F13 Music Recommendations.

[Sky]

Thirding Pandora, really helped open my horizons to some new stuff.

I'm really into the Blues, and all styles. Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley, BB King to name some major ones. Delta blues are good.

Hoodoo Man Blues - Junior Wells (possibly my favorite Chicago Blues album)
Live In Boston vol 1 - Fleetwood Mac (zomg early mac  )
Gold Collection - Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf (2 disc)
Susan Tedeschi - Just Won't Burn (It Hurts So Bad rules)
Luther Allison - Bad News is Coming (amazing funk blues)
Son Seals - Live and Burning (more great funk blues)
John Mayall's Bluesbreakers (the Beano album, Claptop is God, a classic)
Albert King - Born Under A Bad Sign (with the Stax band, one of my favorites)
Otis Rush - The Essential Otis Rush (Otis is a total badass)
George Thorogood - George Thorogood and the Destroyers (Delta Slide is wicked)
Muddy Waters - Hard Again (with Johnny Winter, smokin' late career album)
Elmore James - King of the Slide Guitar
SRV - Live at Carnegie Hall
Etta James - Rocks the House
Eric Clapton - Sessions for Robert J (a bit looser then the actual finished album)
Buddy Guy - Skin Deep (his new album, Lyin' Like a Dog may be the best track he's ever recorded)
Freddie King - The Ultimate Collection
John Lee Hooker - Very Best of

Getting a bit more historical:

Alan Lomax: Blues Songbook (good intro to a lot of stuff)
Big Bill Broonzy - All The Classic Sides (Big Bill is amazing)
Robert Johnson - The Complete Recordings
Son House - Preachin' the Blues (maybe the best Delta artist)

8GB, heh. I have a 30GB ipod that's waaaay too small. I just cherry picked some of the better stuff to list here. We could also get into jazz (Django Reinhard or Count Basie) and classical (Christopher Parkening or Cantiga) and punk (Fear - The Record). Neo-ska-whatever I like King Django and the Slackers. You mentioned Claptop, I listed my favorite Claptop album (and also Beano), but his From the Cradle is excellent as well. Santana, heh...Black Magic Woman is a Fleetwood Mac song, and there's an amazing version on the Mac album I listed, it's really an outstanding recording (also features Green Manalishi, later recorded by Judas Priest).

edit: Forgot to add Rev. Horton Heat! And Brian Setzer Orchestra/Stray Cats/Nashvillians, Devil Makes Three, Drive-By Truckers. So much good stuff. Folsom Prison Johnny Cash or Cook County BB King for some big house stuff. Allman Bros are another great band, either the classic stuff (Fillmore) or the modern lineup which is as good or better (Live at Jazzfest 2007 via their website). Aretha Franklin - the Delta Meets Detroit, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Blind Willie Johnson, Charley Patton, Chet Atkins, Chuck Berry, Corrosion of Conformity - Deliverance, Derek Trucks Band - Live at Georgia, Eric Burdon with War, Funkadelic, Godsmack - Faceless, Guy Davis (kind of a modern Gary Davis or John Hurt), Taj Mahal, Hound Dog Taylor, James Brown - Say It Live and Loud (BEST FUNK ALBUM EVER), Jelly Roll Morton, Hendrix - Jimi Blues, Johnny Winter - Progressive Blues Experiment, Kenny Wayne Sheppard - 10 Days Out (great great documentary), Kyuss (stoner rock), Leadbelly, Leon Redbone, Les Claypool, Lightnin' Hopkins, Little Walter, Los Lonely Boys, Magic Sam - West Side Soul (classic), Mars Volta, Meat Beat Manifesto, Melvins ( Buzzo), Mushroomhead, Otis Redding, Otis Taylor, Our Lady Peace, Paul Butterfield, Pepe Romero, Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder (bluegrass awesome), Roosevelt Sykes (great piano blues), Sonny Boy Williamson, Sonny Landreth, Tom Waits - Small Change, Tomahawk (or anything Mike Patton does), Warren Haynes/Gov't Mule, Wilson Pickett, Zen Guerrilla...that's just another snippet, scrolling through my playlist and picking some of the better stuff.

[Salamok]

Embarrassing to admit but I usually code to Sting or REM, fits in the pleasant yet non-engaging, non-distracting, background music to code by category. 

So if you ever plan on loaning me your music player to listen to while coding then you have to put both collective works on it.

[Ookii]

Digable Planets, A Tribe Called Quest, and Black Sheep for your old school hip-hop.

I don't really know what is considered electronic, but Goldfrapp, Massive Attack, Royksopp, and Ladytron.

[IainC]

Also try Rosetta Stone,Psychedelic Furs, Suspiria and Velvet Acid Christ for moody melodic rock or ambient EBM. New Model Army are great for 80s alt rock flashbacks too.

Das Ich are in the same mould as the industrial stuff Schild posted earlier but a bit more shouty - they have done some cracking remixes of VNV Nation stuff though.

[Merusk]

The lack of Prince in this thread is a crime.

[Tige]

Depending on what you are listening to or looking for it's worth having both Pandora and LastFM.

Here's some free/legal stuff to find explore.

http://www.beatmaka.com/index.php - Little bit of everything.  Requires a sign up, I've never gotten any spam or anything other than a news letter once every couple months, if that.

http://music.download.com/?tag=navtab - You can spend hours, if not days, here.  Plenty of free stuff, especially classical.

http://evanescencereference.info/music/ - No brainer.

http://www.purevolume.com/ - Hit or miss.



edit:  No downloads here but one of the best radio streaming options imho for finding new stuff.  http://somafm.com/

[Signe]

Schild and I said Frou Frou within a day of each other!  What are the odds?  Maybe he really IS the long lost non-biological son of mine.  Funny that.  He doesn't seem to muster up any signs of maternal instinct.  Maybe it's my overwhelming dread fear of drunken children without jobs.

[Amarr HM]

Oh oh forgot to mention.
Stone roses - Stone Roses & Second Coming

[trias_e]

Since you mentioned classical, here's a random list:

Bach - Organ works:    Toccata and Fugue in D Minor 565 is the famous one.  They are all good.

Vivaldi - Four Seasons:     Simple yet very effective.  Very diverse in emotion but very tight and focused.  Generally translates quite well to modern listeners.

Mozart Piano Concerto #24:   His piano concertos are all impressive but often showman-like and not particularly serious.  This one, on the other hand, is some serious shit. 

Mozart Symphony #40:  Great not in the initial theme but the development.  With alot of classical hits this is the case, but listeners only recognize the initial theme.

All of Chopin's piano works 

Schubert - Unfinished Symphony:  Probably one of the most violent and intense over-the-top first movements ever.  Simple and beautiful regardless.

Dvorak - Symphony for the New World

Grieg - Peer Gynt:   You'll recognize it.  It's alot of fun to listen to.  Translates very well to modern listening.

All of Beethoven's piano concertos:  This is where his greatness really shines.  Later ones are quite possibly the peak of western classical music.

Debussy - anything will get you the picture, so to speak (hur hur)

Prokofiev - Romeo and Juliet

Holst - The Planets:  Mars at the least is fucking badass.

[climbjtree]

Okay, so my connection is slow and I've had to pick and choose between what I'm sampling for now. I must say, y'all have good tastes in music.

There's lots of really good stuff here that I hadn't heard of before, and you guys have made some really good suggestions that I'd just totally forgotten about. Specifically I'm thinking of Psychedelic Furs, which reminded me of The Bolshoi, so thanks for that!

Some long list of blues musicians is great, too. I'm always glad to be exposed to more stuff.

[MrHat]

Guys, I don't think climbjtree has heard.

[climbjtree]

Heard what?

[schild]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHg5SJYRHA0

[Tige]

Specifically I'm thinking of Psychedelic Furs

Just looked at what I have with the P-furs on my iphone.  I've got them with;
INXS
Echo and the Bunnymen
Gary Numan
OMD
Love and Rockets
Depeche Mode
The Cure
The Clash
The Church
Squeeze
Pet Shop Boys
Thompson Twins
English Beat


....and on and on

[climbjtree]

Am I the only person that still watches the video after they realize they've been rickrolled?

Also, good call on Echo and the Bunnymen.

[schild]

Oh hey, someone mentioned Love and Rockets.

Might I mention Tones on Tail? Might as well pick up the album Everything! if you can track it down. It's good stuff.

Skip Dali's Car.

[stray]

Yeah, seconded (thirded?) on Love and Rockets

[schild]

Also, Peter Murphy - Wild Birds. I'd name specific albums, but they really collected his best stuff there. Might as well get Alive Just for Love also, mostly for the inclusion of Cool Cool Breeze, which might be one of the best poems ever.

[stray]

The lack of Prince in this thread is a crime.

Prince is like Billy Idol and Madonna to me... Totally awesome persona/gimmick/what have you, great vox, people I admire, but only like 5 songs that were truly great to me.

[schild]

Billy Idol does not have 5 great songs. Two would be stretching it.

[stray]

White Wedding, Rebel Yell, Dancing With Myself, Eyes Without a Face, and...his cover of Gimme Some Truth in Generation X

[Bunk]

My personal favorite pet (Canadian) indie band:  http://www.jakalope.net/ Several full length samples on their site.

They're a Dave Ogilvie/Phil Caivano project, female singer from Alberta, Trent Reznor is the associate producer, and includes guest stuff from Bob Pantella (Monster Magnet), Alex Lifeson (Rush), and Bill Reiflin (REM) among others.

[stray]

Jackalopes don't exist in Canada. Just Texas! 

Another good Trent collab is The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of Niggy Tardust (Saul Williams album)


[edit] Also, if you'd like a newish metal fix, Mastodon rules

[IainC]

Oh hey, someone mentioned Love and Rockets.

Might I mention Tones on Tail? Might as well pick up the album Everything! if you can track it down. It's good stuff.

Skip Dali's Car.

All of the Bauhaus splinter groups are pretty good. In fact most of them are better than Bauhaus...

Simple Minds are a much underrated band as well if you're on an 80s alt rock kick.

[schild]

Ok, Jeff pointed me to the fact that Wolfsheim split and Peter went on his own.

Well.

If his "own" means really really fucking good, then so be it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwIK-kTuD3o

Goddamn that's great.

Peter Heppner - Solo

[Merusk]

The lack of Prince in this thread is a crime.

Prince is like Billy Idol and Madonna to me... Totally awesome persona/gimmick/what have you, great vox, people I admire, but only like 5 songs that were truly great to me.

Well I agree and I disagree. I don't listen to whole albums of Prince, but he's got more than a few songs I can listen to, but then I like a lot of Madonna too.  I know, It's sad.  I think part of it is it's the music I remember from the age of 8 and up.

Did anyone mention Bowie? I didn't see Bowie or Eurythmics/ Annie Lennox in here either. rar!

I think my music taste is broken at times. I go from the above to Slayer/ Pantera to Mr. Bungle then off to Depeche Mode before a series of Weird Al songs on my iPod.

M-m-m-my Bologna.

[stray]

Shit.. Don't feel bad.. seems like the tastes of quite a few of us are eclectic and "broken". That's a good thing!

Bowie is an absolute through the 70's. I pretty much bypass the 80's and 90's. Some of the recent albums are cool though.

[schild]

Bowie is another one I felt was just obvious. I mean, comeon, do we really have to name every other HUGE MEGASTAR that wasn't named.

Oh man, maybe he should get the Rolling Stones and some Springsteen on there.

Shit, fuck yea, throw some fucking Beatles on there also.

THIS IS LIVING.

[stray]

Wait I actually did mention the Stones and Springsteen, didn't I?

Haha

[Signe]

What a bunch of tired old stuff you all listen to.  And that's coming from someone who is probably older than very nearly mostly all of at least one of you. 

[Merusk]

I think, to your chagrin, you'd be surprised how many younger people don't know Bowie, Springsteen, etc.  Much like most people my age don't know Dizzy Gillespie, Al Jolson, The Big Bopper, Frankie Valli, or Buddy Holly other than by name. (Or, "oh hay weren't those guys in that La Bamba movie?")

Music stars have a narrow window of fandom, unless the are ICONIC. Bowie isn't iconic in any way shape or form like The Stones or The Beatles.

What a bunch of tired old stuff you all listen to.  And that's coming from someone who is probably older than very nearly mostly all of at least one of you. 

The new stuff I listen to is of the hard rock variety.  Modern pop, R&B and Rap aren't my thing.  It happens, we get old music moves on.

[Signe]

I don't listen to modern pop, r&b or rap either, for the most part.  I do like some rapcore but that's hardly the sort of rap I think you mean.  I mostly passively listen to whatever Righ is into at the moment which ranges from  Hawkwind (eek! talk about old!) to Porcupine Tree to something or other that was invented just a minute ago.  I can't keep up with him.  An evening relaxing with music for me is usually a spli.. umm... lemonade? and some kind of progressive trance or house.  Electropunk or Industrial or something if I'm feeling edgy.  Some of it's old, but not ancient!  Don't let them turn you into a weirdy beardy, Climbjtree! 

(I do still have a soft spot in my head... I mean heart... for Slayer, though)

[stray]

I like to think that, like any musician, my taste is solid, old and new, eclectic, and not-giving-of-the-fuck of what sounds hip or outdated or obscure or conventional. It's just all noise in the end. Most of it is just the same variations of the same 6 or 7 chords being clanked away under different recording situations. And as long as there's some sincerity to it, it's alright by me.

[edit] currently, i've been delving into the "nordic" folk black metal shit, looking for some be-all-end-all representative of that sound... haven't found one. interesting genre though (sometimes a bit tacky... and in many cases, totally fucking insincere  ).

[schild]

Of course it's insincere. My recommendation, start and stop with Hard Rock Hallelujah.

[stray]

That's actually not so bad... It's missing the orchestral folk element though. Like these guys (tacky? still not sure.. could be awesome):

Einherjer