Old Hindi Songs – India goes groovy. Read The Review!

What would you imagine if your ears got suddenly tickled by a mysterious Sitar melody, a hypnotizing rhythm of the Yakshagana, luscious solo of the Bansuri flute and a little bit ear-splitting female voice singing about hearts of two lovers getting burned to ashes because of their star-crossed love?

Now, this isn’t a scene from a lovely Bollywood melodrama – it’s an Old Hindi Songs app available for Android devices. So strap your seat belts we are going to Delhi!

What Old Hindi Songs Is

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Essentially this app is a pocket version of gaana.com – the biggest music-streaming service in entire India. Or, to be more precise, its sub-category dedicated to vintage Indian music, borrowed from both Bollywood movies and non-cinema culture.

What this application promises to you is the unforgettable, melodious journey into the past – to the golden and glorious era of the classic Hindi tunes. And what’s even more enticing, all that songful luxury is at your service absolutely for free, 24/7.

The music catalog of the Old Hindi Songs is truly enormous – you basically can find any singing celebrity or a famous/obscure ballad from the olden days and stream it right in your Android-powered gadget, without having to upload it.

Features of the application include:

• A monstrous variety of playlists and digital radio stations neatly divided into categories based on genres, historical periods and even emotional atmosphere.
• Music videos – all of those related to the Hindi songs classic epoch are gathered here, in one place.
• Playlist organizing – tap on the heart icon to rate a tune you enjoy and later integrate it into your own playlist. DIY-approach at its finest.
• Bitrate customization – this is my favorite option. You can adjust the audio quality of the music-stream by choosing a bit rate that works with your mobile connection speed the best. You have three types of bit rate: Low (32 Kbps), Medium (64 Kbps) and High (128 Kbps).
• Quick access – the songs that you marked as your favorites can be replayed in a blink of an eye.

That functionality list looks pretty endearing, especially for an online service that is not associated with Spotify or Deezer or whatever. Nevertheless, some of the app’s nuances are rather unsatisfactory and as you know: the devil’s in the details. The score is 5/10.

Interface

Saying about the interface of that app – it could be better.  The design is cluttered– so far it’s an epitome of anti-intuitiveness which looks like it’s been designed by a greenhorn armature. Unappealing, messy and clumsy. 1/10.

Performance and Usability

Okay, even the best of mobile apps have a few shortcomings but in Old Hindi Songs it’s something outstanding, I swear. And here’s why:

• No searching by the song title – seriously?! This function is a stumbling stone of any music-streaming service, and its absence is unforgivable. You have to spend almost half an hour on something that you could in a couple of seconds if only there was a search-bar.
• Poor audio quality – let’s face the truth: the highest, 128 Kbps bit rate available in this app is sort of fossilized relic. Today’s lowest acceptable standard is 256 Kbps utilized by Apple Music. Compare it to Spotify with 320 Kbps and Tidal with their lossless format.
• Lagging – the music streaming lags even with the seamless network connection, sometimes just leading to the app getting collapsed.
• The application stops functioning after playing 3-4 tunes on its own. No idea why.

To top that complaint list off I’d like to say that it wouldn’t hurt to include classic Bollywood songs in other languages, including Tamil, Urdu, Punjabi, etc. The app is free but crowded with pestilent ads, beware. The score is only 3 out of 10.

Cross-Platform Use

This app is compatible only with Android devices, so my mark of this point is 6/10.

Verdict

If you like Indian culture, if you’re a fan of Far Cry 4 or you are yourself of Indian origin and want to explore the rich musical legacy of the hot subcontinent – this is definitely your app. However it needs to be improved.

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