Internet radio turned out to be here to stay, and my Wi-Fi radios were always playing something different - for example the stations below.   ✱   Radionomy was very important, both as a listener and as a creator. People could create their own radio station(s) there, basically for free. Most people there were hobbyists.   ✱   About the stations below: * = Radionomy.

⟶  Pic 1: A screenshot of the Radionomy home page.  |  Pic 2: An article about Laid Back Radio*.  |  Pic 3: The site of Laid Back Radio*.  |  Pic 4: An article about Double XX*, in French.  |  Pic 5: A screenshot of the site of the French station FIP.  |  Pic 6: An article about FIP.  |  Pic 7: A screenshot of the site of the French station Nova.  |  Pic 8: The Flemish public youth station Studio Brussel.  |  Pic 9: The French station Paris1Reverse, a station playing minimal, techno and deephouse.  |  Pic 10: The site of Bolz Radio*.  |  Pic 11: AlternativeRadio*, the page at the Radionomy platform.  |  Pic 12: Addicted To Radio, another platform hosting a lot of stations. During the early 10s I frequently listened to '90s Dance & Beyond'.

⟶  Sound 1: The sound of Laid Back Radio* around 2013.  |  Sound 2: 42 minutes of Only 1 Revival (2011 or 2012), another station focussing on the danceable side of the 90s. Sadly this one pulled the plug already very soon.

On the creators' side: March 2011, I launched my own Radionomy stations. They always featured extensive self-made imaging, created in Audacity with purchased voice-overs and roughly 1001 different sounds.

⟶  Pic : Changing the mixpoints in the Radionomy software (the 'Radio Manager').

Another source I used a lot, alongside internet radio, was 22Tracks. I often recorded tracks with Total Recorder and kept the best ones. Spotify already existed, but it wasn't dominant yet.

⟶  Pic: A screenshot of the 22Tracks site.

I still visited music blogs and discussion forums like Fok!forum (there's a music section), and spent plenty of time on Twitter.   ✱   In addition, smartphones entered my life - at first very cautiously.

⟶  Pic 1: An article about Fok!forum.  |  Pic 2: The Twitter whale.

I also created a long series of personal websites. They were made with WordPress, with constantly changing designs. Those sites were partly filled with my personal music lists, much like the site you're looking at now, and partly linked to the radio stations I managed on Radionomy.   ✱   There are aspects of that Radionomy episode I’m not particularly proud of; that’s why the names in the screenshots have been altered, with Google and the web archive in mind.

⟶  Pic 1: Own site, in early 2011. My radio stations didn't exist yet.  |  Pic 2: Own sites, both created spring 2011.  |  Pic 3: Own site, in late 2011.  |  Pic 4: Own site, in late 2012.  |  Pic 5: Own site, in summer 2014.

This era resembled the previous one in many ways. I listened to FM radio even less, and I hadn't started listening to NPO Radio 1 yet, the Dutch national talk station. That meant there wasn't much to be found in the archives, especially not material both related to myself ánd likely to interest others. Nevertheless, I gave it a try. Sometimes I tuned in to those request weeks.

⟶  Pic: An article, scanned from the 'VaraGids', about the 00s Request Week at NPO 3 FM.

How to identify tracks before the rise of Shazam, especially in the very early part of this era? You could write down a few lyrics, type them into Google, and hope the song title would surface. But of course this didn’t work for instrumental tracks.   ✱   Alternatively, you could keep an eye on your internet radio screen or your Winamp player, and write down whatever was displayed. But not every station showed track info, and playlists on radio station websites were far from standard back then.   ✱   Sometimes, when using a laptop or pc, I recorded parts with Total Recorder. Sometimes, uploading a fragment to YouTube or posting it on a discussion board did the trick - the title would occasionally pop up.

⟶  Pic 1: My YouTube account, including a couple of track IDs.  |  Pic 2: Some pre-Shazam notitions. There was always a piece of paper near my internet radios.

The situation was similar to the previous era. Alongside recent releases, many older tracks surfaced, still featuring more guitars than the newer ones. The popular 'indie voice' I didn't like was still there.   ✱   And it was another blurry era when it came to enjoying recent versus older tracks. Many recent ones were still discovered by chance, although less so than around 2009. Older tracks could be months, years or decades old.   ✱   The CDs featured on the pic below ended up being some of the last CDs I ever bought, as I started buying less and less due to a lack of fresh blood - especially in brick-and-morter shops. Hunting for CDs was always part of the fun.

⟶  Pic: These are some of the CDs I picked up during this time, all featuring older music. Some were second-hand, others still brand new.

A continuation of the previous lines. --> Second-hand stores were still closing down. And around 2013/2014, I had more or less collected the second-hand CDs I wanted. Visiting the Car Boot Sale in Oss and such events was still fun, but by this point hunting for books became more interesting. But basically, I still really enjoy the CD format.

⟶  Pic: A blog about Dutch CD stores closing down. It didn't stop.