Rhapsody Ravings

Last week I mentioned a couple of artist links on Bandcamp; this week I'm going to list a few bands I have been enjoying on Rhapsody that also have downloads/physical CD releases at CD Baby. I mentioned a few years ago that my Rhapsody subscription was the best ten bucks I spent a month, and lately that's been the case even more than ever. Apparently Rhapsody is now going to be called Napster, but as long as the access to such a wide variety of music remains the same I don't really care either way.

One drawback of both Bandcamp and CD Baby is their search engines - CD Baby makes it difficult to find anything beyond best sellers, editor picks or new releases, and Bandcamp have a variety of tags but you can only filter by one of them at a time.

South London post-punk outfit The Opposition have been making their back catalog available for a while now. Of particular interest to me was the Lost Album - a collection of tracks released in the early 80's. You can buy their downloads direct at http://www.theopposition.fr/boutiquenglish.html
or find the aforementioned Lost Album at CD Baby here for $9.99. The CD is no longer available at the time of writing. Rhapsody has almost all their back catalog available for streaming at the moment. Good stuff!!

If you're into minimal synth style electronica or synthpop, cult NY band Perfect Jewish Couple might be to your liking. They recently released Time Capsule, a collection of carefully remastered 80's tunes. You can purchase the CD or download at CD Baby here or directly from their website at http://www.perfectjewishcouple.com - I think the price is the same either way. Again you can find this one on Rhapsody as well.

One post punk band I heartily recommend is an obscure California one. Back in 1987 The Broken Toys released a 7 track LP called The Cut of Memory. Despite a lot of interest and a good following they never released anything else. Fortunately the band came back together in 2012 for a reunion concert and also released a meticulous remastered version of the album with a host of extra tracks, all of a really high standard. I generally skip through a lot of tracks when I have Rhapsody on shuffle play, but their material is quite excellent. Similar to The Church, who I think they supported once, and they also have a Facebook page. You can find the album at CD Baby here or again Rhapsody has both this and the live reunion concert.

There's plenty more out there so I might make this a regular feature.