Seem's like today is Pandora day at TexasGigs. We had lunch with founder Tim Westerbrook this afternoon.

Pandora is an online music service that helps you find new music by comparing music you already like based on a gizmo that measures lots of attributes related to voice, rhythm, instrumentation, etc.

It was really cool to talk to Tim -- I understand the service much better now, and now have a different angle in the Last.fm vs. Pandora vs. other services debate.

I think people (myself included) initially gravitate to Last.fm because it collects a lot of data points more quickly/easily by tracking what you listen to from your own collection in Itunes. But, if you're serious about finding new music, even if it is from unsigned bands that don't make anyone's "popularity list," Pandora seems a stronger tool. I don't use Last.fm to discover new music-- I use it as a surrogate for my existing collection when I'm not connected to my main library. Pandora helps distinguish between, say the characteristics that might make someone love the Old 97's twangy stuff, but be less enthralled with the pop.

Like anything else, you get out of it what you put into it. And these are different services for different purposes. I like 'em both, but am going to dig much deeper into Pandora now.

Click here for the audio interview.