Never miss another show – Update

Back in December, we covered Tourfilter, an easy online tool for tracking live gigs. We recently spotted two new start-ups (plus one incumbent) that are also helping music lovers find the shows they wouldn’t want to miss. iConcertCal is a plug-in for Apple’s iTunes software. Users enter a city and state or province, and iConcertCal will scour their iTunes library to match artists they listen to, to gigs lined up for their hometown. It works with (smart) playlists, too. Create a new playlist called “iConcertCal” and add tracks by artists you’d like to see perform, or have it list only tracks that you’ve rated with four or five stars, limiting the concert calendar to artists you really like. Calling itself a “digital to analogue lifestyle converter”, Sonic Living is more like Tourfilter: the user needs to tell it which bands or artists to look out for. Saving users from typing everything in manually, Sonic Living lets users upload lists of artists from an iTunes library or last.fm account. Sonic Living also integrates a social aspect that iConcertCal lacks — users can easily find other members who like the same artists, or are going to a certain show. Last.fm, the social music network, recently added an events feature, too, which also lets users see who else will be attending a concert, creating an appealing and relevant link between online and offline social interaction. Both iConcertCal and Sonic Living have limited reach outside the US. Of the major international cities we checked in iConcertCal, only London came up with a good number of upcoming shows. Sonic Living lists thousands of events in London, but no other non-US cities. Tourfilter already included a London page, and has added Melbourne, Dublin, Vancouver and Toronto to their international roster. Last.fm has international coverage, but mostly appeals to its own user-base. Which means there’s plenty of room left for smart listing concepts in cities across the world. Combine the best of the above, and find a way to stand out. Could be early notifications, to insure users won’t miss out on fast-selling tickets, or mobile listings, or the most complete calendars, or… For more on catering to consumers’ incessant desire for relevant information, check out trendwatching.com’s infolust briefing. Websites: www.iconcertcal.com – www.sonicliving.com – www.last.fm Spotted by: Josh Spear