| Non-motoring > Spotify discovery tool | Miscellaneous |
| Thread Author: Crankcase | Replies: 12 |
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 08:04
Spotify discovery tool - Crankcase
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Sometimes I'm ahead of the curve, usually woefully behind. I'm a bit behind this one, but nonetheless - if you can use spotify, and want to discover "stuff", try forgotify.com/ It offers you a track that exists in Spotify, but has never been played by anyone at all. Once you've heard it, it gets removed, so the chances are nobody will ever hear it again either, which appeals to me somehow. Anyway, you get a load of "what the heck", one or two "ok, that's bearable" and the occasional "hey like wow man, far out, I had no idea". I've "discovered" Kim Parker (daughter of Charlie) who I'd never heard before, The Routers and The Klezmatics, all of which I've enjoyed. And a load of old pony too of course. And some of the album artwork is fantastic, even if the music isn't. |
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 08:51
Spotify discovery tool - WillDeBeest
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Sounds like fun, Cranks. Now, perhaps you can help one who's even further behind. I'm trying to decide at the moment between Spotify / Sonos and Pure Music / Jongo to update my domestic and mobile multiroom and internet radio capability. So far I've gone as far as subscribing to Pure's premium £10 service, which allows me to download playlists for offline use - as in the car, when my Pure-driven iPod interface feels like letting me. It also works with Beestling Major's Contour internet radio. But the Jongo multiroom range has been poorly reviewed as difficult to set up and prone to network dropouts, so I'm holding off buying an A2 to play through my big amp and speakers. So should I jump to Spotify instead? Last time I looked the offline version was £20 rather than £10 but the bitrate is higher. Trouble is, it lacks Pure's access to iPlayer content and other on-demand radio, which is quite a biggie for me. I've also seen that Spotify would require me to use Facebook, which I don't have and don't want. But the Sonos hardware is universally admired - at a price to match - and a much more elegant networking solution than Pure's reliance on what it finds in the house. So, can you at least get me straight on the facts? Since I don't need true multiroom sound, perhaps I'd do better to stick with software clients on our smartphones and simply put a decent speaker dock in each room, plus maybe a Bluetooth streamer to feed the amplifier. Whadda ya think? |
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 09:07
Spotify discovery tool - Crankcase
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I'm not really the person to ask as I've not done what you are trying to do in anything like the same way. What I can tell you is that Spotify is £10 (less if you don't mind restrictions/ads), not £20, and you do get offline access in that price. I'm running it on four devices, and I think you can have five. You download the track is all. You can then play it in the car, as we do, for example, by plugging a device through the car speakers. However, you have to reconnect to Spotify within 30 days or it gets erased. I don't use Facebook to log in, but I joined before they made that mandatory, assuming they have, so that could be a show stopper if you don't want it. The bit rate, when set to "Extreme" is 320kbps on an iOS device. It doesn't say what it is on a PC but I expect it's the same. As for multiroom, I use my iPhone or iPad to Airplay the Spotify feed to my Apple TV in one room, and that feeds my amp and speakers. In another room with a second amp and speakers I've successfully used the same Airplay technique to send it to an Apple Airport express, and that has an optical out to the amp. Not as clever as Sonos by a long chalk, but how often do I need different streams in different rooms? Never for me is the answer. I looked at the Sonos thing, and it seemed to me that it's a huge amount of money for something you can do for a quarter of the price, but it is going to look lovely and probably just work without the fiddle. For me, tightwad I am, I fiddled to get the solution above. If I didn't have iOS and Airplay, sure, I'd use bluetooth I expect - cheap as chips to set up something. Don't know squiddly about Jongo though. Last edited by: Crankcase on Fri 25 Apr 14 at 09:09
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 13:49
Spotify discovery tool - smokie
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Hmmm Klezmer. I hadn't heard of it before I was in Key West last year and saw The World Inferno Friendship Society, who's "style merges punk, soul, klezmer and jazz, while its collective membership features horns, piano and guitar". I'm still not sure I'd recognise Klezmer if it hit me in the face but they were an awesome band. |
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 13:53
Spotify discovery tool - Alanovich
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| Sounds like 18 blokes all playing different tunes on too many instruments to me. Think I shall avoid that one.......... |
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 14:45
Spotify discovery tool - Crankcase
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Klezmer is new to me too, and takes a bit of getting used to - but you have to admit some of it has energy. If you care to, try Frank London's Klezmer Brass Allstars featuring Boban Markovic playing Cocek #5 by Freylekhs. I think that's right. Or you could put your head in a blender with a couple of trumpets, the end result is similar. |
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 15:28
Spotify discovery tool - WillDeBeest
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I've come across klezmer from Mahler's borrowing of it in his symphonies (as in the third movement of No 1). Never been quite brave enough to try it raw. Thanks for the information and corrections, Cranks. I'll be driving whatever from IOS - and possibly Mrs Beest's Android tablet. I don't regard a PC as a useful tool for listening to music - mainly because it's the wrong shape and usually in the wrong place. I'm using this one to digitize some LPs - specifically at the moment Ozzy Osbourne's Bark at the Moon, which I found last weekend in near-pristine condition but in a ratty sleeve. Sounds great, though. Last edited by: WillDeBeest on Fri 25 Apr 14 at 15:29
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New Fri 25 Apr 14 15:36
Spotify discovery tool - borasport
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I know nothing, but I know what I like :-) and the two Klezmer cd's I have in my collection represent opposing ends of that spectrum Marmaros' 'Lost Jewish Music of Transylvania' at one end (I kid you not) and Gogol Bordello's 'Oi Va Voi' at the other. I haven't played one of the for years, and every time I look at the other I wonder why it didn't go in the bin after the first airing ! |
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New Fri 9 May 14 15:33
Streaming through a hi-fi amp - WillDeBeest
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Little update on my hi-fi hookups. Had the last couple of weeks off work for medical reasons (operation to repair a sports injury, then lots and lots of exercises) so have also had time to consider what I need. Like Cranks, I decided true multiroom is an expense too far; I don't really need to pass from room to room and hear exactly the same thing. I do have two specific wishes:
The first is now satisfied with a V90-HPA headphone amplifier from Musical Fidelity, fed from the tape output of the big amp. It has another trick, which is a built-in DAC that can take digital audio straight from Windows or Mac, convert it and output it through the headphone sockets and its RCA analogue outlets. So I got to hear the hi-res stream of today's Radio 3 Lunchtime Concert through the good speakers. Clever, but not for every day because it means setting up a laptop in the living room. So for my regular streaming needs, I need something to take the audio output from an iPhone. Apparently iOS 7.1 makes it possible to get digital audio out of the dock port using the Camera Connection Kit, but this seems expensive for what it is, if not for what it makes possible. It would also tie the phone physically to the DAC / amp. So instead I've ordered - but not yet received - Logitech's latest Bluetooth Audio Adapter, which will pair with the iPhone and feed streamed audio to the big amp. It may not be the highest of fi but for £32 it'll let me test the principle, and if I like it enough I can come back for MF's V90-BLU and use the Logitech in another room. I can also make my own choice between Sonos and Pure (and whatever Apple comes up with in the rumoured acquisition of Beats) rather than being tied by my choice of hardware. Fun. |
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New Fri 6 Feb 15 23:33
Sonos and Jongo - WillDeBeest
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Nine months after saying I had no experience of Sonos or Jongo, and somewhat to my surprise, I've gained quite a lot. First to come along were the pair of Sonos Play:1 speakers that I've mentioned elsewhere. These took up residence in our bedroom and are - for their size, ease of use and £338 UK price, simply astonishing. I've fed them mostly on 320k mp3s from the house NAS, which they present like a miniature hifi system, with proper dynamics and separation, front to back as well as side to side. Combined with the comfort of the bed as a listening position they make for a very enjoyable experience. Next step is a subscription to a music service - could be Qobuz Hifi, could be Deezer Elite (both CD bitrate rather than 320k), won't be Spotify. I've already trialled Qobuz with the Sonos and they combine beautifully but I'm trying to work out the cost-utility balance at £20 a month in terms of pence per play. The Sonos system has grown this week, joined by an ex-demo Connect from a shop in Reading that now feeds the big MF amp in the living room. That, as you might imagine, sounds even better and makes a stronger case for going Qobuz. I won't be going back to Pure, who rather sweetly sent me a Jongo A2 as a goodbye gift when I stopped my Pure Music subscription. They'd like to compete with both Spotify and Sonos but neither the service - 192k mp3 - nor, fatally, the hardware is anywhere near good enough. The service could improve with work, but the hardware - if the A2 is typical - is infuriatingly underdeveloped. The biggest mistake is to make it use the house wifi for everything. Sonos used the house network for its first connection, then builds a dedicated Sonos mesh for everything else. Jongo does it all on wifi and, predictably, it doesn't always work. Nothing ruins music faster than signal breaks and dropouts, so it became just another bluetooth device. And it doesn't even do that as well as my thirty quid Logitech, needing to be manually reconnected every time, and with an irritating delay before responding to a change of volume. Pure makes great play of Jongo's 'compatibility' with all sorts of online streaming services, but all this means is that you can run the various streamer apps on a smartphone and bluetooth them to the A2, which in turn can bluetooth them on to other Jongo devices, but bluetooth is a pain even from the other end of a 6m room, and not what serious listening is made of. If you want true networked music - the best competition Jongo can offer to Sonos's multiple dedicated clients - then Pure ties you to the sonic and functional inadequacies of its proprietary service. The A2 when I was considering one was priced at £100; it can now be had for half that and I still can't recommend it. Sonos is expensive but so satisfying, and feels like it will go on pleasing for years. |
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New Sat 7 Feb 15 07:14
Sonos and Jongo - MD
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A pub close to here has 'Sonosed' the whole place and it is stunning, absolutely stunning. They received a years sub to Deezer as well then it's a tenner a year.. All of the staff can control the system from their phones and one of the clever young barmen has managed to rig it so that as he walks through different zones the volume increases as he enters and diminishes in the zone/area he has just left. Now where's my 8 track? |
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New Sat 7 Feb 15 07:17
Sonos and Jongo - MD
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| Oh! Forgot to say its worth taking a look at Boomer radio from the states. It is 'mildly' commercial, but so unobtrusive. Don't be put off by this. |
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New Mon 23 Feb 15 15:30
Deezer - WillDeBeest
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Quick update: enjoying a one-month trial of Deezer Premium+. Classical catalogue may not be quite as comprehensive as Qobuz but favourite artists like Anne-Sophie Mutter and Osmo Vänskä are there. The phone app is easier to navigate and it's much easier to 'sync' tracks to the phone to play via the iPod interface in the LEC. And I like the 'Radio Station' feature that you seed with an artist and that then offers tracks from others in related genres. Sonos integration is well sorted, and I'm impressed by the sound, even though it's only 320k. FLAC is coming next month in the shape of Deezer Elite; there's talk of special offers for existing subscribers, and I think I'll aim to grab one. |
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