Not as free as I used to be (on Amie St.)
Ever since they modified their site and added Sony, I've been going to Amie St. far less than I used to. This isn't intentional, nor can I state with any real confidence that there's any cause and effect there, but it is what it is. I used to go daily, sometimes several times a day. I was on top of shit. Since the revamp and the Sony, not so much. It may be that I reached a saturation point coincidentally right when the changes occurred, and it was a natural scaling back of my visits. It probably wasn't healthy how often I went to Amie. And I like how they handled the Sony drops. It didn't get put in the new releases and, thus, drown out all the true new releases. I think the new site is more clunky, and it's harder to read. I think that, actually, is a big problem for me. Smaller typeface, and just organized in a way that doesn't seem to draw my eyes in natural motions. I do, however, much much much prefer the new sample player. Big time. The search engine still is just making shit up as it goes along. I'm not offended that some albums don't start as free or that they go up in price faster than they used to. I still think Amie is a great site, and should be a part of everyone's balanced music meal. It does seem like, with all the changes, that they aren't dropping as much obscure stuff as they used to. Probably very busy managing all the changes, so it's to be expected. I hope for more success for those guys. I also hope I start heading down their way more often again.
Comments
I did use the 50% off cash sale to get quite a few of the $5 sony's, I am hoping they have a nice selection of those per month, ala Amazon's 50 for $5. I can dream, anyway.
Any idea why this is so, e.g., is it because we're only now heading into the fall's large schedule of top-notch new arrivals, or does it have something to do with Sony's arrival at Aime Street?
I've also observed that the midnight new releases tend to be less interesting as well as less free. Bigger releases often appear during the day, and seldom bundled together.
Finally, it's no longer possible to buy an album directly from the new releases page. This makes the process much more frustrating (at least for me, as I wait for the page to load up against the competition of other users.)
TKW Band, or Prose in Rosette (I cringe at that name).
I think if you're looking for Amie to be the great trough of free albums, it's not going to be what it once was - too many people are on to it and a lot of the labels that likely to join are already there. That said, it is still a great place to get some of the big name new releases if your timing is good. This morning I got 8 albums including the new Raveonettes and Mountain Goats for a grand total of about $20 (about $8 in real money). Even if an album is nearing $5, with the 50% off sales and the extra REC money, it works out to about $2 a disc - more like pre-Sony eMu.
As far as using the recs go, here is a strategy - grab a popular album you want when its around 30 cents a track. When it tops out at 98 cents, you will have made 34 cents per track and effectively gotten the album for free - the only thing it will have cost you are the recs you had sitting in your account.
Craig
Wow. Your street cred is HUGE. Is there anyone with a higher street cred than you and that jujubeebop person? I see that you make about $.30 a REC. Can I brag a little and say I make about $.70 per REC? Plus, I've started RECing only artists I love and are popular, so I know I'll make the full amount. I earn $4.03 for every dollar I spend in real money. Which is why I love Amie Street.
I just got the brand new Brandi Carlile album (which is $9.99 everywhere, it seems) and had to pay full price because it's a Sony release (which eMusic won't get for two years), but with how much I get per dollar, it cost me less than $2.50.
Long live Amie Street.
brittleblood
Craig
There are a couple of people with more with more street cred than I or jujubeebop have, but they are affiliated with Amie Street - one being their Web Designer. My average could per REC be higher, but I've been handing out RECs to a lot of albums that I like that I know won't sell a lot (at one time I had over 500 RECs so I figured why not). Quite of few of my RECs have only made me about 10 cents or so.
I can't complain. Between my girlfriend and I, we have almost 45,000 tracks from Amie Street. After spending a combined $400 or so, we still have about $350 in our accounts and another 350 RECs to dole out (which should net us another $100 in credit or so when all said and done).
here's where i'd insert one of those nihilsitic single key-stroke icons if i knew anything about samponic html...which would be linked to the samponic wunderhit track 6
It's got some good stuff on it - especially the slow ones.
How long have you been using Amie Street?
I actually signed up much earlier, like a few weeks after it launched, but there was absolutely nothing there of interest at the time, so I forgot about it for a couple of year, until someone posted on eMu that the Burial Untrue album was free over there. I rushed over there and was hooked. ironically, I had already bought that album at eMu but hadn't gotten around to listening to it, so I didn't realize I had it already.
like chanel no. 5, use of "samponic" in general discourse has a dangerous and lingering affect.
Craig
I think the last significant label drop where a lot was free at one time was the Tru-Thoughts label. Amazingly, several of their albums remained free for almost a whole day,
I just checked the Amie Top 25 - I apparently have 20 of them.
Between Amie, the 3 eMu accounts (with the You Rock Bonuses), the Lala sales, and the complete Beatles collection that just came in the mail from Amazon last night, I've got around 100 new albums in the last month. Don't even know where to start.
Craig