In my continuing quest to expand my personal Yahoo! Music kingdom, I've become intrigued by the Sansa Connect WiFi player. I really liked the description of the device given at "How to get the most from your Sansa Connect". I'm totally bought into the subscription model, so this seems pretty cool. I'll probably end up waiting for version 2.

On the home front, I'm considering giving the Sonos system a try. I'd probably jettison one of my YMU accounts (yes, I have two: one for me and one for Christine) for a Rhapsody account. should probably do that anyway.

Long-time readers know that I'm a huge fan of the Yahoo! Music Unlimited service. I've built my little music ecosystem around it, with a Creative Zen Micro and a Roku Soundbridge as devices that support the subscription content. I'm generally happy with the set up, even though the Yahoo! Music Jukebox is -- ummm -- just not very good. Here comes a rant.

So, here's what I want to do: subscribe to a podcast (specifically, the KEXP Music that Matters podcast) with Yahoo! Music Jukebox and have it automatically download new episodes to my portable player when they become available. Pretty much a minimum level of functionality you'd expect out of a podcast client, yes? Let's try to set it up.

First, there's no support for podcasts out of the box, so you have to go find a plug-in somewhere. So, go to the help, type in "podcast" and a promising page comes back: Podcasts and the Yahoo! Music Jukebox. Cool, maybe this is going to be easy. "If you already have the Yahoo! Music Jukebox, you only need a plug-in to use podcasts. Download the plugin here". Great, let's click on that link.

Huh? I'm taken to some Yahoo! Gallery Beta home page, with no mention of anything music-like anywhere. Okay, fine ... must have been a re-org. Let me just type in "podcast" in the search box then. Here are the results. Wow, that's pretty unhelpful -- nothing that looks like a plug-in here. I click around for a while, and there's just no plug-in to be found anywhere.

Okay, that didn't go so well. Maybe Google knows where the plug-in is. Ah! There's an entire Yahoo! Podcasts Beta site. Here we go ... a link in the FAQ: Podcasts in the Yahoo! Music Engine. Well, that's the old name for the client, but that's probably okay. Click to that page ... we might be in business! "If you have the Yahoo! Music Engine software, you can get the entire Yahoo! Podcasts experience without launching a browser. All you need to add is the podcast plug-in, if you haven't already downloaded it, click here". What am I waiting for? Click!

(In the background, we hear the gnashing of teeth and the rending of garments)

Back to square one, I find an old reference on Jeremy Zawodny's blog to a podcast plug-in from 2005. I'm more than a little skeptical because it's so old, but what the heck ... click on it and I actually get deep-linked into a page that actually works!

So, I download the plug-in, try to install it, and it ends up uninstalling Yahoo! Music Jukebox from my machine. Wow. Fine. Reinstall Yahoo! Music Jukebox. Thankfully, all my settings are still there. Try installing the plug-in again. This time it seems to work ... I get two tabs labeled Yahoo! Podcasts and My Podcasts.

Success? Not a chance. Even though I have these two tabs and it looks like I can subscribe to podcasts, there's just no way I can find to actually link the podcast to my device so it gets synced up. Maybe create a playlist, add the postcast subscription to the playlist and sync the playlist? Nope.

All smarminess aside, I'm stuck. Seriously, can anyone help me at this point?

I've been exposed to so much great music via Internet radio that it just fries me to think that ignorant lawmakers are trying to crush it. Please sign the petition to do what we can to keep these stations operating.

It's that time of year again ... time to hand out magic Christmas music boxes to your family and friends. What's a magic music box? It's one of your old MP3 players that's stuffed in one of those "old electronics" drawers that you have in your home office. Just follow these quick and easy steps:

1. Dig the MP3 player out and dust it off.
2. Start digging in that other drawer you have for the bulky AC adapter that no doubt came with it.
3. Plug in the MP3 player and hope that it boots up without any omnious clicking sounds.
4. You have a USB or Firewire cable for this thing, right? Try plugging it into your computer and pray that it's recognized. Otherwise, it's time for a driver hunt!
5. You have all your Christmas CDs ripped, yes? Good. Clear off the MP3 player and fill it up with holiday tunes.
6. Grab a mini-to-phono cable, the MP3 player and the AC adapter and head over to your parents house.
7. Now, find your parent's stereo and look for a spare input. Aux? Tape in? Video 2? I'm sure there's one that's open. Plug in the MP3 player (and the AC) and relabel the input selection "Magic Music Box".
8. Turn on the MP3 player, set it to "Random Repeat All" or whatever, hit play, and hide it. Presto - endless, delightful holiday tunes.

What a LIFE HACK, eh? Just tell your parents to just hit the "Magic Music Box" button whenever they want the holiday tunes, and don't forget to go retrieve your MP3 player after the holidays so you can do it all again next year.

I can confirm that FairUse4WM works in stripping the license from a DRM'd music file. I just tried it with a Yahoo! Music Unlimited file and it took it from this:

to this:

Now, I have no intention of stopping my subscription to Yahoo! Music Unlimited (for which I have professed my love on every possible occasion), and my portable music player and my networked music player both support PlaysForSure subscription content. So why would I even bother with this program? Because more than half the time it's a complete nightmare getting my Roku Soundbridge to play subscription content. PlaysForSure my ass. I'm pretty sure it's the fault of the Yahoo! Music Jukebox, but it's so hit-and-miss getting a song to play on the Roku that I'm tempted to use this program to un-DRM songs that I know I'm going to want to play. It's really frustrating to hear from Jessica (who's turning four next week) "Daddy, let's hear the Yeah Yeah Yeah song!", followed by me trying to play it on the Roku, having it not finding the song, rebooting the Roku, restarting Yahoo! Music Jukebox, trying again, only seeing half the songs, rebooting the Roku again, finally finding the song, only to have it timeout trying to acquire the license.

I just want to be able to do what I'm supposed to do, and if FairUse4WM will let me do that for personal use, then I have no qualms about using it. Thank you, FairUse4WM people!

The start of this album couldn't sound more like Tool. It's like coming home again. Blasting right now at FeedBurner HQ. As Steve says, "there is no substitute".

Alright, a new version of the Yahoo! Music Engine was just auto-downloaded: 1.1.1.20. Let's see, what changed? Hmm, no changes file, no release notes, nothing in help about it. O Fortuna! YME development team, you should be proud of your changes, whatever they are! It must have been enough to warrant an entire 0.0.1 point release. The whole interface generally seems snappier ... is that what you did? Please include a changes file with future versions ... pretty please?

My obsession with Yahoo! Music Unlimited continues. I got the latest update so that I can stream music directly to my Roku Soundbridge, although it's as kludgy and finicky as anything else that touches DRM.

A new awesome source of playlists is playlistradish.com. I can already tell I'm going to be spending a lot of time listening to these. You can read more about it here, or subscribe to their FeedBurner feed.

Also, continuing in my fanboy-like devotion to Ian, he posted a nice Mojo update to the Yahoo! Music Blog. I love loading these playlists on to my Zen Micro and hitting shuffle.

I've really enjoyed what ian c rogers has been doing behind the locked doors of his 360 blog, including posting some fantastic XSPF playlists that have found their way onto my Zen Micro. Now I see that there's a Yahoo! Music Blog that he just posted to announcing the Webjay acquisition. I'm going to subscribe (no FeedBurner feed?) and hope that it's updated frequently.

Just as an update, I'm still very much enjoying my Yahoo! Music Unlimited subscription and still listening to a couple of new albums every night. I'm liking the Zen Micro, and I got the Roku Soundbridge for Christmas (but I haven't had time to hook it up yet). So, yes, I'm fully in the PlaysForSure DRM camp.

There are still lots of things that I'm frustrated about with Y!MU, though. Off the top of my head:

1. Things that aren't "albums" listed as "albums". It's a real pain to find the latest album by a band if you don't know its name. Suggestion: on the album listing page, put the number of songs on the "album" in parens so I know what's an album and what's just a remixed single.
2. Release notes for the client? Sometimes, a new version of YME is downloaded, but I have no idea what has changed.
3. Are you telling me there haven't been any new plug-ins for the past three months?
4. Playlists are really lame. This is where I'm hoping Lucas will help out. It's such a huge pain to try to share a playlist ... it should be effortless. Help us Lucas!

There's more, but I don't want this to turn into a rant. I still recommend Y!MU to everyone that cares about music. I'm hoping for big things in the future!

It's time for a Yahoo! playtlist for the latest College Music Journal New Music chart. Major bummer that Y! doesn't have Broken Social Scene or Dangerdoom in the catalog ... but they do have the latest Sun Kil Moon -- it's just mistitled.

Playlist: CMJ NMR 940

Contents:

• My Morning Jacket, Z
• Franz Ferdinand, You Could Have It So Much Better
• The Go! Team, Thunder, Lightning, Strike
• Fiona Apple, Extraordinary Machine
• Various Artists, This Bird Has Flown
• Wolf Parade, Apologies To The Queen Mary
• Sun Kil Moon, Tiny Cities
• The (International) Noise Conspiracy, Armed Love
• Rogue Wave, Descended Like Vultures
• Gang Of Four, Return The Gift
• Metric, Live It Out
• Matt Pond Pa, Several Arrows Later
• Tom Vek, We Have Sound
• Death Cab For Cutie, Plans
• Sigur Ros, Takk...
• Ladytron, Witching Hour

You knew a price increase had to be coming. Yes, Yahoo! is raising the price for their Music Unlimited program from $4.99/mo to $9.99/mo if you want to be able to download the music onto your machine or a portable music player. Kind of a strange distinction, but okay -- it will still be worth it to me at that price point.

My question is, does anyone know of a way I can re-up my membership before the price change goes into effect on Nov 1? I've been an annual subscriber since May, but if I could reset my contract from today that would be sweet. Trying to find a way to contact Y! about anything is painful -- they obviously have gone to great lengths to minimize any kind of customer feedback.

Time for another Yahoo! playlist. This time it's from CMJ (College Music Journal), and it's this week's New Music chart.

Playlist: CMJ NMR 935

Contents:

• Sigur Ros, Takk...
• Death Cab For Cutie, Plans
• Wolf Parade, Apologies To The Queen Mary
• Franz Ferdinand, You Could Have It So Much Better
• Nada Surf, The Weight Is a Gift
• Devendra Banhart, Cripple Crow
• Ladytron, Witching Hour
• The Dandy Warhols, Odditorium Or Warlords of Mars
• Super Furry Animals, Love Kraft
• Broadcast, Tender Buttons
• Ok Go, Oh No
• Coheed & Cambria, Good Apollo I'm Burning Star IV Volume One: From Fear Through The Eyes of Madness
• The Go! Team, Thunder, Lightning, Strike
• Her Space Holiday, The Past Presents The Future
• Fiona Apple, Extraordinary Machine

Load up the playlist, put it on shuffle, and enjoy.

Flower15 means a ton of great music November 8-13 at the best venue in Chicago. I'm tempted to fake a business trip and get the event pass, but as it is I'm happy to be attending the Friday late show with the Popes.

Anyway, if you use Yahoo Music Engine and you want to gear up for the shows, I've created a Flower15 playlist that includes the following albums:

• Local H, Whatever Happened To P.J. Soles?
• Detachment Kit, They Raging, Quiet Army
• Hopesfall, A Types
• Minus The Bear, They Make Beer Commercials Like This
• Pelcian, some of Australasia and some of The Fire In Our Throats Will Beckon The Thaw
• Criteria, En Garde
• Ted Leo & The Pharmacists, Shake The Sheets and Hearts Of Oak (two albums because Ted r0x so hard)
• These Arms Are Snakes, Oxeneers Or The Lion Sleeps When Its Antelope Go Home
• The Essex Green, Everything Is Green
• Just A Fire, Light Up
• Jimmy Eat World, Stay On My Side Tonight and Futures
• The American Analog Set, Promise Of Love
• Maritime, Glass Floor
• Smoking Popes, Destination Failure
• The Promise Ring, Very Emergency
• Make Believe, Make Believe
• Tristeza, Spine And Sensory
• Isis, Panopticon
• Evergreen Terrace, Sincerity Is An Easy Disguise In This Business

So download this Flower15 playlist, put your music player on shuffle, and then go help a good cause.

Some may wonder why a blog with the title "Dancing About Architecture" doesn't have more writing about music. Others may have no idea what the hell I'm talking about. No matter: the point is, I love music and I've always loved music, so let's talk about music.

In the several months since I've started using Yahoo! Music Unlimited, it's become a larger and larger part of my daily music experience. I've ditched the iPod and replaced it with a Creative Zen Micro, which works with Yahoo. There are a hundred things that could be improved with this setup (the service, the client, the player, and the DRM), but the fact remains that this is the best way to consume massive amounts of music.

One of the cool things about the Yahoo! Music Unlimited (which I'm going to shorten to "Yahoo Music Unlimited") is that you can share playlists which are captured as xspf files. So, I'm going to start sharing xspf files.

The first best place you can go to fill up your player is to go to Ian Rogers blog. Of course, it's hosted at Y! 360, so you'll need to submit to a full body cavity search before being allowed to read it. But once you straighten up and get past that, you'll find Ian has done a wonderful thing: he's created xspf playlists for recent issues of Mojo magazine. There's no better way to get exposed to a wide range of new music than to download one of the Mojo playlists and hit "shuffle". There's a lot of great stuff and a lot of crap, but it's all new.

Here's the Sept 2005 Mojo playlist.

I'll follow this entry up with lots more music. And you really owe it to yourself to at least give Yahoo Music Unlimited a try. You may not think you'll like music rental, but you might be surprised.