A Librarian's Guide To 'Free and Legal' Music MP3 Websites

Last June I discussed one of my favourite MP3 blogs, Radio WFMU's Beware of the Blog.

Today's site is a particular page within the above blog that is well worthy of several visits. It's the Country Fuzz Spectacular, a tribute to the use of fuzz guitar in country music. You might expect country music to rely heavily on pedal steel guitar and dobro, but here are some incredible songs from Nashville and Bakersfield that feature the most wicked distortion. In fact, it is argued on the blog that guitar distortion was invented by Nashville session guitarist, Grady Martin. Crikey, and I thought for all these years that the Kinks did it first!

This site features several prime cuts released between 1960 and 1978, with the best ones recorded in the mid-60s. Songs by some big names like Marty Robbins, Merle Haggard, Buck Owens and Waylon Jennings appear here, along with several true nuggets from lesser-known artists like the Willis Brothers, Darrell McCall and Glen Garrison.

Thank you so much WMFU for bringing these gems to light.