Weekend Open Forum: Where do you get your music from?

[Jos]

The music landscape is changing. Well, technically it has been changing for quite a while ever since peer-to-peer file sharing applications like Napster popped up and turned the industry on its head. But with so many legal alternatives competing these days it’s gotten to the point that buying or subscribing to a service is more convenient than pirating.

The latter, in particular, is getting a lot of attention lately. Streaming music generated more revenue than CDs in the US for the first time in 2014, and Apple, which until recently stuck with its a-la-carte model through iTunes, has decided to step into the streaming music service game with Apple Music.

Today we want to know where you get your music from. Still buying tracks and albums individually -- digitally or CDs? Are you paying for a music subscription service instead? And if so, which one did you go for and why?

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https://www.techspot.com/news/60974-weekend-open-forum-where-do-you-get-music.html

 

[CrisisDog]

As I'm now noticing the quality difference between average MP3s and CDs, I've been trying to keep everything lossless. Going through my collection of CDs again, it's FLAC on Windows and ALAC for Apple. Trying to keep everything legal, I browse HDTracks.com for new stuff in 24-bit or better. If I can't find it there, I usually hit a local store for the CD. If you're into trance / house, the Armada Music Store has new downloads in WAV. If you're into older indie stuff, 4AD has an offering of FLAC files for purchase. For streaming, I've stuck with Slacker over the years, no particular reason...

 

[psycros]

Tunein Radio and Shoutcast. I'm not an audiophile and I like a variety. Plus with a good stream ripper you can build up a nice jukebox and play your own "radio stations" without needing to burn through more data.

 

[davislane1]

Spotify
iTunes
Live events
The ether

 

[yRaz]

I stream music from youtube 95% of the time. I usually listen to the radio in the car if I'm listening to anything at all

 

[AnonymousSurfer]

Spotify and Frostwire. I pay for Spotify, and any songs I can't get on there is then downloaded with Frostwire. Then I add em to my playlists and play em in Spotify.

Honestly, if you're still using Pandora you should at LEAST consider trying out Spotify. You can listen to all your radios just the same, and you can choose songs and add them to playlists. It's way better, even if you're running the free edition. I've been using it since 2011, and I tell everyone who's using another platform to try spotify. Most of em convert over and praise it everytime they want to listen to THEIR playlists instead of some random songs that Pandora usually plays

 

[Hexic]

Arrr...

 

[Guest]

Ahoy !

 

[Seraphim401]

YouTube

 

[Tekkaraiden]

Still buy Cd's when I can find them.

 

[Route44]

When in the car either the radio or CD. At home either I stream Youtube or the stereo/radio set-up.

 

[Steve]

Spotify

 

[Sancticide]

Amazon MP3 and Prime Music streaming

 

[penn919]

I use to use Grooveshark before it was taken down; however, now I've migrated to Google Music. I'm surprised by all the people content with youtube. The audio quality on the videos aren't good enough for me.

 

[TitoBXNY]

I really like Spotify. I have been able to find almost every song that I listened to as a kid as well as my parents.

 

[NimbusTLD]

FLACs from Bandcamp.

 

[DaveBG]

Torrent sites mainly

 

[trgz]

Like my games and films, I'm constantly in catch-up mode so I tend to wait until the whole CD drops in price or pick them up 2nd hand. Time to time I will buy an album or track via Bandcamp, Amazon, Google, or direct from the artist but never, ever, ever, through iTunes, or Spotify for that matter (and I was on Spotify when it was invite only back in 2008)

 

[Guest]

I use Google Play Music for early music and classical pieces, and downloaded/CD-recorded music from various sources, physical and digital, for everything else.

 

[Guest]

I buy CDs online and rip to FLAC. I'm not audiovile but I can hear the difference.

 

[maestro0428]

I mostly listen to Pandora as I'm on the computer most of the day. In the car, it's CDs most of the time.

 

[Dalunar]

I tend to buy CD's and rip them to FLAC for backup and listening on my pc, and mp3 for my phone. I also use Jango for internet radio.

 

[Guest]

At work and at play definitely Pandora. $4 a month, nothing better!

But in the Car, Sirius XM

Never listen to commercial radio any more! I hate commercials!

 

[tractorphil]

I get all my music from Amazon.

 

[Jim$ter]

Spotify 320K is the only way if you appreciate sound quality. Pandora and Sirus XM have horrible sound quality. Apple music would be promising except I think they are stuck on inferior 256K which is lame.