Music.app

I tend to give Music.app a hard time; while its intentions are pure, I find its attempts to cater to every possible demographic overly idealistic and more often than not are to the app’s determent. Music.app’s goal to please everyone historically results in bloated, confusing interfaces compared to its more focused contemporaries. In fact, earlier attempts were so bad they served as the catalyst for Cesium’s (now Cs’s) creation back in 2014. However, last year upset this trend with a radical refresh to lyrics, a feature that inherently only caters to active listeners. Not only did this redesign include “live” lyrics tracking for select songs on Apple’s streaming service, it also featured the gorgeous “lava lamp” album art visualizer that first captivated me in tvOS’s Music.app years ago. While the rest of Music.app remained mostly unchanged, I remained hopeful that this hinted at a renewed dedication in Apple towards improving their Music.app experience. With another year and another major iOS release safely behind us, it’s time to check back in to see how it fared.

Leading up to iOS 14’s release, I heard whispers that the betas included my number-one requested feature for the lava lamp visualizer to be officially accessible in the player view. Of all iOS 14 features, I was most eager to see this one for myself. The minute the upgrade completed, I rushed to Music.app, started playing a song, and was greeted with…

… a disaster. The rumors that my beloved visualizer will now accessible in the player view were gravely mistaken; it is not the same effect, in fact it’s demonstrably worse. While at first glance the new effect in the player view seems similar to the original from iOS 13, iOS 14 now aggressively smudges the effect, which blends the previously distinct colors into a disgusting, sludgy stew. Take an extreme example like Paul McCarney & Wings’ Wingspan compilation, which cleanly features just two stark colors (neon yellow and navy blue). Included above are two recordings of Music.app playing a song from that record: the first showcasing the new iOS 14 visualizer, and the second showcasing the original iOS 13 visualizer, which can still be seen on iOS 14 for “live” lyrics only¹. To make matters worse, the iOS 13 bug that allowed users to access the visualizer on the player view despite the lack of official support no longer works in iOS 14, the new visualizer continues to be displayed instead of the original.

Aside from the “Library” tab switching locations, nothing else in Music.app’s local library experience changed this year. While in theory I should love the new player view visualizer, its shoddy implementation consistently reminds me that the original effect is still not visible in the player view despite tremendous customer feedback begging for it. For those customers and myself, what we got instead this year was nothing short of a slap in the face, and I’d rather return to the boring white or black background than keep their sorry excuse of a substitute.

Widgets

Music.app only supports three rudimentary widgets—one for each of the three widget sizes—and are among my least favorite of any player. While I appreciate the “Recently Listened” discovery feature, the lack of customization options is disappointing.

That’s to say nothing for its hideous design; there’s way too much bright red; the Music.app widgets visually scream at my face on any page they’re placed on, tearing attention away from everything else. There’s not even a toned-down dark mode variant, it’s the same bloodcurdling red all the way down.

While it’s nice to see Apple providing first-party music widgets to customers as an example for third-party developers to follow, it’s a shame they set expectations so low.

Personal Score Card

• Next App: “Picky”