The ShadowMusic Web Community

The other day, I bought my very first "smart phone", an Apple 5. Before that, I had flip phones/etc. that had no touch screen technology, no apps, etc. Today I found one of those song-identifier apps...it's called Shazam. Can you believe the name? It's one of those apps where you let the phone listen to a song and it will identify it, tell you data about it, etc.

Like any mature, intelligent, reasonable person I naturally decided to see if I was smarter than the phone. I used my laptop, went onto YouTube, and played a video of the Shadows performing "Bombay Duck." I'm not going to make this easy for the phone and choose Apache. OK, Bombay Duck playing...I pressed "Begin Shazam" and...it got the song exactly right, showed me the album cover, everything. OK Mr Smarty Pants phone, here's "Chelsea Boot." See what you can do with that. #@!% It got that one right, too!

Next, I go to Siri, the talking assistant on the phone. "Siri, who is Hank Marvin?" I was expecting "Huh, what?" The phone displays the words "one moment"...and then there it is on my screen. Brian Robson Rankin, born on October...

Regards from the person who is not smarter than her smart phone ,
Donna

Haha, Donna. That is amazing. And it can show you where I live if you type in the address, find you the closest Japanese restaurant, and store your entire library of Shadows music (I always record in Lossless, to preserve the quality). I must get Shazam.

We're all Mac at home, but Windows at my office. My phone - a large Samsung Galaxy Note 2 I is Android, but has many iPhone-like features. The large screen allows me to check the forums in the car on the way to work (
not to worry, I have a chauffeur, common here). I may just shift to an iPhone when I retire.

Best,

Andy

Hi, Andy. I found that there is a Droid App for "Shazam" as well as the Apple iOS app. I put it on my Kindle Fire tablet, which is a Droid. Haven't actually used it on the Kindle Fire, but I installed it. Both versions of the app are free, at least here in the US.

After I posted my message, I gave the Shazam app one more chance. I started playing songs from my "On the Continent" box set by Cliff, which are songs in other languages (Spanish, Italian, German, French, etc). This app got every song I tried, including "Kleine Taube" which is Cliff's "Pigeon" song. I highly recommend the Shazam app.

Kind regards,
Donna

It's a good piece of kit Donna, I have it on my iPhone & iPad.

I have a version of that app in my home, she is called "Jean", hum a few bars and you will get loads of information about Cliff and his music. Sometimes I wish she had a mute button!

Downloaded to my Samsung phone, it is brilliant, and scary all in one.
Ron

Just to point out to all you smartphone and tablet users, there is a better (in my opinion) app than Shazam. It works in exactly the same way but recognises more tracks, in my experience. It's called Soundhound and amazes me by scrolling the lyrics in synch with the music. It's also free to download.

I had Shazam some years back and it was quite expensive to use.
Have things changed ?

I believe Shazam let me have about 5 free goes in a set period. Soundhound is just totally free.