iPhone and iPod touch owners are no longer constrained by their iTunes song library thanks to the iTunes App Store. With services from Pandora Radio, AOL Radio and Last.fm, all deliver streaming music to iPhones and iPod touches, the dance party never has to stop because of a lack of tunes. We groove to each service to help you find which one is right for you. 

 

AOL Radio

So the iPhone and iPod touch lack an FM tuner. So what? AOL Radio fills the gap and then some, serving up some 350 stations of streaming-radio goodness. It’s a fantastic app for music and talk-radio fans, and it doesn’t cost a penny.

When you first run AOL Radio, you’re presented with a list of categories, starting with AOL Recommends, What’s New, and Spinner.com (a collection of about 17 themed stations from the site). From there the list spans 25 genres, from Alternative to World/International. A few taps is all it takes to start listening.

We have exactly two complaints with the app. First, we couldn’t find any NPR stations, probably due to licensing issues. Second, you can’t leave AOL Radio running in the background—the music cuts out the moment you exit the program. Those are disappointments, to be sure, but they don’t diminish the overall appeal of this incredible freebie.

THE BOTTOM LINE
The best thing to come out of AOL in years, AOL Radio offers an endless supply of streaming music for a price that can’t be beat.

Check out the entire AOL Radio review.

 

Last.fm

Love Last.fm? You may like its eponymous iPhone app. Not familiar with the service? Do yourself a favor and try AOL Radio or Pandora instead. It’s not that the app is bad, per se, it’s just confusing and inconsistent, especially compared with the competition.

Last.fm creates custom radio stations based on your favorite artists. So if you like, say, Brendan Benson, just type in his name and you’ll get a station featuring him and similar artists. As you listen, you can “love” a song or ban it, the idea being to help Last.fm learn what you like and don’t like—and choose songs accordingly.

The iPhone app (which also works with the iPod touch) requires a Last.fm account—creating one is free if you haven’t already. Run the program, tap “Start a new station,” and enter an artist, tag, or user name. While you’re listening, you’ll see familiar options like love, ban, skip, and share (which lets you e-mail a track link to anyone in your address book), along with a Buy on iTunes button.  The app also provides artists bios, a list of similar artists (any of which you can tap to create a new station), and even a roster of upcoming shows for the selected artist. Neat.

THE BOTTOM LINE
Last.fm does a fair job reproducing the Web version’s custom-radio experience, but newcomers to the service may find it confusing.

Check out the entire Last.fm review.

 

Pandora Radio

Universally adored by music fans, streaming-music service Pandora is sure to be equally adored by iPhone and iPod touch users, who can get in on the action with the nifty Pandora Radio app.

Like its Web-based counterpart (and like Last.fm), Pandora Radio creates custom radio stations based on a selected artist, song, or even classical composer. Left to its own devices, Pandora chooses subsequent songs based on similarities in acoustics, instrumentation, and the like. But you can also give songs a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” as you listen, thus helping Pandora learn your preferences. (Tapping the thumbs-down icon immediately skips you to the next song and prevents the previous one from playing again.)

THE BOTTOM LINE
Simple and stylish, Pandora Radio is a must-have for fans of the Web service—or anyone who likes custom music mixes.

Check out the entire Pandora Radio review.

 

THE WINNER
Any free app that brings unlimited streaming music to your iPhone or iPod is a winner in our book. That said, AOL Radio stands out by offering hundreds of channels (including local stations) and more useful features than you’d expect from a 1.0 release. Fans of Last.fm and Pandora should absolutely check out their App Store counterparts, but Pandora Radio is the better of the two thanks to its simple, straightforward interface. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with stocking your device with all three apps: Each one merits a permanent home.