Pandora music recommendation service claims to discover what music you like and give you more of it.
I’m always interested in discovering new artists. Portishead, Sleeper, The Breeders, Sneaker Pimps; I discovered all of them by using such early services like HOMR and Firefly.
So I figured I’d try and see if I could find jazz music like that played on the Cowboy Bebop soundtrack. A local radio station plays that sort of music on the weekends; I like it; would definitely like to hear more of it and add it to my collection.
So…. I tried Tank!, the Cowboy Bebop theme. They never heard of it. How about Seatbelts, the Yoko Kanno-led jazz band that performs the song? Nope. Heck, how about Yoko Kanno herself? THEN it plays something; dance music or something from Battle Angel Alita or something like that. Crap.
Well, put Portishead and Sneaker Pimps in. And I get stuff like Madonna and REM. Pass.
How about male vocalists like Crash Test Dummies and Mark Knopfler? Actually… that kind of worked… and I am listening to it now… the songs all sound more or less similar to each other, but that’s what I asked for, I guess.
But so far, I’m just not getting that excitement I felt when I first heard Portishead… instead, it sounds like an easy listening radio station.
I want to be led somewhere a little dangerous; Pandora keeps you safely within the warm confines of what you know.
Those earlier services took your playlist, compared it with other people’s playlists, and let you know about things they liked that maybe you would like if you heard it. Pandora just tries for stuff that sounds just like the stuff you already listen to – except, probably not as good. You put in the names of the best, right? Anything similar is probably not the best, by definition.
