cool downloads for your iPod

The Knowledge Omnivore’s loving spouse gave her an 80GB iPod three years ago, and she hasn’t looked back since. Not only does it now contain over 5300 songs (okay, importing the Omnivore’s massive and eclectic cd collection into iTunes took some time, but it was definitely worth it!), it also contains photos, audio books, podcasts and a LOT of playlists. I thought I’d share some of my favourite music, podcast and book sources:

Digital Music. I get most of my downloads from iTunes Store Canada. This was a no-brainer once I discovered that an album costs $9.99 Canadian from iTunes Canada…and €9.99 from iTunes Netherlands (a 30% difference) Get your act together on this, iTunes, Europeans are already being royally ripped off with cd prices, time to buck the tide….unfortunately you need a Canadian credit card to use the iTunes Canada site (or American one for the U.S. site, etc.), so can’t hold out real hope here, but maybe Europeans can press Apple into giving them a decent shake. It’s the same @#$%@#$ music, after all. But I digress…just want to make a point that 99.9% of the music on my iPod is legal, since I believe in giving artists their due..maybe not their bloated recording companies, but the artists, yes.

I have a LOT of Canadian music on my iPod, including Kathleen Edwards, Crash Parallel, Sam Roberts, Gordon Lightfoot, Neil Young, Martha Wainwright, Leonard Cohen, Paul Horn, Sarah McLachlan, Kate & Anna McGarrigle, Loreena McKennit, k.d. lang, Lowry Olafson, Jann Arden, Diana Krall, Our Lady Peace, Matt Dusk, Michael Buble, the Rankins, Barenaked Ladies, Holly Cole, Nickelback, Hedley, Colin James, Hank Snow, Shania Twain, Ashley MacIsaac, Sum 41, Bryan Adams, Paul Anka, Joni Mitchell, Alanis Morissette, the Guess Who, Avril Lavigne, Heart, Bruce Cockburn, Rush, Anne Murray, Nelly Furtado, Robbie Robertson, Simple Plan, Celine Dion, the Tragically Hip, Great Big Sea, Chantal Kreviazuk, Amanda Marshall, Oscar Peterson, Serena Ryder (and I’m sure I left out a few). You don’t have to be Canadian to make it onto my iPod, but it helps…

Podcasts. Such is the dominance of Apple that ‘podcast’ is a combination of ‘iPod’ and ‘broadcast’…so it’s no surprise that I use the iTunes Store as my main source of podcasts, but they are all free, whether you get them there or through other free download sites such as Podcast Alley. I use them daily for my workout and meditation routines, but also as a source of information on global business, etc. Some of the ones I subscribe to are: Radio 538 – Tiesto’s Club Life; Oprah’s Spirit Channel (everyone from Byron Katie to Eckhart Tolle, including an entire series on ‘A New Earth’), and ongoing tips on ‘the Law of Attraction’; 20-minute Yoga Sessions (from Yogadownload.com); a Quiet Mind; Beginning Meditation; Exercise-World fitness social network; fitMix Archives (fitMusic.com); Learn to Meditate; Meditation Oasis; Meditation Station; My Thought Coach; Pilates on Fifth Video Podcast; PODRUNNER; Power Yoga with Dave Farmar; Monocle; BusinessWeek; and the great iTunes University series of top lectures from Ivy League Schools, with some of the best from Stanford.

Audio Books. While I have some standard downloads from Amazon, most of my audio books are free downloads of classics from LibriVox, which are read aloud by volunteers and uploaded. These include works by everyone from Edgar Allen Poe to Emily Bronte, from Somerset Maugham to Saki, and give me tremendous pleasure. I haven’t tried others, but both AudioBooksforfree and Literal Systems come recommended by the peerless Project Gutenberg, phenomenal source for free downloads of both ebooks and audiobooks (most of the latter are downloaded in podcast form). I also download podcast audio readings of New Yorker Fiction, fabulous.

Playlists. While the Knowledge Omnivore relies on very savvy friends like the estimable Khun Rodney for much of her playlist pleasure, she has recently fallen like a brick for iTune’s Genius. Genius searches through your total song collection and makes recommendations, and while not foolproof (you get some strange combinations occasionally) when you have 5000+ songs on your iPod, SOMEONE’S got to search through to put playlists together….and it offers a continually fresh selection ensuring monotony never sets in….unless, of course, you have abominable taste in music, in which case even Genius cannot help you….

For those with concerns about the privacy of Genius (thanks to the incomparable Queta for reminding me of this), and many of us have an Evil Empire suspicion about Apple, for sure, have a look at a good article on CNET. CNN is positively orgasmic on the topic and says ‘iTunes ‘Genius’ feature is pure genius!’. Decide for yourself…