I happen to be a big fan of The Shins. They are from Albuquerque, New Mexico, and currently living and recording here in my home city of Portland, Oregon.

My good friend James Hall over at The Good Harvest just redesigned/rebuilt/relaunched their website. It is very fun and many easter eggs have been planted throughout the site. I love easter eggs.

I am normally not a big fan of pure flash sites, but this site works for me. Here are a few reasons why.

1) Load Time - Aside from the front end load time, and the video load time, there is seamless navigation between every page on the site. I can’t stand it when I am on a flash site and there is a loading screen between pages. I immediately close out and lose interest. James has also done a nice job with the animations that take a visitor between the different pages. It’s fluid. It works.

2) Easter Eggs - Did I mention I love easter eggs. The reason that most flash sites don’t work for me, is the purpose of them. Does a Real Estate Company really need a snazzy flash site? Most likely no. That is what is cool about bands, you can build stuff to be fun, functional, and artistic. There are other fields to host fun websites, but music is the most prominent. I love easter eggs.

3. Usefulness - The site is giving fans a lot of what they want. The easter eggs especially give those who are curious an extra layer to the website. There are secret videos and tons of other useful content built in.

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So what is this site missing? I wouldn’t mind seeing a little more community involvment. Whether this stems from a Shins blog, a chat room, or someway for people to comment on shows or trade audio. Let’s encourage the masses to do what they are doing already. A game would be nifty too.

Perhaps The Shins will make love with The Good Harvest and produce more flashy offspring.

Good job James.

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