Hey there, I have been using Spotify for a while now but I am getting irritated by its policy of only allowing you to listen to a song 5 times, and I am not prepared or able to pay for it, so I was wondering if any of you know of any free alternatives to Spotify (preferably its own client, although a website will do) that are available in the UK.

Any suggestions much appreciated

WiMP.

EDIT: Maybe that's just in Norway. Also that one costs money.

But yeah, I've started to really dislike Spotify. In Norway I can supposedly listen to 10 hours of music a month though, but I doubt that's the case. They always decide to lock the music, and there's no way I'm paying 17 bucks a month.

I found a service called Rdio and I thought I hit the jackpot but it turns out to be a 7-day trial Then you have to pay.

I think 5 listens is way too tight a limit for each track, if it was like 20 listens then I could live with it, but alas I have to have the same track starred 100 times lol.

They removed the 5 play limit here and let us listen to music for 10 hours a month. Now, that may sound good but I swear I can only listen for 3 hours before they cut me off.
Spotify started off as something free and awesome, but then they became greedy [censored]s.

Yeah I agree, it used to be like that for us, but with a 20 hour month limit. I think their strategy of trying to get people to buy premium has failed and just made people look for alternatives. I can put up with the ads - what else do you expect for a free service? But the listen limit is just bad.

I prefer Pandora, I am not sure if its available in the UK though....

First of all a reminder to all that instant bans and suspensions will be given out to people advocating and admitting to illegal activity.

You have various options:

1. Buy the record. It's probably the easiest, most reliable solution - and an individual song is only about 79p. I mean, what were you going to do with that 79p anyway? Buy half a packet of Doritos? A third of a can of lager? A quarter of a magazine? Or help fund your favourite artist's next release?
2. Sign up to something like Last.fm - it's a "radio station" which scans your record collection and plays you a shuffle mix of your own songs plus other acts that are linked or similar. It's free, though I think there's a premium subscription that allows you to make it portable for smartphones. (No, Pandora is not available here - it's a similar thing.)
3. Listen to the song you like on Youtube
4. Keep an eye on Amazon.com's MP3 section - they often give out free tracks, including whole sampler albums from record labels.
5. Have a look on Bandcamp - a lot of bands have their albums up for streaming, and I don't think there's any restriction on how many times you can play it.
6. If it's a new release, keep an eye out on the press (e.g. Guardian, NME) - there are often "first listen" exclusives on new albums.