Friday, January 30, 2009

Free Music Friday

I don't know if there's enough good free music out there to do this every week, but on Fridays I'm going to try to highlight something free, anyway.

Our first download today is Amazon Presents Green Hill Music Digital Sampler. The sampler has five songs. All fall under the genre "New Age/World" music, and if you hate that genre it won't be for you. I listened to them on my walk this morning and while they were a little too slow and relaxing for a walk, I found them very pleasant and melodic, and I'm sure I'll call them up again on my music rotation.

The second free download is a surprise: Steve Martin's Daddy Played the Banjo, from his album "The Crow: New Songs for the Five-String Banjo." I expected something along the lines of King Tut, but this is a straight-up bluegrass album, with songs all written by Steve Martin. Apparently the album features vocals by Dolly Parton, Mary Black and others. I tried to figure out who does vocals on this song, but it sure doesn't sound like Steve. I wish they'd let you see the "back" of the album on downloads or see the credits somehow. Anyway, great bluegrassy banjo song and definitely worth downloading.

Amazon has a slightly weird downloading process. You have to download the "Downloader" first, then once that's installed, it will open the downloads for you and automatically load them into iTunes (or whatever software you use, I think, but I use iTunes so I can't speak for other programs). It's very easy once you do it once or twice, and get used to it opening, queuing, then downloading the songs.

Monday, January 26, 2009

Giveaway Alert

Since the boys have become Pokemon-obsessed, I have had the opportunity to peruse many Japanese import sites (damn you, Pikachu, for hitting your peak of popularity 10 years ago and now only being available via internet)...and I have come to conclude that Japanese stuff is really, really cute. Very, very cute.

There's a giveaway right now over on one of my favorite crafty sites, Crafty Crow, where you can win $25 in cute Japanese fabrics. I can't sew, except for rudimentary hemming, but I would definitely be able to find something to do with $25 in cute Japanese fabrics.