Google Android Gadgets Guide

It has been a busy few days for the folks at Slacker, Inc. Today they announced the next version of their Slacker Radio 2.0 application for Android phones. This isn’t your typical bug fix and minor update.  For the first time ever, Android users in the US will be able to cache their Slacker stations right to their phones and listen anywhere, regardless of a connection to WiFi or data.

With the new Slacker Radio 2.0 and a Radio Plus account, music fans can cache stations with the touch of a button.  The station gets stored for access later in places like subways, planes, and hospitals.  Another benefit of having a Radio Plus subscription is that your music is played sans advertising and you get unlimited song requests and skipping capability.  If you’re a casual listener with a free Slacker Basic Radio service, you’ll still be able to cache stations for up to 14 days as well!

The millions who listen to the free Slacker Basic Radio service will continue to enjoy the same unparalleled music experience that now includes a free trial of the complete station caching solution. With access to a song library that is nearly four times the size of the leading competitor, Android owners can use Slacker Basic Radio or Slacker Radio Plus to create their own Personal Radio stations or listen to and personalize over 120 expert-programmed genre stations.

Features found in Slacker Radio 2.0 for Android:

• Music library featuring millions of songs
• High-quality stereo playback
• Over 120 professionally programmed genre stations
• Create custom stations based on artists or songs
• Fine tune stations on-the-fly to play more of the music you like
• View artist biographies and photos
• View album art and reviews
• “Peek Ahead” artist and album preview
• Pause and skip songs
• Rate songs as favorites
• Ban the songs and artists you don’t like

Added benefits of Slacker Radio 2.0 with Slacker Radio Plus:

• Cache stations – enjoy Slacker Radio even without a Wi-Fi or cellular network
• Greatly improved battery life on cached station playback
• Auto Station Refresh – Allows automatic overnight station syncing
• Unlimited song skipping
• Ad-free listening
• Complete song lyrics
• Unlimited song requests for creating stations

Look for the updated Slacker Radio app later this month!

When Grooveshark first released an Android App back in early December, many users, including myself were extremely excited.  Unfortunately, the app failed to live up to many expectations as it was not free (requires a VIP membership) and very buggy.  However, this week the Grooveshark application was updated and while it is still not free ($3 VIP monthly membership) it is now amongthe best music applications on the Android platform.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the service, Grooveshark is an online music search engine, streaming service, and recommendation tool.  Think of it as Pandora, but you can actually search for specific songs and create specialized playlists. The updated app, pictured below, removes most of the bugs which gave users problems, as well as gives users the ability to search for songs(searches are processed very fast, even over EDGE), build a playslist within the app, sync playlists with the online version of Grooveshark, favorite songs, and make songs available for offline playback (although this doesn’t work as well or clearly as I would like).

The music quality is not as good as that of Pandora, but it is almost there. If you are a fan of Grooveshark and Android you should check out the update! For me, it’s hands down the best music app on Android at this point and it’s only going to get better.