My Shiny New Timesuck

See the blue box in my already-crowded righthand sidebar? (I can't figure out how to put stuff anywhere else). Terry Teachout reminded me of Pandora's existence; unfortunately I can't remember who first put me onto it.

You must, must go there, but briefly, here's the deal: you start with a song (or artist) you like and Pandora (courtesy of the Music Genome Project) starts suggesting others songs you might like, not based on some limited, genre-based, record-company template, but on a bazillion qualities such as "mild rhythmic syncopation, mixed acoustic and electric instrumentation and major key tonality" (the qualities that made them think I might like Joni Mitchell's "Nothing Can Be Done.")

Read Monsieur Teachout's post for a far more intelligent commentary on this offering than I could ever produce. Meanwhile, I'll waste my life (and my husband will waste his) refining our "stations."

You'll notice I have two so far. One was called "Spit On A Stranger Radio"; I changed it to Watering Place because it's the repository for absolutely everything I like, from New Order to Barbara Cook. The other is called "Life In a Northern Town": that's the song I started with, trying to create a station that I can play while I'm working on my book and trying to remember what it's like to be 14 (awful). Of course, Pandora doesn't deal in such surface classifications as "80s," but I am finding some interesting current stuff that suggests the sounds of my youth, which did take place in a Northern Town, so why not keep the name?

Shut up, MomVee, so your two readers can hit Pandora.