Now you can finally become that friend in the group who always knows about a live show first. Able to scan your iPhone’s music library within seconds, Songkick creates a personalized concert calendar for you, based on your music and your city, and tracks your favorite artists so you never miss an opportunity to see them perform live.
And although Songkick has 100,000-plus concerts in its database, you can make use of the app’s alerts and other customizable features to ensure you’re being fed information on only those artists and venues you love the most. Want to see how it works? Hit the jump and I’ll show you.
Getting Started
The first thing Songkick will do is scan the music on your iPhone in order to learn which musicians you like. It will automatically import these into the “Your Artists” list of bands you’d like to track, but you can also manually add artists using the plus sign in the top righthand corner of the Artists page. (But more on that last part later.)
Songkick scans the music on your phone to determine which artists you like.
In order to track artists, it will be necessary to sign up for a free Songkick account within the app, and then log in. If you don’t do this, you can still use the app to look up artist and venue schedules, but the app won’t remember them. (In other words, you’d have to search for Coldplay’s tour schedule every time you wanted to pull it up, instead of the app simply saving it for you.)
Upon startup, Songkick will also ask permission to identify your location. Once it knows which city you’re in, it will compile a list of upcoming shows at venues that are near your location. Now the app has all the information it needs from you in order to start providing you with results.
Viewing Tour Schedules
The four main tabs of Songkick can be accessed at the bottom of the screen in the following order: Concerts, Locations, Artists and Settings.
For the purposes of this review, let’s start with the Artists tab. When you select Artists, you’ll find an alphabetized list of all the musicians you’re tracking. A red banner reading “On Tour” appears in an artist’s individual icon if he or she has scheduled upcoming concerts.
Tapping on an artist's name brings up his or her concert schedule.
Tapping on an artist brings up a tour schedule providing dates and locations of all known upcoming shows, plus cancelled shows (indicated by a yellow banner which says “cancelled” slapped across the date). On this page you’ll also find a “Stop Tracking” button if you’re looking to cut a certain artist loose.
Checking Concert Info
From the artist’s tour schedule, tapping on a date will take you to the info page for that particular show. Click through for a map of the venue’s location, to research or buy tickets, to share on Facebook or Twitter, or to email the information to a friend.
Clicking on a concert brings up a map to the venue, ticket information and more.
If the event will also include performances by other artists, you’ll find that information on the show’s info page as well, right below the “I’m going” and “I might go” buttons. Click on the artists’ names to be taken to the event’s Line-up page, where you can learn more about each individual act — and see calendars of their upcoming shows, too, natch.
Checking the “I’m going” or “I might go” buttons moves a show/event into the “Your plans” section of the Concerts tab, and I’ll explain what that means in the next section of this review.
Your Concert Itinerary
The Concerts tab is where you really get the benefit of the personalizations you’ve made to Songkick. Here you’ll find a running calendar of Your Artists’ upcoming shows, as well as Your Plans, which is a list, ordered by date, of all the concerts you’ve checked as “I’m going” or “I might go.”
The Concerts tab shows your personalized search results, plus the concerts you plan to attend.
It doesn’t matter which checkbox you choose — checking either moves the show into the Your Plans category, although your specific selection will show up in your account’s feed on the Songkick website.
The Just Added sub-tab shows any new events Songkick finds for your tracked artists. And you’ll also notice the calendar icon in the top righthand corner, which enables you to conveniently jump to a future date.
Locations and Settings
Your Locations tab will present you with a list of any and all upcoming shows in your city, regardless of whether you’re tracking the artist. An “add/edit” button in the top left enables you to add or delete cities, and you can use the arrows at either side of the city name to scroll horizontally through your locations. And you’ll see the calendar button again, so you can check out future shows.
The Locations tab provides search results for any and all shows in your area.
The Settings tab is perhaps inaccurately named, as there isn’t much to set. You’ve got options to log out, rescan your music library, provide Songkick with feedback, and read the Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy.
Conclusion
The Songkick website works much like the app, albeit with a more involved interface interface and expanded features. Although, to be fair, the Songkick app was probably intended to enhance the website experience, not vice versa, and in that regard, the app does a good job of allowing users to keep up with their concert plans while on the go.
If one of the website’s major concepts, however, is the aspect of social media interaction among users and friends who want to remain up-to-date on one another’s concert-going schedules, the app leaves something to be desired — for one, a real-time feed showing updates from other Songkick users. For another, more share options beyond just Facebook and Twitter.
Ultimately, though, people who don’t see the lack of social media integration as a deal-breaker, and who download Songkick mainly for the ability to keep up with their favorite artists, will not be disappointed with this app in the slightest.
