Slackers and Tunes... Pass the Doritos
Browser based custom radio stations have been around for over a decade. I remember a friend of mine from AOL chats had a station on one such service. I've used Yahoo Music's LAUNCHcast from time to time over the years. I never found the concept compelling enough to fight through the huge number of clicks required to truly customize a station.
In the new world of MP3, mobile phones made for music, and satellite radio there seems to be little need to use web based radio. Even the CD is an endangered species.
When I read about Slacker in PC Magazine's Top 200 Web Sites, I planned to check them out simply to review the service for this very blog. I'd introduce it to my readers, then forget about it.
It was a week ago when I first checked them out. I'm still using the site. In fact, I have a browser widow going right now. My custom station is playing "Good Times Bad Times" - those Zeppelin boys had such trouble with their women.
The first thing I noticed about Slacker was the ability to start building a station and listening to the music without signing up or signing in. This is so rare on the web now, I was figuring that I would have lost the chance to save the station I was building. When I signed up for an account, already listening to the station I dubbed "Chris & Tina's Classic Rock Mix," I was able to save my settings.
The second feature that impressed me is how the software recommends similar artists. When you type in the first artist to add to your station, you are prompted with a list of twenty artists that are related musically. This neatly solves the problem of "blanking" when attempting to fill your station with all the music you love.
It's also possible to make further choices with the "Fine Tune" options. By setting Artist Discovery, Popularity (Song), Favorites, and Year one's music taste can me matched perfectly.
Hands down, my favorite thing Slacker offers is making as many stations as you like, plus listening to preset stations and other users' stations. Those are even customizable, too, in one's own account.
In addtion to "Chris & Tina's Classic Rock Mix," I've created a station just for me. I call it "Eclectically Mine." With the feature designed for Web 2.0, I can bring you my station right here, or on a social networking site:
Create your own Slacker Station now
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