First, I am a long time and loyal user of Pandora. In my family, there are two Apple Music folks and one Spotify. I have tried Sirius XM two or five times; when they're practically giving it away. I find it clunky and cumbersome. Plus, they don't seem to realize they are NOT add free just because the ads are for themselves. I even have free Amazon Music, but just couldn't get into it.
My current favorite channel is 70's Folk. Here is where the problems start. I don't know the first thing about creating an algorithm, but I'm pretty sure that one made for this station has at least two concrete guidelines: Folk music and from the 70's. One is rather subjective and one is absolute. The failure on the folk music aspect is fine with me. I actually want all the 70's has to offer. What I can't get past, is songs that ARE NOT FROM THE 70's. That shouldn't be that hard to do, yet apparently is not attainable. In just the last week: Cuts Like a Knife ('83), Overkill ('83), Summer of '69 ('85), Losing My Religion ('91)! I like them all, but c'mon, 1991?!
My second issue is useful information. Show the original album that a song comes from. A Beatles song could come from any one of seven albums or collections, but I want to know if it was on Revolver or Sgt. Pepper's. The only song of note that actually debuted on a greatest hits collection is Last Dance With Mary Jane.
Along with that, put the year it was released. That's helpful. It adds to the experience by conjuring a feeling or a memory from a time and place. Instead, you put when it was remastered. Seriously? The only people who could possibly care about this are serious audiophiles, and they're not listening to streaming music from a digital source. They're listening to vinyl on $2K turntables through amps with tubes on them. No one cares.
These are easy fixes. It provides information to us, the users, and gives you a chance to fire whomever is writing your algorithms. I'm sure this is not they're only blunder.
Sincerely, Loyal Customer K. Alan Gardner
