Free music

Loads of bands and record labels have realised it’s worth giving away a few songs as ‘tasters’. As a result, there’s lots of free, legal music available to be downloaded from the net. You won’t find international super-acts like Coldplay or Pink giving away their song – their huge marketing budgets mean they don’t have to – but virtually everyone else is (and why would you listen to Coldplay or Pink anyway?).

The easiest way to find free legal music is to search for it through Google. It’s best to only download music from the official website of a band or record label, because you know it’s legit. There are loads of other sites that claim to host ‘legal’ downloads; most of them are legitimate, but not all.

A great place to start looking is music.download.com, a slick site where many bands post their free tracks. Another really useful resource is Finger Tips Music, whose Select Artist Guide features direct links to the much of the best free music on the net. I've also put links to some of my favs below.

Some great artists that are giving it away:
Sufjan Stevens (here and here)
The Decemberists
Death Cab For Cutie (here and here)
Television Hill
Sigur Ros
Tom Waits
Iron and Wine
The Shins
Augie March
Spectacular Fantastic

Some fine record labels known for their generosity:
Sub Pop
Asthmatic Kitty
Anti
Epitonic

H/T Jeff Hunt for putting me on to free music.