Top 10 Trendsetting Music Blogs

We try to stay on the cutting edge of what music has to offer as well as cover the people and trends behind the music through our industry profiles.

Blogs dot com team has picked the Top 10 Trendsetting Music Blogs to help people find not only the best music being put out today, but also the acts that are likely to make it big tomorrow.

Top 10 Trendsetting Music Blogs

Aquarium Drunkard

Most music blogs don’t have corresponding record labels, but then again, most blogs aren’t like Aquarium Drunkard! This blog shares the same city with us here at LA Music Blog and covers everything you need to know about the indie music scene.

Brooklyn Vegan

While BrooklynVegan is mostly NYC-centric, it’s still a blog to follow no matter where you live. They have everything from metal to hip hop, and they know what to pay attention to at all times.

Buzzbands

Buzzbands is a staple of any LA music fan…or at least it should be! Kevin Bronson has an eye for live shows and an ear for what’s great in LA, and while he doesn’t always stick to LA bands, he does cover the great acts that come through town.

Invisible Oranges

This site covers everything metal, so if you love the heavy stuff and want to know the latest, follow these guys and you will never be left behind!

Kings of A&R

When compiling this list, Kings of A&R was the first blog that came to mind. I follow them on a regular basis to find new, up-and-coming acts to feature on our site, and they have an amazing track record of picking bands that get signed.

Pitchfork

Pitchfork was another easy one to add to this list. If an artist makes it on Pitchfork, they are going to get attention from everyone else…unless Pitchfork doesn’t like them, of course.

Rap Radar

For those of you looking for what is going on in rap and hip hop, this should be the site you follow. Rap Radar always has the inside scoop of who is working with whom and when new music will be released.

Stereogum

Stereogum might be more than a music site, but they have a very good eye and ear for what is great in a multi-genre format. They offer up-to-date news on the industry, the bands, and the people involved.

The Hype Machine

While The Hype Machine is more of a “Best of the Music Blogs” blog than a music news or review site in and of itself, it is a great way to get exposed to a variety of opinions on music in one convenient place.

The Lefsetz Letter

While Bob Lefsetz doesn’t blog in the traditional sense of the word, he is still one of the most outspoken and on-point bloggers in music today. I don’t always agree with him and some times he doesn’t focus on music, but if you want to know what’s happening in music today, sign up for his newsletter.

Important Features' Updates in Wordpress Version 3.0

Wordpress 3.0 Features:

1. Custom Post Types
2. Menu Management
3. Custom Taxonomies
4. New Default Theme: “Twentyten”
5. Multi-site

a. Custom Post Types

By default, WordPress lets you publish two types of content: "Posts" and "Pages". In version 3.0, you can define additional content types with their own attributes. For example, if you’re running a WordPress site for a design agency, you might create a custom post type to display portfolio items, another for employee pages, and another for client testimonials. From there, you can customize your theme to better suit each individual post type.

You might even want to turn your WordPress site into something more like Tumblr. This will be easy to do in WordPress 3.0 simply by creating custom post types for Text, Photo, Quote, Link, Chat, Audio, and Video.

b. Menu Management

Menu management is one of the most exciting and talked about features in WordPress 3.0. This feature gives you full control over your site’s navigation menus. With an easy drag and drop interface, users can create menus that include any mixture of links to internal pages, external URLs, categories, you name it. Then you can embed these custom menus as a widget wherever your theme allows.

c. Custom Taxonomies

While this new feature may seem a bit complex to non-developers, it certainly brings WordPress 3.0 closer to a true CMS. Custom taxonomies allow you to create additional pieces of meta information. By default, there are "Categories" and "Tags". Now we can add additional types, with the option of being hierarchical or not.

For example, if you are a film fanatic and you use your WordPress blog to post reviews and rate new movies. You can create a custom taxonomy for "Rating", etc.,.

d. New Default Theme: “Twentyten”

Twentyten is the long-overdue default theme packaged with new installations of WordPress 3.0. It features a clean, yet bold design and introduces some nice functionality not found in many themes. Two features built into Twentyten are particularly useful if you’re new to WordPress and don’t have the coding skills to customize your theme. They are:

• Custom Header Image
• Custom Background Image

e. Multi-site

You can’t discuss WordPress 3.0 without mentioning the new multi-site capabilities. That is, you can manage several different websites (with different domains and/or sub-domains) all with a single installation of WordPress. What was previously known as WordPress MU (Multi-User) is now merged with the core WordPress system in 3.0. Enabling multi-site capabilities likely isn’t something for the average user, as it requires some tinkering with the code and configuring server settings. That said, the average user likely isn’t interested in having multi-site capabilities.

For more information, please visit: http://mashable.com/2010/05/10/new-features-wordpress-3/