pick your flavor- mix playlist gifts for yer bum!

__2004-11-15 @ 11:12 p.m._______ blog, blog, blog. Hello again. I just got off of work at the record store, sucking down a PBR, and listening to Echo & the Bunnymen's Heaven Up Here, undoubtedly their best. I have a fucking heart attack everytime the drummer starts to go wild on "Over the Wall," but I hate it when I'm driving 'cause with my hands flying all around, air drumming, I have to be careful to not get in a wreck. When you give someone a mix cd or playlist, and they don't tell you that they really liked it or never mention it again, does this mean they didn't like it? I make a point to mention to people after they give me a mix, that I really liked it or at least if I didn't like it, pick out a song to mention that we could talk about. Like, if I didn't like the mix, there's certainly a song I can pick out and say "uh, that song was interesting...what do you think of it?" Not that the giver would put something on the mix that would deliberately suck, but sometimes you pick random songs that might not be pefectly aligned with the person's tastes, just to spice it up- and hey, they might really enjoy it and make the mix even that much more unique! I guess I just assume that if I gave you a mix and you don't ever really mention it again, you probably think it was really boring or kind of sucked. Which is fine...I'm not gonna cry but if I give you a mix, let me know what you think because if it sucks, I wanna make a better one for ya....and until ya tell me about it, I won't know how to do it. I made Charlie a mix a few months ago and it was really cool because afterwards, he told me what he liked off of it and what he thought sucked (most of what he thought sucked had saxophone on it- fucking sax). (my fucking god the title track to this album is the most rocking my ass off song of all times! I'm taking a break to air drum- hang on.) Ok, back to the mix I made for Charlie. He told me the artist he liked and the ones he thought we terrible ("yeah, not really into those dudes- too hip for their own good- if I was drunk I might hit 'em if I saw them on the street- not really down with that). Honesty is good in this case. Anyways, I was thinking I could make playlists for people and then send them emails to pointing a link to them, but then I thought "yeah, but then they'll have to pay for the mix." So, what Apple needs to do is set up a gift playlist program, where you can buy the songs for someone and send them a link waiting for them to download it. No more sending cds just so they can be loaded right back into itunes. Which, in all honestly, is part of what Soundflavor (the company I work for) is hoping to be a part of. You see, if I send someone a playlist and say "hey, come and get your kickass playlist I bought for ya" and then you say "well, I liked that song by that band and this other band and this other band," instead of sifting through the entire catalog of the artists you seemed to like, you can use filters to recommend and find the songs you would like within a few clicks. Basically, it would provide something that you might not think you would need until it's sitting right there for you to use. Instead of the intimidating, daunting task of sifting through a band's entire back catalog or using band after band as a way of recommendations, what about finding the types of songs you like specifically using a couple of simple filters. That's what I think Soundflavor hopes to be and I think it's a good idea. For most of us, we like to navigate a band's back catalog and really dig into an artist or band's vision, album by album. And that's fine, I'm with ya, believe me! But I think the general public would really use this technology and benefit from it. I also think that even the biggest music geeks could utilize Soundflavor filters to find obscure music that they really would like to find without having to search every record store on the earth. But that whole thing hasn't happened yet, so we'll have to see what happens...it's certainly looking promising. BTW, I really want to go to a concert for free, so thanks to all of those I've invited to join soundflavor...but I still need three more people to join. Email me if you would like to join through me and I'll hook you up! Love, me << | >>