Pandora.com - A Pretty Cool Idea

I’ve always dreamed of a radio station that I could control myself. Sure, you can play your own CDs or MP3s or whatever, but for me there is just something different about the radio. Maybe it is the anticipation of not knowing what’s coming next, I don’t know.

Anyway, there’s a new service out there on the web called Pandora and it’s a very innovative and cool idea.

It’s an online radio station (more or less) that allows you to control the music that it plays for you. You select an artisit that you like and the system then begins building a list of music that it thinks you will like based on that selection.

If you don’t like a particular artist, you can give it the “thumbs down” and it will stop playing that song and not play anything else from that artist.

I’ve just started playing with it and I began by telling it I like Rush. In addition to the Rush songs it has played, it also played songs from Asia, Evanescence, Led Zeppelin and Crossroads. Needless to say, some of them got the thumbs up and some got the thumbs down.

It appears that Pandora is available as a free, advertising-supported service or a service you pay for which eliminates the advertising.

So far I’m pretty impressed and plan to keep on listening.

[tags]pandora radio, internet radio, web radio station[/tags]

Keeping Up With Neil Peart

There are occasions when the world does, as the saying goes, seem to be a small place. Little glimpses into the personal details of other lives remind you that there are many connections between us that we may not often think about.

It was with some surprise and a few small smiles of recognition that I read the latest news posted by Rush drummer Neil Peart on his personal website. As a Rush fan of many years, I always find interesting the little tidbits of information concerning their recent activities, and if I might say with regard to some of Neil’s motorcycle stories, antics.

Neil has taken to discussing many of his personal experiences and feelings about music and sometimes a lot more, on his website in recent months. It’s no surprise that the primary lyricist for Rush can put a few words down quite effectively and I always enjoy reading what it is that he decides to share with the world.

Apart from a few updates on song-writing activities with his Rush band mates, a new “recording” drum set and the fun he has been having writing music and recording with a fellow by the name of Matt Scannell form Worcester, Massachusetts (I’m originally from Massachusetts myself, a few towns northwest of Boston), Neil mentions a few things of the sort that kind of make you go: “Wow, really?”

The first was his mention of his long-time passion for the fragrance of the lilac flower. I too, since childhood, have been particularly fond of that aroma that makes itself available for a few short weeks in late May or early June in this part of Southern New Hampshire.

I believe that my fondness for the lilac flower began in fourth grade when I had a hopeless crush on a girl in my class who wore perfume (or something) that reminded me of that very fragrance. Each year in May, I, as Neil once famously penned “commit my yearly crime,” (yes I know Neil actually wrote “weekly crime” and to him, I extend my apologies) and pull my pick-up truck (its height is better suited for this caper than the car) up to a stand of blossoming lilacs on some local road and break off a small branch with a cluster of flowers.

The lilacs occupy a vase in a prominent spot on the kitchen counter for a few days so that I may stick my nose into them occasionally as I pass by and be transformed again back to my fourth grade classroom. They never last long enough, either on the counter or in the ground and are gone too soon, leaving me without that particular pleasure for another year.

In another passage, Neil mentions that he is not much of a sports fan. Something else the rhythmic Canadian and I have in common and something that makes me feel a little more alienated from the public-at-large each year. Locally, it is a rarity for the weatherman on TV to complete a forecast without at least a brief mention of the conditions that are expected for the Red Sox game. It might just be me, but it seems as if people are more sports-crazed now than ever.

Finally the fact that I am an aging drummer, although I hesitate to use that word in association with my abilities in an article that features so prominently the legendary Neil Peart. Still, after almost 20 years since last sitting down behind a set of drums, I one day hope to make some room for a kit of my own to play purely for the enjoyment of it.

Neil’s writings are well worth keeping abreast of for any Rush fan, and it’s amazing to me how these little glimpses into his life reveal a few similarities to my own. Thanks, Neil and please, keep on writing.

[tags]neil peart, rush, matt scannell[/tags]