Starting soon you’ll be able to listen to music as well as video via your XBOX 360. We’ll have more when we can get some hard details on what that entails, or whether you will be required to have a ZunePass and XBOX Live Gold Subscription. Either way this should be epic.

When it comes to music subscriptions,  Zune Pass has “a huge edge” over Rhapsody’s subscription service, according to this analysis from Ed Bott.

Those two are the only major music services that offer subscriptions, which in my view is the future of music services. If you’re into all-you-can-eat music, Zune Pass is the way to go and you can’t beat its cost model. (With the $14.95 Zune Pass, you get unlimited music downloads or streaming, plus you can download 10 songs per month that you get to keep forever.)

For downloading pay-per-tracks, iTunes is obviously the market leader, in its near-monopoly in that area. How do its competitors line up in terms of cost, selection, sampling, user experience, and recovery of downloaded files? For an interesting comparison of iTunes, Zune Marketplace, Amazon MP3, Lala, Rhapsody, Amie Street, and eMusic, see the full review.

Thanks to RL for the tip!

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Today I attended part of Billboard’s pre-CES Digital Music Track.

An interesting panel discussion gave some insights into the complexities of digital media. On the panel were players in the digital music industry, including Sony Executive VP Peter Brodsky, ex-head of Yahoo Music David Goldberg, Lala.com founder Bill Nguyen, and reps from the National Music Publishers Association and the Digital Music Association.

Obviously the delivery, distribution, and sale of digital content is changing rapidly, and the panel gave perspectives on the complexities of licensing and royalties, and the weird content ownership questions that exist among artists, record labels, and publishers.

Lala has a completely cloud-based model, where you buy a track for (typically) ten cents. There are no downloads – you play your music 100% from the cloud. (Obviously, you can only play it from a web-connected device.) Nice simple model – no downloads, and no pinning your music collection to a particular PC. And, you can upload your own music collection to the cloud so that you can play it from anywhere.

I asked Lala founder Bill Nguyen about whether he was concerned about the lack of portable devices that are web-connected. He told me to watch for an announcement – this week – about that. Hmmm. A new device? Or maybe an app to allow more devices to use Lala, like the Lala iPhone app released in October. We’ll know soon.

I also asked Bill about his opinions about Zune’s subscription model. His take is that downloads and the associated DRM are cumbersome. He’s not big on iTunes either. Lala relies on no downloads, and no downloaded software – it’s strictly an HTML website, no plug-ins or client-side software required.

Pretty interesting model, and I plan to check Lala out more. Even with Lala’s ten cents per track, though, I still like the flat monthly-rate model of Zune Marketplace. For frequent downloaders of music, it’s a cost-efficient way to get a rich music collection, without having to pay for each individual track.

And, I need to take my music to be portable. I carry two devices that can connect to the web – my iPhone and my Blackberry. I don’t use either for music, though. I much prefer the music experience from my Zune 120 and my flash Zune, for music on the go.

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You responded, with suggestions for over 600 tracks! You reminded me of some great driving tunes from my past. And you introduced me to some new artists and songs that are sure to find permanent homes on my Zune 120. I was also pleased to receive some great instrumental recommendations.

Now I’m developing the Best Ever Driving Playlist, that should help those counties and states roll by in a most pleasing way. I will post that playlist for posterity on the first of our “Best Ever Playlists” page. Stay tuned for that!

Thanks to all of you for your helpful suggestions. And please join me in congratulating Novasoccer, who I’ve selected as our winner of a rare and awesome Zune T-shirt. This T-shirt is straight from the Microsoft Zune team. Thanks to Cesar for letting me snag a few of these the last time I was on the Redmond campus.

You can see all of the playlist suggestions here. Thanks, everyone!

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The first time I heard Neil Diamond’s “Forever in Blue Jeans”, I thought he was singing ‘Reverend Blue Jeans’. And that’s what I hum to myself whenever I hear the song.

It only gets embarrassing when I sing out loud.

So make me feel better, if you will. What are some of your own mis-heard song lyrics?

We’re not alone – I’ve linked below some collections from Amazon, including that all-time Elton John classic, Hold Me Closer, Tony Danza.

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Thanks to all those participating. Be sure to get involved and nominate your best songs via PM to ballbagcheese for Music Battle Royal 3.

A Zunerama member, who I will refer to as bbcheese, has started a new round of our tournament-style musical exploration project.

He has posted 16 songs, and asked Zune users to rate their top 8.

The top-rated tracks will proceed to Round 2, and successive rounds, until a a winning song is crowned.

It’s a fun way to get people involved and listening to new music – and seeing other members’ comments on the music choices.

You can download or sample the songs in the tournament through the Marketplace deep links in the post, or the downloadable playlist. Join the madness!

Seal – A Change Is Gonna Come

A Change is Gonna Come

If you think you’ve got a song that has what it takes to make to the top, by all means submit it to ballbagcheese for Music Madness, Round 2.

On my run this morning with my Zune 8, I accidentally selected the wrong playlist: ‘Our Songs’ instead of ‘Harvey Workout’.

As a result my pace was a little slower, but it brought back some fun memories.

I always want to add new tracks to ‘Our Songs’, but Carrie (who you know as ZuneWidow) favors the ones that relate to some meaningful time or passing moment in our lives.

Here are a few tracks from Our Songs: (update – added links to track samples on Zune Social)

• Brown-Eyed Girl. I think this was one of the first songs we danced to.
• Something to Talk About. We used to work in an office together, so we can relate to this song.
• Shiny and New. I love every word of this song. If you haven’t heard Late Tuesday, you need to. Zune Marketplace has all of their tracks.
• Someone Like You. Nobody says it like Van Morrisson.
• Ordinary Miracle. Our lives are full of ‘em. We also have another Sarah Mclachlan track, I Will Remember You.
• Forever and For Always. Great lyrics from Shania.
• They Don’t Know. Anybody else remember Katrina?
• Something Good. Veering towards corny here, I know. But we are impelled to do a nose-to-nose version of this every time we watch The Sound of Music.
• Giving You the Best That I’ve Got. Like Anita says, “I bet everything on my wedding ring”.
• The Note Song. One of Carrie’s habits is leaving little notes – in my rollaboard, in our daughters’ lunchboxes, on our bathroom mirror. This is another great track from Late Tuesday.
• Come Thou Long-Expected Jesus. When our twin girls were four, I recorded them singing this. (Sample.) As they get older, it’s fun to be reminded of their toddler voices.

Some newer ones I’ve added are One Sweet Love (Sara Bareilles), Lucky (Jason Mraz), and 1,2,3,4 (Plain White T’s). And yes, I’ve got Clapton’s Wonderful Tonight on there. That goes without saying, right!?

What are some of your ‘Our Songs’? Let me know!

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Our resident deejay (and Zunerama mod’) Jander has posted a montage playlist of cheesy 80’s inspirational music. As Jander says, it’s good for a laugh and also makes for a “surprisingly motivational workout playlist”.

I believe it, too, with cheeseball classics like Eye of the Tiger, Only the Young (that’s Journey, kiddo), Hearts on Fire, Gonna Fly Now, Danger Zone, Holding Out For a Hero, and the ever popular My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down. For more torture, check out Jander’s playlist – which includes links to YouTube music videos.

Crank it up, and rack up that weight bench bar while you’re at it. Just don’t hurt yourself – you’re not an 80’s kid anymore.

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