all things emusic

[Uncle Skid]

There's 19 under his name, and also quite a few compilations. I managed to get five discs before things went to hell over there.

Good luck getting them -- downloading is a joke.

[Son-of-a-Weizen]

i can't get anything to d/l....

It could just be my system, but whenever the download process just stopped cold, I'd reinstall the download manager......it only takes 10 seconds and seems to 'jump start' the download process when it stalled.

[Soulstation1]

i wonder in the new system, will an intro to a song, ie live record, count as a d/l.

so a "live" 10 song set, could count as 19/20 d/ls songs???

also 60/65 d/ls a month is about 2.25 d/ls a day.

that ain't nothin'....

i wish i had joined awhile back.

ss1

[Soulstation1]

anyone having any luck with emusic today?

ss1

[Uncle Skid]

anyone having any luck with emusic today?

Nope. Absolutely awful the last few days.

I'm done -- cancelled my membership this morning; I'll get $1.50 back for the remaining few days of my second month.

It's really sad it ended up like this, but I suppose it was inevitable. Overall, I can't complain too much, as I downloaded a whole bunch of great music for a very reasonable $28.50.

I think the real benefit of EMusic (and it's old pricing) was the ability to download various albums/tracks with very low risk. With the new pricing, it becomes too much like the other online music services -- trying out new music becomes much more expensive and difficult.

Call me paranoid, but I firmly believe that EMusic demise was somehow caused the the big boys who are trying to get the public to believe that paying a dollar for one (copy-protected) digital music file is a good deal.

And while I'm on my little rant here, it seems awfully short-sighted as well. While I realize an old fart like me isn't the big record companies target market, I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels that an MP3 (or any compressed format) file is not a suitable substitute for the real thing on CD or vinyl.

If anything, my EMusic membership has caused me to buy *more* CD's in the last few months. Maybe I should ask for a refund??

[AfricaBrass]

If anything, my EMusic membership has caused me to buy *more* CD's in the last few months. Maybe I should ask for a refund??

Same with me.

Since I've never viewed mp3s as being equal to cds in quality. Their main function for me has been to introduce me to new music.

I guess the RIAA doesn't understand this benefit.

I still think the $1 an mp3 model is insane. Maybe a $1 an album, but that's pushing it for me.

[RDK]

I can't really blame them for the "restructuring," but they went way too far with it. Before, you were allowed (well, sort of) 2000 tracks/month for $10 or $15 per month membership fee. Now it's something like 60 tracks for $15.

Why couldn't they have compromised more reasonably, at say 200 tracks per month for the same fee? I think a lot of us would have stuck it out if that were the case...

[Noj]

I am convinced it is ruined, and I will cancel. I have a whole shelving unit of cdrs to listen to, so I can't complain.

[Soulstation1]

has anyone stayed with e-music?

is the d/l speed back to the way it was?

ss1

[BFrank]

I'm sticking with it for the time being. It's still a better deal than any of the other legal d/l services. Fortunately I got more stuff than I could possible listen to in the last year or so that I have been a member.

I only downloaded a few tracks since Saturday, but it seems to be back to normal.

[Noj]

I gave them one more chance, and a Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis track froze my computer. It was the last straw, I cancelled.

[The Mule]

I'm sticking with it for the time being as well. Download speeds seemed back to normal on Saturday and I spent most of the weekend completing all the messed-up downloads I had attempted since the big announcement. So far everything downloaded previously can be downloaded again WITHOUT counting against your new monthly total.

I'm in the $14.99 for 65 tunes a month plan. Since I download mostly jazz that's a pretty good deal. The average jazz album has 8 or 9 cuts so that's about six or seven albums a month. Hell, most of the ESP titles have only three or four tunes on them. You could still download a lot of their whole catalog in one month!

So, for now, I'm hanging on...

[randyhersom]

I stayed it for the time being too. I was worried I'd relinquish my re-download rights if I let it lapse. I've re-downloaded the Monk and Wes boxes since the download limits went into effect, and downloads are much better than before the limits. The number of tracks was well over 40, so they seem to mean what they say about redownloading still being unlimited.

About five screens of new releases went up after the limits. The Frank Kimbrough is definitely on my list, and the Mark Whitcage is a maybe. Hoping to see Organissimo soon!

[randyhersom]

Geez. They backed up the ESP-Disk truck at E-Music. They were at maybe 15%-20% of the catalog before the policy change, and I'd have to guess they're close to %100 now. My next batch of download credits arrives November 23, and I'm sure I'll go through them all within a day or two. Ayler at Slugs, Henry Grimes Trio, more Sonny Simmons, Marion Brown, Revolutionary Ensemble, Charles Tyler and Michael Gregory Jackson.

[BFrank]

They also seem to have acquired the Artemis label, which includes Warren Zevon, Graham Nash and Steve Earle among others.

Still........none of this stuff is actually available to d/l yet.

[randyhersom]

Cross-check the titles on the ESP stuff before downloading. The new "Capricorn Moon" by Marion Brown is the same album already posted as "Marion Brown Quartet".

Edited November 21, 2003 by randyhersom

[gdogus]

I've decided to stick with EMusic, albeit on the lowly 40 tracks/month plan. I do hope the new arrivals will continue to flow in, and that they'll make it worth while.

[BFrank]

Don't remember if this was mentioned earlier in the thread, but the "Yo Miles!" sets are pretty great. Also, because there are only a few tunes and they are REALLY long, it won't eat into your allotment much.

[BFrank]

I just noticed that in addition to the $10/40 and $15/65 they have added another level: $20 for 90 downloads.

[Soulstation1]

i finally burned the vince guaraldi holiday music.

i really like his piano playing, especially on the christmas song.

the charlie brown series was probably the first time listening to jazz of any sort for me.

i need to burn the other christmas stuff i've d/l from emusic.

ss1

[BFrank]

They're finally starting to add some new tunes. Looks like they just added the Delmark label, too! Here are the artists that they have, so far:

• Fred Anderson
  
• Roy Campbell
  
• Rich Corpolongo Quartet
  
• Jimmy Johnson
  
• Roscoe Mitchell
  
• Aaron Moore
  
• Kevin O'Donnell's Quality Six
  
• Cecil Payne
  
• Tad Robinson
  
• Roscoe Mitchell Quartet
  
• Malachi Thompson
  

[Uncle Skid]

They're finally starting to add some new tunes. Looks like they just added the Delmark label, too! Here are the artists that they have, so far:

Thanks for the update! I check their site periodically to see what's new, but I haven't signed up again yet.

Has downloading got any better since November? Did they finally take care of all the bugs and problems in their software?

-- Mark

[BFrank]

It seems to be running smoothly, although if you are on Windows you may need to download the updated Download Manager that fixes a new "runtime error" bug.

Also, there are some issues with "temporarily unavailable" tracks on some albums. They claim to have that situation straightened out by the end of January.

So, Uncle Skid........I guess there are still issues, actually. You may want to wait until Feb to get started.

[Uncle Skid]

The "unavailable tracks" thing must be very frustrating, if it happens frequently. When I was a member, once I had downloaded a complete CD, I'd pretty much forget about it for awhile and go on to the next one. I'd hate to have to go through all my downloads, checking for missing tracks.

Oh yeah, I forgot -- it's not unlimited anymore. I suppose it'd be much easier to deal with when you only get 40-60 per month.

I'll probably wait for at least a few more months -- I still have quite a few downloads from November that I haven't listened to yet. Plus, I've been on a CD buying binge lately, and a box from Mosaic showed up a few days ago.

So much music, so little time!!

[GA Russell]

How easy it to quit?

Figuring ten songs per album, 90 songs for twenty bucks is a great deal. But I wouldn't want to listen to 9 new albums a month, month after month after month. That's too much for me! So I would sign up for a month, then wait three months, then sign up for a month, etc.

So, is it easy to quit, to do what I mention, or are they imprecise about this, so you get stuck being a member for two months at a time.

By the way, can you monitor your account, so that you know how many downloads you have left on your current payment?