If you can put up with the annoyingly cool Flash interface¹, CBC Radio 3 is a fantastic source for listening to new music. Will Pate directed me there this morning to listen to a jazz group called Baron Samedi ESQ and I found a lot more. It looks like they have a regularly updated playlist you can open with twenty songs in it. Just click on the double-page icon next to the media player when the site opens to launch it.
Just this morning I discovered six great songs from six different bands I've never heard of. The bands are listed in the order they appeared in the playlist:
- Neusiland - When You Get Back from the War
- Synthetic Folk Hero - All I Need is a Spoon
- Great Lake Swimmers - Moving Pictures Silent Films
- Mark Kleiner Power Trio - Love to Night
- The Cansecos - This Small Disaster
- Junior Pantherz - Shoot the Messenger
¹ Warning: this site will maximize on your computer, will leave two browsers open as a result, and will instruct you to 'relaunch' a site you probably have never used before.
Comments
Alan - January 10, 2004 8:34 AM
I really like CBC3. I think it is the only good I have ever seen done with Flash other than a few time sucking games - and are those really "a good"? What I like most about it structurally is ease you can move about the site using the index and internal page turning tools. The text/pictoral content is interesting and effective, too, and I really do not how it could be pulled off as well without Flash. The biggest problem is, as you say, the demand for access to lots and lots of bandwidth, which I am lucky to have here but I know is not everywhere.
I also had not heard about many of these bands but am now buying a few of the electronica CDs from Electron in Toronto.
Will Pate - January 12, 2004 9:42 AM
Radio 3 always has a few good songs in their playlist. If you liked Baron Samedi ESQ, check out:
<ul>
<li>Los Furios - Upbeat ska with a latin/salsa twist. Issue 2.17.</li>
<li>Pocket Dwellers - Humber College music program educated, energetic jazz/funk/hip hop from the Toronto suburbs. Issue 2.15.</li></ul>
Johnny Rukavina - January 12, 2004 12:37 PM
I have, based upon your post, decided to give Radio 3 another chance, in spite of the insane, almost purposefully un-intuitive (I think the marketing people call it 'edgy') interface. It vexes me so much that I generally listen to the BBC on the web instead.
Daniel Burka - January 15, 2004 3:03 PM
I just discovered that if you go into the archives, using the left menu in the site, you can listen to playlists from previous 'episodes'. Even more good new music.
Toby Rockwell - January 15, 2004 4:36 PM
At least when it's fired up in Firebird, the window isn't actually maximized. The maximize button is greyed out, and the window is the size of a full screen, BUT it can be moved, which allows other windows to overlap.
It is overdesigned by half, isn't it, but with the archives to dig through there's buckets of fun music to peruse. It's actually pretty efficient in using bandwidth, it sucks in a whole song in a couple seconds and then uses no bandwidth until the next song.
Shane Krause - March 12, 2004 4:39 AM
Hey
Thanks for the mentions.
-Shane Krause (of Baron Samedi)