These Twitter/Music posts weren’t originally meant to be a series, but it seems Twitter is one of the fastest evolving social media services out there and every day people are finding new ways to utilize it to share information, photos, videos and of course music. I found a great post on the Wired Epicenter blog today that highlights the growing number of ways to find music on Twitter.
I thought I’d give you a run down of the services they covered with my opinions, plus a few more articles for link love:
Twisten.fm 
Twisten.fm works like the HypeMachine but it’s aggregating music found on Twitter instead of music blogs. If you login using your Twitter ID you can see what music your friends have posted or you can view the list of “Everyone” and browse through (and play!) the latest tracks that have been posted on Twitter. It also acts like Blip.fm in that you can search for music using GrooveShark‘s music library and tweet a track of your own right from the same page. If you haven’t yet checked out GrooveShark – please do.
Musebin.ws
From what I can tell, there are a couple of key differences between Musebin.ws and Twisten.fm. Musebin.ws allows you to search tweets for an artist or album (you can enter a song name but it will bring up all results from that album) and see all relevant tweets made about that artist/album. This can be quite cool because you can read other Twitter users specific feedback about an artist. On Twisten.fm you cannot search through the most recent music tweets, only see them as they are added. However, where Twisten.fm has a leg up is that it allows you to play them right in the window. Musebin.ws often has a link included that was in the initial tweet which will send you to blip.fm or tinyurl, but you cannot play the track in the Musebin.ws window.
TweetJ
TweetJ was only given an honorable mention by Wired.com but I actually think it ranks ahead of Musebin.ws in concept anyway. It seems they’ve also sorted out their search engine issues because it’s up and running right now, however they do seem to have issues with a general lag in the site – could be the influx in traffic from the Wired article. TweetJ shows the most recently tweeted tracks and allows you to play them (like Twisten.fm), has a search engine to search for tweets by a specific artist (like Musebin.ws), AND they have a Top 100 Tweeted songs. I’m not sure if this is the Top 100 ever, the Top 100 in the last 24 hours or some other criteria but it’s still pretty cool. TweetJ still has some bugs to work out as far as the design and ease of use, but the ideas are all there and it’s functional.
Wired.com’s article also brings up the idea of using the Twitter search to find music which can be quite useful if you know the right string to enter. Rather than rehash it here, check out the article for their carefully crafted search string.
While this next one wasn’t on the Wired list, it’s been buzzing all over the net lately and definitely deserves a shout:
We Are Hunted 
Though We Are Hunted isn’t specific to Twitter, it does utilize Twitter along with other social networks, music blogs, torrents and p2p file sharing to aggregate the Top 99 songs online by the day, week or month. You can play the songs write on the page and an iTunes link is included as well for purchasing. The page is quite visually appealing with artist art for every entry on the list. It’s simple, pretty and works really well. Similar in content to the music you’d find on HypeMachine, it’s clear that the remixers and indie kids of the world are the ones dominating the net. This may be my new spot for finding music.
As always, the music world and Twitter are buzzing in harmony – check out these links for the latest in Twitter Music News:
Ten Musicians Worth Following on Twitter via Paste Magazine
Twitter’s Musical Potential Unlocked by K’naan, Moonalice via Wired Blog, I filled you guys in about the Moonalice story last week in my Bands vs. Twitter article, but the top of the article is about K’naan Warsame – a hip-hop artist who has been using Twitter to get lyrical recomendations from his followers as part of a promotional contest.
Tweak and Tweet: Make and Share Synth Sounds with Twitter via Create Digital Music – The title says it all. This is a freaking COOL idea.
