A Startup A Day

 Little know fact about myself – I’m into music.  Like, really into music.  I was very close to majoring in music in college instead of computer engineering, and played for several years in a rock band back in Detroit.  I go to concerts all the time, read music magazines, listen to the latest indie bands, etc, etc.. 

I also love putting music together in various ways create a good flow.  Mixes can be difficult to put together – you really need to think about when to throw in that huge summer hit to pull everyone out on the dance floor, or the way Frank Sinatra can flow into Duke Ellington to create the perfect ambiance for a romantic candlelit meal.  

Today’s idea is a site that allows you to build, share, and download music mixes for a specific type of party or event.  Here’s how this might work.  Let’s say that you’re throwing an 80’s theme party.  The plan is that people will begin arriving in their leggings and Michael Bolton t-shirts around 9pm for drinks, with the party kicking into full gear between 11 and 1, then slowing down up until 2am – at which point you start blasting Starship on repeat until your guest leave.  You could enter in the basic details and timeline, and the site would display a sample play list. 

The songs would be listed in chronological order and color-coded to denote energy level of the music (more blue = chill, more red = high-energy dance music).  Each song would have a little 15-second preview clip so you could quickly identify any songs whose titles you’re not familiar with.  If there are any songs that you really dislike, you could simply switch the song out with one at a similar energy level.

Once you’ve chosen the perfect mix, the application could search your iTunes library to determine which songs a user already has, and then provides an option to automatically purchase the songs on the mix that the user doesn’t own.  Once the songs are downloaded, the app could also add-in a playlist into iTunes that keeps the songs in order for easy play back.