Great news – you never have to steal music again!
Now, hold on just one second. I’m not accusing you of being a crazy illegal downloader who hasn’t payed for music since Britney uttered her first “ooo baby baby” and Lars Ulrich sued Justin Timberlake for inventing Napster (wait, that doesn’t seem right). What I’m simply saying is, there’s no reason to pilfer your music from shady places and take money from the rich and the poor and the not very rich and the very poor.
Have you heard of RDIO? It’s a game changer. Legal, loaded and cost efficient.
RDIO is a streaming music service that has the full support of the major labels and a significant chunk of the smaller ones as well. You basically visit the site, sign up (it’s free for a week) and start searching for all the music you want to hear. After a week, you can sign up for $10 a month. There are apps for your iPhone and Blackberry so you can stream straight to your smartphone (but make sure you have dollars and the data plan to cover it, though – I got dinged first month out on my iPhone). Even better – you get the option to sync the music so should you go offline, any music you sync from RDIO is available to listen to even if you’re underground or wi-fi challenged.
Like I said, this is a game changer.
For weeks I wanted to check out Deep Purple’s first album with David Coverdale, Burn. I thought about buying it off iTunes but I wasn’t sure I wanted to spend the money. As soon as I hooked up RDIO, I streamed that badass album. I was glad I did. Same with Thin Lizzy’s Jailbreak and Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s Welcome To The Pleasuredome. These were all albums I was curious about, but was always reluctant to plunk down the money for them. But with RDIO, I can listen to them all I want. If I want to own them, I now know what I’d getting. And while it’s not perfect (you can’t listen to The Arcade Fire’s Grammy winning The Suburbs or any Def Leppard on there yet), the artists I’ve looked for do tend to be available.
If people can get onboard (like my buddy Perry, who I’m following on RDIO and has some pretty decent musical taste, and The Queen, who thinks our Netflix subscription is a waste but is loving RDIO)), I think subscription based music services might just be the wave of the future. I don’t feel the need to own as much now – I’m happy to rent. I know the artists are getting their money, I’m not stealing from anybody and in the long run I think I’m going to save money. RDIO doesn’t mean I’m going to stop buying music. Believe me, I’m the first one in line when the new Yes album drops later this year. But it does mean I can hear more music and appreciate more diverse artists that I wouldn’t want to spend $10 on (…And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead’s latest is a fine example).
$10 a month for as much music as you or I can listen to. I can’t imagine how a music lover who believes artists should get paid for their art can say no.
Check out RDIO here.
