NPR.com for Music (Web Review)

The National Public Radio (NPR) website is absolutely fantastic for music fans. There are a plethora of features and sections that make this website one that I check often. I have just started using this site within the past three months so I am definitely not a veteran to the site but I have poked my nose around enough to be familiar with it.

Concerts

This is the best website that I know of apart from youtube to go to find a concert. It has the pretty much the best quality of sound that you can get for a live concert and the music player that they have is great. The player has a Q and so you can get a nice long set list going for yourself. There is such a wide variety and if you think NPR is just for Classical music you were wrong, it is one hip site. The variety includes classical, blues, jazz, rock, pop, hip-hop, and some folk action, and everything else. The hosts of the Concerts are great and intro the bands nicely and give you a sense of what is going on before the concert begins.

Free Downloads!

The best part of the concerts and this site is that there are many free shows to download. I have personally downloaded about 50 concerts for free from bands such as The Avett Brothers, Tallest Man On Earth, Dirty Projectors, Spoon, Dawes, Phoenix, Jonsi, Low Anthem, Adele, The XX, Iron and Wine, Yeah Yeah Yeahs!, David Bazan, The Antlers, and well…. so many more. It is always interesting to hear a live performance and better when you get to keep it. It took a little doing to find all of these performances but look up your favorite band and see if they have one, or look through the entire list of concerts and choose the ones you like.

First Listen

Before a CD is released on this website you can get a First Listen to many albums. Just recently they previewed Panda Bear, Fleet Foxes, and The Antlers. The entire album is available and so you can see if you actually want to buy the album before its release date. This has made me want to purchase some music while deterred me from others and is definitely a valuable tool to use.

All Songs Considered

This is actually a program that does just what the title implies: people talking about music, bands, and of course, songs. It is nice to not have to blindly search the internet to find new music alone and nice to have some suggestions from others. This is a show that does that very well. They also play it 24/7 on the internet and it is available on podcast so you can listen anywhere you would like. It has been going on for 10 years and it is still going strong.