Pandora.com

I think we might need to put Pandora.com in a new category of review topics: “Products That Simultaneously Save Mom’s Sanity and Get Her Toes A’tappin”. Pandora.com is a live continuous radio stream that you can access through your computer or – even better – download as an app for your iphone or ipod. Not being a particularly tech-savvy person I thought of myself as the last person on earth to review an iphone app. But here at Momicillin headquarters we’re encouraged to write about products we love and use all the time, and Pandora definitely fits the bill. Best of all it meets all of my favorite mommy requirements: it saves me time, it’s not complicated, the whole family can enjoy it and – most importantly – it’s FREE!

What makes Pandora unique is that the listener has the ability to create a station based on the style of music he or she might be in the mood for. Enter an artist’s name and Pandora will continuously stream songs by that artist and songs that are similar in style and sound. Having a dinner party? Plug your ipod, phone or computer into your speakers, enter “Mozart” and have lovely background music the entire night without all the work that goes into creating play lists or changing cds. Hosting a game night? Maybe a little Brian Setzer Orchestra and some swing tunes will help get things going. Kids going crazy? Just type Dan Zanes and get hours and hours of family friendly sing-able music. The possibilities are endless. Pandora will also remember your choices once you’ve entered an artist’s name so you can continue to create new stations or go back to some of your old favorites. For the intense music lovers out there Pandora also provides a bio of each artist that comes up on your play list and a description of the song.

So for ease, enjoyment and price – did I forget to mention that all this listening pleasure is FREE?! – Pandora is definitely worth the download!