It happens.
You recommend a band to a friend because you know they will like it. But they don’t.
If you’re like me and you treat this type of thing at least as seriously as a bad burrito, you think, ‘What the hell? How is this possible?’ Maybe you realize your pick was flawed.
That’s where Pandora.com comes in. Like a very wise friend, the free Internet radio site streams music suited to your taste, and it’s nearly impossible to fault.
The excellent site isn’t radio in the traditional sense. Along with being commercial-free, there are no actual stations or playlists. You just plug in a band or song, and the site creates a pseudo-station — something it might call “Pearl Jam radio” — spooling off similar music.
“Pandora’s completely blind to the popularity of an artist,” Tim Westergren, the site’s founder, said. “It doesn’t know that Bruce Springsteen is a big star and the Modern Skirts is not. It doesn’t know that. It only knows what it sounds like.”
It gets that knowledge from about 50 professionals who listen to songs, spending about 30 minutes to classify a track for the Music Genome Project, which is another branch of the site.
These so-called musicologists, often with a background in music theory, sit around a quiet Oakland, Calif., office, wearing headphones, staring at a computer, dissecting songs: The “subtle use of strings” by U2, an “unintelligible vocal delivery” from Keith Richards, the “cash obsessed lyrics” of Kanye West.
With those pieces identified, the site can lump together artists and songs that suit a person’s taste.
Pandora lists a single mission: To introduce people to music they will love. But that’s not entirely true; there’s more to it. As Westergren said, “We’re trying to create a musician’s middle class.” The idea being, by exposing people to music from underground artists, groups draw a fan base and make a living.
It’s a noble enough goal, and one that, no surprise, came from a musician. Through his work as a film composer, Westergren had to figure out the musical tastes of directors. He decided to try to bottle the ability.
The project launched in 2000, and now, 54 percent of the music played comes from independent artists. With 94 percent of the site’s music streamed daily by some of its 9 million users, a lot of independent music is being heard.
To be clear, “independent” in this context does not mean “navel-gazing noise rockers who favor Pabst Blue Ribbon beer.” It just means artists that aren’t on a major label, the cleanest definition of the term.
For instance, if you plug in, oh, say, “Gimme More,” the newish Britney Spears song, Pandora plays established hitmakers like Ashley Tisdale and Aaliyah, but also mixes in unknowns like Simply Smooth and Ariana.
The site doesn’t always stick independent artists next to big names, particularly when you drop in a group’s name instead of a song title. When I created a Justin Timberlake station, every artist — Jennifer Lopez, Usher, Fergie — was basically a caricature of the term “radio-friendly.”
Part of that may be because of Pandora’s thumbs feature. Listeners can give a thumbs up or down to a song. If the tune gets too many negative marks, it may be moved to a different station. Listeners have deemed it an ill fit for their station.
The site also acts as a counterpoint to the traditional idea of radio. Even on most Internet radio sites, songs move in a linear fashion; either you listen to what’s being played, or you change the channel. On Pandora, you can skip a song.
Granted, Pandora doesn’t let you do everything: You can’t rewind, and you can’t skip more than six songs in an hour on a given station; license agreements forbid it. And while Westergren wants the site to go mobile, your average person can’t listen to it in the car.
Still, for a home or office, it’s far beyond the freedom of regular radio, if only because of its variety. As Westergren put it, instead of formatting a playlist to fit the tastes of legions, Pandora suits itself to basically one listener.
“You are a center of gravity,” he said, “not you as one of half of a million.”
Reporter Andy Rathbun: 425-339-3455 or e-mail arathbun@heraldnet.com.
Learn more
What: Pandora, a free, commercial-free Internet radio site or “pseudo station” that streams a playlist that you refine.
Where: pandora.com
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