Sometimes technology is awesome.

Much of the time I'm a right old bastard when it comes to embracing the new. The prime example of this would be mobile phones, or mobile devices as they should be called nowadays, having evolved so far beyond simple phones as to be only one step away from taking over the world in an horrific trapper-keeper calamity. I still hate mobile phones, no matter how brilliant they undoubtedly are.

However, where I very much make an exception is in the way I'm beginning to consume music. For the longest time, online was anathema to how I thought music should be collected. I would always argue (rightly, I still think, in many cases) that there was no substitute for discovering music than spending an afternoon in a music store, browsing endless shelves of CDs. I arrived too late for LPs and I'm very glad of that fact, for they are shit. I like my noise crystal clear, thanks all the same. You know the 'warmth' those aficionados go on about? It's known by another name: poor quality. This attitude towards the humble LP would offer clues as to how I would come to embrace new technology in the future, but for the longest time I would not join the download bandwagon. In a way, I still haven't; I don't download music, I still buy CDs, but I no longer use music shops and NME (at least not exclusively, but I will forever be in debt to NME for turning me on to Polly Scattergood) to discover music I've never heard before.

Most bands still release music the old-fashioned way, but there are a few who've experimented with new ways of releasing music. Arctic Monkeys made a name for themselves largely through MySpace. Radiohead released the phenomenal In Rainbows online, allowing the buyer to choose their own purchase price. Ash have abandoned the old 'new record every two years, release a few singles, tour relentlessly, repeat' rut they had become stuck in, and are now almost at the end of their A-Z project, where they've released a new single online every month for 26 months.

But where the whole thing really came alive for me is upon the discovery of Blip (http://www.blip.fm/) via Twitter, and upon the receipt of an invite to join Spotify. Blip allows me to listen to other people's favourite music from around the world, and it's where I've discovered many previously unknown artists from The Veils to Mazzy Star, and countless weird and wonderful cover versions, like Blondie's amazing version of We Three Kings. It also allows me to interact with people the world over with similar tastes to mine (who would've thought there'd be an American who liked Echobelly as much as I do?) Spotify allows me to do similar things - I can tailor a radio station to my own tastes, I can share playlists with friends, and I can road-test albums before buying them (thank goodness I listened to the second Elastica album before wasting my money). I can see Spotify leading the way to future technology where CDs are extinct, and people listen to music by streaming it directly out of the ether, and when you find that rare gem of an album or song so good it changes your whole life for the better, you can share it with others who'll understand instantly, instead of just going on and on about it down the pub to people who aren't really that bothered. I would, of course, be sad to see my CD collection go, but I can honestly say I think it would be much better that way. Bring on the future!

The best example I have yet seen of how this technology can work happened recently, thanks to Twitter. Amanda Palmer, that most amazing woman from The Dresden Dolls, who is married to Neil Gaiman, that most amazing man who writes the most amazingly beautiful stories, was accosted by a young music student outside the Berklee College of Music. That's in Boston. The other side of the world from me. The young man was named Tristan Allen, and when he sat down in front of a piano in Amanda's house, proceeded to blow her away. She tweeted about it. She then went on to showcase Tristan's talent to the world via the live video streaming website UStream. The kid was genuinely incredible. He would take well known pieces like the Halloween theme or a Philip Glass song, and just improvise the hell out of them. Thanks to this technology, I was (via a computer monitor, obviously), in Amanda Fucking Palmer's house on the other side of the planet to the sofa I was sitting on, listening to an impromptu performance of genuine excellence by a teenage music student in real time. To be able to share in the goosebump moment with Amanda as she discovers something amazing for the first time is incredibly exciting. It's so far removed from meetings with record company executives and the suicide-inducing X-Factor that it was like a ray of perfect sunshine in the midst of a miserable day. See Amanda Palmer's blog about it, including the entire streamed performance, here: http://blog.amandapalmer.net/post/962861244/my-answer-to-grayson-chance-presenting-tristan. It's over an hour and a half long, so if you haven't got time to watch it all (although it is highly recommended), go to the duet at one hour twenty seconds and be as amazed as I was at the 10 minutes that follow.

This is the potential of this technology. This is the benefit of making everyone and everything connectable. This, hopefully, is the future of music.