Every quarter I scrape all of my commonly listened-to music into a Spotify playlist of its own, before moving on to totally new music and repeating the cycle. It’s a ‘slash and burn’ process which I detailed right here a few weeks back, and now it’s time for my latest release!
Star Mix ☆ Q3-12 (balearic, progressive, vocal)
For the last couple of years I’ve been using Spotify as a paid-up subscriber. It’s £10/month in the UK, which is a strong cost:value ratio for the time and various means by which I use it, such as:
And since I no longer play physical CDs, nor use iTunes or other media player (barring web apps such as SoundCloud, Hype Machine, Mixcloud etc.) Spotify has become the main hub and jumping-off point for whatever type of music I’m after.
Spotify leaves it to its users to build, subscribe to and share playlists, their primary organisational schema, however they see fit. But with millions of tracks and carte blanche to curate a personal library of preferences comes a unique challenge: how should one filter, organise and archive their preferences with access to the worlds biggest music collection?
There is no self-populating iTunes-esque ‘smart playlist’ feature, no editorialised ‘recommended playlists’ feature, and until recently there was no way to search playlists without third-party involvement. Users have to come up with their own organisational approach, and I use my patented Star System™. Here’s how it works:
So without further ado, here are my Star Mix Playlists for your listening pleasure, along with some tasting notes.
And finally, my current star mix. Subscribe to this one if you only want my new stuff in your earholes. Happy listening!
Er, yeah, sorry about that… Here’s what I’ve been up to instead though!
Meanwhile, Brand Republic goes and published The BR 200 which is a list of “the best advertising, marketing, media, PR and digital blogs.” They stuck me in at #153, which is cool! Thing is, I haven’t blogged that much, have I? I’ll sort that out, sorry.
Meanwhile, as a mark of respect to the others on the BR 200, and to any remaining readers out there, I’ve compiled an OPML list of all the blogs on that list, which you can import into your RSS reader of choice.
There ya go, people! Enjoy all those proper bloggers. Hehe.
I can’t play any instruments, but this is the album I like to play about with on Djay, mixing software for iPad
[hr]
Voted best guitar solo ever, so get ready for a face-melter! Thanks to Andrew for the hookup.
[hr]
Hmm… no comment.
[hr]
I remember this blaring out over the kitchen speakers as I began to develop a taste for music.
[hr]
These guys were the soundtrack to my summer last year – nearly that time again!
[hr]
So there we have it, people – thirty songs that mean something to me in (at least in some small way). I hope this has been at all enlightening, it’s certainly been fun to put together. Don’t forget, you can always submit new music to me by adding to my collaborative Spotify playlist.
Happy listening, Tom x
I recently upgraded to a brand new phone, the Samsung Galaxy S2, and let me tell you, her beauty is a thing to behold.
This is my second Android device, my first being an HTC Hero, whom I loved like a little brother. But I love my Galaxy like she’s a sexy robot from the future, trained to be awesome.
Given I’ll be spending the next couple of years with her, it’s important that I maximise all that awesomeness. For me, that boils down to the following areas:
It’s quite possible to achieve these things from your Android device: it just requires a bit of time to work out your priorities, and sometimes the advice of a few well respected sources. Ultimately, it’s experience that leads to a happy relationship. By the way, yes, I’m still talking about mobile phones.
With all of this in mind, I think I’ve found my ultimate Android setup, the perfect relationship, if you will. So without further ado, I present to you my Ultimate Android Homescreen, a perfectly-tuned combination of sexiness, usefulness, battery life and entertainment.
At just three screens, she’s the most efficient I could conceive of – the product of several hours hard thinking!
A couple of things glue this all together: Tasker, and LauncherPro. I also advise JuiceDefender, but like all of the apps listed below, it’s not an essential. After all, this is more a ‘what worked for me could work for you’ article (like this one).
(click the graphic to view in fullscreen)
Whether you follow this exact recipe, or you choose to develop your own ultimate Android homescreen, I hope you’ll be very happy together, and I’d love to hear from you in the comments below.