The Hype Machine is a 'blog aggregator,' an internet site that tracks thousands of online blogs and the MP3s they post. Assembling a searchable database, it's an instantaneous, incredible resource of cutting-edge bands and brand new tracks; a site that does all the legwork for you.
Its simplicity is its greatest reward. Every day people are out that typing away, blogging about the music that's stirring their loins. Hype Machine collates them, and, via some simple clicks, turns an array of posts into a single playlist. As if to encourage it's sense of exploration, there's even a 'random' feature in which a click teleports you to into the unknown.
In its role as middle-man, the site is keen to promote it as a forum for listening, and providing the appropriate links to legally-downloadable/purchasable versions of the tracks it highlights. I'd be inclined to suggest that fostering an obsession with music has far more positive effects for the music industry —whatever that means these days— than it does negative ones.
Since its initial launch in 2005, the Hype Machine has become an internet behemoth; in so many senses superseding the blogs that feed it. For some, it's a Frankensteinian creation, out to crush the little guys, be they blogs or bands. For others, it's the underground uprising into a single, glittering colossus; creating a realm in which the business interests of corporate-owned radio aren't the ultimate arbiters of popularity.
Whatever your view, there's no denying the Hype Machine has become a massive resource for those on the lookout for new, undiscovered, still-way-underground artists.
