RopBop Blog

Instead of doing my usual post of songs I am going to go in a little bit of a different direction with this post. I am going o throw out a couple of really neat music related sites I have happened to stumble upon while navigating the deep dark never ending abyss that is the internet. So grab you hard hat with a light mount and follow me as we go exploring.

Allmusic.com
I have to say that with out this site, you the reader, would more than likely have to listen to me babble about stupid trivial things in my boring ass life. Like my music organization process , my favorite M&M color and why, or the countless things I am pining over daily on a daily basis. Believe me you don't want to hear about any of that, It's about as interesting as watching paint dry, besides that is what my other blog or facebook are for. So to at least keep the few followers I do have I jump on the ol' Allmusic and do some homework and get some juicy tidbits to make it look like I know what I am talking about. The site is an encyclopedia of any band that you can name, well almost any. It features biographies, discographies, song listes and samples, credits and even awards. Not only that but it hosts extras like a list for new releases that come out each week, an awesome album of the day feature, album reviews up the wazoo, and tons more. The thing I love most about it is it's all linked, sort of like Wikipedia, only more creditable. This is a must visit for any music geek.

www.songmeanings.net
Have you ever listened to a song and had either of these problems? A.) The mush mouthed singer is slurring the words so bad that you swear he must have had 20 beers before recording. Of course you HAVE to know the lyrics because if you sing it wrong in front of someone who knows the correct words they will make a point to call you out in the most non discrete way possible. B.) In an effort to be artsy fartsy the songwriter thought it would be a great idea to confuse the hell out of any one who tried to understand what his "cryptic" and "mysterious" song was about. With the help of Song Meanings you can now be brave to belt out those words and be the callee instead of the called out. Then after that you can console the or put on the finishing move, by dropping some behind the music science. Although before doing all that you may want to know that this is all user generated A.K.A. not 100% accurate. However it is nice to see what others think and more than a few times there is a general consensus or someone read an interview where the band explained what the song was about. Just be careful you might come to find out your favorite song, that you thought was about love, was actually about a hot dog the songwriter had that day.

www.yhbtm.com
YHBTM stands for You Have Bad Taste In Music. This site is more for something to laugh at than it is useful. I have a little story to tell before I go into this further. I recently got hooked on Yahoo Answers. If yo don't know what that is it's basic question and answer service (someone posts a question, users answer said question, after a certain time an answer gets voted as the best.) Anyway I love to go on there and suggest new music to people, you know try and broaden musical horizons and what not. However I'm not the only one who suggests things and I almost always see recommendations like Fallout Boy, The Jonas Brothers, Nickleback, or Miley Cyrus. I will admit I do like a song or two by some of those artists, well by Fall out boy anyway. On the whole I loathe tend to loathe cookie cutter bands and people who don't at least try to listen to something other than what the radio plays. That is just part of my musical snobbery though. I don't ever tell people that they have bad taste in music though, I'll just leave it to this guy. He's got a bigger pair than me.

goodblimey.com
In the last year or so I have seen a huge increase in the popularity of mashups. For those not in the know of what a mash up is think of it like this. You have two potatoes, each of them represents a song. You have a kitchen masher, thats the DJ. Put the songs into a pot, let the DJ mash them up and the outcome is a delicious, more often than not danceable, mix of the two songs. It's not always an easy task to accomplish. I have heard really nasty mashups that make me want spew out of my ears, and I have heard really good mashups that leave me salivating for more. Well fear not because Colin Murray The host of BBC1's "The Black Hole" show has been kind enough to archive over 2,000 great mashups and put them in an online player. Definitely something you can break out at your next party and impress your guests.
from just the few I listened to my personal favorite is George Harrison VS Jackson 5 - I Want Pitty. Just a heads up. You might want to click on the link to open it up in a separate window as I had a little issue with the player on the main page. Besides you should just have it on a separate window and put that sucker on random while surfing, or doing house work.

tofuhut.blogspot.com
Last, but not certainly not least is a site where I first learned what a music blog was. The Tofu Hut is a huge list of music blogs that is pretty well categorized. I might be shooting myself in the foot by listing this site but since I was just talking about how I was all for expanding musical horizons it would be plain selfish not to post this link. I am going to tell you straight out, there are a million better music blogs than mine and I could never compare to them. All I ask is that you don't forget to stop by the ol' RopBop. I mean, where else are you going to read how I sort my music by genre and then alphabetize it, or how my favorite M&M color is Green, because that is my favorite color in general or how I want a slider phone with a keyboard? ...oh yeah, thats right, facebook.

I hope you enjoyed this change of scenery and at least found something to waste an hour or two with. If you liked it leave me a comment or shoot me an e-mail. If I get a good response I'll try to add more posts like this in the future along with the regular posts.