The new promised land lays in switching mindset from individual track purchases, to purchasing access. They call it the celestial jukebox, or music like water, but you might call it music like cable TV—as many songs as you can consume, for a monthly fee.

“By now, the download sector should have hit hockey stick growth,” Forrester research director Mark Mulligan tells us. “Access-based services have long been part of the digital music map, now they’re being reassessed as a means of addressing consumers other than the traditional aficionado niches.”

From Spotify and We7, to Rdio and Mog, there’s a rush on among services looking at popularizing the model. And, if rumors are to be believed, Google (NSDQ: GOOG) and Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) itself may be about to join them.

Look out, Pandora—these guys aren’t fooling around with unlimited “radio” services, users of which have little control over what they hear. We’re talking about labels offering choice from the whole of their catalogs, which they have spent the last decade digitizing, for less than the price of an album each month.

» Here’s our roundup of the runners and riders in the on-demand, unlimited-music space…