Last March I wrote a preview post showing off Lala’s upcoming iPhone app, which gives users the ability to stream their entire music collection from the cloud, without having to worry about syncing their files. At the time Lala wasn’t ready to give a release date for the app, but our impression was that it was due out fairly soon. Obviously that wasn’t the case. But now we’ve gotten our hands on the latest version of Lala for the iPhone, which was just submitted to Apple for approval. And it’s safe to say that it was worth the wait.
For those that haven’t used Lala before, here’s a quick overview of the service: Lala revolves around the concept of the ‘web song’ — you’re allowed to listen to any song you want totally free exactly once. If you like it, you can then pay 10 cents for the right to stream it as many times as you’d like from then on. This means that you can ‘purchase’ and entire album for around a dollar. You can also use Lala’s Music Mover tool to upload your entire library of MP3s to the cloud free of charge. This is all built on top of a very slick interface, but so far it has come with one downside: because all of the songs are streamed, users didn’t have a way to access them when they weren’t at a computer. Lala’s iPhone app changes that.
The app will be familiar to anyone who has used the iPhone’s native iPod app. The big difference is that all of your songs are streamed from the cloud, so you don’t have to worry about syncing your songs. The app is also better for music discovery than the normal music app, because you don’t have to wait for songs to download — you can instantly add an album to your music library in one click. And it’s significantly cheaper.
Of course, streaming has its own problems. Normally if you’re disconnected from a streaming music service, your music goes dead. Fortunately the Lala app uses caching to store hundreds of songs from your library, which it has waiting in case your connection dies. Lala wouldn’t say exactly how many songs are saved, but they say that the app uses some intelligence to determine what gets cached (e.g. it will generally save songs you’ve most recently added to your library).
So what was the reason for the delay? Lala CEO Geoff Ralston says that “basically everything” had issues, from dealing with licensing from content owners to tweaking the app itself. Suffice to say, it works very well now, and is sure to be a hit among Lala users. It has good timing too: Lala just launched as one of the partners powering Google’s music search service, which is sure to drive a lot of traffic to the site.
Other music streaming apps coming for the iPhone include Spotify, though that isn’t out in the US.
Check out a video walkthrough of the app below.
Excited for Lala on the iPhone. Hope it makes it through.
The background’s distracting me..Did you just have an earthquake or something..
Looks cool. I like how the battery is almost dead in those screenshots. It gives the illusion that it’s a battery hog.
Looks like you have a large crack in your floor…
Wish either Spotify or LaLa was able to be used internationally
this is an awesome app that truly leverages the lala service; i had a feeling this would coming very soon after the google music launch..now if only i had an iphone
Don’t mess this up Apple! I want my Lala app yesterday!
You said it! Been waiting ages for this. Lala rocks!!!
Will this work with the 3rd generation ipods? I hope so.
I wonder which will come first for the Android, an app for lala, Rhapsody, or Napster? Skeptical of it being Napster, since that CEO has gone on record stating that the economics don’t work. lala and Rhapsody seem to be receptive to the idea.
I’d happily pay $10-$25 for such an app, but would not be willing to pay a monthly fee or upgrade my current membership (and accrue additional monthly charges).
My dream app / combo? Pandora + lala. Now THAT would be a match made in heaven
Superb radio with the ability to buy the song I’m listening to with one or two clicks!
You are the voice of reason,
I love pandora & uploaded my entire music catalog to lala phenomenal service.
Would be awesome if pandora provided such a service
I’d happily promote this app on http://www.appgiveaway.com afterall we are about promoting quality apps.
http://www.maestro.fm already does all this and it’s already on iTunes… direct link to App store itms://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=324246243&mt=8&s=143441
I have tried this app and it ROCKS. short of being able to run in the background like itunes, it is the killer app for music in the cloud.
Spotify + Last.fm with audioscrobbler is a much stronger solution than Lala’s strange business model. I hope they will enter US soon.
Been using lala for a year or so, and the social aspect of music discovery (finding new music from people with similar tastes) has been incredible. Taking it with me was the only thing missing, can’t wait for this app.
Follow me at http://bit.ly/mylala
I have been a tester for this app and its come a long way.
They tell us not to tell anyone about it but I am glad they decided to share it with you.
I feel it has been good enough to send two the app store for weeks now but the lala dev team really took a lot of care to make sure every bug was killed.
My fingers are crossed and I hope Apple lets it though.
If you can’t wait (I couldn’t), sign up for the beta:
http://www.lala...dback/11H351659
Looks awesome. Can’t wait to get our hands on it and do a review.
i dont have an iphone but i will say that is a really cool application,it seems very quick and handy to download songs
Certainly happy to see the caching option instead of trying to stream everything real time. This was one of my biggest criticisms of the Rhapsody iPhone app when I reviewed it a few weeks ago.
http://appstruc...dys-iphone-app/
Anyone know if lala app will b available for blackberry?
Jason, any word on when the app is coming out? It’s been about a month now.