All the feels...

Keeping with my recent music theme I've been rambling about I want to talk about nostalgia, and the good or bad feelings certain music can give a person.

For me, I tie specific moments in my life to whatever music I was obsessing over at the time.  Alanis' - Jagged Little Pill (omg so cliche!) was pretty much my anthem album in high school and the early stages of becoming a young woman.  Many rites of passage moments, many heartbreaks, many BFF moments, and learning who I was.

I went through a phase where I only listened to country (lol some of it's good, shut up) and Martina McBride's Greatest Hits album specifically is bitter sweet to me.  It was a very difficult time for me back then.  First baby.  First huge, insanely, life-altering break up.  I remember being so angry at life, and everything around me. But I loved that album.  The songs I still hear on occasion bring those feels back, while they're still slightly bitter, I reflect back and know I'm in a better place now.

Now as a grown adult and somewhat established in life I can say most of my music in my rotation brings the good feels.

Speaking of which, have ya'll paid attention to the recent release from Two Steps From Hell? Miracles. It's pretty amazing, very video gamey.  Makes me feel a little empowered :D  This is the stuff that I listen to in the background when I'm working or concentrating on something super serial like ohhh..I dunno, a blog.

Speaking of video games (you knew it was coming) let's talk Final Fantasyyyyy! Pls?

Photo by eldi13

The Final Fantasy series has been in my life for years.  More recently in life than childhood I have to admit.  FFXI hits another milestone for me.  After the Martina breakup my sister got me into video games to try and help keep me occupied and as a newly single baby mamma my social life took a wrong turn at Albuquerque, never to be seen again.

I've met some of my favorite people in life by playing that game.  We've all sort of migrated away from XI over the years, playing random things here and there but for the most part we've all stuck together wherever we went.  The music from that game is something I frequent still to this day.

A lot of us are currently hanging out in Final Fantasy XIV.  Many of us played the original 1.0 train wreck.  While we made some excellent memories together we were glad to see it being revamped.  I'll never forget those feelings that night the 1.0 servers went down for good.

They had us watch an amazing new cut-scene.  I bawled like a baby.  Was a very emotional experience.

I had recorded some footage of that night and used my new favorite song dubbed to it.

This song they used was um....friggin' awesome, to say the least.  I was mesmerized by the amazing vocals.  I quickly did some research to find out who it was ( Susan Calloway ) and became and instant fangirl.  Turns out she's done vocals for other FF tracks too that I apparently missed early on.

I recently had the pleasure of attending one of the Distant Worlds Orchestra  concerts in Chicago a couple months ago.  One of the best experiences of my life.  The nostalgia was overwhelming.  It will forever be in my "good feels" bank of music memories.

Nobuo Uemastu was there!

When Susan came out I started crying like a 14 year old at a NKOTB concert. Ok, maybe not that bad but it was close.

RIP Louisoux

Beautiful, as always. 

It really was an experience of a lifetime and would love to go again if ever given the opportunity.

Her voice is pretty amazing.  If you haven't checked out any of her other music I employ you to do so.  She's got some of her stuff up on her website here.  She's actively touring with the Distant Worlds as well if you happen to be near an area they are coming to.  Warm fuzzies guaranteed.

She's got some new songs coming out I immediately fell in love with that she performed on a local Radio show in Detroit.  She's done a few low key/intimate local shows here that unfortunately I haven't been able to get to because I was travelling.  Some day...

Wow, long post is long.

Anyone else have any tracks or albums that hit them right in the feels?

xoxo

Many Music. Such Players. So Streaming.

I'm a music buff, can't really go more than a few hours without it.  I enjoy discovering new artist and genre recommendations whether it be from a humanoid or an android.

Music streaming has been my go-to for about the last 5-6 years now.  Back then (5 years is a long time in technology land!) there weren't a lot of options.  That industry recently exploded and we now have over a dozen options both paid and free.

Over this span of time I've tried them all...no literally.  All of them.  I was always in pursuit of the one that was a perfect fit that had all the best features.  Honestly, it was an uphill battle till recently.  My Sonos demanded some prerequisites that pigeon-holed me into certain services that were compatible.  They've recently went all out and started supporting a trillion different services now.

Fast forward to today and I can say that Google Play All Access is my favorite and provides all the features I need.  I'll now go over how I came to this conclusion and why this works best for me and list a few of the services worth mentioning.

In no particular order:

Pandora - Hands-down the best radio type service and it's free if you don't mind the occasional ad.  Their paid version eliminates those.  I've tried other service's radio version and they don't even compare.  The compilations they put together are great and typically spot on.  If you use the service long enough you're able to make pseudo playlists by thumbs-downing songs you don't like and they will eventually weed out the stuff you don't care for and play only what you like.  They do offer some social media interaction.

I usually use Pandora to discover new stuff to add to my permanent playlist over on the Googles.

Go create a Will Smith station over there.  You'll thank me (and Jenna Marbles) later.  Click her video with NSFW caution haha.

Methods: Web and Mobile.

Rhapsody - This was my first ever music streaming service I ever subscribed to.  They had 2 plans. One that was PC only + 1 mobile device and one that you could add up to 3 mobile devices to.  They were under the radar and didn't advertise very much and they were also fairly expensive at $15 a month.  They have a radio option but it doesn't compare to Pandora.  You do have unlimited access to their music library to create unlimited playlists.  If self-created playlists aren't your thing then move it along.  They do offer some social media interaction with the web version but no one uses it so they won't be able to open it lol.  RIP Napster, don't trip on RealPlayer.

For a long time this was about the only service Sonos supported with their system too.

They've since got a bit of a face-lift in the last year as they've teamed up with T-Mobile and added a third tier of cheaper service "UnRadio" and even special pricing with them if you are a T-mo customer. I hated to leave them, it was a good gig while it lasted but again, Google ended up providing more features for me and even at a lower cost.

Methods: Web, Mobile, and PC App. - Allows offline/downloadable music.

Rdio - This service was okay.  I found a lot of the music I wanted wasn't there.  They're fairly new to the market so they might not have everything yet. I don't really have anything bad to say about it except for the free version literally limits you to XX amount of hours before telling you to subscribe.  The actual number to that seems to be a mystery.

I didn't hate this one but I didn't love it either.  Again....free or paid.  There's other services I feel are a little better.

Methods:  Web, Mobile, and PC App. - Has a sync ability but I didn't use it long enough to determine if this was their "offline" mode or not.

Spotify - Ok so Spotify has its place in the world, that's for sure.  I can't ignore them but I don't need to use them either.  Spotify is a pleasant blend of radio, suggested compilations (Spotify & fellow user created), and self-created playlists for free.  The ads... annoying as hell.  There's physical pop up ads in the overlay and radio commercials as well.  Makes me rage a little.  Butttt it's free.  You can also see what your friends are listening to and subscribe to their playlists.

Don't pay for this service. You can get superior service elsewhere if you're looking for a subscription based plan.

When I signed up for Spotify (beta) there was no social media embedded into it yet.  It didn't require a Facebook account at the time.  Now, if I'm not mistaken, it requires you sign up via your FB account now.  I've also found out that when you search for specific music, it pulls up really obscure nonsense that sounds like it was recorded in someone's mini van sometimes.

Methods:  Web, Mobile, and PC App. - Allows offline/downloadable music.

Google Play All Access - My sweet sweet Googles.  Yup. Self proclaimed fanboygirl.  When they announced this service at I/O 2013 I hopped on it immediately...like F5'd the sign up page.  Got special pricing for being an early adopter.  UI took some getting used to but overall I really liked it.  I used it for about 4-6 months before I inevitably switched back to Rhapsody due to my Sonos integration.  Google Play wasn't supported yet, sadly.  I switched back to Rhapsody for the time being till they got their integration together.  Now I'm back and happier than ever.

They too have radio stations, personally I think they're not quite as good as Pandora, but not terrible.  Unlimited playlist creations, and you can share playlists with other subscribers.  The real kicker here is if you're someone like me that enjoys some off the wall remixes, or weird video game soundtrack compilations that don't always come up on these services, they have cloud storage inside Google Drive that allows you to incorporate your own MP3's into  your playlists.  You can play them back from anywhere, even mobile devices.

Once you start using it, and creating playlists, and listening to radio stations they will start giving you recommendations based on your listening history.

My only gripe about this one is there's no PC app.  There's Chrome extensions you can get that turn into a pop out player but it's still just a browser.  Social integration with G+ and direct playlist/song links for everywhere else.

Methods:  Web & Mobile. - Allows offline/downloadable music.

Beats Music - lol.





Song of the day:

Google Play:  Ninna Nanna - Lulu Rouge

Spotify: Ninna Nanna - Lulu Rouge


Thank you, drive through.

First post whaaat?!

So I had some wine and decided to start a blog.

I have no idea what I'm doing but I really really really love this song and the only place I could find a shareable version was Spotify.  It's not on youtube...can you beleeb it?

So, without further ado...

Eyes On Fire (Dubbed on Drugs) - Blue Foundation

p.s. It pained me to use Spotify just now.  I subscribe to Google Play Music (it's far superior for a paid service) but I've learned the vast majority uses Spotify and I will abide for the greater good of music sharing. xoxo

I did make a FFXIV video once and this happened to be playing in the background when I recorded it.  If that's your thing.