My Spotify Playlists

I was just getting used to the Amazon and Google music clouds when along comes Spotify. For the past couple of weeks or so, this is where I've been listening to most of my music.

And creating playlists has become one of the most addictive internet time-wasters I've ever  indulged in.

Basically Spotify allows you to stream about 15 million (!) songs. The whole song, not just 30-second clips. And not just well known groups -- lots of bitchen obscurities.

If you're on the free plan, which I am at this point,you have to endure an occasional audio ad. (Most of these currently are house ads telling you about various features of Spotify and urging you to upgrade to a pay plan. A few spots by record companies turn up

Other people have written better beginners' guides to Spotify than I could do. (Here's one).

I just wanted to post links to my playlists. Subscribe to your favorites. Most of them will be evolving as new stuff is added. Here they are:

* Big Enchilada Super Smashes:  A sampling of songs that have been played on The Big Enchilada podcast.

* Psychedelic '60s: An hour or so of late '60s psychedelia, mainly stuff they played on the radio in 67-68.

* Psychobilly Madness: Greasy punks with stand-up basses. Hotrods! Switchblades!  Zombies!

* Rock 'n' Soul: Everywhere I go from Kansas City up to Maine, Rock 'n' Soul Music's driving people insane!

* Frank Furter's Fave: A tribute to the American hotdog.

* The Great Country Albums: From Marty Robbins to The Waco Brothers, some of my favorite country albums of all time. (No "greatest hits" compilations here. These are all albums that were meant to be heard as such.) 11 hours of music here!

*  Country Underground : Call it underground country, call it XXX country, call it the music Nashville does NOT want you to hear (hey, that sounds familiar!) Here's an hour or so of the stuff

* '70s Country Jukebox: An hour's worth of country classics (and some shoulda-been classics) that they actually used to play on AM country stations.

* Alt Country, The First Generation: This is country rock from the mid '60s through the mid 70s.

* Gospel Glory: I went nuts with this one. Six hours of Lord-praising, soul-saving Black gospel, mostly from the 40s and 50s, though I've got some great Staples Singers tunes in here.

* Remember the Fabulous '90s: Grunge and more. Mostly early '90s stuff.

* Songs I Heard on My Transistor Radio: I almost called this my "Measles Mix" because when I caught the measles in the early '60s (I was in third grade) I found solace and discovered a whole new world of music in a little transistor radio my mom gave me. It wasn't much bigger than my iPod is now. At first it was just a way to escape the boredom of having to stay home from school but being too sick to hang out with friends. The music became an obsession. Come to think of it, it still is. Here are some of the songs from the pre-Beatles '60s that led me to become the rock 'n' roll maniac I am today.

Update: 8-14-2011 I just created Waiting for Waits, a collection of Tom Waits covers. (Unfortunately the Richie Cole song of that name wasn't available on Spotify)