Songbird 1.0: The Web Browsing MP3 Player

Version 1.0 of the free MP3 management application Songbird was released last week to considerable buzz; and after using it as my PC's primary player for the past few days I can understand what the fuss is all about.  Touted as a potential iTunes killer, Songbird syncs with almost all iPod devices and runs on PC, Mac, and Linux-based computers.  Its current feature set is quite robust, and since it is open source you can count on expanded functionality in the future.

Songbird's default look and feel is distinctly Apple-y, and iTunes users will quickly find themselves at home with the application.  Basic library and playlist selections can be found on the left side of the interface, along with links to SHOUTcast streaming radio and bookmarks to web sites.  That's right, the Mozilla-powered Songbird player comes with tabbed browsing functionality.  While I initially thought this was overkill for a media player, I've found it to be a great tool for discovering new music.  Songbird will scour any webpage for links to music files and present listening and purchase options in a pane at the bottom of the window.  You can also right-click on a music blog's webpage and subscribe to its content.  After tweaking your options, Songbird will automatically download new music from subscribed pages and dynamically create playlists for it.

Songbird's open-source design is augmented by user-created "feathers", or plug-ins.  You can use these to customize the program's appearance and functionality to suit your needs.  The Mashtape feather comes bundled with Songbird and displays artist information, news, photos, and videos in a pane below your library.  This works great for most artists, however the results for groups with common one word names (like Tool, Mum, or Stars) are often inaccurate.  Users can download additional feathers that will gather lyrics and album art, emulate Apple's CoverFlow feature, publish your playback history to last.fm, recommend new artists based on your collection, and even find local concert information for groups in your library.

There are a few important features missing from Songbird.  It won't sync with the iPod Touch, iPhone or Zune, has no CD ripping capability, doesn't provide any equalization options, and can't watch your music folders for changes.  Songbird also uses more RAM than iTunes, clocking in at a hefty 160MB on my computer.  The development team is aware of these issues, and their Spring `09 release will address most of them.  Music lovers shouldn't hold off on trying Songbird though.  Even with its flaws, Songbird is a powerful tool for playing your tunes and discovering new music.

--Jon D.