We have raved about Shazam before (at least about the iPhone version: you BlackBerry users are on your own). A few months ago, Patrick turned me on to SoundHound. I didn’t really give it the time of day, because, like, what does he even know?
As mea culpas go, this one is pretty painful.
The SoundHound software is amazing. From the About page: “SoundHound’s breakthrough Sound2Sound technology…has resulted in numerous breakthroughs including the world’s fastest music recognition, the world’s only viable singing and humming search, and instant-response large scale speech recognition systems.” I recently put the “singing search” clause to the test, pitting my horrifying vocal stylings — alongside Toto’s criminally monotone delivery — against The Hound’s vaunted sniffer. Here were the results:
For those who need me to restate, I will. In spite of the fact that I simply cannot sing, I sang Toto’s “Africa” into the iPhone. SoundHound listened patiently for a moment or two, and then told me it was very likely that I was singing Toto’s “Africa” into my iPhone. Either that, or I was choking to death on the liver and onions platter at Ben’s Diner. Also note the hilarious third and fourth possibilities, above.
(SoundHound? It’s gonna take alot to drag me away from you.)
