Pandora and Alice in Chains

In a previous post, I had briefly mentioned my fascination with Pandora – the internet radio service based on the Music Genome Project. If you haven’t tried it yet, it’s quite a brilliant idea. Sign up for free and enter a band name or a music genre and Pandora does the rest. Zach Kron had an interesting description of the ‘parametric thinking' established by your artist selections.

The Music Genome team creates parametric magic by listening to all kinds of music and rating each song based on about 400 attributes such as beats made for dancing, cool jazz qualities, vinyl ambiance, and electric guitar riffs.

ABC News had a feature story on Nightline that included an interview with Pandora founder Tim Westergren:

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Alice In Chains

If you’re a 90’s grunge music junkie like me, you probably list bands like Alice in Chains, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Mudhoney and Meat Puppets as some of your favorites. I spent most of my five years at architecture school listening to Bleach, Ten, Insecticide, Dirt, Jar of Flies and other amazing albums (try the soundtrack to Natural Born Killers…it was a late night studio staple for us!). The loss of legendary artists Kurt Cobain (d. April 1994) and Alice In Chains front man Lane Staley (d. April 2002) might have even prompted some of us to launch anti-heroin campaigns, but alas, what happens to our favorite bands when tragedy strikes? Dave Grohl (Nirvana drummer) went on to form the excellent rock band Foo Fighters; but what would Alice In Chains do next without Lane’s harmonic offset to guitarist Jerry Cantrell? The band reunited in 2005 and brought in vocalist William DuVall. In September 2009, they released their first album in 14 years titled “Black Gives Way to Blue” – which I found by creating an “Incubus” station on Pandora! (phew)

Their new album is one of those rare comebacks that captures the original essence of the band. Black Gives Way to Blue has the haunting harmonies reminiscent of Jar of Flies (1994) and grinding riffs like their breakthrough album Dirt (1992). A couple of the songs remind me of Mark Wahlberg in Rock Star, but in total I find myself listening to this album over and over again. Only about 6 albums fit into that category for me!