6 ms·

This looks cool and I like the idea of going back to having my own collection, but what are you doing for discovery now? I'm really tired of the same ~150 songs

This looks cool and I like the idea of going back to having my own collection, but what are you doing for discovery now? I'm really tired of the same ~150 songs spotify really thinks that I like.

woodruffw 4y ago
I have three main sources of discovery now: 1. Last.fm: I've been scrobbling for years, and Last.fm is weirdly good about giving me recommendations I enjoy. I'd say ~80% of its "personalized homepage" recommendations hit the mark for me; I like that most are linked to YouTube so I can quickly confirm whether they're a good fit. 2. Bandcamp: I try to buy most my music via Bandcamp, and I use artists that I like to discover similar music/bands that they like. Subjectively this feels a little less fruitful than Last.fm, but it's definitely more expansive. 3. Social recommendations: I run a server that multiple friends use and upload to, and they tell me when they've added something new that they think I'll like. I also listen to an Internet radio stream run by friends, and I go to a lot of local shows. By ratio, I think I probably get 50% of my new music through Last.fm, and then 25% each through Bandcamp and my social sphere.
- RheingoldRiver 4y ago
  Don't take this in the wrong way, but how do you find last.fm usable anymore? Do you run noscript on it? Do you pay for it? I haven't been able to go there in like 5 years since they injected a billion ads and made your personal scrobble history practically unusable (you have to pay to search it????). This thread has prompted me to export my history to csv since that's the only way I track what I listen to and I struggle a lot to remember the names of albums I like so I really want to be able to group & sort by playcount, and I miss the old last.fm so very, very, very much. But I absolutely will not pay for a site that ate my data for years and now holds it hostage (especially when I myself am the product).
  - woodruffw 4y ago
    No offense taken! I use uBlock and whatever else I have in my browser, plus I block a lot of things at the DNS level. So far that's left it moderately usable; the only part I really interact with is the index page, though, and occasionally checking my own profile to make sure I'm still scrobbling.
- vanilla_nut 4y ago
  I love the idea of sharing a backend music server. I should give that a try! Thanks for the idea.
takoid 4y ago
Just wanted to chime in and recommend Rate Your Music [1] as well. Really great way to dive into different genres and artists. [1]: https://rateyourmusic.com/ https://rateyourmusic.com/
- johnfn 4y ago
  RateYourMusic is a great site. It's also an infinite rabbithole to waste endless amounts of time. By the way, did you know it has a film section too?
RheingoldRiver 4y ago
It depends what music you like, but at the end of the year every year, a lot of people with very different tastes post their favorite of the previous years $yourVerySpecificFavoriteGenre. For me, this is video game music. My absolute favorite blog for this is "Press A," [0] which is hosted on a broader music blog called "A Closer Listen," but in addition to their post, I also simply do a search of "best video game music of $previousYear" every January and typically find about 20-30 different recommendations, which I sample on youtube and then get what I want of that. This past year seems to have been particularly stunning, so far I've listened to Kena: Bridge of Spirits, TUNIC, Elden Ring, and Sable, all of them utterly fantastic (Elden Ring actually being the weakest of the list). Pretty sure Kena will prove to be my favorite of the year, but I think it'll take me months to get through everything, simply because I haven't wanted to move on from anything yet. Some previous lesser-known favorites include Sayonara Wild Hearts, Stellaris, and Spiritfarer. [0] https://acloserlisten.com/2022/12/12/press-a-2022-the-years-best-videogame-soundtracks/ https://acloserlisten.com/2022/12/12/press-a-2022-the-years-...
- vanilla_nut 4y ago
  Fun fact: SEO spam and AI-driven search seems to have made "Press A" a completely un-googleable term at this point. Seems to correct me to Wordpress no matter what I do, even using quotes, and then ignores A as a glue word. It occurs to me that finding this blog would be a good test for a search engine.
  - eipi10_hn 4y ago
    I searched *Press A* in Kagi and it shows that website at the top for me https://wtf.roflcopter.fr/pics/o4jKTW7y/C6N4W6W5.png https://wtf.roflcopter.fr/pics/o4jKTW7y/C6N4W6W5.png
- aks_tldr 4y ago
  Wow thank you sir for introducing me to these Jems. See no algorithm will come close to understanding such intricate cultural details.
prawn 4y ago
Were you using Discover Weekly or similar? I've found Spotify helped me create a massive list of songs I really liked. My liked list is up over 2,000 and Discover Weekly will usually unearth another 10+ great options without fail each week, and similar with song or artist radio. Wonder if it's preferred genres or something that happens with a certain playlist size? (One of my gripes is that the shuffle on long lists isn't very good, but I solved that by splitting my main list into a few sub-playlists and then using shuffle on those.)
- hjadal 4y ago
  My discover weekly used to be great, but at some point it broke and started suggesting me finnish, dutch and german music. Despite me always skipping them in the discover weekly.
  - mackrevinack 4y ago
    same here. i had much better results years ago but recently i think ive been getting someone elses discover weekly by mistake because there is hardly anything on it that i like
  - prawn 4y ago
    I often favour music without lyrics because it's less distracting in an office environment, so music by international artists doesn't bother me at all - might even be preferable. More interesting for my kids to hear international influences if we're listening in the car too. I just checked my Discover Weekly for this week to see if maybe it had gone downhill, and fav'ed about 20+ out of 30. I think it must just work very well for the styles I like.
- apercu 4y ago
  Weird. I usually call it "Discover Weakly" or "Discover Meekly" because it's usually about every 3rd week that I find a new artist. I like all sorts of Americana but Spotify loves to feed me blues. I'm not all that in to "blues".

This looks cool and I like the idea of going back to having my own collection, but what are you doing for discovery now? I'm really tired of the same ~150 songs spotify really thinks that I like.

woodruffw 4y ago

I have three main sources of discovery now: 1. Last.fm: I've been scrobbling for years, and Last.fm is weirdly good about giving me recommendations I enjoy. I'd say ~80% of its "personalized homepage" recommendations hit the mark for me; I like that most are linked to YouTube so I can quickly confirm whether they're a good fit. 2. Bandcamp: I try to buy most my music via Bandcamp, and I use artists that I like to discover similar music/bands that they like. Subjectively this feels a little less fruitful than Last.fm, but it's definitely more expansive. 3. Social recommendations: I run a server that multiple friends use and upload to, and they tell me when they've added something new that they think I'll like. I also listen to an Internet radio stream run by friends, and I go to a lot of local shows. By ratio, I think I probably get 50% of my new music through Last.fm, and then 25% each through Bandcamp and my social sphere.

RheingoldRiver 4y ago
Don't take this in the wrong way, but how do you find last.fm usable anymore? Do you run noscript on it? Do you pay for it? I haven't been able to go there in like 5 years since they injected a billion ads and made your personal scrobble history practically unusable (you have to pay to search it????). This thread has prompted me to export my history to csv since that's the only way I track what I listen to and I struggle a lot to remember the names of albums I like so I really want to be able to group & sort by playcount, and I miss the old last.fm so very, very, very much. But I absolutely will not pay for a site that ate my data for years and now holds it hostage (especially when I myself am the product).
- woodruffw 4y ago
  No offense taken! I use uBlock and whatever else I have in my browser, plus I block a lot of things at the DNS level. So far that's left it moderately usable; the only part I really interact with is the index page, though, and occasionally checking my own profile to make sure I'm still scrobbling.
vanilla_nut 4y ago
I love the idea of sharing a backend music server. I should give that a try! Thanks for the idea.

takoid 4y ago

Just wanted to chime in and recommend Rate Your Music [1] as well. Really great way to dive into different genres and artists. [1]: https://rateyourmusic.com/ https://rateyourmusic.com/

johnfn 4y ago
RateYourMusic is a great site. It's also an infinite rabbithole to waste endless amounts of time. By the way, did you know it has a film section too?

RheingoldRiver 4y ago

It depends what music you like, but at the end of the year every year, a lot of people with very different tastes post their favorite of the previous years $yourVerySpecificFavoriteGenre. For me, this is video game music. My absolute favorite blog for this is "Press A," [0] which is hosted on a broader music blog called "A Closer Listen," but in addition to their post, I also simply do a search of "best video game music of $previousYear" every January and typically find about 20-30 different recommendations, which I sample on youtube and then get what I want of that. This past year seems to have been particularly stunning, so far I've listened to Kena: Bridge of Spirits, TUNIC, Elden Ring, and Sable, all of them utterly fantastic (Elden Ring actually being the weakest of the list). Pretty sure Kena will prove to be my favorite of the year, but I think it'll take me months to get through everything, simply because I haven't wanted to move on from anything yet. Some previous lesser-known favorites include Sayonara Wild Hearts, Stellaris, and Spiritfarer. [0] https://acloserlisten.com/2022/12/12/press-a-2022-the-years-best-videogame-soundtracks/ https://acloserlisten.com/2022/12/12/press-a-2022-the-years-...

vanilla_nut 4y ago
Fun fact: SEO spam and AI-driven search seems to have made "Press A" a completely un-googleable term at this point. Seems to correct me to Wordpress no matter what I do, even using quotes, and then ignores A as a glue word. It occurs to me that finding this blog would be a good test for a search engine.
- eipi10_hn 4y ago
  I searched *Press A* in Kagi and it shows that website at the top for me https://wtf.roflcopter.fr/pics/o4jKTW7y/C6N4W6W5.png https://wtf.roflcopter.fr/pics/o4jKTW7y/C6N4W6W5.png
aks_tldr 4y ago
Wow thank you sir for introducing me to these Jems. See no algorithm will come close to understanding such intricate cultural details.

prawn 4y ago

Were you using Discover Weekly or similar? I've found Spotify helped me create a massive list of songs I really liked. My liked list is up over 2,000 and Discover Weekly will usually unearth another 10+ great options without fail each week, and similar with song or artist radio. Wonder if it's preferred genres or something that happens with a certain playlist size? (One of my gripes is that the shuffle on long lists isn't very good, but I solved that by splitting my main list into a few sub-playlists and then using shuffle on those.)

hjadal 4y ago
My discover weekly used to be great, but at some point it broke and started suggesting me finnish, dutch and german music. Despite me always skipping them in the discover weekly.
- mackrevinack 4y ago
  same here. i had much better results years ago but recently i think ive been getting someone elses discover weekly by mistake because there is hardly anything on it that i like
- prawn 4y ago
  I often favour music without lyrics because it's less distracting in an office environment, so music by international artists doesn't bother me at all - might even be preferable. More interesting for my kids to hear international influences if we're listening in the car too. I just checked my Discover Weekly for this week to see if maybe it had gone downhill, and fav'ed about 20+ out of 30. I think it must just work very well for the styles I like.
apercu 4y ago
Weird. I usually call it "Discover Weakly" or "Discover Meekly" because it's usually about every 3rd week that I find a new artist. I like all sorts of Americana but Spotify loves to feed me blues. I'm not all that in to "blues".