when the members of the group are scattered as far as the four winds can scatter them. Of course, that feature is not included with the free accounts, and all members of the group must have premium accounts. It also has a feature that lets you connect with friends on social networks. It all takes some getting used to (particularly the difference in the user interface), but I think that when all is said and done, I’ll be happy with Spotify.
Another change that will be taking place will also be affecting my buying habits. Look way down, deep into that abyss of a mind, and think upon a streaming platform that we knew as Napster. Yeah, you remember! That was my first experience in curating a “lifetime” of playlists, only to lose them all due to “proprietary software”, which basically means that without the software used by the owners of the software, the music cannot be played. Therefore, when Napster closed its doors, it also closed its doors on all of the playlists that we had curated over time. Well, by leaving TIDAL (once again – involuntarily), the same thing is happening to me again. This time, I’ve learned. I have decided that it’s time to start buying and downloading my own hi-res digital music, mine to have for all eternity. OK, well, not quite that long, but I’m sure that you get the picture. I sure wish that some of the helpful creations that we have today had been created a few years back. Can you even begin to imagine how many CDs I had back in the day??!! Yup – sold ‘em all when cash was short. Never again. I will probably hit Barnes & Noble for some of their $4.99 specials that they run ever so often. They may not get saved as hi-res, but at least I can recover some of that lost music without breaking the bank.
Lastly, one of the changes in the streaming world is an app/website known as jazzradio.com . It was/is particularly useful to me because I stopped listening to the radio when Smooth Jazz became a bore to me. It wasn’t just that I began to abhor that ‘smooth jazz’ (jazz mixed with R&B), but I had already developed a dislike to listening to Deejays who talked incessantly, instead of playing some music; the ‘over-abundance’ of commercials, and the ridiculous habit of Deejays playing the same artists and music over and over and . . . well, ad infinitum. It was the moment when I reached that point that JazzRadio caught my ears. Fortunately, it wasn’t/isn’t radio in a true sense of the word. The music is curated before you even tune in – you never heard a single Deejay’s voice. The music curated is divided into a ‘gazillion’ different categories of jazz – choose what music fits your mood. And last, but not least, it was ‘free’ to listen – the only price was listening to about three (3) commercial per hour. Whoa – high price, huh? Now, they ‘unlock’ about five (5) ‘free channels’ per day. To get past that, you need to upgrade to a premium account. I suppose that bills gotta be paid somehow. I used that app to discover new artists and new music, pretty much on a daily basis. I also bent the ears of anyone who would listen to me rant about such an innovative idea that it was/is. Still a good thing!
Looks like I just became the Deejay that refuses to shut up and play some good music. With that in mind, here ya go! Just a tease, though. Head over to today’s other post for some Manic Monday Musical Medicine for a complete playlist!
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Jazz, jazz, and nothing but jazz. Well, . . . mostly.
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Listen to “Game-changing Jazz Greats” on Spotify
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(Don’t have a Spotify account? Click HERE for a free one)
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Download JazzRadio dot com
Smoothe 