CDNow.com - RIP 12/5/02 - Gone is another resource

Alas, another great music resource has left us. CDNow.com, the once great internet CD superstore and information warehouse, has sold itself out. CDNow is now running their opperations through the once-competitor Amazon's e-business site.

Why does this matter? Because CDNow was the most complete, relatively accurate, well organized source for any and all information about any CD's which were anything more than obscure. For the past 4 years, CDNow was my one-stop resource for CD track listing, track times, sound clips, release dates, discography information, artist / producer information, and (snide) reviews. Also, the highly linked database nature of the site let me find an artist on a CD and see whatelse that artist had done, browse by record label, or search by title, artist, album, and more.

Oh, and you could buy CD's there too. Which I did all of three times in 4 years. Which is why I guess they went under. Um, sorry CDNow.

So, what's left? I turn back to the CDDB only to see that the elegant pure-text, fully searchable, fast, complete interface of when I last visited 4 years ago has been replaced by yet another mainstream-whoring, Amazon-click-through-linking, still-can't-find-the-producer-of-the-Tribe-Called-Quest-album-I-heard-on-the-way-home-like-I-could-on-CDNow, essentially useless interface.

So, what resource do we discography-hunters, band-influence-researchers, and new-music-seekers have? Please tell me there's something out there that compaired to the ever unchanging, ever easy, ever rock solid interface of my 4 year relationship with CDNow. Oh, and maybe I'll buy some stuff through them instead of supporting my favorite local record store (which, by the way, can get anything from CDNow, and more, in less time... which is why I shop there).

www.allmusic.com

Not perfect, but very comprehensive.

I know what you mean. I was using CDNow, too. But, whenever I couldn't find what I wanted there, most times the allmusic.com had what I was looking for. If anyone else knows of something better, do share, please.

Not to mention the list of hundreds of CDs I wanted to buy listed on their wish list (or whatever they called it) which went bye-bye without so much as a warning.

I sent people links to things I wanted a couple days ago that's how I found out cd now was gone. You would think they could have waited until after christmas.

Damn. they had more music clips off albums than Amazon did, and they were Window Media format rather than crappy non-woriking Real Audio. Sigh, yeah that sucks.

So, what resource do we discography-hunters, band-influence-researchers, and new-music-seekers have?

http://www.google.com

freedb (probably http://www.freedb.org ) has a forked copy of CDDB before they took the contributed effort of many people and decided to milk it for whatever they could get. I think they have a half-decent search interface, too. I'm too lazy to look now.

CDDB before they took the contributed effort of many people and decided to milk it for whatever they could get

Oh, you meen Gra... err Greednote?

escient. gracenote. atria. rational. ibm. potato.

What are you talking about? Allmusic was waaay better than CDnow was. That site wasn't even accurate most of the times I used it. It would have tracks listed incorrectly and everything. Allmusic is the far superior database.

Besides, I was under the impression that Amazon already owned CDnow. Didn't CDnow, as its own company, go under a few years ago? Maybe it was some other company that snatched them up.

With Allmusic.com and the UBL, you don't need many other resources for music. Granted, ever since Artistdirect bought up the Ultimate Band List, it's not been as good, but it's still there.

What do I see in the future? Allmusic will get a lot bigger, and have a pay version of their service. Have any of you been to a bookstore that uses the AMG database? My college bookstore's record section has listening stations set up. They run the AMG database just as it is online, except that for almost everything they have an audio sample. If they offered this online for a fee, I'd gladly pay it. Hopefully they're headed in this direction.

To sum up, CDnow blew. AMG has always rocked.

I totally forgot until tonight that cdnow is so old they used to have a telnet interface.

Some kids these days don't even know what telnet *is*.

Back in the day when I supported them, I exclusively used telnet to buy from them. I have no idea why, but that's what I did up until they shut it down. Ahhh... The memories...

I totally forgot until tonight that cdnow is so old they used to have a telnet interface.

Didn't they even do gopher at one point? I seem to remember accessing cdnow with OmniWeb and having it not recognize the browser and offer me a gopher link as an option. I guess it might have been telnet... Anyway, the crazy thing is this wasn't that long ago, probably 2000.

Oh, and I agree the passing of CDNow is a sad thing. They weren't as accurate or comprehensive as allmusic, but their data was much easier to get to and they didn't do that amazingly stupid javascript link thing.

-Mike

Ditto that one! This post was the first I had heard about CDnow leaving ... Now I have to make a wishlist elsewhere!

I just got an email back from Amazon support re: wishlists:

If you created a CDNow Wish List prior to December 3, you can still access that wish list by visiting the CDNow Preferred Buyer's Club web site at:

http://www.cdnowpbc.com/

You'll find the Wish List button in the blue bar at the top of the resulting page.

However, please note that titles added to your CDNow Wish List that are not available through the CDNow Preferred Buyer's Club web site will not be available on this list.

Mine seems to be there.

f you created a CDNow Wish List prior to December 3, you can still access that wish list by visiting the CDNow Preferred Buyer's Club web site at:

http://www.cdnowpbc.com/


It looks like it's the old CDNow site, mostly.

it looks like it's the old CDNow site, mostly.

Yeah, except you can't search by anything but Artist or Album. When you do find something, all of the info you expect from CDNow is gone (track length, sound bites, bio's, etc, etc, etc...). I sent Amazon an e-mail a few days ago and got some bullcrap formatted response with the www.cdnowpbc.com link. At first I thought "Awesome, the old CDNow site is still up and running" but I quickly found out that it really only survives in appearance.

Damn, got my hopes up to see the old CDNow interface. Haha, someone should get a screen capture of that for the graveyard. Where IS that internet (dotcom startup) graveyard, anywhere? I found it once.

As for UBL, it threw me a popup of that Gator spamlaiden Weather Bug. Any site that hosts that [censored] (yes, censored, but sometimes i just have to swear) is off my bookmarks.

Allmusic... Hm. I love how their "featured style" has a cover shot of an obscure old REM album that I love. But can I find the producer of Tribe Called Quest's "Midnight Marauders"? In three clicks or less? Let's see...

Holy crap! That was amazing! I found the answer (or what I thought was the answer) in three clicks or less. And it looks way more informative than CDNow! It'll take some getting used to the interface, but wow. I'm sold on allmusic. Thanks!

Bye CDNow, I'll miss you. Welcome allmusic!

> Where IS that internet (dotcom startup) graveyard, anywhere?

You mean the Wayback Machine?

http://www.archive.org/

I dunno, I just clicked on one of the albums they "feature" at the top level and there are song clips and a review. So I guess it depends how you look for it and what "good bits" are.

Wow, I'm always amazed by the number of people who don't know about Allmusic. I've used the site for at least 7 years (for several school reports as well), and have told everyone I know about it. I don't think they advertise at all, which is odd.

Frankly, I'm amazed they've stayed free all this time. I can't imagine they make enough sales from their hard copy books, especially when the same info is available for free and more up to date. I also haven't seen it used in many business applications other than the bookstore I previously mentioned.

I agree about the UBL. Like I said, it was much better before Artistdirect turned it into a small feature of a music store of its own.

I bought at least one hardcopy book, because I find it useful to have a static copy to browse. Plus, i listen to mostly older music, so it works out nicely.

I was amused to find that "Cub Koda" wrote a bunch of the reviews, and was himself reviewed elsewhere in the volume.

Yeah, that's true. And when he died they had a memorial on the site for a while.

I imagine that they sell their information to companies, but provide it free to individuals.

Where are you guys buying your CD's now? Amazon.com buh lows and my indie record store can't always get stuff...