[juju]

I try to search everywhere on the web I can think of for names of musicians that I might like, then I download a few of their songs off gnutella and listen to them. For a while, I thought I could just listen to the 30-second clips on Amazon.com. But I discovered that 30 seconds isn't nearly enough time to judge a song by. Some songs take a while to get started. They have to build up mood and tension, and it's kind of the whole thing that affects you.

I was searching for "top 100 songs" lists on the web. Some are helpful, some are not. I found that the billboard-type lists aren't so useful because they only show me what was popular during that time period, and most of the really good stuff wasn't popular. But sometimes you can find lists of individual's favorite songs or bands. Those tend to be much more fruitful.

Amazon has a feature where if you're looking at a cd, you can see what people who bought that cd also bought. I've found this to be an incredibly fruitful source. The only downside is that you typically never leave your genre of choice. Speaking of genres, though, you can also look up the best selling cds in any particular genre on amazon as well. I've found several great artists this way.

But even when I find an artist I like on Amazon.com, I still try to download the song through file-sharing.

Asking friends what they listen to is another good way.