One of the original ideas that got kicked around during the early days of Ground Control was that of a concert calendar; one that was customizable by region and was viewable in actual calendar format, as opposed to the unwieldy–yet still convenient–lists of shows like Pollstar. Here's the problem: we didn't really know how to implement it, and so it fell by the wayside in favor of things we could do with decent levels of kick-assery, like live coverage, streaming music, and the jukebox. We try not to pat ourselves on the back too hard.
Then in January, I stumbled across something that did everything we had hoped to do with the calendar and more. Not only would it keep us appraised of all the shows we wanted to see, but it could even let us know about shows we weren't even thinking about. That something is this: iConcertCal.
The beauty of iConcertCal is that it does everything for you. No more perusing Pollstar or daily checks on your favorite venue's website. iConcertCal is a plugin for iTunes that takes the place of the pretty much useless visualizer–you know, the thing with the swirly colors you've never used. All you have to do is type in your location, and iConcertCal indexes the music in your iTunes and cross checks it with concert databases. Your mp3 library automatically becomes your concert calendar. Here's a screenshot of concerts I might hit this month.
I didn't even remember that the Thermals and the Appleseed Cast were playing down here, so I'm pretty damn stoked that I decided to write this tonight.
Just go download iConcertCal at www.iconcertcal.com