The yearly festival known as SXSW offers the universe at large the ability to download a slew of free mp3s in the form of a torrent. This year as well as most are full of indie noises and some of the more popular acts like Bloc Party and other recognizables. Some random stranger decided to [...]

Archivist Jim Blackwood has done an excellent job pulling off a quality matrix recording of Calexico, the indie/mariachi/alt. country rock band straight outta Tucson. The results can be downloaded for free at the always legal archive.org. The band has a few unique qualities, and their output is probably a preferred taste. I enjoy a handful [...]

Some websites die, progress for the worse, or benefit for recreation. Ideas get recycled, reinvented, abused, and improved. So it goes with web-based audio technology. If you need a replacement site or are just looking for new ways to listen to free music without trouble, then read on.
Albumbase is Dead
There once was a site called [...]

Last.fm serves up free mp3s, and I’ve said so before on other pages. When it first came out there was no search feature and you only knew if you landed on their page or crafted a special heavy google search with advanced operators. Ashlee Simpson’s album was up for a week a long time ago. [...]

KEXP delivers for all a wonderful podcast for the Song of the Day with links to all the previous days in case you missed the download. These are normal mp3s that can be automatically setup for itunes or viewed in Firefox for manual saving. A few days ago I found this and was pleasantly relieved [...]

Artnoc Repus offers an album length of demos for downloading via open source audio. Staying Here Forever draws from an arsenal of softer compositions as well as rompin’ selections that are pulled off well despite the lack of a complete backing band.
Heres a play by play with your songcaster, liquid parallax:
Track 1. “San Diego” is [...]

Amazon.com has had free mp3s for a least a few years. I remember discovering they had a “free downloads” section and I was able to find some stuff that interested me. There was even recognizable stuff (I can’t remember all of them, but I do recall seeing Yo La Tengo, popular Christmas tunes, and some [...]

From my previous post I found “Miserlou” played by the Air Force. I managed to find some others that are pretty interesting. Some for the Christmas season, some patriotic songs, and a few hymns and ceremonials. Usually everything produced by the government is public domain, but things become tricky if they borrowed or used copyright [...]