Celebrity Cola: March 2005

Finding quality music online can require a lot of work. I recommend first finding a nice, quiet office job (or maybe some steady temp work) that has a bangin’ high-speed internet connection. That way, you’ll get paid on an hourly basis to download music.

I've spent many happy months of my life being paid $15 an hour by nameless corporations to scour the internet for MP3s, which I then spend hours labeling, tagging, and listening to with J. River's Media Center/Jukebox (the latest version of which makes it extremely easy to listen to podcasts and Internet radio, as well as your typical CD and DVD viewing, filing, and ripping options).

You’re employer will think they’re paying you to shuffle papers, make photocopies, collect invoices, coordinate with FedEx, and answer voicemail, but your bosses are suckers—it’s all about collecting tunes that you’ll eventually take home using your portable hard drive, iPod, or CD burner.

The following is an evolving list that reviews websites, tools, and tricks for facilitating the downloading of cheap and free (and often even legal) music online:

And Now For the Gratis Tunage:

AllofMP3: Super-cheap access to mainstream U.S., European, and Russian music (less than 10 cents a song, depending on the quality you want; even the dirt-cheap “low quality” files are superbly encoded). They’ve even got a high-quality bootleg version of the Beach Boy’s lost Smile album. And bunches of the Beatles’ albums (not available online anywhere else). And rare imports. And some indie music. And lots of Bjork. And, and, and . . . And it’s all kinda sorta legal thanks to sketchy Russian copyright/royalty laws held over from the Soviet Union days. There are other reliable Russian music sites running similar gambits (notably, MP3Search.Ru and MusicMp3.ru), but this is the biggest, oldest, most trustworthy, most quickly updated, and easiest to use... All-in-all, AllofMP3 is quite possibly the greatest music-download website ever known to man (for standard-issue U.S. and Euro pop/rock/dance tunes, anyway) . Gotta love commies cum capitalists.

Always the Volume: Contains dozens of free demos, b-sides, interviews, and live tracks from the gorgeous and talented twin sisters Tegan and Sara. Listen to their tunes because they’re incredible artists with nice lyrics and a super-group indie backing band, not just because they’re alterna-chick lesbian sex kittens. (Yes, they are. Oh, lord, they ARE! Meeeeow. Especially catchy: the Interruptvector stompin' dance remix of T&S's acoustic Hello. "Until I've done all that I can...")

Amazon.com's Free Music Downloads: Normally I'm a big Amazon fan, but this slick-looking area of the Virago empire is an emperor without any clothes -- exclusive MP3 files are often nothing more than streaming or copy-protected files with a fake MP3 extension, meaning you can't burn the track to a disk, or the ability to play the track expires, or it just doesn't play at all. Other Amazon download offerings turn out to be nothing more than 30-second or one-minute long samples. There are a few good tracks here and there, however, if you have the patience to sift through the crap.

AntiFolk.net: Doesn't host any music files, but it links to a plethora of hep, off-the-beaten-path bands that usually have MP3s posted on their own sites. For instance, AntiFolk will lead you directly to one of my favorite new NYC bands, the Ben Folds meets honky tonk piano-backed Creaky Boards, where MP3s are always around.

BannedMusic.org: A free-speech rioting site featuring such modern classics as the awe-inspiring The Grey Album by DJ Danger Mouse, The Double Black Album by Cheap Cologne, and the Illegal Art Compilation by Stay Free Magazine ("A compilation of songs that have been the subject of lawsuits, primarily for unauthorized sampling. Includes music by Negativland, Biz Markie, The Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, and De La Soul").

betterPropaganda: a "music discovery" site that aims to help users find new music that will fit their tastes. Concentrates on edgy electronic, rock, and hip hop, including the more interesting indie fringes of those genres. Features podcasts, streaming music, music videos, mini-reviews, and -- most importantly -- free MP3s of new singles from a wide variety of artists. No username, password, or fees required. They'd like you to buy the complete CDs, but there's no pressure. The number of tracks offered is limited in scope, but fresh tracks are very frequently cycled into the free queue.

BitTorrent and the nifty BitTorrent client known as Azureus: Okay, most people know about BitTorrent, and I personally only use it for downloading TV shows, but it’s undeniably great for quickly grabbing entire albums all at once. (Umm, I mean, if I were going to illegally download TV shows in a widescreen and commercial-free format, then this would be the program I’d use, but I’d never do anything, uh, illegal). Once you've installed your BitTorrent client, begin your search for files at the BitTorrent Search, ISO Hunt, Torinium (aka HyperTorrent), NewNova.org (from the ashes of SuprNova.org), and Link2U.tk pages.

Bleep: Falling somewhere between the worlds of eMusic and iTunes, there lurks Bleep.com. On the one hand, buying an album on Bleep is more expensive than buying from eMusic (nearly $10 an album instead of approximately 25 cents a track) -- but on the other hand, Bleep provides many hip "major indie label" and British/Euro rock-pop albums that eMusic hasn't got the rights to include in its digital indie-tune database. Like iTunes, Bleep is a la carte; eMusic requires a modest monthly subscription fee and charges you that fee even if you don't download anything, so Bleep is a safer bet for the casual downloader that doesn't need a monthly fix. Unlike iTunes, Bleep delivers high-quality MP3 files instead of the proprietary DRM file-types most legal music services now force upon users. In that sense, Bleep and eMusic are kindred spirits, both providing completely safe, legal MP3 tunes for a decent price and paying close attention to the indie rock/pop scene.

Bluetack Internet Security Solutions: If you think you might be downloading music that you, well, perhaps legally should not be downloading, then you'll want to make sure you supplement your firewall and/or router with some hardcore protection like Bluetack's free Blocklist Manager (BLM) and Protowall, or good ol' PeerGuardian. It'll help keep out the bad guys and music cops. (I also use the free versions of Kerio and AntiVir as my basic firewall and antivirus software, respectively. And once a month I run Spybot, Ad-Aware, CWShredder, and CCleaner to clean out any problems that may have snuck in with my surfing. All of these costless programs are safely available at Download.com.)

Bootleg Browser: A frequently updated list of bootlegged concerts from every genre, era, and style. The Bootleg Browser will lead you to a small hoard of free, fresh, and piping-hot new MP3 sites, whether your taste ranges from Tom Waits to the Barenaked Ladies to XTC to, um, a live Avril Lavigne concert to Iranian/Middle Eastern tunes you can't understand one iota of 'cause they're in Farsi... it's time to boot up!

CCC Mash-Ups Galore: mashmeister CCC mixes together classic tracks, forming entirely new sounds. His big project in 2004 was Revolved, a complete reworking of the Beatles' Revolver album -- not bad. Keep this guy on your radar.

Classic Cat: A directory of no-cost classical music. Nearly 2,000 files were available the last time I checked, from Karl Friedrich Abel to Carl Zeller, with plenty of Puccini, Wagner, Tchaikovsky, Mozart, and Beethoven in the mix.

CNET's Music.Download.com: In the wake of the old (better) version of MP3.com closing down, there weren't many good places for unsigned bands to gather together, promote their music, and give away free MP3s. But then along came Music.Download, and the melodies flowed freely once again. The problem with unsigned bands, obviously, is that 98% of it is worse than athlete's foot. But since it's free, there's no harm in digging around for buried treasure, which the CNET editors' reviews and users' ratings help with. Music.Download spices the dish by throwing in some tracks from big-name acts like R.E.M., Snoop Dogg, Postal Service (a fave of mine), and Ani DiFranco, and hipster comedians like David Cross. They even have a handful of tracks from my overly talented old classmate Sam "Iron & Wine" Beam.

Coverville: A very smooth, 30-minute music podcast featuring top-notch cover songs. Licensed with ASCAP and BMI (i.e., it's supererogatory legal!).

Dailysonic: A daily radio show/mp3zine/podcast "for the hipclectic crowd." It's one big, free download (usually about 35 minutes long and 28 megabytes in size) and includes alternative news and music.

DVD Tools: Rip, copy, save, play, and burn music and video from even copy-protected and region-locked DVDs with the software, hacks, and advice found on the Doom9, DVD Decrypter, Clone AD, and MPEGX websites.

eMusic: The best MP3 service for indie, alternative, and world-music MP3s. This site is 100% legal and chock full of useful info, the artists and labels get paid, and it's pretty cheap -- less than 25 cents a song, on average, depending on how much you pay into your monthly subscription (unlike other subscription-based sites, eMusic downloads are real MP3 files, so they don't expire when you cancel your subscription and they'll work on any music player). Compared to services like iTunes and Napster that charge you an outrageous buck a song, eMusic is a steal, and many of its excellent albums simply cannot be found on mainstream sites (like rarities from the K Records label). But hey! It's not just indie music. Styles include: Alternative/Punk, Blues, Classical, Country/Folk, Electronic, Inspirational, Jazz, New Age, Rock/Pop, Urban/Hip-Hop, World/Reggae, and Soundtracks/Other. They've even got some Ray Charles, Del the Funky Homosapien, and the White Stripes.

Epitonic: An exhaustive source of indie info and bios, with free MP3 (and WMA) files provided for almost every artist profiled. Translation: thousands of superb songs for zero dollars, if you hunt around the site long enough.

Firefox: If you're browsing with the Fox -- and you should be, punk, since it's the free open-sourced wonder browser and there are all sorts of audio/video media-, music- and MP3-based extensions you can add to make it your perfect multimedia browser, too -- just install the nifty Firefox extension DownThemAll (DTA) and you'll be able to easily download all MP3 files from every page of most websites with a simple right-click of your mouse. No more hunting and pecking on hundreds of MP3 links or trying to figure out how to download the file instead of listening to it -- let DownThemAll do the grunt work for ya! Although there are similar plugins for other browsers (and for FireFox itself), this one has no spyware attached and is soooo sweet, mate. Note: As of this writing, the default downloading filters on Firefox's DownThemAll are only for “all files,” archives, images, and videos.... To enable one-click music downloading, click on Preferences/Advanced Options, choose the Filters tab, and then quickly set up a new filter by entering “Music” as the “caption” (this will be your new filter button) and then typing .mp3 (and/or .wma, .wmv, .ogg, .acc, etc.) in the “filtered extensions” box. Once it’s set up, grabbing music off the web couldn’t be easier.

GarageBand: Independent musicians load their music onto GB, users rate and review the tracks, all the tunes get ranked by popularity and categorized by genre, and everyone gets to download boatloads of free MP3s. Find: Incredible music by NYC's famed subway troubadour Theo Eastwind, melodies by talented Ohio songsmith Peter Adams, and lots of terrible music hidden among troves of gems. If you like what you hear, you can email the musicians, join their mailing lists, or order their CDs. The downside: although it's all free, finding and grabbing good music can take a long while--and GB only lets users download one MP3 at a time.

Geek Dreams: This site's owner infrequently posts music files, but when he does it's of hard-to-find material like the original, unreleased version of Fiona Apple's "Extraordinary Machine" (a fantabulous album that Apple's record company, Sony, shelved for over two years until sites like Geek Dreams began distributing leaked copies, forcing Sony to finally release a highly revised version of the CD in late 2005) and live bootlegs of the Pixies and Radiohead performing at the 2004 Coachella festival, etc. If you enjoy Geek Dreams, I'd also recommend the music archives at the Achtung Baby! blog.

Glorious Noise: a stalwart alternative music mag that always posts a bundle of "free legit MP3s."

The Hype Machine: An oft-updated archive of links to the audio files posted on the most popular MP3 blogs. No matter if you're an oddball looking for a bootleg of Ben Gibbard covering April Lavigne or you're just a song junkie seeking every hot, strange, new and weird track getting passed around the music zine circuit, you'll find it here. (Recommended by the The Rawk Blog.)

The Indie MP3 Blog: a UK-based site that posts music news along with a couple of really good new MP3s every day or two (alongside the main site, www.indie-mp3.co.uk, which frequently hosts some lovely Brit pop). Basically, the editor of the site finds smashingly kosher indie music files online (like legal MP3s from The Besties), and then shares the love. Nothin' wrong with that! Also, check out the Indie MP3 Blog's infrequent-but-superb mixtape-like podcast.

InSound MP3s: Also super-indie and super-free. Again, it's a limited selection (they want you to sample some tracks before buying full albums), but it's updated regularly and it's good, hard-to-find stuff (includes tracks by Lou Barlow, Cat Power, Airborn Audio, Eluvium, and Marianne Faithfull).

iPodder.org: Lists new podcasting websites every day and upkeeps a directory of thousands of online audio sources. If you're not running the free iPodder software, this site won't be as easy to use as it should be, but the music section of its podcast directory will still give you the names of hundreds of music websites that offer complimentary MP3s in the form individual song downloads and massive podcasts (online radio shows converted to a savable—usually MP3—format). A similiar site -- which is actually easier to use -- is Podcast Alley, a careful organization and ranking of hundreds of MP3 audiocasts.

iRATE radio is a free, open-source music downloading client (for Windows, Linux, and the latest Mac OS) with access to over 50,000 files (and growing). Full downloading access to a selection of fine Creative Commons-based music websites, combined with open-minded artists and record labels trying to promote their latest singles, allows iRATE to find music, which it then sends to you, the user. As you rate the tunes, it automatically finds more music that you'll like -- and filters out music it thinks you'll hate --by comparing your opinions to the ratings of other users on the system that have similar tastes. And unlike similar services, iRATE is free, legal, and adware/spyware free.

Kazaa Lite Resurrection (KLR): A safer, spyware-free, RIAA fightin’, possibly illegal version of the popular file-downloading Kazaa Media Desktop. Created by some badass hacker types at FileSharingPlace.com -- home to the legendary and free K-Lite Mega Codec Pack that includes QuickTime Alternative, Real Alternative, Media Player Classic, and tons of tools and codecs that will let you play every type of file known to man without having to use programs that are controlled by The Man -- KLR is the among the safest and easiest ways to fileshare. But make sure you only download programs like KLR and K-Lite (Kazaa Lite) from FileSharingPlace, lest you end up with a fake version laden with adware. While there, check out the classic Soulseek and the hot new windows P2P (peer-to-peer) client eXeem. A comprehensive list of other P2P applications and P2P in general can be found at Wikipedia's Peer-to-Peer page, including links to the popular eDonkey/ed2k and Morpheus filesharing clients. Note: For Mac users, Acquisition is a good choice, and LimeWire will work for everyone. If you need a second opinion before using a new P2P client, try searching the FileSharingPlace forums or read the user reviews of all the mainstream "Mp3 Search Tools" at Download.com.

Keeping It Peel: Thousands of radio broadcasts from the late, legendary BBC radio host John Peel, who specialized in bringing bands in for interviews and then coaxing them into incredible live performances. The radio studio recordings of the performances are known as the Peel Sessions, and they're really, really, really worth checking out, especially since the BBC now has them available online for free. Regrettably, the BBC has chosen to code these Peel offerings as RealMedia files; as everyone knows, RealOne/RealMedia/RealPlayer is evil and their files are not playable on iPods, etc.

KnobTweakers: A blog full of carefully selected and totally free indie-label and no-label electronica music. Since only promotional tracks are used, these downloads are legal. (This site was previously entitled simply "Free Music Downloads," which has gotta tell ya somethin'.)

The Live Music Archive: Thousands of absolutely free and legal live music bootleg recordings from hundreds of "trade-friendly" bands, such as Godspeed You Black Emperor!, Billy Bragg, Jack Johnson, Jason Mraz, the Grateful Dead, Phish, and Jump, Little Children. The donation-dependant Live Music Archive works in association with those lovable LosslessEncoding freaks over at Etree.org, an organization that also happens to host the bt.etree.org Community Bittorrent Tracker, where I've found mind-blowing live performances by Wilco, Yo La Tengo, Rachael Yamagata, etc... (By the way -- you haven't truly heard the scorching soulfulness of the post-Bumpus, ultra-femme-fatale Yamagata until you've heard her live. Preferably, live and with a head cold, because the hoarser her voice, the better the groove.)

Magnatune: Allows you to stream albums from hand-selected, micro-label bands (of varying genres) for free. Of course there are plenty of other websites and programs that let you stream music and radio stations on the cheap—even mainstream stuff—so the real benefit of Magnatune is that it’ll let you listen to entire CDs, and then, if you dig 'em, download disks for only $5 a pop. Good news: The artists get half the cash.

Media Search Engines: SingingFish and Altavista Audio are both good and, according to Tech-Recipes.com, the following search command will use Google to “find open directories with MP3 files with Pearl Jam [or whoever]. Obviously you can change the band name or file type to better define your search”... -inurl:htm -inurl:html intitle:"index of" mp3 "pearl jam". If that’s too much work for you, you can just use WebJay to grab music directly from playlists compiled by users that scour the web for MP3s to stream (and download) from the WebJay on-site player.

The Mobius Mixdown: Every week, Dan "Mobius" Sieradski airs a groovy mix on Israel & Palestine radio station 107.2FM, Radio All For Peace. Then, the entire set (usually 15 songs), is released online as a single MP3. The eclectic shows have have included music by Handsome Boy Modeling School, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Sparklehorse, Van Morrison, DJ Dangermouse, Funki Porcini, Ladytron, Kimya Dawson, Ween, and more. See the Mixdown section of the OrthodoxAnarchist website for full set-lists and MP3 files of each and every show.

Mocking Music: Euphonic album links and song downloads are used to spike the punch of this blog's rummy, satiric discourse.

MP3Dimension: A search engine and user-updated database of free (but not always legal) MP3 files located online. The site has some bugs and incorrectly labeled files, but otherwise it seems to be legit.

Multi-Source P2P Proggies: A trusty commentator on my site has heartily recommended TrustyFiles, a slightly bulky but useful program that combines the power of the Gnutella (Bearshare/Limewire) and FastTrack (Kazaa) networks with a BitTorrent client. However, the Yodas at FileSharingPlace.com have recommended using KCeasy instead, because TrustyFiles, while dependable, is associated with the P2P-regulating DCIA. KCeasy, by comparison, is committed to battling the darkside. Just add the giFT-FastTrack plugin to KCeasy and you'll be able to scour the Gnutella, OpenFT, and FastTrack networks all at once. Personally, I'm lovin' every minute I spend on KCeasy. A similar option is the in-progress proggie giFTwin32. For your Apple Mac, check out The Poisoned Project.

Negativebeats.com: Is reportedly riddled with spyware and evil cookies. The same goes for Positivebeats.com and most other free music sites that force you to download software or a browser plugin in order to download music. Stay away. I'm not even gonna link 'em here, even though they appear to have a lot of music available--'cause they're bad news.

NellieMckay.net: Serves up a healthy serving of live tracks from the bubbly, idiosyncratic songstress Nellie McKay.

NME: Blistering British music news and the occasional free MP3 (and some streaming albums and concerts).

Pandora: Alright, so Pandora won't help you add to you MP3 collection, but it's an amazing website nonetheless. After landing on the homepage of this deceptively simple webspot, you merely type in the name of a band you like, and Pandora, accessing the knowledge of the Music Genome Project (MGP) and it's own database of legal-to-stream tunes, finds either a song from the band you're looking for or a track from a sonically like-minded act. While it streams the track to your headphones, it begins compiling a list of other songs that MGP thinks you'll like, and then plays the tunes in the form of a personalized radio station. In TiVo-like fashion, you can rate each of the songs being played, which further informs Pandora about your likes and dislikes. And you can add more band names to your list. Very quickly, Pandora has nailed your musical tastes; from then on, every time you log in you'll be confronted by an individualized radio station that not only plays most of your favorite bands, it plays tracks that you'll love even though you've never, ever even heard of half the acts. It makes mistakes, to be sure, but the more songs you rate and the more bands you add, the more accurate Pandora becomes. Creepily so: It often knows what you like before you know what you like. Sound quality? High. Cost? Free (for now). Ease of use? Superb. (Similar music-streaming services include AccuRadio and Last FM -- but AccuRadio didn't behave very well with my FireFox browser or my firewall, and Last FM charges a subscription fee).

Pearsall's Tunes: Dance/techno mixer Pearsall Helms stays on top of the mix-master world in his music blog, posting some MP3s and advocating for other club/rave/techno blogs like Autonomic for the People, Bassnation, Blackdown, Chantelle Fiddy's World of Grime, Drumz of the South, Freaky Trigger, Ghetto Postage, Gutter Breakz, Kode 9, Love Ecstasy Crime, Silver Dollar Circle, and hip-hop blogs Can't Stop Won't Stop, Government Names, Houston So Real, and We Eat So Many Shrimp.

Pitchfork: Informed, intelligent, and irreverent indie music news, reviews, and, yes, free tracks.

Podtropolis: Legal and illegal torrent files, including video podcasts, audio podcasts, TV shows, and films.

PopMatters: How very indie. And how very, very free. This dependable online culture zine -- in association with Filter Magazine -- coughs up a small new handful of cherry-picked MP3s, videos, trailers, streaming media, and media links once or twice a week on their PopMatters Music Downloads page.

Pure Volume: You have to join PV before getting access to the tunes and forums, but once you sign up (it's free, yo) it's non-stop fun, boys and girls! Run by Unborn Media, the site's mission is to provide an online venue for unsigned bands and small indie labels -- currently, over 100,000 tracks are ready for download. Pure Volume is like a slick version of the old-school, buggy Internet Underground Music Archive (IUMA).

Radio Podcasts: Lots of radio stations are now offering quality podcasts (radio-type or mixtape-style broadcasts packaged into single MP3 files) -- download the shows to your PC, put 'em on your ipod, keep, delete 'em, whatever. It's hot. And usually free. Check out, for instance, KCRW Podcasts, BBC Radio, and Australia's ABC and Triple J (JJJ), the latter featuring the brilliantly funny and insightful Sunday Night Safran ("Religion, Politics, and Hoochies" with John Safran and Father Bob). For groundbreaking new music, the two top dogs in the U.S. are probably KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic (MBE) and NPR's All Songs Considered. KCRW also keeps delivering the goods with the Music Exchange podcast, which teams MBE host Nic Harcourt with BBC Radio's Steve Lamacq (the new John Peel, some might say). Many other web-based shows abound, including Whole Wheat Radio's streaming ultra-indie broadcasts and "audio magazine" downloads. Or visit Odeo to search podcasts by topic.

Sonic Sunset: A weekly streaming radio broadcast also available as MP3 files, Sonic Sunset features funk-house-electro DJ mixes built upon "a wide variety of funky futuristic records from all styles and years, inspired by Detroit's seminal open-minded radio DJs."

Songzilla's Digital M4 Music Blog: In addition to unique music news and analysis, Songzilla presents an MP3 tool that aggregates "promotional Internet releases for the shared benefit of the listener and artist." Translation: free MP3s. (The last time I checked, the music aggregator drop-down menus were not working very well, especially with Firefox. But when it works it's muy nifty.)

Stylus Magazine: Subtitled "The Needle and the Damage Done," Stylus features a couple of MP3 links in it's daily styPod blog.

Sub Pop Records: The fabled independent record label unleashes fistfuls of free MP3s to everyone they can.

Superburst Mixtapes: Comic-book legend Warren Ellis curates exquisite sets of tunes.

Take Your Medicine: A great new music blog providing sizzlin' indie and Brit pop/rock tracks, including MP3s from Kate Bush, Badly Drawn Boy, Bell And Sebastian, Ash, et al.

Various BitTorrent Sites: File Soup features BitTorrent info, forums, and advice; isoHunt is a dynamite torrent search engine; Torrent Reactor provides links to thousands of torrents; LiteZone.com ranks and categorizes other BitTorrent websites; and Hypertorrent is another decent torrent search engine. Also good: Mininova.org, MyBittorrent, #BT on EFnet, TorrentSpy, and TorrentBox. Note, however, that due to server overload and legal problems, many of these sites appear and disappear regularly.

VicChesnutt.com presents a healthy smattering of tracks from the inimitable Vic, who's worked with eccentric legends like Van Dyke Parks, covered eccentric legends like Daniel Johnston, and been lauded by R.E.M. legends like Michael Stipe.

Weezer Tunes: WeezerNation has more rare =W= tracks than a cow has tits (demos, B-sides, covers, promos, oh my! Just click on "media" and then "audio"); the Weezer Bootleg Archive has hundreds of live tracks (although the site is known to disappear now and again); Weezer 101 provides lots of band-related news along with links to other websites that have media files from the Weez; Weezer Riff-Raff at Weezed.com has a sparkling collection of =W= rarities in its A/V section, where you can check out Weezer singer-songwriter-god Rivers Cuomo's acoustic crush-tribute to my good friend Ann Poonkasem, a.k.a. the Annie/Ann Tapes, a.k.a. the banned Rivers MySpace.com Posts (Note: Weezer Riff-Raff cycles through offered songs and does not always have downloads available); finally, visit the BitTorrent forums at WeezerForum.com. Also, if you dig the Weez, you must also adore Matt Sharp and the Rentals, so check out the Rental's rare tracks at Citizen Lowell and Seven More Minutes, nick a couple of solo promo tracks at In Music We Trust Records, and visit MattSharp.net in case the former Weezer bassist-songwriter is feeling generous in his "downloads" section.

The Wikipedia MP3 Blog Page: Lists off lots blogs that supply the world with free MP3s, including FluxBlog.org (formerly the newflux.blogspot), which doles out rock and pop; Aurgasm, an "eclectic menagerie of aural pleasures"; Cocaine Blunts & Hip-Hop Tapes, which smokes out some hip-hop files; Scissorkick, featuring "moody sounds for headphones and dance floors"; Soul Sides, "music for rhythm addicts"; Tofu Hut, which attempts to give forgotten music "resurrection and due recognition"; music (for robots), which is just too cool for words; Teaching the Indie Kids To Dance Again, the best-named music blog on the planet; No Frontin', "a music, politics, and culture blog"; and various audioblogs, podcasting sites, and music webzines. More audio blogs can be found at the MP3Blogs Aggregator.

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Related: GoingWare's Legal Music Downloads article, featuring hundreds of links, tips, and ideas for grabbing tunes online.

More TK (that means "more to come," for you non-publishing-industry folk out there). Drop a comment below if I'm missing any good MP3 info, and I'll add it to the list.