Do you search out new music/bands on your own or are you just satisfied with what the radio and MTV (does it actually play music anymore?) or other mainstream media forums play?

I search them out myself. I have kids who help a lot with this too as we are all indi lovers.

Stay far, far away from MTV. I only listen to popular music stations on the radio if I’ve forgotten my iPod in the car and am bored with what is on NPR. The “classic rock” stations are now playing grunge… What in blazes!!

I only really find out about new groups (or groups that have been around forever that I’ve never encountered before!) from friends, or occasionally, at bars.

I never listen to radio. I rely on personal recommendations from friends, read reviews in places like Paste. Sometimes I’ll go to sites like music-map or tuneglue to find new artists who produce music in the styles I enjoy. Also, there’s a local cd shop that I like a lot, and they post new music on their Facebook page – I’ve picked up some interesting things there.

There is enough music I am interested in on the radio. I also listen to things others suggest.

I really on the radio a lot. Since it takes awhile for new songs to hit the area, I usually stream music from the coast.
A couple of favorite bands atm are Foo Fighters and Death Cab for Cutie (<- which I heard on local station the other day for the first time!)
I mostly like songs rather than bands, though. I like a variety of genres. Except classic rock and rap.

Im a member of the largest music torrent site on the web. Everyday they have a top 10 downloaded torrents, most of it being new cds and from bands I’ve never heard of so I just download a bunch of stuff go through it and figure out what I like. Since I became a member of that site 2–3 years ago my music collection has grown exponentially.

During Christmas they had a huge freeleech thing going on, I grabbed something around 84 gigs of music I’m a total audiophile :P

I’ll also find new music from Last.fm since it keeps track of what I listen to and suggests new music for me.

Edit: To answer the second part of your question in the details, thats a really hard question, I can’t say who my favorite band is, there are just so many great artists out there. I could at most give you top 5 from any given genre. I tend to be very diverse when it comes to music and will listen to just about everything, I think talented musicians can be found in every genre. They just don’t turn up very often in pop and almost never in modern country.

Another vote for Music Map.

I look for it on my own, on some radio stations but also through friends. I am on a couple mailing lists for smaller venues. It’s nice to discover a new band!

Here’s a song I discovered last night from watching a TV show, album out soon. Drew Holcomb

I usually listen to a public access radio channel. They have a variety of “DJ’s” all who have about a two hour stint. Most have a format of some kind but they play what they want to play so I get a wide variety of music and will look up anything or anyone that interests me from their playlists.

I rely on my sons to do the research, and then listen to their recommendations. Local radio is crap…........

I search out new music a lot. I’m currently using an app called Jango which, like last.fm etc searches for music that is similar to what you already like.

I look for it on my own and friends refer me. I also have fb where you can listen to your friends or anyone’s playlist which is interesting. Of course I Heart Radio is pretty good, too.

The radio LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It’s one of the worst things around these days. Sometimes it’s so bad it can almost bring me to tears. I use Spotify, and I love it. For any given artist it suggests about 6–8 similar to them, and the suggestions are usually pretty accurate. It’s also easy to share music on there so friends and I will send songs back and forth and I’ve discovered a lot that way.