ShareMyGuitar – Social Network For Guitar Players

Name: ShareMyGuitar
URL: http://www.sharemyguitar.com

Check this site out if your New Year resolutions included one that went “Learn to play the guitar like John Petrucci”. ShareMyGuitar is a social network that will let you see to that. The only people who use it are guitar enthusiasts. By signing up for an account, you’ll be able to share pictures and videos of your favorite guitars and players. You’ll get to read interviews and news. And you’ll also be able to create polls and post questions for more knowledgeable folks to come to the rescue.

Alternative guitar tunings, chord charts, rare tablatures… you can request (and get) all that through this site.

And when it comes to polls, you can ask whatever you want. You can ask who’s the best rhythm guitar player under the sun (pointless – everybody knows it’s Pete Townshend), what’s the most famous guitar in history (pointless – everybody knows it’s Lucille), who’s the hottest chick who’s ever played a guitar (pointless – everybody knows it’s Orianthi)… all these things you’ve always wanted to ask but kept to yourself can be elucidated here. Continue reading

Myxer – A New Social Radio Emerges

Name: Myxer
URL: http://www.myxer.fm

If Marconi were around today, he would be decidedly proud to see what’s becoming of his beloved creation. Spending some time with Myxer alone would make him stand ten feet tall. Myxer is a site that takes online radio as we’ve always known it, and puts a marked social element on it.

Myxer is a desktop and mobile service that lets you listen to music with all of your friends online. You listen to songs with all of them, and you get to discuss what’s being played by using a live chat.

Moreover, a tool named “Song Stories” is provided. This lets you do something which is quite novel in itself: creating a video where you can explain what any song means to you, and have that video shared with all of your contacts.

As a service, Myxer is totally free. You can use both the web application and any of the mobile apps without having to start pinching your pennies. Both iPhones and Droids are supported to the same extent.

This is Myxer’s promotional video, as featured on YouTube:

WildChords, An iPad Game That Lets You Become A Guitar Player

Learn To Play The Guitar With WildChords

The hardest bit when trying to learn an instrument is finding the time to practice. You show someone who hasn’t picked a guitar in his life how to play an E chord and he will get it. And he will retain it, even if he’s got a memory like a sieve. No doubt about it. But being able to concatenate different chords together harmoniously is something which only comes with practice, and the kind of perseverance that lies beyond most people’s grasp. Progress is always slow at first, and while few do a Pete Townshend and put their feet through their instruments most call it a day before too long.

Well, that’s what this emerging company is trying to remedy. Ovelin is a Finnish startup that is about to release an iPad app that turns practicing the guitar into nothing short of a game. Continue reading

Learn To Play Guitar With James Taylor

James Taylor Now Offers Free Guitar Lessons On His Official Site

What about learning guitar from a truly renowned performer in the history of American folk music? And what about doing it without having to pay a dime?

That’s exactly what James Taylor’s latest online initiative is all about. The five-time Grammy Award winner has just begun imparting free guitar classes on his own website, www.jamestaylor.com. So far, he has uploaded two different tutorials, and an introductory message. You can watch them here. The idea seems to be offering updates on a weekly basis.

And just to do some brushing up, this is a video of Taylor performing his career-defining song ”Carolina In My Mind” at the BBC.

MPlayr – Listen To Music Charts On Your Browser

Name: MPlayr
URL: http://www.mplayr.com

MPlayr is one of the best ways to stay abreast of what is being played on some of the most representative music charts the world over. On this site, you can tune into the US and the UK music charts, and learn what sounds are trending there. And I mean it – the site lets you do more than just read a list of songs ranking in either territory, it actually lets you listen to them online. That can be done directly on your browser. You won’t have to download anything, and you won’t have to pay anything either.

What’s more, the site has a chart devoted to iTunes. Again – you can see what’s hot in there, and listen to it straight in your browser.

Other meritorious aspects of MPlayr include letting people look up both new and old songs and have them played on the fly, and letting users create playlists they can then share with all their friends on Facebook (the one service which is used for signing in). Continue reading

Meet Incubattle, An Online Game Released By Incubus To Promote Its New Album

Incubus Has Released Incubattle To Promote Its Newest Album, "If Not Now, When?"

You might like Incubus or not, but there’s no denying that the social media campaign that they have put together to promote their latest album (“If Not Now, When?”) has been nothing short of admirable.

First, they had an interactive live stream going. Then, they announced a partnership with video-sharing app Viddy. And then, they began interacting with fans on Formspring.

What was left to do after all that action?

The answer was entirely obvious… a beat’em-up a la Double Dragon or Renegade!

These are two names that will surely ring a bell if you’re over 30. They were two of the most popular arcade games of the ‘80s, and I recall endless summer vacations playing them with my older brother.

Well, Incubus has come with their very own variation on such titles to promote their latest album. It’s named Incubattle, and they have done a terrific job as far as I’m concerned.

The game lets you pick your favorite band member and fight your way over five different stages, fighting pirates that have stolen copies of the album (he!). You can play the game on your own, or with a friend. And in addition to the usual punch/jump/dash controls, each character can perform a special move when he has collected enough leaked copies of the album. Continue reading

The Birth Of Facebook Music

Soon You Will Be Listening To Music On Facebook

Big news today as it has just been announced that the next F8 Conference will revolve around one thing: music. I’m sure someone at MySpace is having a heart attack right now…

The Internet has been abuzz with discussions concerning a possible Facebook and Spotify alliance, but Zuckerberg himself denied that. And most people (count me in) also saw such an alliance as unviable. But now it has been confirmed that Facebook and Spotify have indeed been discussing a joint service. And what’s even more interesting, Facebook has also been approaching other music service providers. If it’s not Spotify (again – I stand my previous ground), then it’s surely going to be an America-based startup. Which makes more sense, owing to the legal implications of streaming music online.

We can only try and guess which features Facebook music will have, but it’s fair to assume that a tab reading “Music” will be displayed on the left-hand side of the screen, right with your friends, groups and places, and that clicking on it will let you stream songs live from the one service that becomes Facebook’s music partner.

With Facebook being the most visited site on Earth, this can be the death knell not only for MySpace but also for services like Apple’s own Ping. We’ll have to wait until August to know more, as that is when the F8 Conference will be held and all these questions will be answered for good.

The Les Paul Google Doodle Will Live Forever On Its Own Page

The Les Paul Google Doodle

Google’s Doodles were implemented by the search giant as a direct response to the random backgrounds that one gets when using Bing. Doodles conmemorate the birth of famous people, the date in which discoveries and inventions were made, and the date in which remarkable products were issued. And just last week, one of the most interesting Doodles ever was featured on Google’s homepage.

I’m obviously talking about the Les Paul Doodle. It celebrated the 96th anniversary of the birth of Les Paul, unarguably one of the biggest names in guitar history.

This Doodle proved so popular during its original run that it was left online for two full days (Doodles are only left there for 24 hours at most). And the immense popularity of the Les Paul Doodle was confirmed when Google announced the musical logo would live forever on a page of its very own.

So, the Les Paul Doodle will remain accessible for perpetuity here. You will be able to create songs and have them recorded and shared with all of your chums. Just check the video featured below in case you have not seen what this latest Doodle is capable of.

How To Play The 30 Day Song Challenge On Facebook

I see many people have visited MusicKO as of late looking for information on how to play the 30 Day Song Challenge on Facebook. The post I recently published where I highlighted my 30 days of music seems to have motivated that.

I recall that I also had trouble getting started, so I decided to write this post. It basically tells you what to do in order to start posting videos once you have liked the page itself on Facebook.

This is the way it’s done:

1) Log in to Facebook.
2) Go to YouTube, and look up the video you want to post for that particular day.
3) Click on “Share”.
4) Click on the Facebook icon. This will open up a pop up (E, a separate window) that you will use to post the video to Facebook. This is done by addressing 30 Day Song Challenge (@30 Day Song Challenge), and then pasting (or typing) the information for that specific day (as found on the “Rules” section of the 30 Day Song Challenge page). This is the step that can confuse people. Look, a picture is worth a thousand words:

This Is How Videos Are Posted To Facebook When Playing The 30 Day Song Challenge

There. It wasn’t that tricky, was it? But we all definitely agree this info should be provided on the 30 Day Song Challenge page itself.