FRED MANTEGHIAN BLOG

I never thought picking out 50 songs to download from emusic.com's website would be so difficult. I never thought it would take the full two weeks time I was allotted. Any more than two weeks, and I would have ipso facto agreed to begin having $10 or so deducted from my credit card on a monthly basis, in return for which I'd be entitled to download another 30 songs a month.

That's one song a day. Like a vitamin. In a perfect world, maybe.

Ever hear the term "an embarrassment of riches?" emusic is like the opposite of that. Anything you want, it won't be here. It is like the purgatory of music web sites. 33 a song and you just wait around until the big thumbs up or thumbs down and you either get to go to heaven, which means the iTunes store, or hell, which is just having your eardrums poked out with a sharp pointy object. In a way, compared to emusic, it would be humane.

I go looking for "Procol Harum." First I get two listings, and I have to pick. Do I want Procol Harum or do I want Karaoke - Procol Harum. I debate this momentarily but then firmly click on the former. Up pops a very nice and not overlong hitsography of the band by Bruce Eder of the All Music Guide, describing their umpteen albums and then allowing you pick only their latest one, from 2003, The Well's On Fire. Where are the seventies' classics "Home," and "Salty Dog"? Looks like those must selling well enough elsewhere, like iTunes, so you won't find them here at 1/3 the price.

Rolling Stones? Did you want a tribute band or Karaoke. Hurry up kid, I ain't got all day.

Fleetwood Mac, I do find a live recording of "Oh Well" from the pre-Muckingham Hicks days. Click.

Finally, I hit a mother load. The entire creative output of the early 70's British Band, "Family" is here, all five albums, plus a live recording. I pick and chose, five from Bandstand and five from Fearless.

Another mother load – "It's a Beautiful Day." And boy, is it ever! They have all their albums too. I pick seven essentials from Marryin' Maiden (I already have their entire self-titled 1st album on CD) and move on.

I do find some new artists to counteract my inner dinosaur. Nice songs that will have me glancing away from oncoming traffic to see who they are when their turn comes up on the shuffle. Of course, doing so too often could leave to my extinction.

The sound quality of the downloads is poor. Not fair, not acceptable, not by my standards. But they're free, so I press on. The highest encoding rates I see are on some of the Family's recordings, 224 kbps. For the most part, it runs about 175 kbps. And that's in the aging mp3 format. A far cry from the 320 kbps AAC I use when transferring CDs to my iPod. My friend could hear the poor quality of the Family downloads in my car. I had to assure him it sounds much better on vinyl.

But still, there are some more "freebies" on my account and only one day left before I have to cancel. I'll pretend I'm at the beach listening to FM over a cheap transistor radio. At least I'll have the songs.

I return to "Procol Harum" – you know, some of these songs are really quite good! Matthew Fisher is back again on organ. Gary Brooker on piano and oh, that unmistakable voice. Gone is guitarist Robin Trower, but on a "Robe of Silk," his effects pedals are clearly on display by the new salty dog, Geoff Whitehorn. Okay, Click, click, click. All done.

Free trials are like free Starz weekends. You try them, you watch a few flicks, but boy, it's easy enough to live without when Monday rolls around. So on that note, bye-bye emusic. I'm not sure what you're thinking, but carry on you wayward son – oh wait, that's only available in Karaoke.