Will apps kill the cable music channel? MTV ought to queue up more reality shows like “Jersey Shore,” ’cause VEVO is hammering away at what little is left of its music video business.
VEVO offers a popular web site, an iPhone app and, now, VEVO HD for the iPad. All three feature free music videos from several music publishers. VEVO HD might be the best of the three, mostly because of the easy portability and touch interface of the iPad itself.
VEVO HD presents handy sorting of the large catalog of music videos. You can view by Featured, Most Popular, Artist, or you can browse by a long list of Music Genres. Flicking through the video catalog is fun, and lets you discover new music. After you touch on a video to play, there is a slight delay while the video loads — to pass the time VEVO displays artist trivia. The videos play smoothly, and the sound over of the iPad’s built-in speakers is decent.
You can share any of the videos you watch with friends over Facebook and Twitter with just a couple of taps. Perhaps the coolest feature is Music Map — which displays the video watching selections, anonymously, of people using VEVO based on location. It starts with your current location — but you can travel the globe, and check out music tastes around the world by dragging the map around.
Finally, VEVO lets you create and edit your own playlist of videos, so you can queue things up for a party or a night at home.
It’s not perfect. The app did quit unexpectedly a few times during my testing. But it’s free, so don’t hesitate to check it out.
