On Stage ($0.99) is a brand new music app from Fabian Kreiser, the developer behind the awesome Icebird Twitter app ($3.99, reviewed here).
Built right into On Stage are a few handy little features to help you appreciate your music a little more. Lyrics from songs can be displayed or looked up from right within the app, and the same goes for artist biographies (provided by Wikipedia).
Navigation is very similar to the native iPod app, except there are only four tabs to choose from (Albums, Artists, Songs, and Playlists). Volume controls, AirPlay, and shuffle and repeat buttons are all present.
I don’t particularly miss the landscape CoverFlow of the iPod, but I do miss the ability to see all the songs within the currently playing album, as well as Spotlight search within On Stage. I’m hoping a future version can remedy one or both of these issues.
The only major downside to On Stage is that it runs best on devices with lots of RAM, which really means that this app is made for the iPhone 4. My 3GS tends to run out of memory and close apps on a regular basis, and reloading On Stage, especially when it comes to my 10GB music library, can take quite a while.
So what’s the quick verdict? On Stage is already a very interesting (and much sexier) alternative to the iPod app. It’s a much cleaner music player experience, but until the the app is optimised to load music libraries faster, I’d suggest that only iPhone 4 owners pick this one up for now. Your 512 MB of RAM should save you from ever having to close On Stage, so you should be able to enjoy both the gorgeous visuals and a seamless experience without the hassle of reloading your music library.
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On Stage was bought by iSource for review. For further information regarding our site’s review policies, please see the “About” page.
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TAGS: music app
