Posted By Becket Morgan in App Picks, Lifehacks, Mobile, Music

BreakingModern — Amid the sea of streaming music options currently available, it’s not easy to find a user-friendly, high-quality service that stands out from the crowd, but Songza delivers. It provides users with expert-created playlists for any occasion and makes it incredibly easy to find the right playlist anytime.

Music Concierge (No Tip Required)

Songza’s curated playlist library, which is available to users in the United States and Canada, is not organized by artist or album, but instead by activity, genre, decade or mood. Log in to the website or open the app and the Music Concierge will ask you to make a series of choices that will lead you to a playlist.

For example, when I signed in at 7:00 p.m. on a Thursday, I was asked to select among options including studying (no lyrics), unwinding and having friends over. I wanted to have friends over, clicked that option, and was given another set of choices including upbeat indie hits, fierce and sexy R&B and classic rock favorites. Selecting the classic rock option, the Concierge offered me three playlists to choose from.

Once listening to a playlist, you have the option to vote songs up and down, which will adapt the playlist to track your preferences. If you give a song a thumbs down, the app will immediately skip to the next song on the playlist. Click the thumbs up on a song you enjoy and you have the option to play the song’s music video any time by visiting “favorites > songs.”

You can select your playlist based on music genre or decade, typical in many streaming music services, but Songza gives you the added options of choosing by activity and mood. Songza offers playlists for typical activities like cooking with friends, lying on a beach, relaxing, sleeping or housework. Users are also offered playlists for city cruising, shopping at a vintage store, skateboarding, pleasing a crowd and dirt road driving. Feeling aggressive, nocturnal, earthy, motivational or funky? Songza offers playlists for these and dozens of other moods as well.

Google and Songza

Songza was acquired by Google earlier this year, and in October Google announced the integration of the Songza technology into its Google Play Music service. Users now have the option to access the thousands of curated Songza playlists via the Google Play Music app, with the additional benefits of the ability to download playlists for listening offline and the ability to see the next song coming up on the playlist. The redesigned section “Listen Now” in Google Play Music uses the form and function of the Music Concierge, enabling listeners to discover new music or revisit its recently played lists.

With Songza you can also share your current track with friends via Facebook and Twitter with the click of a button. Of course, you have the option to buy the track you’re currently listening to with a click, which takes you directly to the Google Play store or to iTunes.

Songza is free with no listening limit and is available for Android on Google Play, Apple iOS, and on the web.

For BMod, I’m Becket Morgan.

All screenshots: Becket Morgan

Header/Featured image: “evlis gold” by Cherrysweetdeal via Flickr Creative Commons