My friend down the hall, Joe LaDuke, has tossed two excellent suggestions my way in just the last few weeks. The first was Pandora, a subset of the Music Genome Project. If you haven’t seen it yet, Pandora is basically a personalized Internet DJ. Type in an artist or song that you like, and Pandora will break down your selection via a number of musical criteria and then offer up a selection of other artists that match up with your tastes. While it naturally can’t acknowledge my desire to have something cool and ambient after a hot ska set, Pandora is fantastic for exposure to new music. We kind of like that here at 3hive. Joe’s other offering was Hem, and based on what I’ve read about the band, it seems like someone should have told me about them sooner. Favorably compared to Mazzy Star and Cowboy Junkies, among others, Hem offers fat, lush, beautifully-written, unadulterated songs sung wonderfully by Sally Ellyson. “The Golden Day is Done,” from an album full of covers and other band favorites, gives a good hint of Hem’s unique sense of place along the backroads of the American South.
Sharing the sharing.
There are 5 or 6 other MP3s (mostly live stuff) at http://www.hemmusic.com/music.html. Scroll all the way down to bottom. Good stuff.
Thanks Barry. I found a lot of those links to be broken. The "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" link worked, however, if you're looking for some X-mas cheer.
you just found pandora now?? get with the program! 🙂
Hem is amazing. I have the album "Rabbit Songs" and recommend it very highly.
I wasn't a big fan of their last album but this one has me by the balls.
with those liberty mutual ads (wonderful, touching ads by the way) they're finally getting a bit of recognition. good for them! thanks to 3hive, i can claim i knew about hem way before everybody else did. (well, most people, at least)