Wrap your tunes in an old school package with VinylLove Pocket iPhone app (Appolicious)

APPOLICIOUS ADVISOR RATING:

3 of 5 bars PRICE: $0.99TASTY: The visual of picking your songs out of virtual record crates gets an A+ for nostalgia.BUMMER: At the end of the day it doesn’t recreate that great vinyl sound.COOL: You can actually “scratch” the record on the player.

There’s a reason that music fans still collect and talk about vinyl records. Few people lament the death of the 8-track or the cassette tape, but the specific sound quality of a record is hard to beat. It’s not surprising to see another app, in this case VinylLove Pocket, try to recreate some of that nostalgia and apply it to your existing iTunes collection. In many ways Vinyl Love Pocket’s efforts are successful, but not where it really counts – sound quality.

Visually, VinylLove Pocket is a treat from start to finish. Instead of slapping on an iTunes style album display onto a supposedly vintage app, VinylLove Pocket gives you the nostalgia show right from the get-go, offering up all of your albums in crates where you can flip through each album cover like so many collectors do today. It’s a really cool visual touch.

The same goes for actually putting the needle on the record when you are selecting a track from the album you picked out. There’s a very enjoyable monotony to the whole activity, and the fact that it actually takes more than a split second to play a song is almost a joy in the fast paced world we’re all living in.

But there are things are the digital age we take for granted, and VinylLove Pocket reminds you of them quickly. You can scratch the needle on these records to your hearts content, but you can’t skip forward or backward on a track at all. If you’ve picked a song you can either listen to it or go to another tune, but there’s no searching for a specific section of a song here.

And that sort of trouble is worth it when the sound quality is as pristine as you’d get from a real vinyl record. But that’s not the case here, of course. VinylLove Pocket can’t improve the sound of the audio that comes out of the tiny iPhone speakers.

There are certainly worse ways to spend a dollar, and visually ,VinylLove Pocket has a few neat tricks. I especially admire its adherence to a vintage look and feel. But all it’s really doing is putting a new cover on your same old iPod. I’ll stick to real records, myself.

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Bullseye doesn’t quite hit the mark as a brand new style of app (Appolicious)

APPOLICIOUS ADVISOR RATING:

3 of 5 bars PRICE: $1.99TASTY: Visually interesting app should keep attention spans at least a few times through the song.BUMMER: The interactive portions of this don’t elevate it to anything beyond a musical screensaver.COOL: Two versions of the song to choose from should delight fans of Polyphonic Spree.

Bullseye By Polyphonic Spree bills itself as an “interactive music video,” a statement that conjures a number of different ideas. I was hoping for some sort of game that was timed to end alongside the song. Instead, the interactivity amounts to a lot of window dressing and not much more. But it might still be a step in the right direction.

There isn’t much to the app itself. A small options menu lets you pick which version of the song you want to hear (acoustic or studio), and you’re off and running. The video mirrors the lyrics in the song, so there are some pretty impressive animated visuals of objects splitting apart and coming together, and a big tree with fireworks during the song’s closing moments. But the interactivity leaves a lot to be desired. Tapping certain objects makes them come to life — flowers bloom, plants grow, fireworks explode. But once you’ve seen this once, there isn’t anything to keep you coming back. This isn’t interactivity in the style of a choose-your-own-adventure book. It’s interactivity like rubbing a scratch ’n’ sniff sticker. It just isn’t interesting.

The idea of interactive music videos is a great one that could benefit the music industry tremendously, but this app falls short of that premise. It’s saved a bit, thanks to some unique visuals that feel right at home on the mobile platform. A video like this would look weird on the big screen, but on your iPhone it feels like an extension of a strange app game. That said, only drop the two bucks for Bullseye by Polyphonic Spree if you already love the song, because chances are you won’t be opening it often otherwise.

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Keep tabs on activities at the Hollywood Bowl for Android (Appolicious)

APPOLICIOUS ADVISOR RATING:

5 of 5 bars PRICE: FreeTASTY: Keep tabs on what's happening at the Hollywood Bowl all summer long.BUMMER: There's nothing negative to be said about this app.COOL: This is a beautifully designed application.

If you live in Los Angeles, you know that no other experience is like being at the Hollywood Bowl in the summertime. The venue's own app for Android allows you to keep up on everything related to the Hollywood Bowl.

The first thing you'll notice upon launch of the app is its very colorful, scrolling day-by-day calendar. Each date is marked so you can see who will be performing within the coming weeks. If you see something of interest, just click on any day to read a description and learn the time the event will begin. Then, you can either buy the ticket or add the concert to a favorites list in order to receive reminders and announcements.

The Hollywood Bowl application also explains how to get to the venue from wherever you are, and where all accommodations are once you arrive: bathrooms, concession stands, picnic areas and even your seats.

The app has it's own social networking element, too. One section of the app is reserved as a fan photo gallery to which users can browse pictures from other users and submit their own photos.

The app runs smoothly and loads quickly, so you won't have to wait very long to find the information you need.

Other than the fact that the app is well-made and informative, I'd have to say that the Hollywood Bowl app's greatest feature is its design. This app is a calendar and a directory, guides that usually come in boring black and white, but this menu glows rainbow. It's actually one of the more creative uses of color I've seen in an application.

Pretty colors aside, this app is also neatly labeled and organized, so most users won't have any trouble finding their way around.

With so many tours coming to the Bowl this summer, this is exactly the app you need to stay in the loop and get the most out of your experience.

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