In NJ, summer 2011, I witnessed a violent conversation about what is the best mobile music app. It pretty much sums up the state of mobile music streaming in 2011:

Alternatives that come to mind are MOG and Grooveshark—both of which share the same main attraction as Rdio and Spotify: on-demand streaming. They are fundamentally different from discovery-centered apps like Pandora. Last.fm and exfm are in the cross. Who’s back do you have…what’s your vote? ▼

Get On Bits.

Digital is the bomb. When I say ‘get on bits’ I mean get digital. Get on YouTube. Get on Facebook. Get indexed. Become bits. Bits outlive memories. Legacies live on bits. ‘All we are is bits in the cloud.’

Bring Me The Horizon singer Oliver Sykes pushes the edge of the Vans Warped Tour 2010 stage in Dallas, TX.
Photo: earlylove/Flickr

YouTube it.

In 2010, YouTube takes the cake as being the sweet spot for music. Their fact sheet reads currently that “people are watching 2 billion videos a day on YouTube” and that “52 percent of 18-34 year-olds share videos often with friends and colleagues.” Vevo, which launched in late 2009, saw screaming growth through 2010 largely due to its integration with YouTube. It’s pretty understandable why video is so engaging—it combines multiple senses: sight, hearing, and—if you’re pressing a keypad or touchscreen—touch. Triggering the brain from multiple angles makes for strong communication and vivid memories. Video influences people. Last month in Wired, TED curator Chris Anderson and Jon Chu talked about how access to free online video accelerates innovation. Chu used the example of kids who learned dance moves by watching videos of other dancers, “Kids in Japan are taking moves from a YouTube video created in Detroit, building on it within days and releasing a new video, while teenagers in California are taking the Japanese video and remixing it to create a whole new dance style in itself. This is happening every day. And from these bedrooms and living rooms and garages with cheap webcams come the world’s great dancers of tomorrow.”

Live is unique.

Seeing a live show is an experience—it’s not a product, but that’s not to say that it can’t be captured on one. Ask Aderra, a company who “records live concerts to flash drives and MicroSD wristbands which are available to the audience immediately after the performance.” Their USB drives can also be used to access exclusive content on the web. It’s important to realize that experiences have more intrinsic value than products.

Cut the intro.

Get right to the hook. Two time lessons in 2010 were seconds and clicks. At NMS NYC 2010, Jay Frank (@futurehitdna) said that artists have, “10 seconds to engage someone—to impress them.” He said to “clicks to content,” because the more clicks it takes, the more it’s bye-bye attention span. In a way this explains the addiction to YouTube, whose videos are one mere click beyond Google search results. “Anything more than two clicks and you’re missing out on the majority. … Impress them fast.” If you’ve made it this far into the post, you’re a champion, and deserve a video for the rest of the ride.

API breakout.

Expect to see more mashups based on music APIs. Most notable IMO are mashups built on APIs from The Echo Nest and from SoundCloud. The Echo Nest is a data-driven startup that launched in 2008. Its platform is in use on MTV Music Meter, MOG All Access, Indaba Music, Bandintown, exfm, and more. Based on data from Compete, web visits to SoundCloud were up 850% in 2010. A number of apps—many mobile ones—support integration with SoundCloud. Keep Grooveshark on the radar, their web visits were up 235% based on Compete, and unofficial Grooveshark API documentation is available on APIshark. The Grooveshark library is also accessible through the Tinysong API. Spotify too has potential for a mashup explosion. See the API list: 30 Music APIs.

Mystery tour.

There are several events/ticketing services out there beyond Ticketmaster/Live Nation, such as Eventful, Songkick, Ticketfly, and Live Music Machine. Ticketing is mysterious and because of that I think less music startups have gone in its direction. But live music is really what music is all about, and I think we’re going to see a lot more action in this space, especially when more people have smartphones and are using location-based apps. But the question I’m asking about ticketing is, ‘what could possibly stop Facebook from wiping away the entire online ticketing industry with an official ticketing service within Facebook Events?’

Brainmelt.

I’d like to write about licensing, but it’s just so boring and complicated, still, in 2011, and this article is already way to long for the YouTube Generation. I do think something about the licensing needs to change, especially in the U.S. where “WTF is SoundExchange?” is the typical reaction, and many musicians believe that receiving payouts from rights organizations is a straight-up myth—it’s not, but setting it up may melt your brain. For now what I think is worth knowing is that the majority of money that SoundExchange pays out comes from Pandora. So if you’re on Pandora, then you definitely want to be registered with SoundExchange. If you’re asking “how do I get on Pandora?” then read this. First, push to the end of this article. You made it this far. I promise you it’s worth it.

Born free.

If you asked Austin Powers what he thought about the internet, I know exactly what he would say..: “it’s freedom, baby, yeah!” His nemesis, Dr. Evil, would be saying “throw me a frickin’ bone here!” Who would you rather be? Free is the nature of the internet and what makes it such an advance. If you’re not embracing that free spirit, then you’re in the wrong industry. It’s like the accelerated innovation I mentioned at the start of this rap. Everyone is building on each other’s work. It’s human nature. Pablo Picasso would tell you that “good artists copy—great artists steal.” Picasso didn’t become famous by making a few great paintings. He became famous by making thousands of them. He only sold the ones that he needed to, keeping the rest in his possession, and nowadays I can’t help but wonder if he’d be getting them on bits. Really it comes down to more than creating fresh music, but being innovative on every front, and living it. That, my friends, is art. // @ryanve

Top FREE Music Apps
iTunes – 2010 End

Top PAID Music Apps
iTunes – 2010 End

UK startup BandApp is hell-bent on becoming the indie mobile replacement for MySpace and record labels. Similar in concept to Sound Around (now part of ReverbNation) or MobBase, BandApp’s monthly service gives musicians a platform to create and manage their own iPhone apps. But BandApp is taking a different approach in that they’re sidelining the paralyzing iTunes App Store approval process and delivering their apps via the web, and in 2011 will launch their own retail outlet, a digital storefront, called the BandApp Store.

Perhaps the most intriguing thing about BandApp is who’s behind it. Have you ever heard “The Ballad of Chasey Lain” or freak danced to “The Bad Touch?” [iTunes link] Don’t lie.

Actually BandApp founder Adam Perry (a.k.a. The Yin) was a drummer for the band ‘A’ until circa 2005 when he joined The Bloodhound Gang, who released those two particular sonic treats in 1999.

Pricing: Bands: £20 startup fee plus £7/month with 1-yr contract or £75/year. Fans: Free.

I gave a quick test run on my iPhone of one app, and it worked pretty well, nice features, especially the fan wall, but an issue with going horizontal (no landscape mode yet maybe). The fan wall gives a direct connection between the band and the fans, and has nice Twitter and Facebook shareability.

To try out the apps point your iPhone’s Safari browser to one of these: bandapp.com/theblackout – bandapp.com/zebrahead – bandapp.com/wearetheocean – bandapp.com/a. Once there, just use your menu to “add to home screen” and you have instant pain-free mobility. Can you pocket it?

Want to get in on this action and try Sound Around free for three months? Well, you’re in the right place because we have a couple promo codes to dish out to bands. To be eligible to win one: Use your band’s twitter (or disqus) account to sign in below, leave a comment, and check “share on twitter.” You can check out band apps already built by Sound Around in the App Store.

Sound Around: iPhone apps for bands.

Gee, Scott, what do you want to do tonight? The same thing we do every night, Steve—try to help music take over the world by building better mobile apps for bands and their fans!

In 2009, in a little place called Raleigh, North Carolina, brothers Scott and Steve Klein had been brainstorming tech startup ideas. Both were students at NC State, but with opposite majors—nearly yin and yang. Add entrepreneurial DNA, and they’re Pinky and The Brain. Scott (Brain) was preparing to graduate as a computer engineer, and his younger brother, Steve (Pinky), was studying business management/marketing. Their startup would be born, but the question was, what kind? Taking advantage of their student resources, they had access to mentoring and networking through the NCSU Engineering Entrepreneurs Program.

They started 2bros1blog.com to blog about what they learned on the startup road. Many early ideas were solutions aimed towards the university community. Scott had learned Objective-C, the programming language for iPhone apps, and they decided they really wanted to get involved with mobile apps. Everyone has a phone, and they always have it with them, right? But they needed to find the right niche. They thought about campus sports or news apps, but when they proposed building a news app for the college paper, they were met with perplexed stares. Scott and Steve realized that for their app service to fly, they needed to find people that were really interested in expanding and engaging their audience. Being music fans themselves, they took what seemed to be a logical turn that summer—towards musicians. Next stop, Sound Around.

Scott graduated in December, gave a speech, and started a job at an TransLoc—a startup that provides realtime location information to mass-transit users. He built their iPhone app. At the same time he and Steve (who was still in school and working part-time in Macaroni Grill) were developing what would soon be called Sound Around. At the turn of 2010, they took on 15 bands as closed-beta testers. In February Steve learned the ins and outs of web design and built getsoundaround.com.

With people skills and resourcefulness, they’d bootstrapped their expenses so far, but in early 2010 they got involved with TechStars in an effort to raise seed capital. In March they flew to Boulder and found themselves surrounded by like minds in the tech scene. Of 600 startups, TechStars funds only 10. Sound Around made it to the top 27 but not the final 10, and it was back to bootstrapping.

In a typical college scenario, the two brothers were living in a 4-bedroom apartment with two other students—David and A.J.—but when David moved out to live with his fiancé, Scott and Steve commandeered the empty room and converted it into a workspace—their current headquarters.

Having success with the beta apps, they started recording videos to demo the Sound Around platform, and, in the meantime started the application process for funding through another (more local) startup incubator, called LaunchBox Digital…which pretty much brings us to the present. Last night was a milestone for Sound Around. Their first apps were approved by Apple and are now live in the App Store. The party was on, but it’s only the beginning for Sound Around.

In the upcoming weeks, Sound Around will be running discount promos via Twitter. Stay in the loop: @VirtualMusictv and @getsoundaround.

Scott is on a 3-month sabbatical from his job at TransLoc to focus full-time on Sound Around. Steve would love to be able to dropout next semester and get Sound Around rolling without distractions. Funding would help them “scale faster” but with or without it they’re expecting to launch in public beta this summer. They considering finding a 3rd team member experienced in web and/or Android dev.

The ‘band apps as a service’ market is a wide-open frontier. There’s some fundamental characteristics about Sound Around that really make them stand out.

1. It’s the DIY mindset. Sound Around’s young, two-brother team is the core of all their development. They’re building it all from the ground up. By not hiring out their programming or design, they’ll be able to constantly address feedback and improve their platform. When demands of the app market change, they’ll be able to adapt the fastest.

2. Sound Around purely focused on developing apps for bands/musicians. They’re not leaving the music niche—immense as it is—and they plan on rocking it. MobBase is their only direct competition right now, and there’s plenty of room to coexist in this space.

3. In what I’ve learned about Scott and Steve, I can tell that they understand the importance of people in the mix. They plan on creating an interface for interaction—not one-way communication—and they have a lot of innovative ideas on deck.

4. Their pricing is user-focused. It’s not based on installs. Bands pay based on the number of fans that actually use the app each month. The starter $14/month plan covers 1000 unique app users per month. Above 1000 is $0.01/user until the next tier—$29/month for 5000 unique users.

5. Their mascot is a giraffe named Shirley. She’ll make you smile. :) Giraffes are a symbol of evolution, you know. She doesn’t always travel with the team of course, who’ll be attending events this summer, including Warped Tour in Charlotte, and would love to meet up.

// update // October 19, 2010 from Scott:

I know it hasn’t been very long since we officially launched back in July, but we’ve been working on something really cool behind the scenes that we’re finally ready to tell everyone about. One of our fellow local music companies, ReverbNation, has acquired Sound Around and will be moving quickly to launch the product to their more than 900,000 artists.

Steve and I are both super excited to be joining the ReverbNation team to work on providing mobile products that will continue to move the needle on acquiring new fans, and engaging existing ones on a deeper level. We’ve been heavily vested in creating useful technologies in the mobile space, and we have no doubt that these efforts will only be amplified as we move into our new roles working alongside an impressive and passionate team of individuals.

For everyone that had a hand in touching, shaping, or otherwise influencing our foray into building a product and launching our first company, we can’t thank you enough for all of the hours of mentoring, being a cheerleader, and (most importantly) bringing us down to size when we needed it.

Did you also notice the relatively small amount of Skype-to-Skype usage? That means most Skype minutes are actually paid. Personally, I’d really like to see 3-way calling with video in the future, which was announced as a possible upcoming paid feature, but I’d probably only actually use it if it were free. However if I could get by without paying AT&T I might rethink that. Skype isn’t the only mobile VoIP service either, and, according to Wired, mobile VoIP is beneficial to cellular carriers.

What features would you want in your favorite band’s mobile app?

UMF is a younger audience of ‘technology-carrying youth’ so where are all of the videos and photos? This year I saw a staggering amount of people with their cameras and video cameras in the air. People were recording entire DJ sets on their Blackberrys and someone had an iPhone just taking photo after photo which meant I didn’t even see the entire Swedish House Mafia set due to his phone being in front of my face the whole time. Where did his photos go? Why didn’t he post them? Because I saw the photos and they fucking sucked. There’s a reason why old media will be around for a long time. Very few new media people or ‘citizen journalists’ produce any content worth looking at, much less, paying for. Capturing The Moment—Making It Count | adam-jackson.net

This got me to thinking—I definitely agree there were slim pickings of decent UMF photos, and a lot of them had embedding disabled or obnoxious watermarks. For Flickr’s sake people, use tags, and allow embedding and all-sizes viewability. For the love the Internet, use a Creative Commons license. Here’s where you can set this: Flickr » You » Your Account » Privacy & Permissions » Defaults for new uploads » What license will your content have? I also wish Flickr’s advanced search had more filtering options—like most favorited and most comments for a start.

Snapping outstanding amateur music photos takes a lot of effort. Sometimes by concentrating on taking photos/videos, one misses much of the actual experience. On the flip side, I think many people snap photos for the sake of the memory, and not the photo itself. Even a dark, blurry photo will trigger the memory of the concert for years down the road. There’s a sentimental value to it. It may depend on the person and their motivation for taking the photo. People also might take photos to help them tell a story or have a way to share their experience with their friends or family—whether it be in person or via MMS, Facebook, etc. One obvious advantage to digital photos is that you can take millions of them without buying film. But the 5’1″ chick behind the dude with his iPhone in the air all night might tell you otherwise. Me, being 6’1″, I’m pretty much in the way of most people in a concert situation like that—even without a camera. I tend to be pretty conscious about who I’m standing in front of because I don’t want to block anyone’s view. A little consideration for the people around you can go a long way. As far as the amount of quality citizen journalism, the sheer volume of online content is humbling, and there is plenty of quality out there, but many of us are missing it because we don’t always know where or how to look. Now, I ask:

Style-wise how does iMatik compare to your previous albums?

TF: Well, I usually produce hip hop and rap albums that are vocal-based, with verses and choruses, etc. I thought about getting a bunch of artists to add vocals to the album, but once I started actually working on it, I thought the vibe was more upbeat than most of my other work. I used to love instrumental “Scratch DJ” albums like DJ Shadow, Invisible Skratch Picklz, etc. and thought maybe I could go in this direction.

Once I found Flare, the iPhone app that is remarkably like a real vinyl turntable and mixer, and found out how realistic it sounded, plus that it allows you to upload your own samples, I knew what I was going to do. I used to have a DJ rig when I was younger, and knew a little bit about scratching, so I just made it work with an iPhone.

I really love the result, since most of my other music is dark or just plain strange, and this album immediately seems to make friends with people, instead of scare them off!

Mobility is the obvious advantage to iPhone music creation, but how do iPhone apps compare feature-wise to software and drum machines?

TF: There are some limitations on the iPhone that are hard to overcome. The biggest issue is pressure sensitivity. Not having pressure sensitivity takes a lot away from the expressiveness of an instrument, since each note comes out with the same volume and timbre. There are ways to overcome this though, such as programming individual sounds to play just right, or editing velocity after the performance, on apps like Beatmaker that support velocity editing. Also, just picking the right sound sometimes is the solution without having control over volume, some sounds are better suited to fitting in, or can be edited to fit.

The second, and more obvious disadvantage, is the small screen. I can’t tell you how many times I pressed the wrong drum sound or key, and had to go back and try again. This is just something you have to live with if you are doing music on a phone, although some apps allow you to adjust the size of the playing area to try and make it easier. For me, the solution to this problem is in the iPad, which I am foaming at the mouth for already!

Besides these two limitations, it is amazing how much sound quality, programmability, and depth some of these apps have! Especially Intua Beatmaker, which allows you to import/export any sounds you want via wireless, so you can program sounds in your computer and load them on your iPhone. This is an area I just brushed the surface of.

You mentioned Beatmaker, iDrum, Flare, and Jasuto—can you give us a breakdown on the advantages of each app?

TF: Sure:

Beatmaker is definitely the most “pro” as far as looking and feeling like a real production device. It is very similar to an MPC with some of it’s functionality, having a 4 x 4 grid of pads to work with, and being able to assign anything to those pads. Beatmaker’s sequencer also lets you build complex arrangements, so if you really want a program that will mimic a computer application like Fruityloops or Reason for example, this will come the closest to doing that. iTunes link

iDrum was my first favorite, because it’s so easy to get hooked on its simple, fun, step sequencer. The main method of programming beats with this device is a visual grid of buttons that represent a note value—mainly sixteenth notes—that you can touch and they light up. When the button is lit that means it will play on that step each time around. You can use common iPhone motions like finger sweeps and shaking to get around in the sequencer. There’s an option for realtime sequencing as well. The built in sounds were awesome and well programmed, so even though I could have used my own huge arsenal of sounds on my main computer, I found using the built-in sounds almost always got me the sound I was looking for. iTunes link

Flare is the ultimate iPhone DJ app. It is a lot like having a mini actual turntable on your phone, with a built in DJ scratch mixer with features useful to a DJ. I used the mixer in hamster-switch mode for most of my scratching, since it allows you to punch in just little snippets of audio. The feature that truly makes this app amazing is it that enables wireless upload of any audio file you want to use. I grabbed weird found sounds, movie samples, old beats, just about anything I could think of, and uploaded it into the phone to scratch with. iTunes link

Jasuto is crazy—it is a modular synth and effects-creation environment on your phone! You can drag and drop modules such as oscillators, compressors, delays, and route or key them from all types of things. I’m a bit of a caveman when it comes to this stuff, so I just dragged objects until it made crazy sounds, and used that. In the future I plan on trying harder to learn how to use this app more, since I think the idea is so amazing! iTunes link

My desert island app is definitely Intua Beatmaker. That’s the one I can sit down with anywhere and feel like I’m in the studio.

What features would like to see in the next round of music production apps?

TF: I think everything right now regarding mobile music apps is limited to screen size. That is such a limiting factor, since you can’t add a lot of buttons or menus in a small area without killing the fun. So when the iPad is released, I really hope application developers take advantage of the screen real estate, and make apps that offer more features visible without having to hunt through menus. Also I hope apps start taking more advantage of the gyroscopic features of the iPhone—like I would want to be able to wave or tilt the phone to control filter frequencies, etc.

What’s your beat-making software of choice in the studio?

TF: It’s a toss-up between Reason and Ableton Live, and now sometimes Logic. My day job is testing music software, so I know all the apps, and I love little things about all the apps that keeps me switching from one to the other. I guess I would choose Reason just because I am almost guaranteed to not crash my system with that!

Do you prefer programming the beats or recording them live with your fingers? What’s easier on the iPhone?

TF: I’ve always been more of a live-recording guy, coming from a bass-playing background, so I usually record in realtime. But on some apps like iDrum, they make step sequencing so fun, I ended up doing a lot of that too. This album definitely has way more step-sequenced parts than I usually make.

Did you transfer the iMatik album tracks to your computer to do post-production, or was everything done on the iPhone?

TF: Yes, everything was transferred to a Mac Pro running Cubase 5, which is my main recording app, and I just used the computer like a tape machine. I used a mini-dual 1/4″ cable to get everything over to my Universal Audio 2108 stereo preamp, and tracked everything in using that, since it usually sounds great with line level sources.

Because the iPhone does not have the ability to run two apps simultaneously, I realized all overdubs would have to be done using a separate app. To me this still fits in with the mentality of an iPhone-only album, just like a saxophone-only album could be tracked into a recording app and still be considered “pure” if there’s anything “pure” anyway about an album made on a phone. ;-)

I used plugins and hardware in the mixdown, most notably a Summit DCL-200 on mix buss, Universal Audio EMT 250 and 140 for reverbs, and during the mastering phase I used the new UA Manley Massive EQ plugin, which sounded amazing!

What was the weirdest place you created a song with the iPhone?

TF: Well, since my commute to work is really far, and my girlfriend lives even farther away, I find myself staying in motels on a regular basis, just to make things work. It is usually a weird but fun feeling to be in some strange motel, sitting on the bed, with a basketball game on or something, and me with my headphones on making a beat.

I went to Mavericks surf competition recently, and the waves were so amazing I didn’t really use the phone a lot, but that was also a cool place to make a beat. The funniest place is probably making a beat while waiting at a place like Applebee’s or something—it’s just cheesy enough to work!

How long did it take you to make iMatik?

TF: About 4 months (3 months to make the initial beats and songs, and 1 month for overdubs, mixing, mastering, etc.) Really at first I didn’t start it as a serious project, I just started doing it because it was fun. But then I got, uh, kind of addicted to it, so I figured I might as well make it into an album!

In what ways do you think the iPhone is changing music production and the music industry?

TF: Well for one thing, I grew up with old drum machines, and none of them ever had wireless or 3G! Now I can upload any sound I want to a little device that I can carry with me. Sure, you can make music with a laptop, but that still involves wires, powercords, etc. Once the iPad comes out, and developers make the next generation of music apps, I think making music on a mobile device is going to explode.

What’s your take on touchscreens in general? Will computer keyboard/mice become things of the past?

TF: I don’t know, because I still hate typing on the iPhone. I always am missing the letter I was trying to hit. There is something about the tactile response of a keyboard that I love, so as far as communicating, I would still want an actual keyboard. The mouse on the other hand, I wouldn’t miss at all! It has been a great run for the mouse, and maybe for pinpoint accuracy in some apps, the mouse will always be needed by some people, but I hope to not need one in the future.

For music production, though, touchscreens are so necessary, due to the need to control multiple parameters at once.

Are there any up-and-coming local artists in the SF Bay area music scene that we should know about?

TF: Well I’ve been working with a lot of cats from the Hayward and Oakland areas, and they are mostly just kids, but I’ve never seen a more hungry group of talented individuals in my life. I just hope they can work together a little bit more to bring everyone up. Rappers like Too Much, The Kid AY, The Scholars, Studio Pete, New New, etc. Also from the South Bay I gotta give a shout out to Brycentenial, the workhorse in the south bay, Big Blac, No Mercy Records, Magruff Muttley, Marcus Weezy, and the list goes on and on.