music - page 18

Internet Radio has some fierce competition. Since the launch of iTunes Radio in 2013, it became much harder to single out one service in particular that reigns supreme. Does the popular US service Pandora still have what it takes to surpass all others? Is Slacker Radio more your personal preference?

Either way, following on from last week’s column where we compared on-demand music services, we have taken it upon ourselves to narrow down the competition, including iTunes Radio, Pandora,  Slacker Radio, iHeartRadio, Last.fm and TuneIn Radio; see the table below. We’ve also done some hands-on testing and in-depth research in order to determine just who has the leading edge and what they offer in terms of functionality, catalog size, features and usability.

With popular music streaming apps like Spotify and Pandora already popular and on devices all over the world, any newcomers are faced with an immediate challenge. The makers behind the popular headphones and speakers Beats By Dre are taking their crack at the genre, with their new app and service Beats Music.

Take a look at the new Beats Music app and see how it compares to the competitors.

This is a Cult Of Mac video review of the iOS application “Beats Music” brought to you by Joshua Smith of “TechBytes W/Jsmith.”

Musx is like Instagram for music. Post tracks you like, add a few words and your followers can check out the same tunes. Why the hell didn’t anyone think of this before?

Beep is a weird little device that could be either just the thing you’re looking for, or the stupidest accessory ever. It’s a Wi-Fi volume knob that hooks up to your speakers, and streams music either direct from Pandora, or from your iDevice via its own companion app. No AirPlay, no Rdio or Spotify. I told you it was weird.

Forgotify is kind of like that box at the back of the thrift store which holds vinyl records so bad that even the sample-crazy music nerds won’t touch them – only on the internet. It’s a web service that collects the roughly 4 million (!) unplayed tracks on Spotify, and serves them up to you at random.

Having just crawled out of its smackdown from Google, Rap Genius is back with a new app for iOS that gives you access the site’s breakdowns and explanations on all those pop songs you just don’t understand.

The Genius app lets you swim in the all the annotations for song lyrics, poems, and news articles provided by the Rap Genius community. Once you install the app it scans your iTunes Library to prep all your song lyrics. There’s also a Shazam like function that can find lyrics for any song that’s playing around you.

The app is only available on iPhone with no word on an iPad version or upcoming support for Android, but you can grab it for free on iTunes starting today.

Here are the full release notes:

I probably wouldn’t written anything about the new Netatmo Weather Station Channel on IFTTT, but then I saw one of the sample automatic actions that it can trigger, and figured I had to show you. Once set up, you can have IFTTT send a Twitter DM to your roommate when his music is too loud. Amazing.

Most musicians I know are struggling to buy a new set of guitar strings, let alone a new iPad Air. But if you are a music-making, iPad-toting, live-gig-playing musician, then you might be interested in IK Multimedia’s new iKlip 2, and the accompanying iPad Adapter.

For those of us who live the lives of professional bloggers, here’s a common occurence. You wake up in the morning and load up a bunch of tabs of stories you want to read that day. Soon, you have two or three dozen tabs open, one of which has an auto-playing video. And no matter how hard you try, you can’t bloody find the thing!

Yeah. Chrome just fixed that.

iPhone users can now enjoy Spotify music for free, as long as you’re happy with shuffling through your tune. And even better news for iPad owners: the tablet version of the app treats you iPad as if it were a desktop machine, letting your listen to any music you like.

Griffin has added a non-ugly, multitrack version of its StudioConnect music box. The sturdy-looking unit lets you record multiple instruments on your iPad (or Mac, if you’re still living in 2010), piping the results straight into the music software of your choice.

Kanto’s YU2s seem to come from a time when speakers were solid, simple structures; proud temples to sound that said of their owners, Hey, I’m serious about music, and I know what I’m doing. Aesthetics were important, of course, but unquestioningly took a backseat to sound. Sound was king.

If you haven’t heard of Kanto before, that’s OK — the Canadian outfit just sprouted up in the Vancouver suburbs around five years ago. The YU2s are Kanto’s latest speakers, the smallest of their lineup of a half-dozen or so, and they’re designed to fit unobtrusively on a bookshelf or desk and play music from your computer or mobile device.

The YU2’s performance during our review, however, was nothing short of astonishing — and they could very capably substitute for larger speakers in a variety of roles.

Surprise: These cans aren’t quite the flashy, youthful boombasts their outward appearance suggest (yes, that’s a good thing). And, surprise: There’s much more here than simply a nod at the term “active noise cancellation.”

SMS, which is helmed by Rapper 50 Cent, jumped into the headphone game just shy of three years ago. At that time the lion’s share of attention was directed toward their wireless Sync cans, which stream music via the somewhat uncommon Kleer technology. But that doesn’t mean the rest of SMS’s broad, diverse lineup should be ignored, and that assertion is well-supported by the performance — and, yes, dash of flash – of the wired, active noise-canceling Street by 50 ANC headphones.

MIDI Guitar for GarageBand is a Mac app (remember those?) that turns your guitar into a MIDI controller for, well, for any instrument you like. Thus you can thrash away on your axe like the heavy metal rock god you are, and have the sound emerging from the speakers be a plinking, ringing triangle.

Beyonce surprised us last Friday by exclusively releasing her fifth album, BEYONCÉ, on iTunes without even a whisper of a warning that it was coming out. The sneak attack was aimed at stopping pirates from siphoning off Queen B’s honey and it looks like it was a wild success.

Apple announced today that BEYONCÉ has become the fast selling album ever on iTunes with an ungodly 828,773 albums sold on the first three days alone. Who says you can’t sell a million records in a week anymore?

As expected, Spotify has today announced a new music streaming service for Android and iOS that won’t cost you a penny to enjoy. It’s not traditional Spotify streaming as you know it, though; the new “Shuffle” feature lets you pick an album or artist then delivers tracks in a random order.

Michael Pallad, former VP of sales at Cumulus Media, has left the radio giant to oversee Apple’s ad sales for iTunes Radio internationally according to a report from AdAge.

Pallad joined Apple on December 2nd and has spent the last week  getting oriented at the Cupertino Headquarters, but he’ll be pressed to get up to speed ASAP as Apple’s initial iTunes Radio ad deals are set to expire at the end of the year.

Pandora released an update for it’s iOS app today that brings its UI inline with iOS 7’s minimal aesthetic. The free update isn’t just a new coat of paint though as the company also included a neat new alarm feature that allows users to wake up to their favorite Pandora station.

Apple added the ability to change the alarm tone to a song in the new Alarm app for iOS 7, but rather than waking up to the same song everyday, Pandora’s feature allows users to pick their favorite station to wake up to, so you’ll be serenade into consciousness by a new crooner every morning.

The free app update also contains a number of small improvements and bug fixes and is available in the App Store now. Here are the full release notes:

The Gramophone for iPhone and iPad certainly isn’t the first horn-speaker we’ve seen for our iOS devices, but it might be the most beautiful. The speakers, which run from $200 to $300 depending on size, is fashioned from wood and metal and will boost the sound output of your device by 3x.

Yes, Joshua Young is a doctor. And yes, the strange device he built and now wields is indeed sonic. But no, it’s not a screwdriver.

Instead, Joshua’s intricate alloy AUUG controller is an imaginative musical device that turns the iPhone or iPod into a unique instrument that uses accelerometer magic to bend and blend sound.

Browsing the App Store can be a bit overwhelming. Which apps are new? Which ones are good? Are the paid ones worth paying for, or do they have a free, lite version that will work well enough?

Well, if you stop interrogating me for a second, hypothetical App Store shopper, I can tell you about this thing we do here.

Every week, we highlight some of the most interesting new apps and collect them here for your consideration. This time, our picks include an app for quick notes, food television, and an app to help you visually keep track of your life.

Here you go:

Writedown — Productivity — Free (Pro version: $2.99)

Sometimes, you have to write something really quickly on the go. Like, say, if you were supposed to find an app to write up for your daily post on a tech blog.

Actually, never mind that example. It’s crazy and would never happen. But if it did, Writedown might be a good fit. It’s a quick and easy document creation tool that cuts out all the distractions (other than ads, in this Lite version). You just type your thing in a clean interface, and then you can export it to a text, e-mail, social media, or share it with AirDrop.

It’s bare bones, quick, and easy to use. Not that I’m using it right now.

Crazy.

Writedown

EndlessTV – Seasons — Lifestyle — Free

Now that we’ve gotten that pesky Halloween thing out of the way with all its gross movies and candy and fun, we can get down to the serious business of planning “The Holidays.” And if you’re need appropriate programming on your phone or iPad right now, EndlessTV’s “Seasons” app might be what you need. It features quick-loading, topical shows (mostly about food) that you can swipe through at your leisure.

I learned how to make a pumpkin pie from an actual pumpkin and I don’t even know what I’m going to do with that knowledge.

EndlessTV – Seasons

Time Planner — Productivity — Free

When you need to track stuff you need to do, it’s essential to have an app that can handle tasks and to-do items as well as a robust calendaring system. Time Planner does just that, and does it very well. It also adds a colorful palette, a nicely organized way of creating tasks and reminders, and a list of categories that really helps you focus in on what each task is about.

Choose to add a task to Home, Work, Rest, Lifestyle, and other categories to color the tasks with a visual cue. When you start looking at your schedule for the day, you’ll have a colorful reminder of the things you’ll need to focus on, perhaps noticing that you spend too much time at work, and not enough on restful activities.

You can have Time Planner remind you of stuff you need to do by day, time, or location, which is pretty much what all to-do apps should have these days.

Time Planner

Songkick Concerts — Music — Free

Like live music? Got an iOS device full of music? Songkick Concerts looks like the app for you, then, as it trawls your music library to find concerts in your area. Be the first one to grab tickets to hot events, all based on your own music preferences. Sounds good, right?

If you’re traveling to a new city, never fear, as you can use Songkick Concerts to search your destination for upcoming concerts from those very same artists. Want to see Kanye West in Madison Square Garden? I mean, who wouldn’t? Use this app to find out when and where he’s playing, and tap through to buy tickets right within the app itself.

Of course, you’ll want to use Songkick Concerts to bargain shop as well, since it lets you compare venues and prices for all the artists you must obviously want to go see, since they’re in your music library.

Songkick Concerts

Songkick Concerts — Music — Free

Like live music? Got an iOS device full of music? Songkick Concerts looks like the app for you, then, as it trawls your music library to find concerts in your area. Be the first one to grab tickets to hot events, all based on your own music preferences. Sounds good, right?

If you’re traveling to a new city, never fear, as you can use Songkick Concerts to search your destination for upcoming concerts from those very same artists. Want to see Kanye West in Madison Square Garden? I mean, who wouldn’t? Use this app to find out when and where he’s playing, and tap through to buy tickets right within the app itself.

Of course, you’ll want to use Songkick Concerts to bargain shop as well, since it lets you compare venues and prices for all the artists you must obviously want to go see, since they’re in your music library.

Songkick Concerts

There aren’t many in-ear monitors made of steel. Aluminum? Yes. Plastic? Wads. But steel-bodied IEMs — now that’s a rare find. There’s good reason for this: Though the material is solid, hard-wearing and, according to some, produces a cleaner sound, it’s heavy — which can make steel-housed IEMs often uncomfortable and annoyingly ill-fitting.

But forget all that. Scottish-based RHA have managed to make the stainless steel-bodied MA750i supremely comfortable and well-fitted, even under heavy action. In fact, RHA absolutely nailed it perfectly with these ‘phones in every single category that matters, with only two or three minor trade-offs.

Chances are you’ve already picked your preferred music streaming service by now, but you’ll have another to consider next year when French startup Deezer make its debut in the United States.

The company has avoided the U.S. up until now, citing too much competition, with Spotify, Rdio, Google Play Music All Access, and many others already offering subscription-based music streaming services there. But having already amassed over 5 million paying customers in 185 countries worldwide, it’s ready to do battle with the big guns.

I’m not a guitar amp nut; I have little appreciation for old-and-moldy audio components and purist babble (oh yes, I know! “Vacuum tubes! Blah blah blah!”) But a look at the promo video for Positive Grid’s new Bias iPad app has even me drooling.