Music Beta by Google, a bold move from internet giant

What It Is...

After Apple succeeds mining gold from its iTunes and Amazon with their Amazon Cloud Drive, it looks like that Google itching to jump on the wagon too. They just launched their own music streamer, librarian and everything in between or cloud storage services called as simple as 'Music' on May 10th, 2011. Because this is the beta stage, they named it...Music Beta (off course) :)

This Music Beta currently available only for US resident. But as I lived outside US, Indonesia to be precise, I found a way to experience this cool services with some hacked steps. You can read the steps in here : How to access Google Music BETA for the unfortunate non-US resident (coming soon on this site).

So what's Google promised ? First of all, you can listen to your music everywhere, anytime, whether you use your desktop, laptop, other people's computer, on your smartphone or tablet as long as you have an internet connection or with some clicks, with no internet connection too (offline).

If you want to upload some music, you don't have to sync your android gadget to a computer / laptop using wires. It's a cloud music services, so everything is on the internet. This includes your playlist or even your iTunes library if they are non DRM / non copy protected songs (Apple would hate it, don't you think?). Google said that it capable to hold 20,000 songs in your account, enough to make you satisfied for years to come.

You also can mix your songs that go together using 'Instant Mix' into a playlist. And off course you can add new music using 'Magnifier' which includes exclusive artist interviews and live performances.

Now let's take a glimpse of it one by one.

The Experience…

I created a playlist from free music that Google provides in my laptop computer. When I checked my smartphone, it's available in it too. The same when I add some songs to a playlist from my smartphone, it shows on my laptop. So this is working as intended. Beware that you must have android OS version 2.2 to use the Music Beta android app.

If you would like to add your own music from your hardisk, you have to download Music Manager application (available as a download when you log in to your Music Beta on desktop). This application can import your music from iTunes, Windows Media Player, your Windows' Music folder or any folders of your choice. If you have a vast music library, just let Google transfer it one by one until it finished while you use your computer as usual. Make sure you allocating enough time because if you don't complete the transfer, you have to sync all again from the start. One big problem for me is from my only 1000 songs collection, Google refuse 460 of it (see the explanation below) and only transfer 540 songs which takes  5 full days. That's unusually slow although I use WiFi to transfer it. I can't imagine if you have 10,000 songs and only 3G connection :( But maybe this is just me and my internet provider. Oh, by the way, user can't upload music from their android gadget, it must be from web player / desktop application.

So, what file format Music Beta support ? According to the manual / help section, it can only import these file formats (please read the notes too) :

As a sound engineer, I usually use .wav format from my CD audio collections for mastering references. Too ashamed Music Beta doesn't support it, so 460 songs of wav got skipped by Music Beta, strangely including some MP3s, so expect some transfer failures even though your music is on the proper and accepted format. The 'pain-in-the-ass' thing is that you can't just select the offending files and try to transfer it again :

As for the number of songs, I don't have 20,000 songs on my library, so I can't check Google claims of it. Maybe some of you have ? Comparing with Amazon Cloud Drive, which gave only free 5GB or around 1000 songs, this Music Beta sure win in this area. Btw, Google allow you to sync your music on up to 8 devices, which is enough if you are a common people ;)

One note for you is that Music Beta can't stream music from a different device at once, for example playing back music from your android and from your desktop browser at the same time will spit this message (although this is not instantaneously, I manage to playback from two devices for a few songs before this came out...if I remember correctly, it happened when I paused and un-paused a song) :

Next functionality is the Instant Mix where you can choose one song and Google pick up the other songs that match the mood of the song in your library. Just open a song and from the Music Beta menu on my Android choose 'Make instant mix' and Google automatically create a playlist which contains songs with the same mood. I choose 'The Final Countdown' by Europe and Google comes up with 'Top Gun Anthem' from the Top Gun movie,  'Eye to Eye' from ASIA, 'No More Mr, Nice Guy' from Alice Cooper etc, which is remarkably close to what I would choose. The chosen songs come from your own collection or from Google itself which you have import in your library...pretty cool !

One other neat feature of Music Beta is that you can make some songs / albums / artists / playlist offline so you can listen to it even though there is no internet connection (maybe you stranded on some desert island? LOL). After marking the song or album as offline, it will notify you on your Android gadget notification bar that the song you choose has been available off-line.

Google just add Magnifier which is essentially a service to discover new music. Google team of music experts choose the best music from new artist and recommend it to you. There is a daily music which is free. You can watch artist interviews and live performances too. Just go to the http://magnifier.blogspot.com to experience it.

One feature that currently not working is purchasing the music. Sometimes, I would like to purchase the album of some artist that I like but when I choose 'Shop for artist' in my Samsung gadget, it just take me to my browser with the name of the artist on Google.com. If I use the web player, it redirect me to Media portal in Google, where you can purchase music but no specific stores attached to Google. It looks like Google wasn't able to jot down agreements with major record labels just like Apple or Amazon that would allow them to sell music. I hope in the near future Music Beta setup their own music store just like Apple or at least cooperate with some music provider out there so users can buy music. So basically, since no way user can purchase music, now all music that Google offer is free music and a lot of it ! This is a good thing. To bad users can't save it to hardisk without Music Beta player, hope this feature coming soon to Music Beta because it will be a nice addition.

My Conclusion...

I love the concept of Google Music Beta and enjoy some of its features and really like it a lot and have use it daily. Apparently there must be some improvements to be made so it would become the ultimate music streamer and librarian for the masses. I do know that it's now still in a Beta stage so one can except some imperfection in some area, but it comes from internet giant, so I think user expect more than this. Given that the 4G connection is on the way, we should expect that the upload and streaming thing improved. 4G connection and Google Music will turn your android gadget into a cloud-powered music center.That's why I give a B score for it now. I'm looking forward for the final Google Music soon and you do too, don't you ?

PROS :

• Simple interface on web player and android.
• Free hosting up to 20,000 song in your music collections.
• No worry if your computer or gadget is stolen, your music will always be there on cloud.
• Choose music based on your mood with Instant Mix (Auto playlist).
• Ability to listen offline with no internet connection.
• Can import your iTunes library (non DRM tunes).
• Fast search on your music.
• It comes from Google :)

CONS :

• No integrated music store like Amazon or iTunes yet.
• Some file formats are not supported.
• Can't choose specific song to upload to cloud, only folder.
• Can't upload from your android gadget, must use web player.
• Slow transfer of your music from your hardisk if you have large library.
• Can't save your music to your hardisk.

More Info :

• Find this on Android Market : https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.music (for non US resident, read here : How to access Google Music BETA for the unfortunate non-US resident )
• Free or paid ? Free
• Version reviewed : v3.0.1
• Reviewed on : Samsung Galaxy SII
• Requires Android : Version 2.2 or up
• Size : 3.8M

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AudioDroid.com review of ULoops gets featured on the ULoops forum

My review about cool audio app named ULoops Studio is being featured in the ULoops forum here : Official News & Announcements of ULoops Forum

I would like to congrats the developer for making such a cool and powerful application, hope other android users find out about it ! For sure, I'll tell everybody about this :)

My review can be read here : ULoops Studio, extraordinary audio apps for making complete music from scratch

By the way, if some of you having fun with some cool audio apps on Android, just let me know so I can review it here on AudioDroid.com ! Thanks !

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MusicGrid, dot music composing fun...but it's only last a few minutes

What It Is...

MusicGrid is a clone of ToneMatrix, a web-based music composing tool where every dot represent a musical note. It's also the clone of famous Yamaha Tenori-On, which is musical hardware representing the same music making experience as ToneMatrix but more complex.

The Experience…

MusicGrid shows as a fun and promising app but upon trying it, I found out that it barely has enough features to make you interested in using it other than a few days. Ok, maybe the reason you didn’t uninstall it because it could immerse new person who doesn’t know about dot-music-composing-fun at all. As this might be interesting for my three or five years old niece for the sound, this can’t be interesting long enough as the color of the dot is just pale grey, not beautiful color rain one's expect. I try surfing to the developer website, but found out that this app is not even mentioned, so I don't know the future development of this supposedly cool app.

In MusicGrid, you can choose 4 basic and simple sound : sawtooth, sine wave (the default), square wave and triangle wave. Oddly, when I listen to the sawtooth, square wave, and triangle wave, they sound out-of-tune in higher octave, compared with the default sine wave. I don't know if it's intended or not. However, it would be nice if the included sound are rich in harmonics like in Tenori-On (Sorry as I always refer to these because that would make this app so cool).

In the grid, every dot plays one simple note. Vertically, these notes are major pentatonic scale (do, re mi, so, la, do) and horizontally repeated over to form a unique musical composition. Other apps like web-based ToneMatrix do the same sequence of notes, maybe because it's easy to have harmonically pleasing series of notes randomly.

The deafult 16 x 10 grid size of MusicGrid for normal screen

For smaller screen smartphone, you can choose 12 x 8 grid size (horizontally x vertically) as opposed to 16 x 10 for normal or larger screen.

The other setting of the app is the tempo of the sound playing which I find it a rather odd because the lowest BPM (=beats per minute) is 150 which in real music is a very fast tempo. The highest tempo is 450 BPM, which is not that fast on MusicGrid, but very fast in real music which rarely a song goes more than 200 BPM or even 180 BPM !

One big drawback of this app is that it can’t export audio in any formats. It would be nice if the user can make MP3 of it or just use the music as ring-tones. The developer said that the features will be added in the future, but given that this app is not in their web, I think this was abandoned....to bad.

My Conclusion...

This app is fun and looks promising, but no sign of further development has burden it to become interesting app. And there are other apps out there that do this kind of thing way better like Sonorox Sequencer (will be reviewed later). I hope this may change if the developer decide to continue to develop it.

PROS :

• Fun and entertaining
• Easy to use even for three years old kid
• Pleasant tone

CONS :

• Fun just for short time
• No save or export function
• Some sounds are out-of-tune in higher octave
• No visible future development from the developer

More Info :

• Find this on Android Market : https://market.android.com/details?id=net.bramp.musicgrid
• Free or paid ? Free
• Version reviewed : No Info
• Reviewed on : Samsung Galaxy SII
• Requires Android : Version 1.5 or up
• Size : 94k

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ULoops Studio, extraordinary audio apps for making complete music from scratch

What It Is...

It’s a music composing app where you can make finished music (called ‘Song’) from the built-in instrument (called ‘Device’) which are pattern-based (called ‘Loop’). The Devices are MIDI-based which include synths, drums and arpeggiator. It's also include Modulator where you can produce sophisticated sound with automated parameter.
You also can record audio using your Android gadget’s built-in mic, so practically you can record everything…your voice, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, violins, even acoustic drums if you want to. But off-course you can’t directly record electric guitar or keyboard output because there is no instrument input on Android gadget. 

The Experience…

There was a thought in my mind that Android audio apps is just a toy compared to full featured audio software generally found in Windows or Mac or Linux platform. Yes, you can play some guitar, drum, bass or piano or make some drum beats on Android but you can’t use it for serious music composing / producing. But this thought has changed since I tried Uloops Studio from Uloops Labs. They brilliantly make a cool and very powerful program yet easy to learn, especially if you are a musician who used to have audio software in other platform. If you are not, there’s a short tutorial on the apps so in the short time, you can master the basics of Uloops Studio.

For a start, the layout of the apps is well laid off to concur with the mind of a musician (which I am). Uloops Studio music making process starts with a loop which is a 1 or 2 or 4-bar pattern consist of a number of devices (=instruments) that you can program by entering one note after another. Beware that some low frequency instrument like kick / bass drum or some synth bass can't be heard thru your gadget's speaker. So it's better to use an earphone when making music (please don't turn up the volume to loud, it might damaged your hearing).

Example of Loop used as intro in a song

Every device can be edited note-by-note to form a musical passages and have their own channel setting where you can set the volume, panning, insert FX and send FX (reverb and delay). You can automate the filter too. Be aware that you have to press the disk / save button once in a while to save your on-going work via your account in uloops.net. In other words, you can't use this app if you don't have an internet connection.

Using your gadget built-in mic, you can record your voice or other instrument and use the available effect to make robot or alien sound. If the audio is not synchronous with the synth or drums because Android hardware related problem, you can adjust the latency so it perfectly in-sync nicely.

Audio recording channel on ULoops Studio

After you finish making a loop which consist of a dozen of devices, set the effect and filter, you can make another loop for the other part of the song. Then you can arrange which loop start as intro and which is the verse, chorus, bridge going all the way to the end to make one complete song.

Song View of ULoops Studio

One appealing features of this app are that they're not stopping at the mixing process, but going all the way to the mastering process where you can apply master FX to all channel of your music to simulate the mastering stage of professionally published song. Altough this mastering process is a simple one (you can choose mastering preset or insert your own effect), this feature makes ULoops Studio nearly like a full-blown DAW on the desktop computer.
After your song is finished, you can publish it online to showcase and have a comment or rating from other fellow users.

So, is this a perfect app ? It's almost perfect ! There are still many improvement to make it perfect. That's why I gave ULoops Studio an A not A+. Here some features that I think can make this app perfect :

• Dynamic tempo : the capabilities to change the tempo on-the-fly using automation (ULoops Studio already has volume and panning automation, why not this ?).
• Dynamic effect, just like dynamic tempo...why no effect automation ?
• Realtime MIDI input using a virtual piano to enter chord for synth devices just like the virtual piano in Arpeggio devices.
• Chord preset or drum pattern preset to help non-musician to make music. (Editor's note : Thanks to Shamrocker below for pointing out that there are already drum pattern presets in ULoops)
• Ability to import mp3 or other audio format (ULoops Studio already has audio tracks).

My Conclusion...

I’m amazed by the quality of the built-in sound, even on the free version of the apps, it’s enough to produce high quality music (in terms of MP3 world LOL). These are evidence in user song showcase in their website (www.uloops.net).
I'm also amazed by the deep of this app which at the same time  tremendously user-friendly for musicians who have use other DAW in Windows or Mac. Did I mention that this app never crash, even in the most complex music ? And FYI, I only use the free version (ULoops Studio Lite), not the paid version (ULoops Studio Pro) which have full-loaded of instruments and effects.

I'm not covering all features in ULoops Studio in this review, but believe me...you're going to be amazed by this app. In other words, this app is so similar to DAW or Digital Audio Workstation just like Cubase, Sonar, Fruityloops etc in Windows or Mac....Ok, maybe not a real comparison, but now I’m so confidence that in the future there will be more sophisticated music apps that push the limit of Android OS & its processor. I'm waiting for it...hope ULoops Studio is the one :)

PROS :

• Fun music making
• Full-rich features
• Very user-friendly
• Good selection of sampled instruments
• No crash even in the most complex music making
• This free version did not prevent you to produce complex and cool music
• Comunnity-based music sharing

CONS :

• Need internet connection to use this app
• No tempo or effect automation
• No drum pattern preset and no chord preset (Editor's note : Thanks to Shamrocker for pointing out that there are already drum pattern presets in ULoops)
• No audio import

More Info :

• Find this on Android Market : https://market.android.com/details?id=net.uloops.android
• Free or paid ? Free and Paid
• Version reviewed : 2.11.2, Free version (ULoops Studio Lite)
• Reviewed on : Samsung Galaxy SII
• Requires Android : Version 1.5 or up
• Size : 2.2M

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WinAmp launched 'Full CD Listening Party', free music every week

Good news ! The new Winamp for Android 1.1 now offers Full CD Listening Party.

With the CD Listening Party, you'll have free access to the hottest new full-length albums (streaming playback only). Each week the list of available albums is updated with the latest releases from the most popular artists.

From the Home screen, select "Free Music" and then tap on "Full CD Listening Party". In some week you can stream full albums from David Bowie, Depeche Mode & Def Leppard... just to name a few. Check back WinAmp for Android weekly for new free albums!

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How this site's reviews work !

Android is an open-source platform meaning that anyone with creative mind and technical know-how can create their own app and put it on Android Market easily.

Because this, there are some good and bad apps out there ! That's where AudioDroid.com comes in, to provide you with the reviews of the audio apps in Android Market (or other un-official market) so you don't have to waste your time (or your money if it's a paid app).

I'm a full-time sound engineer, producer and musician (see www.AgusHardiman.com for my music works & bio) and really love what music applications can do in other platform (mostly Windows OS)...now since I fell in love with Android OS, I'm thinking....why don't I use my musical knowledge for the benefit of the rest of the Android world :)

To make a uniformity, I reviewed all the audio apps with how the apps work in real life, the pro & cons of the apps, which Android OS it support (info based on Android Market or other web since I'm only using 2.3 / GingerBread OS in my Samsung Galaxy SII), the size of the apps and my verdict on those apps marked as A, A+, A-, B, B+, B-, C, D or E like this :

 
















Hope you find this site meaningful and enjoyable !

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Welcome to AudioDroid, all about audio apps on Android !

This is the history ! AudioDroid blog is launched !

Expect to read up on all good & bad things about Audio Apps in Android !

You can access this blog by going to www.AudioDroid.com !

Don't forget to follow our tweets on @TheAudioDroid & like our 'AudioDroid' pages in Facebook & subscribe our Youtube channel on http://www.youtube.com/TheAudioDroid !

Thanks

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