Using The Last(.fm) Music Map

Posted by Flick - 31/07/08 at 07:07:16 am

There are many great mashups that have been contrived for Last.fm recently. Tonight, I came across a mashup that you might find useful. It’s called The Last(.fm) Music Map, which mashes Last.fm events with Google Maps.

Instead of tossing thousands of markers on the global map, The Last(.fm) Music Map asks you to search for events by either location or artist. Querying “Chicago” resulted in 450  events, sorted out on 15 pages. Clicking on a marker reveals a bubble with information about the event; artist and venue names are linked to the corresponding Last.fm page, and a photo of the artist is given.

Searching by artist not only gives you a mapped out tour, but also a list of similar artists, based on the listening habits of Last.fm’s users.

Immediately my mind began to think of ways this website could be useful. Beyond looking for upcoming concerts in your area or for your favorite band, The Last(.fm) Music Map is a great tool for artists and industry folk.

Artists plotting their own tours could search for artists in their genre and discover dozens of venues to contact. Strategic tour routes have never been so important than they are now, due to high gas prices, and artists can glean tour routes from this website.

If you’re plotting a tour, you can look on the map and get a feel for how supportive people are for music in a particular area. Venues can’t survive if fans don’t buy tickets and beer.

Since this mashup shows you where the venues are located, you have a better idea of where you’re booking shows… instead of a random bar in Milwaukee that you know nothing about. Turning on the satellite map tells you whether you’re playing downtown with a dense population or at a place where moths flying around lamp posts make up the night life.

Since event information on Last.fm is driven by a wiki, anyone can enter or edit venue information. This given, the address for each venue isn’t supplied, resulting in stacks of markers that aren’t accurately placed on the venue’s location. For this reason, the designer warned, “Markers on the map could be approximate.”

The Last(.fm) Music Map: http://lastmusicmap.com