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Google Wednesday announced a widely anticipated addition to its popular search engine that reduces the number of steps one has to take between hearing about a piece of music and actually hearing it, thanks to partnerships with a bevy of music services: imeem, Lala, MySpace's recently-acquired iLike, Pandora and Rhapsody.

Search for any artist, album or song in the regular Google search box, and Google's new "OneBox" music search feature ? rolling out to U.S. users starting now ? displays a box of playable search results, so you can hear what something sounds like with one click of the play button.

A Google algorithm randomly decides whether your playable search results come from Lala or MySpace. Both services will let users hear the entire track once for free. If you search for the same track again, the search box will play a 30-second sample instead. Lala has offered this feature for awhile on partner sites like Billboard and Pitchfork, but it represents a new strategy for iLike, which MySpace acquired in August. The site previously allowed only 30-second samples for free in most cases. As such, a Google spokesman tells us, ?[full-track] coverage may vary at first, but that's the goal we'll be working toward."

No money changes hands between Google and its partners as part of this deal; it's a straight trade between the services, which want traffic, and Google, which wants to make its search function more useful to music fans.

In the grand context of sweeping changes the digital music revolution has wrought on our culture in general, the primary effect of this announcement is that average web users will be able to hear full tracks, for free, a mere click after entering the name of an artist album or song on Google.

Instant gratification is an important aspect of this plan, but it's by no means the full deal. To delve deeper into an artist's catalog and find related artists, you can click through to the services. You can get free full-track playback for millions of songs from imeem if you have a free account. Try Pandora's free, interactive artist-based station, or check out MySpace's music videos and tour information ? ?the first time concert data has been integrated into Google search," according to a MySpace spokeswoman. Or head to Rhapsody, which offers each user up to 25 full song song streams for free (unlimited full songs for subscribers) and MP3s for sale. If a given service doesn't have the song in stock, it doesn't surface in OneBox, which could lead to these services offering more exclusive releases.

?The key to stemming piracy is making it easier to find music than it is to steal it," said imeem founder and CEO Dalton Caldwell in a statement. ?By integrating imeem links directly into search results, imeem and Google are making it possible to hear music as soon as you think about it."

Right now, the service is only available in the U.S., but Google is seeking international music service partners that would allow it to roll out overseas. A company spokesman had no response when we asked whether it would eventually include links to Amazon MP3 or Apple iTunes.

SOURCE:MTV.COM