Top 8 Free Music Websites

Posted by The Happy Rock on April 22, 2009

music-free-internet-sites The world of free online music has changed quite a bit from the early days of bulletin boards and Napster. Now, there are so many unique and useful free music services and web sites out there that it can spin your head. Most of them are legal or at least not illegal at this point as the RIAA is usually slow to embrace new movements on the internet.

I did my best to sort through the tidal wave of music services to provide a unique blend of the best free music services. Pretty much all of these options play almost any song that the common music listener can think of.

Pandora – My personal favorite. You create a station by requesting a particular artist and Pandora attempts to play music on that ‘station’ that is similar using a huge database of properties. You can thumbs up and thumbs down songs and bands to tailor the station to play exactly the type of music you want. I have stations for Folk, Christian Rock, Hardcore, Female Rock, Blues, Modern Classical, and many others. All my stations are trained and I usually can just hit play and listen. I rarely have to thumbs down a song anymore. The coolest part is discovering new bands that you had no idea existed. The one drawback is that to keep it legal you can’t rewind or replay a song; you have to wait until the station plays it again.
Blip.fm – This one has been referred to as the ‘Twitter for Music’. You create an account and become a social DJ. You search for the song you want and you can play it and/or Blip it. Blip it means adding a short twitter like message and recommending it to your ‘listeners’. Others can subscribe to your ‘feed’ and play the songs that you recommend. Check out Trent Reznor’s Blip page for a good example.
Grooveshark - Peer to peer music service. Grooveshark connects you with music hosted by other people who have already purchased the rights to the music. You can either buy the song from them or listen to the song for free. Just search for the song you want and hit play. It is as easy and perfect as it sounds. You don’t even need an account to play songs.
Sky.fm – Free streaming radio stations. They have a large range of music categories and huge collection of electronic dance stations. Sky.fm was my reintroduction to free online music, but I have since moved on to Pandora.
imeem – Search and play site similar to Grooveshark, but they do also have videos available to watch. They have a larger selection of music too. You will need to sign up for an account to play songs though.
TheSixtyOne – Unique Digg like service that allows the user to vote up the best music. After a quick listen I realized that most of the music on this site is non mainstream and unique. Great for someone who wants to find great music that is off the beaten path.
Last.fm – Offers a service that is similar to Pandora, Grooveshark, and Blip all in one place. The only problem for me is that I never really got the site interface. I am happy with the offerings at other sites so I never really got into Last.fm
Jamendo – Free listening and downloads. Jamendo allows budding new artists to share their music with new listeners. I figured I better throw in a service that lets you download free music to round off the list. Most of the sites that offer ‘free’ downloads get closed down pretty quickly. Bearshare is still ‘legal’, but that requires you to download software to get access to the music so it doesn’t quite fit on the list.

Hope you enjoy trying out some of these great services. My favorites are Pandora and Grooveshark.

Feel free to share any other sites or experiences that you think are worthy of a mention in the comments section.

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Comments

16 Responses to “Top 8 Free Music Websites”

the weakonomist (13 comments.) on April 22nd, 2009 7:22 am

Yes, Pandora is also my top choice. I even have it on my iPhone. The only problem I’ve ever had with it is many times I don’t like the artists they pick from the algorithm. Example, I like Eminem, but not 50 Cent. It’s taken a lot of thumb downs to get rid of him from that station.
jasmor@ Myrtle Beach Real Estate (1 comments.) on April 22nd, 2009 8:49 am

nice lists

although i love the way some online radio stations work.

skeemer or tunecup lead the way in online music
downloading service.
Mortgage Calculator Man (3 comments.) on April 22nd, 2009 10:49 am

First time visitor! But I’ll be back. Nice posts.

I love Pandora. I haven’t heard of several of the others but I’m going to have to give them all a spin and see how they stack up.

Thanks for the info!
Ben (1 comments.) on April 22nd, 2009 2:28 pm

Hey, thanks for including us (Grooveshark) in this post! We’re insanely flattered to be included on this list! Just a quick FYI: Grooveshark used to be all P2P, where users would get compensated for sharing their tunes. But recently (the last year or so), we’ve focused just on getting music people want right to their ears.

Basically, instead of messy uploading/downloading, just think of any song you want and listen to it right there in the browser. Pandora on steroids?

Anyway, thanks again for the mention! As a small bunch, it really means a lot to us–you rock. If there’s absolutely anything I can do to help out, please please pretty-please ping me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/grooveshark

<3
ben+grooveshark
Kenneth Sena on April 22nd, 2009 8:11 pm

cool list out here. i think the sky.fm is best for me. like to search on radio stations. (www.kika.ca)
Frugal Tips (1 comments.) on April 22nd, 2009 9:48 pm

Pandora is my favorite also. I am embarrassed to admit that I have never heard of the other 7.

I am Russian, so I often listen to Moskva.fm – free Russian radio with lots of options. But it is all in Russian, so if you don’t speak the language, it will be useless:-)
The Happy Rock (336 comments.) on April 22nd, 2009 10:25 pm

@Weakonomist – Maybe it has been so long that I don’t remember thumbing down a ton of songs, but all my stations are all now trained unless I let the station run for a hours then it might throw in an odd song or two.

@jasmor – Thanks for the other two sites.

@MCM – Thanks for stopping by, hopefully you find something you like.

@Ben – Thanks for the Grooveshark comment. It is interesting to know that it isn’t peer to peer anymore, does that mean you have to pay a per song royalty like Pandora?
MoneyEnergy (7 comments.) on April 22nd, 2009 11:47 pm

Great to see thesixtyone on here, I love it. I tried blip.fm, but it’s a bit awkward. I’ll have to check out the others, thanks alot for the list.
Brinkman on April 23rd, 2009 12:47 pm

No http://www.Slacker.com. Crazy. They rock. They have tons of stations plus you can make your own. Plus they have iPhone apps. BlackBerry too.
The Happy Rock (336 comments.) on April 24th, 2009 9:55 am

@MoneyEnergy – SixtyOne is interesting, although blip.fm’s uniqueness is what is intriguing. Especially interesting is to see what others, especially friends or celebs are playing.

@Brinkman – Thanks for the Slacker recomendation.
The Happy Rock (336 comments.) on April 24th, 2009 10:06 am

@Brinkman – Slacker is very much like pandora. I did notice that they have Comedy stations which I think is just brilliant. Listening to some Bill Cosby comedy as we speak.
SOAD (1 comments.) on April 26th, 2009 1:33 pm

i like pandora to, but VKMUSIC (russian program) is my favourite
MusicReviews (1 comments.) on April 28th, 2009 3:28 am

Very good information! It’s good to have a list with all these websites! Thanks!