How to find & download hard-to-find music

How many versions of the song 'Blue Moon' have you heard of in your life? A few at least, I'm sure. After being asked from a friend to find them a particular cover of that song from the mid 1950's, and who didn't know who covered it, I decided to write up this tutorial.

Knowledge is power and knowing a few tricks makes this all a breeze. I want to share with you all a couple ways of going about finding hard-to-find, if not impossible to find, music. BTW, the legality of downloading music online without paying for it always seems to be a grey area for discussion, but if you can't find a song on iTunes or at HMV, what then?

Okay, the easiest way to find a particular song quickly and easily online is to visit.. YouTube.com

Seriously, type in the song you are looking for into YouTube and be surprised by how many videos are using that song for accompanying audio. What then? Check out: http://www.flv2mp3.com/

Just copy and paste the address from the youtube video into their website and out pops JUST the MP3 audio! Now, I admit the audio quality may not be fantastic, but beggars shouldn't be choosers. I just told my friend how to do this, he quickly found the cover of the song he wanted on Youtube, and had himself the MP3 file in minutes. ....Steve saves the day yet again.

But what about BRAND NEW music on a local band's website that isn't released yet? Maybe they let you listen to it on their site, via some online flash player, but they don't let you download it. Who knows why, but you want to download their songs. ..How?

The below method isn't as easy and isn't guaranteed to work.

Okay, first visit their website. ie: http://www.bandsname.com/

Go to the page that is playing the music. ie: http://www.bandsname.com/music.html

Right click and select from the pop-up menu, "View Source"

A bunch of code should now appear in a text editor. Search (Control-F) for ".swf"

There may be more than one result, but among all the choices make you best guess at which one controls the music or just do the next step for all of them. A good chance it's the right one is if the full text result is "bandsname mp3.swf". "Menu.swf" likely isn't.

Test it out by modifying the following "http://www.bandsname.com/bandsname mp3.swf" and copy it into your browser's address bar. You should hear music or see a play button appear.

Again, in your browser's address bar at the top of the screen, modify and then enter the following: "http://www.bandsname.com/bandsname mp3.xml" You'll notice we simply changed the file extension from .swf to .xml

If all goes well, you should have MORE computer code appear on your screen. If you get an error, retrace your steps, try a different .swf file name in the page, or you may need to be a bit clever to continue on your own.

Among all the code, do a search again (Control-F) for ".mp3". If you find anything, you win!

Copy the entire contents of the text string you found, ie: "bandsname mp3_files/01 songs name.mp3" back into the address bar with the band's website address if one is not specified. ie: http://www.bandsname.com/bandsname%20mp3_files/01%20songs%20name.mp3.

This should download the song for you! If you want to list what other songs they have in the directory for download, try the following: "http://www.bandsname.com/bandsname%20mp3_files/01%20songs%20name.mp3". You can then just click on any file to download it if it all works out for you.

Okay, so I hope that all was a bit interesting for you. I don't promise it will work for all web pages or bands, but the basic idea there will work for many of them. No, I won't provide you with any band sites that this hack might work on,.. but I will suggest to you a band that does have great music--- c0ndu1t

Cheers

Comments

How to login to an expired Windows

Microsoft has a neat little way to prevent software piracy of their Windows operating system. "Windows Genuine Advantage"[edit: I stand corrected, it has nothing to do with WGA] with its "Product Activation" requirement. Essentially, even with a valid product key, you still need to activate your Windows to ensure that only one computer is using that specific product key. If you can't activate your Windows, there being many reasons for this, you are left with a 30 day grace period to change your product key to one that is fully valid or get in contact with Microsoft and plea your case. Once your grace period is up, Windows refuses to let you login anymore. You cannot access your files. You cannot go on the Internet. You cannot do anything, except the thrill of trying to activate Windows. Well, luckily for me I do not have to worry about this issues, as my Windows is valid and activated. However, for those who do not and have been so unfortunate enough to have

ATi Radeon 5770: PCIe x16 vs PCIe x8

In this article I will reveal the differences one should expect from running an ATi Radeon HD 5770 1GB graphics card at full and half PCIe 2.0 bandwidth. This is particularly important data for those considering a dual ATI 5770's Crossfire setup on today's Intel-based P55 motherboards which generally offer only a single PCIe x16 slot or two PCIe x8 slots. Are you better off with a X58 motherboard for Crossfire that offers dual PCIe x16 slots? Would just a more powerful single slot graphics card, such as an ATI 5870, be a better call? I can't tell you that, since you may find Crossfire annoying or you may want the absolute best performance from your rig. What I can show you though is if Crossfire on a P55 motherboard is a viable option, especially for those trying to save a quick buck. Read on! While other reviews of limited PCIe bandwidth have been addressed prior, such as at Tom's Hardware, these looked at either now-out-dated video cards or very expensive graphics

The Hard Drive Capacity Calculator

Curious why when you buy an iPod, computer hard drive, or memory stick there is less memory actually available then what was advertised? For example, you buy a new laptop, advertised having 100GB of hard drive space, actually only seems to have 93GB available? It almost seems as if there is false advertising involved. I'm sorry to say, this isn't the case, rather just a tricky usage of terminology used by memory manufactures. Let me try to explain... You see, digital data is of binary numbers. 1's and 0's, also called bits. A group of eight (8 bits) 1's or/and 0's describe what is known as a byte. There are hence, 256 different values for a byte. ie: 00000000, 00000001, 00000010, 00000011, ... 11111110, 11111111. Digital memory is measured in the number of bytes, although it can also be described in bits. This is where it gets a bit more confusing.... Just as with our decimal number system, when a very large binary number needs to be described, such as 123,456,7

Some features of digital cameras

Most of us already have a digital camera that suits our needs. Quite possibly it's a brand of camera you bought at Walmart on sale that no one has ever heard of before, maybe it's the one integrated into your cell phone, or maybe your camera doesn't suck and you are thinking to yourself, what is the point of this article!? Well, I'm hoping to share a short list of some of the commonly overlooked or new features of digital cameras today that you might be missing out on. You might even find them all just enough of a reason to change what you are hoping for this Christmas. 1. Image Stabilization What was once only found in professional cameras has now found its way to the masses. Image stabilization technologies could very well be the biggest change for digital cameras since the auto-focus. With image stabilization you can take photos or video clips without a tripod that would otherwise be blurry due to an unsteady hand. Even with a steady hand, trying to take a photo whi

Intel Core i7 860: Stock Cooler and Power Usage

I'm just throwing this out there for anyone else running into similar problems as I have been having with my Intel Core i7 860 system. I'm noticing that a lot of heat is being produced from these chips when at full load and especially when overclocked, to the point that I feel the stock CPU cooler from Intel is simply inadequate. The included heatsink/fan included with the Intel Core i7 860 has a low-profile design that is smaller than previous Intel coolers, which seems a bit strange in my opinion considering that these chips are rated at 95W TDP. Anyways, I bought two Core i7 860 systems, one featuring a Gigabyte P55M-UD4 motherboard and another one using a Gigabyte P55A-UD4P motherboard (primary board used in this review). Using the stock Intel cooler, I could effortlessly overclock these systems to 3.5GHz using stock voltages. While the systems were stable for all intensive purposes, running Prime95 would cause the core CPU temperatures to shoot up quickly to 100*C (usin

Review of the New Dell Studio 15 (1555) Notebook

Hi everyone, welcome to my review of the new Dell Studio 15 (1555) notebook. I have had the notebook in my possession for just a few days as of this writing, so the review at this time will focus mostly on my first impressions of the device. I will update this article as I gain more experience using this system, so check back soon for added information or send me your questions via email for a prompt reply. The system under review has the following specifications: Processors Intel® Core™ 2 Duo P8600 (2.4GHz/1066Mhz FSB/3MB cache) Memory 4GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 at 800MHz Keyboard

Review: Lenovo Bluetooth Laser Mouse

In an attempt to give back to the community a bit, I am going to giving a review of my experience with Lenovo Canada and two new products I have recently ordered from it online. The two products are the Lenovo T400 14-inch notebook and a Lenovo Bluetooth Laser Mouse. Purchasing I ordered online both the T400 and the mouse late Monday night, from Lenovo .com. The total price, after tax, was about $1,250. Before tax, the T400 cost me $1070, while the mouse cost me $27 (regular $45). Shipping was free. I scored a bit of a deal on the purchase thanks to some e-coupon codes that were mentioned over at Redflagdeals .ca. These e-coupons saved me a lot of money, but it still took about a month of constant checking before Lenovo had what I wanted in stock and at a decently low price. Shopping at Lenovo .com is a bit like playing the stock market; there are ups and downs. One day the LED back-lighting feature would cost $370, the next day it would be just $30. In the rare case, it

Lenovo T400 Review

So, let my review of the Lenovo T400 begin. Configuration under review Lenovo T400 14.1-inch LED 1440x900 display Intel Core 2 Duo P8600 CPU (2.4 GHz, 3 MB L2 Cache, 25 W TDP) 3 GB of DDR3-1066 MHz RAM Switchable graphics: Intel GMA X4500MHD or ATI Mobility 3470 /w 256 MB Bluetooth Intel 5300 WiFi 80 GB 5400 HDD Webcam Media Card Reader Windows Vista Home Basic 9-cell extended battery Price: $1070 CAD (Ordered November 24th, Delivered December 4th) Also ordered a Lenovo Bluetooth laser mouse. Price: $33 (Delivered in 1.5 days) Prices were substaintially discounted, thanks to a friends of employees discount and an addition e-coupon code. CPU Performance: 1M on SuperPI Mod 1.5 scored about 21 seconds. For comparison, my 3 year old AMD Sempron 3000+ overclocked to 2.4 GHz scored 50 seconds and my brother's 2 year old Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 overclocked to 3.0 GHz scored 19 seconds. The processor is very efficient in both terms of clock cycles and power savings, but compared to modern-d

Google's Web Toolkit 1.3 RC1 now out

Not everyone knows what AJAX is, not everyone will care, but for those who do and don't know this already, check out Google's Web Toolkit . As a hobbyist web developer, I know just how frustrating it can be to design a website with really neat functionality and layout. I have been really amazed at how Google creates their many websites, having them all lack that rudimentary feel most older websites today have. Google has really gone above and beyond by releasing the same tools to the public, for free, that they have used to make their very own websites. To top it off, they even have now released the source code for this Web Toolkit of theirs. The toolkit simplifies the programming process by converting easy-to-write Java code into the painfully tricky to perfect AJAX stylings. What does this mean to anyone who doesn't speak Geek? Well, expect fancier, more powerful, and more intuitive websites to start showing up on Internet that don't have multimillion dollar developer

Logitech LX 500 Review

So after a recent incident with my old keyboard involving a kitten and a bottle of diet coke, it was time for a new keyboard. Enter the Logitech LX 500. I found the keyboard for sale at my local computer shop as a weekend door crasher special for 15$ - strange how they still had plenty in stock despite it being Sunday afternoon. It fit my price range and included a decent mouse, so... :$: Cha Ching :$: The keyboard and mouse unboxed The 800 dpi wireless optical mouse is a dark blue and black in colour, with two main buttons, a horizontally and vertically scrolling capable clicking scroll wheel, and a smallish button underneath it for tabbing between windows. The tabbing button does not function without the included software being installed, but the basic mouse functions were working right away. A pair of regular Duracell batteries were included with it. Overall, my impression of the mouse is good for what it is. It feels nice and, even for it not being a very large mouse, it still fit

The Tomorrow Times

Search This Blog