Web Site Pandora Gets Buzz But Does It Deliver?

Increasingly popular website Pandora allows you to create customized online radio stations based on your music preferences (I like the subdudes; therefore Pandora thinks I will like…); and it’s got some music fans and many label folks all gaga that it’s the next big portal for new music discovery. "This raises the bar significantly,"  EMI digital executive Ted Cohen told the LA Times.

Some like music industry commentator and consultant Bob Lefsetz don’t agree. "Think this through. Sure, you might find a few good tracks. But how much time are you going to invest in finding them?," he wrote in his LefsetzLetter. "I put "Jackson Browne"…(and) I’ve heard more mediocre crap I have no interest in listening to, never mind buying, than I hear in a whole DAY on Mike Marrone’s Loft on XM…According to Pandora, if you like Jackson Browne, you like the Babys’ "Midnight Rendezvous"…Jackson Browne is a singer-songwriter. I’d expect  Karla Bonoff, Linda Ronstadt, Warren Zevon, maybe even the EAGLES! But I get the GIN BLOSSOMS??"

Telling you what you’d like based on previous preferences is not a new concept.  Yahoo!’s Launchcast Radio has been around for awhile and if you’ve ever bought anything on Amazon the next time you visit you’ll get a custom home page with stuff you might want to buy.  But what supposedly makes Pandora unique is that it’s relational choices are first based on the opinions of hired gun music reviewers (usually musicians themselves) who "describe" each song as having traits like "mild rhythmic syncopation", "repetitive melodic phrasing" and "country influences" (all of which Pandora seemed to feel fit New Orleans’ subdudes).

In fairness to Pandora, we didn’t find it’s choices as maddening as Lefsetz, and the user experiences improves over time as you add secondary artists that you like to the "station" and give thumbs up or down to various songs.  But the service seems to give no weight at all to lyrical content which often leads live disc jockey’s to some of the most interesting pairings.

Music discovery is probably still more likely to come via trusted gatekeepers who now in addition to DJ’s and journalists include bloggers, Internet radio jocks and cool freinds who email you mp3’s. But Pandora is a box worth opening even if only for the occasional surprise.