A few brief updates

I've had a lot going on lately, so my apologies for not having a whole lot of new music on here in the last little while.  I do have a few brief updates on some things, though.

First of all, the free "Stairway to Heaven" MP3 disappeared almost as quickly as it appeared, which leads me to believe that it was not a legitimate download in the first place.  I don't quite know what to make of that, actually, as last.fm has long been one of my most trusted sources of free, legal music downloads.  I'm hoping that it's not that easy to beat their system and upload anything by any artist.

Next, David over at Music Musings has also posted about the Suburban Home Records free album giveaway.  His post goes a step beyond just asking for recommendations and offers a form for people to submit their own reviews of any of the site's freely available songs; all of the reviews can be seen in a Google Spreadsheet.  Currently there are only reviews there from David and myself, so if anyone else would like to contribute, please go see David's post.  After listening to most of the freely available songs (there are nearly 3 hours worth, and I have them all in a playlist which I like to randomize), I am leaning heavily towards Two Cow Garage's III as my pick, but I'm still going to give this at least another week before I make my final decision.  Remember, this offer expires at the end of this month, so check it out soon if you are remotely interested.

Speaking of time-limited offers, another one is about to come to an end: the Microsoft Windows Sponsored Songs on ReverbNation.  David has a couple of recommendations for that giveaway as well, and there is also the spreadsheet I made that lists all 1008 available songs in a format that is somewhat easier to navigate than the website.  These songs should be available for another week, during which time I'll be taking a final swing through the site to grab anything I may have missed earlier.

For those who don't know about my interests outside of music, I like to develop video games in my spare time, and I recently completed and released my first game, Picture Puzzle Revolution.  The music and artwork in the game are all taken from the last two Nine Inch Nails releases, so if you enjoy their music and are up for a rather insane challenge, please check it out.  

One last thing: in case you haven't heard elsewhere, the Smashing Pumpkins will be releasing their upcoming album, Teargarden by Kaleidyscope, for free over the Internet, one song at a time (for a total of 44 planned songs).  I am not a huge fan of the Pumpkins, but I do quite enjoy some of their work, and I know that many of this blog's readers do as well - my post about Machina II has long been the most-visited page on this site.  I'm really looking forward to seeing how this new album plays out.

Okay, that's all for now.  I hope to be back here soon with some more new music for you to check out.  Thanks for reading!