Blalock's Clones

September 7, 2010 1:22 PM

Blalock's Indie Playlist is a pretty good way for me to find new music. However, it's rather indie-centric and my tastes in music are more diverse than that. Are there any other playlists on the internet that do the same kind of thing except with different genres?

To specify, I know about sites like pandora and last.fm, but that's not what I want. I'd like complied best-of lists of songs that are mainly focused on new/unknown music and artists.

posted by fizzzzzzzzzzzy to media & arts (11 answers total)

Caytlin can rock a todo list
Cut the Crap Mp3 playlist
posted by Memo at 1:41 PM on September 7, 2010 [2 favorites]

http://www.sordomusic.com/db/

Pretty indie, but also varied

RCRDLBL.com

All legit free music, multi-genre

XLR8R.COM

All free again, pretty diverse, but with an electronic slant.
posted by bobby_newmark at 1:54 PM on September 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

Resident Advisor is a pretty great electronic music site. The design of the front page can make it look daunting – yeah, there are a lot of sections – but I like it mostly because it's ridiculously convenient to use to find music. You have to create a free user account, but once you do, you can listen to most of the top tracks listings; there are top 50s for every month and top 100s for every year, and each list has handy little play buttons next to most tracks. (I'm actually working my way through August right now.) They also do daily reviews of albums and singles. Lastly, if what you want is an easily-listenable grab bag of new music, they also post a really great podcast with a different DJ (many of the best in the world) mixing every week.
posted by koeselitz at 2:25 PM on September 7, 2010

You should check out BBC Radio 1's web site too. They tend to break down their shows by genre, but some DJs are known for being eclectic and playing across styles including: Zane Lowe, Gilles Peterson, Annie Mac and Rob da Bank. Almost all of the shows have extensive track listing archives and are available to stream online.
posted by the foreground at 2:29 PM on September 7, 2010

You're in luck! I just compiled a playlist of all of the best non-commercial streaming college radio stations in North America. There is always an awesome set being played somewhere! Enjoy: ZoomOut.in College Radio Map and Playlist
posted by foraneagle2 at 2:31 PM on September 7, 2010

Maybe some of the "Music that Matters" podcasts from KEXP.org?
posted by Zoyashka at 3:25 PM on September 7, 2010

WFMU's Beware of the Blog is a good resource for all things un-discovered and weird.
posted by ooklala at 7:35 PM on September 7, 2010

http://8tracks.com

You can very easily pick genre.
posted by Windigo at 8:27 PM on September 7, 2010

It's not really a playlist but shuffler.fm plays music from music blogs (so, it meets someone's criteria) according to the genre you choose.
posted by Memo at 10:05 PM on September 7, 2010

Blalock's playlists are actually an idea copied off of Criznittle's (warning, Demonid link) Indie/Rock Playlist torrent project from a few years ago which was halted after Criznittle's desktop was seized but seems to have started up again. In general, I find Criznittle's mixed to have less indie pop and variation so if you're into torrenting, give it a go.

If not, Hype Machine is a great resource. It has a lot more electronic music but also a great deal of indie. Popdose also has regular Friday mixtapes which carry a great range of music though they, too, are sometimes indie-centric.

Lately though, I've been obsessing over the Free Music Archive which you can sort by genre. It's a great resource if you want a source for new music.
posted by dubusadus at 10:17 PM on September 7, 2010

It's against rules to pimp your own site on MF but I think it's relevant to the discussion since music playlists is sort of our specialty:

htttp://www.moteldemoka.com

Playlists in there are definitely not as massive as Blalock's - 5 to 8 songs per post usually - but they're more frequent (well, used to be... haven't updated the blog myself in weeks) and you will find them covering several genres and moods. Hope it helps.
posted by moteldemoka at 9:54 AM on September 9, 2010