Cherry Rplayer

You don't have to be a jet-setter to groove to KCRW radio (Santa Monica) in the morning, jam with BBC Radio 1 (London) throughout the day, and bounce to J-pop hits all night long on TokyoNext radio (Medellin, Colombia)--you just need Cherry Rplayer. This streaming music player can play Shoutcast, Icecast, AAC, MP3, M3U, PLS, AACP, and other streams, and it can download the track, artist, and song-lyrics info on demand.

Cherry Rplayer, despite its unfortunate name, is a terrific streaming music app, far superior to its closest rival, StreamFurious. Cherry's interface displays seven stations in portrait mode, or four stations in landscape mode (on a T-Mobile G1). Four tabs within the program help music fans navigate through the options, which include the ability to drill down through U.S. radio stations by city ('US Radio'), as well as the ability to search or browse through stations promoted via the Shoutcast or Icecast streaming networks ('World/Live'). When you find a station you like, simply click the heart icon near the bottom of the screen to add it to your Favorites, which appear under the tab of the same name. And if you forget a station's name, you can consult a history of streams you've listened to ('Visited').

It's not the player's fault, but I was surprised at how few U.S. radio stations appear in the US Radio tab. The jam-packed Los Angeles radio market is weakly represented (under that city's name) by seven entries--three of which are AM talk-radio stations. If a station isn't listed by its city, give the search function on the World/Live tab a try; if you know the station's call letters or name, you can usually find it there.