Feeling overwhelmed with all the free music available from Ektoplazm? I don’t blame you; the last few months have been rather hectic around here! Below I have compiled a list of ten personal favourites assembled in a somewhat sensible progression from dark progressive and forest music through to techno and chill out. Track titles link back to the original release; use the streaming audio player to hear them all at once (Flash required):

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Onionbrain – Wormhole [Uroboros Records]
An immaculate set of moody and mysterious progressive grooves from Brazil.

Synthetic Forest – Min Egen Lilla Värld [Scared Evil Records]
An unusual experiment in dark psychedelic trance: forest music pitched down to 138 BPM.

Farebi Jalebi – Anasazi [Liquid Frequency]
Parvati-style gelatinous bass and sneaky effects combine to make this Indian darkpsy tune a sleeper hit.

Cybernetika – Molecular Probe [Ektoplazm]
What can I say? Cybernetika’s album is the very definition of epic–and this track features the last big climax before the album plunges into denouement.

Re-Horakhty – Dungeon Keeper [Forest Freaks]
Some of the finest full power forest music I’ve heard all year. Just wait for the countdown!

PharaOm – Cellar Door [Neogoa]
Smooth, melodic new school Goa trance with some trippy samples from one of my favourite movies, Donnie Darko.

Excizen – Renesans 63 [Ektoplazm]
Grimy industrial techtrance with exotic melodies and an incredibly powerful drive. Massive!

Mammal Footwork – Wallop (Odium Remix) [Diggarama]
No nonsense progressive techno with a killer groove.

Deto & Gleam – 511 keV (Album Load) [Digital Diamonds]
Sink deep into this sublime soundtrack to a far future science fiction epic. The entire album is a dream; this is but one of the highlights!

Hello Mellow – Cavedwellers [Gliese 581C]
Deep and delicious psychedelic dub showing strong influences of Ott and the Twisted Records sound.

Interested in hearing more recommendations from the top? Check out previous top tens from the fall and summer of 2010.

Photo: mossy tree.

One of the most common suggestions I receive is to open a BitTorrent tracker for free music, ostensibly to decrease hosting costs. There are a number of problems with this suggestion, however, and given how frequently it is mentioned, I figure a full post might be helpful to explain why BitTorrent is not the solution.

BitTorrent, as most people know, is the de facto standard for large-scale peer-to-peer file sharing. It works wonders when shared content is in high demand and there are strong incentives to seed. These conditions are realized on private trackers communities dedicated to (mostly) copyright content, particularly those with a ratio system, where downloads are limited to encourage behaviour beneficial to the community (i.e. seeding and uploading). With a stringent set of rules and guidelines in place, private trackers can become the very model of peer-to-peer distribution, offering fast download rates, excellent availability, and a breadth of content unheard of in the commercial arena.

So what could be the problem? Consider the ideal scenario described identified above: strong demand and incentive to seed. Demand for free music is certainly high but it is nowhere near that of mainstream content under copyright. Still, it is not unreasonable to expect that demand would be sufficient for a free music tracker to be viable on some level, with exceptions for older, less popular releases. In truth, it is the incentive to seed that seems most difficult to me. A ratio system wouldn’t work and altruism will only get you so far. I expect the result would be a poorly seeded tracker and a huge reduction in the amount of downloads.

My forecast has a lot to do with the barrier to entry. BitTorrent requires special software and a certain amount of familiarity with the protocol, or at least some computer savvy. Not much, admittedly, but the population of people familiar with BitTorrent technology is necessarily a subset of those familiar with direct downloads. If I were to implement a tracker with a ratio system that would force users to register and log in, thereby increasing the barrier to entry and thinning the audience. There is absolutely no way to make BitTorrent as accessible as Ektoplazm is today. Given that the vanishingly low barrier to entry is fundamental to the value proposition of the entire site this is not something I want to play around with.

It is also worth noting that even the most prominent private trackers don’t push as much psytrance as Ektoplazm does. Scope out some of the majors and you’ll see that even Shpongle and Infected Mushroom only account for–at most–several thousand snatches. The audience just isn’t anywhere near as large.

Then there are the technical issues. BitTorrent trackers are not permitted on many web hosts (mine included). The reason given is often related to CPU/memory intensivity but I would wager that the strong association between BitTorrent and the exchange of copyright content has a lot to do with it. There are other technical issues but it hardly seems useful to go into the prosaic details given everything else I have raised.

Finally, it is worth noting that I have some experience with operating a BitTorrent tracker. In fact, Ektoplazm began as a BitTorrent tracker back in 2005! Read about the closure of the Ektoplazm BitTorrent tracker in 2007. Take a look at the numbers: 12,000 full releases served in nearly two years of activity. After switching to direct downloads the count blossomed to 100,000 in six months. Three years later the total has exceeded 3,000,000. Part of this is no doubt due to the growth of the site–but that growth would not have been possible had I remained with BitTorrent.

At the root of all this is some confusion regarding what Ektoplazm is limited by. Currently the site is not limited by bandwidth nor hard drive space for these resources are available on an unlimited basis thanks to our excellent provider, Dreamhost (sign up from that link and we’ll get a little bonus). Instead, Ektoplazm is largely limited by CPU/memory resources (the other main limitation being talent, which I may discuss in a future post). Ektoplazm’s hosting bills are proportionate to how much traffic is coming through–and how heavy the load on the server is in any given month. I’ve already taken steps to optimize the site but some expenses are unavoidable. Donations are always welcome should you wish to help out with this.

In conclusion, free music providers are likely to encounter many of the same issues I have outlined in this post. Although it excels in certain situations, BitTorrent is not a one-size-fits-all solution for all your file sharing needs. Direct downloads are likely to be a much better means of distributing legal content licensed under the Creative Commons.

Photo credit: wire trap.

Every season I try to gather up some of the more interesting music-related articles I’ve been reading to share and discuss. Much of this comes from subscribing to various “music 2.0″ blogs, though I will admit to feeling uninspired by much of what I have found in the last few months. Is the movement running out of ideas? Not exactly. It is just that hype brings in traffic–and I have become rather allergic to hype! I criticize a few pieces of hype in the text below but I have also taken care to round up a number of posts containing solid advice for musicians new and old. I will start on a good note.

Finding An Audience In An Age Of Saturation is a great article about music discovery. The issue: pretty much anyone with an Internet connection has more than enough music already. How are musicians supposed to gain the attention of potential fans? Not by spamming people randomly, that’s for sure. The author provides a simple outline of what musicians need to be thinking about if they wish to earn the right to be heard.

Free Music: A Price Worth Paying? is a thought-provoking article about the ethical dimensions of downloading music and supporting content creators. Arguing from a utopian left-wing perspective, the author works backwards from a best case scenario to identify actions that we can take in the present to move the world a little closer to an imagined ideal. Sure, it’s unrealistic, and you might not agree with the politics, but it is certainly food for thought!

In contrast to the abstractions of the previous article, Formed A Band? Made A Record? Now What? is a tremendously practical guide for new musicians interested in getting their sound out there. Although it is clearly intended for traditional bands, much of the advice also applies to electronic music producers as well.

The Myth of Music Ownership, Who Owns Your Digital Downloads?, and Should Digital Collections Be Worth Something? all examine the state of music ownership in the digital era. When you buy or otherwise come to own a CD you can always sell it later (the doctrine of “first sale”) but this does not apply to digital media. When you buy an MP3 from iTunes or Beatport you are essentially licensing it for personal use, nothing more. There is no facility for transferring that licence either. No surprise here, but does it matter? People are going to do whatever they want anyhow.

6 Reasons Why The Album Format Died is a nostalgic look at why single tracks have triumphed over full-length albums. Wait, what? Albums are still relevant! If your only benchmark is total sales then sure, single tracks sell more, cost less, and offer immediate gratification, but the album format is far from dead. Maybe I am speaking only of the particular niche market I work within, but there is a perception that an artist hasn’t really matured until they have released a cohesive CD-length musical experience. I suspect this may be due to the general lack of lyricism in most electronic music genres, particularly genres as sublime as psytrance, techno, and downtempo. Individual songs aren’t as distinct in the underground; it can take a whole album to really understand what the artist is trying to achieve.

A Fragmented Music Community: The Sum of the Parts Equals Less Than The Whole takes a naive look at music promotion from an online marketing perspective. The fact that control isn’t centralized is a problem? Not at all. We live in a time of great opportunity, where musicians can achieve moderate success within niche markets that grew out of the Internet-fueled fragmentation of popular culture. Still, there is a good point buried in there somewhere: it is better for musicians and labels to focus their attention on a limited subset of social networking platforms rather than try to be everywhere at once.

The Real And ONLY Reasons Why Fans File-Share Music is a critical analysis of some of the more cynical explanations for piracy. The author argues that market failure has been accompanied by a moral failure, namely that fans fail to recognize or appreciate the value of art. This is flawed reasoning for the simple fact that music, in the abstract sense, is not simply the recording. Fans still value art and music! They simply don’t value the canned, inauthentic, infinitely copyable facsimile of that abstraction. Has this ever been any different? We now live in the first moment in history where recordings are easily accessible without the need to pay for the physical mechanism of delivery. Anyhow, if fans no longer valued music why is there still being money made in live music? It’s an old lesson by now, but one worth repeating: music fans are more willing to pay for music experiences rather than disembodied copies.

After all that doom and gloom it is refreshing to read Having A Ball: What’s Working In Music, an article published in The Economist. Predictably enough, recorded music is not doing so well but just about everything else is. “The music business is not dying. But it is changing profoundly.”

What is Twitter? Do you have an answer? Find out what Derek Sivers, Andrew Dubber, Steve Lawson, and other prominent music 2.0 figures think about Twitter. There is some needless hype here, as always, but Lawson makes a number of good points such as “be authentic” and “don’t automate,” advice that more people should follow.

Want to know how to make a press kit? Check out How To Post A Perfect Press Kit On Your Website, Getting Booked With An Effective Electronic Press Kit, and The Elements Of An Electronic Press Kit. It might also help to read 7 Reasons Why Writing Well Will Help Your Music Career.

Are there any academics in the audience? Dancecult has put out a call for papers for their upcoming “exodus of psytrance” special due to be published in early 2012.

Like this post? Feel free to suggest articles for me to include in future editions of the new music digest.

Previous editions: fall 2010 and summer 2010.

Photo: on the forest trail.

I have been getting into the habit of compiling quarterly top tens to help visitors navigate the flow of free music here on Ektoplazm. With a new release every two or three days on average there is a lot to listen to! Here are ten songs from recent months that I encourage everyone to try out. As usual, this list is in no particular order.

Pekkanikkarinen – Behind The Veil Of Sleep [Freudian Slip Records & People Of The Butterflies]
Captivating downtempo experiments from Finland. Comparisons with Shpongle are apt but this is entirely original.

Etnoscope – Odin’s Kraft [Ektoplazm & Panzar Produktionz]
Progressive psytrance at its finest. Love the vocals in this song!

M.E.E.O. – Wilder Beast [Mental Sauce]
Suomi-influenced quasi-progressive psytrance with a manic dubstep breakdown? Brilliant!

Sonic Tickle – One 4 The Gods [Uroboros Records]
Killer techtrance grooves with saw-like leads and plenty of wobble in the bottom end. Delicious!

Setanic – Glowing Mushrooms [2to6 Records]
Forest music at its finest: oozing with psychedelic qualities and utterly entrancing. “Oh look, glowing mushrooms!”

Mukti – Monoblock [Ektoplazm]
Hypnotic, minimal, and extremely atmospheric, this is a deceptively simple masterpiece of American psytrance.

Exelization – The Paradox
Fusing old school energy with hard South African psytrance vibes, Exelization has created something that sounds to my ears like a modern blend of Ka-Sol and Etnica.

SubConsciousMind & Judith – Desperation Symphony
Soaring symphonic psytrance glazed with beautiful instrumentation. It builds to a huge climax that just goes on and on. Highly euphoric!

Ben Rama – Gypsies & Jezebels [Drumlore]
An amazing work of richly atmospheric progressive techno from Canada. Electronic dance music filled with emotion.

Perfect Blind – Syncope [Akashic Records]
Deeply enchanting Croatian chill with gorgeous melodies that remind me of an old song by the Pleiadians (Seven Sisters).

Listen to them all:

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Interested in hearing more? Check out my free music top ten from the summer of 2010.

Photo: Don Valley Bridge.

Is it JulyNovember already? My, how time flies. Back in January I invited visitors to respond to a site-wide survey, the bulk of which was used to compile a list of the Best Free Psytrance of 2009. The second half of the survey focused on visitor demographics and the user experience. I was fishing for feedback and–thanks to nearly 400 responses–received a lot of it! In the months that followed I sifted through the data, gained a better understanding of who visits the site (or, at least, the sub-segment of visitors who like to fill out surveys), and deployed code to satisfy several common feature requests.

The big picture: most respondents (87%) agree that the music on Ektoplazm is above average or downright awesome. Similarly, many respondents (83%) think the official in-house netlabel releases are above average or even better. These results are likely to be very biased but it is still gratifying to receive such overwhelmingly positive feedback! At least the survey engaged visitors with varying levels of familiarity with the site; some had just started (11%), others had discovered Ektoplazm earlier in 2009 (35%), many know the site from a few years ago (42%), and there were a few from “way back” (12%).

Some of the most illuminating insights emerged from the pair of questions asking what styles people were interested in hearing more or less of. (Note that respondents were invited to select as many or as few options as they liked so these figures will not total 100% when added together.) There were loud calls for more Goa (44%) and darkpsy (43%), while downtempo (31%), experimental (31%), progressive (30%), and full-on (28%) also enjoyed strong support. 12% of respondents asked for something completely different and Forest, Suomi, and psybreaks/drum ‘n bass have become official styles offered by Ektoplazm as a result. Some others–glitch, dubstep, industrial, world beat, and ambient–are already encompassed by experimental and downtempo, but I wouldn’t be opposed to adding more specific styles if and when enough suitable releases are sent over to justify the addition. Whatever the genre, I am interested in maintaining a focus on music with a certain transportive quality.

Fewer people were interested in identifying styles they weren’t keen on. Of those that responded, most were critical of techno (35%), with full-on (26%), darkpsy (26%), and progressive (21%) also earning some scorn. Goa (15%) and experimental (13%) brought out the fewest detractors. Darkpsy and full-on are polarizing styles, evidently–there is a divide between those who would like to hear more and those who would like to hear less. It is too bad people beat up on techno so much but I’m not about to abandon it as a style since I am personally so invested in it these days. I will, however, stick to the more psychedelic techno releases instead of branching out into more conventional releases. A few comments under “other” indicated a distaste for cheese–which I interpret as meaning commercial-sounding vocal stuff–and I will continue to try and filter that sort of thing out. I figure that Ektoplazm visitors prefer a more underground approach and shy away from music that simply imitates or recycles popular electronic music. At the same time, I am very open to artists making use of the human voice in interesting ways and don’t wish to limit their creativity. It is tricky to find the right balance here and you are always welcome to voice your opinion if and when I get it wrong!

Digital media preference was evenly divided between MP3 (50%) and the two lossless formats, WAV (29%) and FLAC (21%). This squares with what I see on the back-end; MP3 download counts are usually about twice as high as FLAC and WAV combined. Ideally I would like to see more visitors getting into FLAC as time goes on–it really is the superior format–but MP3s are also useful for portable devices and those with limited bandwidth.

I also asked people where they get most of their new music. Most follow the netlabel scene and download free and legal music (29%), many buy physical media (21%), plenty use BitTorrent and P2P sharing to pirate commercial music (16%), few use paid download services like iTunes and Beatport (9%), and a minority futz around with streaming sites like Spotify and last.fm (4%). Would you believe that 13% get most of their music from Ektoplazm? That’s cool. I suspect illegal download is under-reported, or perhaps those who are into the free music scene were more inclined to respond to the survey in the first place.

The next section focused on release descriptions and packaging. Most people were happy with how music is presented here but there were a few comments and suggestions, many of which I have already taken action on. Previously I only posted a single track for previewing but visitors can now sample an entire release before downloading. I have also–as of June–begun to post the previews in higher quality (128kbps stereo instead of 96kbps mono). BPMs are now listed, by request. A few readers requested track durations in the release write-ups but this seems superfluous to me–and work-intensive. If I can find a way to automate it I promise to add this feature (again). Finally, one respondent asked for a “related downloads” feature that is now live on the site. It still needs some tuning but it works fairly well, displaying a weighted list of similar releases based on artist, label, style, and region.

Facebook was the most popular channel to receive updates (39%) followed by Twitter (16%) and RSS (15%). I have since added an option to subscribe by email that I hope will be helpful for those who use none of the above. All of these options are now more visible on the home page and in the site footer to help everyone keep up with the free music posted on Ektoplazm. It is also possible to subscribe to RSS feeds for specific styles–just browse on over and click on the RSS logo that you find near the top.

The question about donating to Ektoplazm exposed an interesting result. While only 7% have already donated, fully 72% said they will donate (or think about donating) in the future. This seems promising. What would I have to do to earn your support?

I will be doing another survey in January 2011 so if there are any questions you feel I should ask just write them in the comments. And, one more time: a big thank you to everyone who responded last year!