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Discover New Music

  • Abnormal Anonymous

    • 8 out of 10
    • Congo Norvell
    • Very few albums manage to capture snapshots of a quality of life in the manner that Congo Norvell's sophomore record, "Abnormals Anonymous," does.

      Comparisons to the Velvet Underground are

  • Another Day on Earth

    • 10 out of 10
    • Brian Eno
    • In his first proper solo release since 1996's relatively cold "The Drop," Brian Eno has constructed a whimsical and ecclectic masterpiece which is arguably one of the year's strongest records thus fa
  • The Life Pursuit

    • 8 out of 10
    • Belle & Sebastian
    • The Life Pursuit is a sort of Reeses Peanut Butter Cup. You get Belle & Sebastian's peanut butter (its wistful, often irresistible pop) dipped in a 'Have A Nice Day!' and glam 70s chocol

  • Go Away White

    • 10 out of 10
    • Bauhaus
    • Go Away White is an album I've been waiting more than 20 years to hear, and the good news is that it was worth the wait.  The latest -- and last, no...for real this time -- album from

  • Aretha Sings the Blues

    • 6 out of 10
    • Aretha Franklin
    • While she didn't always have the best taste in song selection, Aretha Franklin is a must-study for anyone with interest in the human voice. She has the kind of powerful, recklessly passionate deliv

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News

Gates: New Zune and New Strategies Against Apple

Microsoft’s Bill Gates has ambitious plans to take music customers away from Apple, according to the New York Times on Thursday. This is despite the fact that the Zune music player has just a few percent of the music player market and subscription music hasn’t been a huge success.

Mr. Gates expressed bewilderment that the record industry had failed to turn digital music into a big moneymaker. Jeff Leeds reported that Microsoft has plans to change all that. First, Microsoft has taken pains to associate the Zune with the rising stars in music. Next, Microsoft will focus on selling music without DRM.

The final part of the strategy is to encourage music labels to work harder on promoting unlimited subscriptions. [Apple has always suggested that people want to own their music.]

“Subscriptions have absolutely been a mixed story and are not the mainstream thing today,” Mr. Gates said.

However, he thinks that will change in the future.

"People are going to listen to a lot more music because it’s going to be easy to find neat new exciting music, its going to be easy to have your music with you, in the car, when you’re running,” he said. “It seems like there ought to be a way to translate that into an opportunity."

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