Blogging - The Gift That Keeps Giving

Blogging about music is so great because every day I get at least a few recommendations by email, blog comments, twitter, or some other medium.

Josef left this comment on my Ben Kweller is 26 post:

I love Ben – been friends with him since he was 14.
I would also say Patrick Wolf if one of the greatest of his generation as well.

I know Josef has great taste in music but I had no idea he’s friends with Ben. Very cool. If Josef says Patrick Wolf is worth listening, then I listen.

And listen is what I’ve been doing all day. Here’s Magic Position so you can listen too.

Magic Position – Patrick Wolf – Magic Position

#VC & Technology

Comments (Archived):

  1. Yoel Roth

    I can vouch (for whatever it’s worth) for Patrick Wolf being one of the best of his generation. Seeing him live in Philadelphia (the beginning of his tragically short North American tour) was the best show I’ve ever been to, and really a fantastic experience.

    1. Cameron Koczon

      I do like to hear that. I am going to see him tomorrow night in SF. He’s been an obsession of mine for some time now. His older stuff is a lot darker, so prepare yourself as you head back in time with his work.

  2. David

    Fred, not sure if you know them already but maybe you´ll also like Patrick Park and Johnathan Rice. And you should definitely check out Ian Brown´s new album “The World Is Yours”. And for my part, I´ve been enjoying the two new tracks on New York´s Nightmare Of You MySpace page.David

  3. Braydon

    Fred – long time reader, first time commenting – love your blog.You clearly love music, love the music you love, but also love finding new music. I am curious how you like getting recommendations. I don’t mean discovering new music like Hype Machine (and I agree – the new beta is a huge and dramatic improvement), but recommendations from friends. You mentioned the blog, email, twitter and some other medium. Would you like to have an aggregated recommendation feed for music?Braydon

    1. fredwilson

      Here is my dreamA personal crawler that scans my email, blog comments, twitter feed, facebook, etc and picks up all music recommendations and then creates custom playlists for me in rhapsody and the hypemachineThat would be nirvanaFred

      1. braydonjm

        …and you might want to figure out the degree of trust on each recommender to avoid poor future recommendations. I think all this is fairly accomplishable (the email piece might be tricky). You’d have to either input feeds, or provide access to a source of your feeds in some manner.I’m going to guess you’d also want to publish this list (maybe with the recommendations you’ve accepted/like/approve of/added/removed) in a widget/rss feed on your blog (or elsewhere) too.We may have an answer for that. Right now it’s internal only – meaning does not accept feeds from other places, but I like the idea of incorporating data for this. And recommendations will always be more powerful than machine driven.Will see if we can make some nirvana for you ;)Braydonhttp://www.rvibe.com

  4. MW

    Fred — have you ever heard the band Explosions in the Sky? Saw them this week opening for the Smashing Pumpkins in Boston. Really liked them.

    1. fredwilson

      Thanks for the suggestionI’ll check them outfred

  5. Josef

    Fred -Thanks for the shout out. One more plug for Mates of State (also good friends) doing 4 shows next week in NYC. Just checked their site, looks like 3 are sold out, but a free show for CMJ badge holders on Oct 17 2007. I think they’re doing Joe’s Pub first that evening, then doing the free show with The Walkmen at Avalon. I am kind of regretting going to San Francisco on Wednesday now…Last thing about Ben – I think John Vanderslice is also amazing and sweet, they’ve always kind of reminded me of each other…such genuine musicians.

  6. tim heineke

    patrick wolfe is a great album