I would feel more bad for Europeans re. Guvera, if it weren't for the fact that they still have those great-grandfathered emu prices. Sure, free is cheaper, but emu has a lot of my favorite stuff that Guvera doesn't.
@amclark, I agree, I would trade Guvera for a serious reduction in emusic prices at this point, at least for a while. Guvera at the moment = trying to find time to search for things I've never heard of to get for free, because I am long past having anything they have that might have been on any wish list. Not that that is not fun, but it has some limits.
Having said that I can't complain at all at having discovered John Abercrombie by accident and promptly downloaded seven of his albums for free.
@amclark, I agree, I would trade Guvera for a serious reduction in emusic prices at this point, at least for a while. Guvera at the moment = trying to find time to search for things I've never heard of to get for free, because I am long past having anything they have that might have been on any wish list. Not that that is not fun, but it has some limits.
For the moment I'm on the wagon, so to speak, having cancelled my eMu sub and not getting anything from other vendors. It's nice to save a little money, but I'm also trying to think of what a "complete" music collection might look like.
I'm also trying to think of what a "complete" music collection might look like.
That is definitely a benefit. I've been using Guvera to gift myself with a jazz collection in a somewhat systematic way, rather than (after the first week or two) to go for things I already knew I wanted.
The good: new Brokeback album out today. The bad: $6.99 is definitely the new $5.99 at emusic.
ETA, Brokeback is Doug McCombs of Tortoise with additional musicians, currently Pete Croke: bass, James Elkington: drums, organ, guitar, Chris Hansen: guitar. So naturally, from the emusic artist page:
Group Members: Rob Mazurek, Robert Mazurek, Rob Mazurek Quintet, Robert Mazurek Quartet, Robert Mazurek
Mazurek once appeared on one track of an EP by Brokeback.
ETA2, those who like Earth should give this a listen.
My music collection will be complete when I'm dead, I guess. Otherwise why stop? Guvera keeps moving me closer to a streaming rather than collecting point though. There isn't enough time to enjoy everything. But I tell myself to keep going; like emu, it can't last forever.
@Craig - Even though it may taper off, I've had 70 releases (including singles) unlocked by Ghostly in the 6 or 7 months I've been subscribing. Incredible service. And I've also just received another shipment of vinyl I ordered from them with the discount. Had a sale on 12" last month that I cleaned up on!
amc2 and GP - totally disagree with you, as you might expect. We do have grandfathered plans, but a lot of what I want is not available on emusic - just one example, only 2 ECM albums in total released during 2012 have reached emusic across both jazz and classical. Increasingly I am downloading albums because I have credits left at the end of the month, to the extent that I am going back on hold for my next refresh. In any case my monthly download is a fraction of what you have each downloaded from Guvera over recent months. I am tending to buy much more from Amazon at the moment than emusic, and there is no opportunity to buy, eg, jazz back catalogue tracks that are on the majors without going to someone like Amazon, itunes or 7 digital.
It may be lame and Rolling Stonerish of me, but this would be high on my list of '12, if not the top, if I had such a list.
Good points Greg. I don't know if I would trade; I just wanted to feel less bad. Oh well; I have about as much control over Guvera as I did over emusic. Might as well just enjoy the ride. Sorry.
ETA: if you look at some of the lists on emusers' list of lists, I think there are quite a few non-major label things, especially in the older jazz area.
I think the best for those of us not getting Guvera is to keep up the pressure if they would like a trial group. I suspect it is the usual thing, in that it is so difficult to get labels to license within the EU beyond the usual suspects at competitve pricing levels. I am sure emu would have the majors by now if they could and originally intended, or, maybe they actually realised that they made a mistake in the US. I know there is plenty out there at emu if I really search, but that in itself is part of the problem, in that one looses the will after a while! This month I took about half my downloads from my SFL, mainly stuff from Jonah's Jazz Picks that I hadn't downloaded at the time - in fact two thirds of my usual 100 tracks often comes from Jonah's recs, as it is a straightforward way of accessing music I might like there. Certainly Mr Amazon is getting more of my money these days!
Found this in the charity shop for A £1 could not walk past it!!!
I agree about E Music, I have gone on hold again and Greg your remarks about ECM are right on the money, I have been asking for ages and it seems that either ECM do not want anything to do with them or E Music are too lazy to do anything about it. I am up also to trial Guvera in the EU. I am enjoying the new Bandcamp feature and I am finding lots of good new stuff and do not have a problem with the site and downloading
Are there 28 Spurs classics, Lowlife?!!! I must get onto the Bandcamp thing. I never have problems from Bandcamp or Noisetrade for that matter, other than of course they download as zip files. I do get the impression from emusic that they are less concerned about EU members now than ever, often ignoring label/album requests. There have been a number of releasess in the last six months or so on labels they still carry older stock that have not come up at emusic, ECM is one that is more apparent, but it certainly isn't the only one.
I'm sitting at home, some slight snow outside, waiting to see if exchange has taken place on our proposed house move next Wednesday. Only those who have bought property in England or Wales will understand the archaic system of house purchase here, so I won't try to explain the finer details. Everybody in the chain has agreed to move next Wednesday, but if exchange fails to happen today, basically we have to start negotiating about dates yet again, which will probably take a week in itself. If the solicitors would let us all talk to one another, even by email, it would happen far quicker, but some solicitors in our chain insist on post just to swop information like possible dates!!
I went through a house sale last year, and it sounds very similar, just with different terms. The lawyers and realtors managed to keep me from communicating with the buyer of my old house, and that end of the sale turned out quite horrible. But by some miracle I managed to meet the seller of my new house, and things went much better. People are always less willing to screw an actual person than a name on a paper.
28 is a bit of a stretch, the Chas and Dave, Nice One Cyril and Diamond Lights with Hoddle and Waddle are on it, the rest only for purists
Good luck with the move, its such a pressure and having gone through it a few times I know how it gets. The last one was selling my flat, I had already moved and sat in a pub waiting for the call to let me know it sold. The legal system in this country sometimes goes back to the dark ages
amc2 - this is to do with the boundary of the house of the people buying ours. It is an old country house that has been in the same hands for 37 years. Basically it revolves around the thickness of the mark on the photocopied old plan - which side of the line is the boundary. The prospective owners are quite happy, but their London solicitor wants it to be absolutely clear. We have had about 5 dates come and go, but this is the nearest we have got so far to completiton. It is beginning to have an impact upon work, both for my own part-time teaching but also for my wife, a primary (elementary) school head, who can't totally keep her diary free too much.
RE: Emusic versus Guvera:
I'd prefer both :-) . . . If I were presented with a choice, I would prefer Emusic anytime because of it's collection of music.
- And from a political standpoint, I do not like to contribute in any way to the existence of companies like Mc. D.
- That said, if Guvera was available, I would be there dl'ing away !
I guess this could be called "music over politics".
McD's doesn't make people fat; people make people fat. Although any cannibal I've ever seen a picture of looked skinny, so people don't invariably make people fat ... Anyway, I opt for music over politics too.
There's no compulsion to use the McDonalds ads. I can't keep up with the free credits without ever going to the McDonalds page. @greg, As I said earlier, I have no cause to complain about getting lots of free music. But it does depend a bit on what you are looking for. Very little of the music I usually follow is on Guvera. The big upside of that is that I have downloaded a cartload of jazz (including a fair bit of ECM) that I would likely have never got around to buying or even trying, and have really loved a substantial subset of it. The limitation is that, for instance, two artists I like (Brokeback and Motion) released new albums in the last week or two, both are $6.99 on emusic (meaning that even with my $10+ balance I can't get both), and neither (in common with the totality of my emusic SFL, which has been trawled for Guveral overlaps)is on Guvera, while on Guvera between my wife and me we have a couple of hundred credits to spend (and she is *much* slower at collecting music than I am) and I am some days floundering around for the next artist I know nothing about to download, while trying to catch up on listening to last week's haul. That kind of dilemma could hardly be called suffering, and having Guvera has quite patently been much, much better than not having Guvera, and I could always just not click and add the day's credits (still too hard to pass up!), but it does mean that right at this moment if someone said "I'll trade you suspending Guvera for a month for a month of half price on emusic" I'd be very tempted. If one of your goals is to collect ECM, then that would be a very bad trade and Guvera would be heaven. All hypothetical though, as emusic is just getting more expensive and Guvera is still throwing free credits at us that I will in the end thankfully use.
Comments
Having said that I can't complain at all at having discovered John Abercrombie by accident and promptly downloaded seven of his albums for free.
Gu!
At&t broke teh internets! I'm downloading this at the library.
For the moment I'm on the wagon, so to speak, having cancelled my eMu sub and not getting anything from other vendors. It's nice to save a little money, but I'm also trying to think of what a "complete" music collection might look like.
The good: new Brokeback album out today. The bad: $6.99 is definitely the new $5.99 at emusic.
ETA, Brokeback is Doug McCombs of Tortoise with additional musicians, currently Pete Croke: bass, James Elkington: drums, organ, guitar, Chris Hansen: guitar. So naturally, from the emusic artist page: Mazurek once appeared on one track of an EP by Brokeback.
ETA2, those who like Earth should give this a listen.
Not that I'm complaining about G though!
My music collection will be complete when I'm dead, I guess. Otherwise why stop? Guvera keeps moving me closer to a streaming rather than collecting point though. There isn't enough time to enjoy everything. But I tell myself to keep going; like emu, it can't last forever.
Craig
G. Yeah, my collection's still nowhere near complete.
Very cold here this evening 8F/-13C; feels like -7F/-22C.
It may be lame and Rolling Stonerish of me, but this would be high on my list of '12, if not the top, if I had such a list.
Good points Greg. I don't know if I would trade; I just wanted to feel less bad. Oh well; I have about as much control over Guvera as I did over emusic. Might as well just enjoy the ride. Sorry.
ETA: if you look at some of the lists on emusers' list of lists, I think there are quite a few non-major label things, especially in the older jazz area.
Found this in the charity shop for A £1 could not walk past it!!!
I agree about E Music, I have gone on hold again and Greg your remarks about ECM are right on the money, I have been asking for ages and it seems that either ECM do not want anything to do with them or E Music are too lazy to do anything about it. I am up also to trial Guvera in the EU. I am enjoying the new Bandcamp feature and I am finding lots of good new stuff and do not have a problem with the site and downloading
I'm sitting at home, some slight snow outside, waiting to see if exchange has taken place on our proposed house move next Wednesday. Only those who have bought property in England or Wales will understand the archaic system of house purchase here, so I won't try to explain the finer details. Everybody in the chain has agreed to move next Wednesday, but if exchange fails to happen today, basically we have to start negotiating about dates yet again, which will probably take a week in itself. If the solicitors would let us all talk to one another, even by email, it would happen far quicker, but some solicitors in our chain insist on post just to swop information like possible dates!!
Good luck!
Good luck with the move, its such a pressure and having gone through it a few times I know how it gets. The last one was selling my flat, I had already moved and sat in a pub waiting for the call to let me know it sold. The legal system in this country sometimes goes back to the dark ages
I'd prefer both :-) . . . If I were presented with a choice, I would prefer Emusic anytime because of it's collection of music.
- And from a political standpoint, I do not like to contribute in any way to the existence of companies like Mc. D.
- That said, if Guvera was available, I would be there dl'ing away !
I guess this could be called "music over politics".
NP:
- Awesome piano performance by Ursula Oppens
Totally agree, BN, but I too would prefer both, so for me it still would be !!
Local Natives - Hummingbird
Streaming free from itunes - something I've not noticed itunes do before in UK. Worth a listen Lowlife.(Better than Spurs songs!!!)
@greg, As I said earlier, I have no cause to complain about getting lots of free music. But it does depend a bit on what you are looking for. Very little of the music I usually follow is on Guvera. The big upside of that is that I have downloaded a cartload of jazz (including a fair bit of ECM) that I would likely have never got around to buying or even trying, and have really loved a substantial subset of it. The limitation is that, for instance, two artists I like (Brokeback and Motion) released new albums in the last week or two, both are $6.99 on emusic (meaning that even with my $10+ balance I can't get both), and neither (in common with the totality of my emusic SFL, which has been trawled for Guveral overlaps)is on Guvera, while on Guvera between my wife and me we have a couple of hundred credits to spend (and she is *much* slower at collecting music than I am) and I am some days floundering around for the next artist I know nothing about to download, while trying to catch up on listening to last week's haul. That kind of dilemma could hardly be called suffering, and having Guvera has quite patently been much, much better than not having Guvera, and I could always just not click and add the day's credits (still too hard to pass up!), but it does mean that right at this moment if someone said "I'll trade you suspending Guvera for a month for a month of half price on emusic" I'd be very tempted. If one of your goals is to collect ECM, then that would be a very bad trade and Guvera would be heaven. All hypothetical though, as emusic is just getting more expensive and Guvera is still throwing free credits at us that I will in the end thankfully use.