The Ultimate Streaming Music on Your Blackberry Pearl
Blackberry Pearl users are seldom known to be lazy or “slackers”. Business people who are keeping everything organized in the ultimate handheld device. Now, Blackberry Pearl users are instantly able to pull up that latest corporate memo, just about anyone?s contact information, all of their appointments for the next 7 months and now, a custom designed streaming radio station on their phones.
For some reason the brilliant people who developed the Pandora website aren’t very good with math. They know there music, but when it came to providing a mobile application, they went with the iPhone instead of the Blackberry. This, in spite of the fact that the Blackberry has a much larger market share than the iPhone. Initially this bothered me, but now I’m glad. Because they didn’t make a Blackberry app, I had to search for an alternative and I think I ended up finding something even better.
Slacker.com has a very well made application you can load onto your Blackberry Pearl and stream your favorite music. This is done through your mobile provider, so make sure you’ve signed up for an unlimited data plan. The Slacker.com application is free to download and use, but you will have to listen to some commercials infrequently after the initial 7 day trial period. Don’t worry, you won’t be cut off or billed after the 7 days, Slacker will just drop in a quick commercial once in a while (not even close to the amount you’ll get from your local radio stations). It’s a small price to pay for an amazing application.
Slacker.com does an excellent job of creating a custom station that meets your specific taste. If you hear a song or artist you don’t like you can “ban” it from Slacker and it will never play again. The more you use Slacker, the smarter it gets at predicting what you’re going to like. Slacker also employs some music experts to build some general genres of music. If you love reggae, classic rock, jazz, and even comedy, it’s all already pre-programmed on Slacker. Of course, you can still ban a song or artist you may not like and never hear it again.
Slacker also includes all of the album artwork as well as some very in depth artist bios in the event you’re so inspired you want to know more. You can also choose to read a review of the album while the music continues to play.
One of the best features about Slacker is something they call station or son “caching”. Basically, if you have an extra MicroSD memory card in your phone (and you should), you can store a station on your phone so you can play it when you get outside of your phone coverage area. For example, when you’re flying and can’t turn your phones signal on, you can play your “cached” or stored station. If you upgrade to the premium plan, Slacker will even allow you to cache or store individual songs.
For the typical music listener, you can get by just fine with the free Slacker service. But, if you’re a music fiend who can’t get enough, you’ll want to spend the extra $3.99 per month for the premium plan. That’s not bad for a massive music library that learns your likes and dislikes and serves it all up 100% commercial free. This also gives you that ability to store single songs and skip as many songs as you want while they’re playing. Not bad for, what comes to under $50 per year.
The premium service also gives you some other benefits which may be worth the very small fee. Unlimited music skipping means you can continuously scroll forward through the songs until you find just the right one. You can also make an unlimited number of song requests which allows you to create a specific playlist of your favorite songs. It’s about as close as you’ll come to having an unlimited number of MP3’s on your Blackberry. Of course, you don’t need to go the paid route and you’ll still find plenty of enjoyment using Slacker.com
Blackberry builds something called the “Stereo Music Gateway”. This is a device that you wire into the back of your home audio system and then it connects via Bluetooth to your phone. Combine that with Slacker and you have a virtually unlimited library of music to play through your home stereo. Of course, I love Slacker in the car, plugged into a cassette adaptor or FM transmitter through my car stereo. If you’re doing this on long trips I’d highly recommend a batter charger for in the car.
If you’re convinced and want to install Slacker, it’s extremely simple. Using your Blackberry Pearl, head over to Slacker.com and begin the download. It takes only a few minutes and you can sign up for the free or premium service right there inside of the application. Do it now and you’ll have all of your favorite songs ready to go for your drive home in the afternoon.
