An endless supply of great music.
other sites for downtempo, chillout, nujazz, worldbeat, and trip-hop artists and fans...

 

First...my podcast series:

Expand Your Musical Horizons — an eclectic, monthly podcast of chillout, trip hop, nujazz, dubstep, psybient, and other delicious stuff. You can also visit it in iTunes. If you're interested in submitting your music to me for consideration...send me an email or contact me through SoundCloud.

Like my podcast?

Listen to music (internet radio, streaming music):

Groovera Chilled Web Radio -- Offering you three streams of commercial-free, chilled music on the web, ranging from smooth lounge to lo-fi beats. Like most web radio, it aims to give you a more diverse set of artists to enjoy, while at the same time it supports the artists by providing info on where to buy the tracks if you like them.

Beta lounge — This site streams electronica artists recorded live in San Francisco & Germany. Rare stuff, great to hear "live." My most-recent favorite broadcast (listen to it intheir archives): "Ole Deine Villa," from Hamburg in October, 2006. It also offers a club you can join to get a generous sampling of new music in the mail every month for a good price.

Magnatune — "We are not evil." Support independent artists! Preview full works & buy direct downloads -- 50% of each purchase goes directly to the musicians. Disclaimer: I am a featured artist on Magnatune. Magnatune lets you stream entire songs to preview an artist before buying them and they also make podcasts of each of their genres on a regular basis.

Soma FM — For several years now, this web radio station has offered a great selection of indie streaming music sites....downtempo, chill, etc. Like many other internet radio stations in the USA, Soma FM is under the threat of extinction due to legislation passed in 2007 that's skyrocketed the licensing fees for web broadcasters. Please see the banner and link at the bottom of this page for more info, and become an activist to save internet radio.

Lounge-Radio.com — streaming NuJazz/downtempo beatz radio out of Switzerland. If you like the music of Nicola Conte, Rainer Trüby, Boozoo Bajou, DePhazz, Nightmares on Wax, Elektrolux label artists, etc......check out this great station. On its home page, it also informs you of what's playing and what's up next. I confess: I tune in nearly every day!

Sofaspace — Now you have another reason to love Switzerland. From out of Zurich, here's another great, streaming radio station filled with ambient, downtempo, and more music to chill you out. Then, if you still have a local record store and it doesn't offer the great music that you hear online, you can buy some hard-to-find discs through their store, Sofasound. Now if only I could stream this station on my iPhone....

Eilo.org -- Out of East Europe, in partnership with OUIM, an informative and diverse set of electronic mixes that range from ambient to psybient to house, etc. You'll hear stuff you might not know already, but the bandwidth can get choked.

Department-Deluxe — More streaming indie label downtempo and nujazz out of Germany, with helpful links back to Soul Seduction (in Vienna) if you want to buy what you hear.

Monotonik —indie electronica artists; free mp3 downloads, cool stuff.

Epiphany Radio — great streaming downtempo internet radio, features artists like Kush

Tasty Cast —another portal to streaming downtempo and ambient space music. The link looks bad at first, but hang in there...

Live 365 — there's some really great music out there that you haven't heard yet....listen...tune in to hear playlists from around the world.

Night-DJ -- a collection, based in Germany, of great streaming audio (ambient, downtempo, house, indie) from around the world

Electronic Vibe (Germany) -- another online place to listen to stuff that's hard to find at your local conglomerate megastore

OEM Radio -- another streaming downtempo/indie station online. Brought to you by the dub beautiful collective in San Francisco.

Epitonic -- Great indie resource, all genres. Listen and buy.

Podshow — Just one of the many great sites that allow you to search for and stream the podcasts and genres of your choice. I have a featured podcast on this site called "Expand Your Musical Horizons."

The Echonomizer —Home of Wonder Chill radio (chillout, downtempo). Listen up.

Delicious Lo-Fi Lounge — More chillin' music out of Germany.

Mixcloud -- Another resource to discover interesting music from around the world, largely uploaded as mixes from well-known DJs, musicians, and podcasters. I love the way the playlist works on this site. It's social networking and sort of like podcasting, only maybe better.

Musical Starstreams — yep, they're still around, and they have some pretty cool playlists, too.

Radio 23 — A web radio station that features a different number of international music broadcasts at different times of the day. Stream to your computer through iTunes or several other options.

Radio 42 — More high energy than what I normally listen to, but kudos to them for this high-quality broadcast out of Germany. When you feel a bit like partying....or just putting on your headphones to enjoy.

Netmusique — A little something for everyone. Powered by Shoutcast, managed out of San Francisco and Toronto.

Jamendo — A seemingly endless supply of albums from indie artists who upload their music for listeners to stream or download in their entirety. The goal is to give them exposure and help them arrange licensing deals and give them an audience they couldn't access through traditional channels. You can find music that you want to hear or wander through the vast community of Jamendo listeners and discover what they like.

 

My favorite podcasts:

Soilsound Chronicles— This was my favorite podcast, but it only comes out occasionally now. They released a consistently fabulous downtempo/nujazz podcast weekly featuring indie artists and their own music, complete with advice on how to live happily and healthfully. You can still download their podcasts—take them with you— and you'll be a much happier traveler...

XtraChill — Out of Germany comes the xtra cool XtraChill...the music is top-notch and if you don't speak German, it doesn't matter....it's a pleasure to listen to Andreas and Jürgen introduce the chilled-out beats, anyway.

Headphone Commute -- CC-licensed netlabel artists and other ambient, trip-hoppy and experimental artists from around the world, with a great blog of information to boot.

Labels and artists that inspired me:

Pulsar Bleu - Talented German ambient/downtempo artist who, for some reason, doesn't have an album out ....yet

Abstrait Records (label) — From Germany...has a number of excellent releases mixed by DJ Raphaël Marionneau.

Nickodemus — Excellent world-infused electronic remixes, always great with "Turntables on the Hudson."

Parov Stelar — From Vienna. Several great albums and EPs...he does it right whether it's slow compositions or inventive dance grooves. I practically run to the record shop every time he releases something new.

Deep Dive Corporation — Their earliest and most hard-to-find albums are my favorites ("Support Your Local Groover," "Black Mail Recordings," and "Beware of Fake Gurus"). This German ensemble has a lot of great downtempo tracks, but they turn up once in awhile on trance compilations, too.

Jens Buchert — Very prolific electronica composer in Germany. You can buy a lot of his music through iTunes, but see his web site, too!

Music for Dreams (label) — Out of Denmark comes Music for Dreams, which includes artists like Bliss, Flunk, Grassskirt, and Cantoma. Check out their great compilations, "Luftkastellet."

Cargo Cult — From Slovakia, and formerly a featured electronica artist with Magnatune, he's signed with another label now (ACM). Both of his albums ("Alchemy" and "Vibrant") are stellar examples of downtempo with a world music flair: you can also buy his tracks on iTunes.

Musicpark — From out of Austria...check out their Fruit compilations. Each one is excellent and very hard to find in shops. Please, release a new one soon!

Cell (Alex Scheffer) — Under the name of "Cell," this electronica artist has released albums on Ultimae Records in France and Indica Music in Italy. Wonderful mix of ambient and downtempo.

Karuan -- Another great artist out of the Austrian scene. Turkish roots plus that sophisticated Austrian electronic mélange. Don't miss his two full-length releases, "Dohuki Ballet" and "Pop Arif."

Master Margherita — this Swiss DJ/producer from Peak Records has some amazing chilled podcasts, a great album, and some excellent mixes floating around here and there. When are you coming to San Francisco???

Cardamar -- This talented ambient composer produces his own music, makes wonderful mixes, and also has a label that promotes other great artists, like Xerxes.

Waveform — For many years, they've put out very chilled compilations, featuring artists like Chris Zippel, Grey Area, Higher Intelligence Agency, Pentatonik, Deep Dive Corp., Pitch Black, and many more. Check out their Starstreams radio station, too...

Kagdila Records — Small psyambient, trance label based in LA, with nice releases like "Peace Therapy" compiled by DJ Zen.

Interchill Records —If you're into slow, chilled beats, rich warm, basstones, and artists like Gaudi, Ishq, Adham Shaikh, and Kaya Project, this is your label. You should also check out Ambient.us for buying downloads of the mp3s rather than trying to find these albums in your local record store.

Ultimae Records - Wonderful, deep, ambient-chill music from artists like Aes Dana, Hol Baumann, Cell, Solar Fields, and more. Great music, nice people.

Cosmicleaf Records -- More quality psybient and chillout music. From Greece, featuring artists like Side Liner, D. Batistatos, and Kick Bong, among others.

Dusted Wax Kingdom - Very trip-hoppy, head-nodding creative commons releases on this brilliant Bulgarian netlabel.

Reverbnation - great resource for finding new artists or signing up to promote your own music.

Altar Records -- DJ Zen's label, which produces high-quality psybient music. Limited-edition CDs for sale, or buy them as digital downloads.

 

Music community | resources | information

ccMixter — on this site, you can remix music that's licensed through Creative Commons...share it with others...it's all good.

TweakHeadz — resource site for electronic musicians: "everything you need to know about producing master quality music on your computer."

Discogs — Database of music-- almost every album ever made is listed here and cross-referenced, with glimpses into other peoples' record collections around the world. For the hardcore collector...

MacJams.com — Mac musicians sharing their tracks with others. News, info.

Beatport — Site for DJs.

Internet DJ — News, videos, streaming audio, etc.

What I'm listening to lately on lastfm.com

Create Digital Music - Blog of digital music culture, new products , techniques, and information sharing. The gold standard of music blogs.

 

Buy hard-to-find music:

Soul Seduction - Amazingly great online music distributor in Vienna. High-quality previews online, cool weekly newsletter, great selection, great service.

Magnatune.com — You can buy albums and support independent artists of all genres at Magnatune (it's not just for listening online!) They're moving to a subscription service as of late 2010.

Psyshop — Excellent online resource for the rarest and coolest of ambient, downtempo, and trance CDs anywhere. Amazing selection and service: ships from Germany for a reasonable price and arrives internationally less than a week after you place your order! Highly recommended.

GEMM.com — When you can't find that CD anywhere else, and you don't care what it costs...

Ambient Music Garden — Ambient Music downloads for therapy relaxation, meditation, and home listening.

Discogs — Discogs grew up and became more than just an incredible repository about artists and albums. You can put music on your wishlist and buy it from other Discogs members. Sometimes it turns out that you're buying directly from the artist. Even better!

Ambient.us -- Buy high-quality downloads of some of your favorite psybient artists.

 

The politics of music:

Creative Commons—Their website says "Share, reuse, and remiix—legally." Very important organization that protects artists and others through licenses with "some rights reserved." Bookmark this site, please, and if you're an artist, you should know them already.

Webcasters.org— Stay up-to-date on issues involving internet webcasters, royalty rates imposed by the RIAA, and copyright issues.

Association of Music Podcasting—I don't need to tell you that podcasting HELPS musicians...it doesn't hurt them. This organization supports independent musicians as well as podcasters.