The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

God bless Smule. I panned their Ocarina app way back, but since then they've pushed right along without me, releasing idea after idea on Apple's App Store. And I think that, though the Leaf Trombone didn't really capture my attention, this one might finally be the big winner in my book: they've released I am T-Pain, an app that will automatically Auto-tune you into the style of some of the rapper's top songs, with more purchaseable within the app. There's even a "freestyle" mode, complete with a few unreleased background tracks to jam with -- as you can see above, all you do is talk into the iPhone's mic, and you can autotune the news or whatever else you want. Shawwwwty!

Silly? Maybe, but they're going to sell a million of these, and given that Smule's apps tend to be easy to pick up and fun to play with, even people who aren't familiar with T-Pain's work will probably get the app just to sing a few bars to see what it sounds like (you can also send those messages off to Facebook or email as well). And Smule is moving right up into the iPhone 3.0 era: the app comes with four songs, and there are four more available to purchase in-app, along with even more (and more popular: Kanye's "Good Life" and the Lonely Island's "On a Boat" track are due out soon) songs coming, complete with lyrics and auto-tune settings and timings in the future.

Maybe you're laughing. Maybe you think this is dumb, and you've already had enough of auto-tune on pop radio, and don't really want it in your iPhone, too. But trust me on this one: Smule is a company that's made silly music experiences on the iPhone extremely popular, and having T-Pain's tunes and auto-tuning abilities (officially from the company behind the pro version, too) available in this app is going to make it big, no question. The app's available right now for $2.99, so pick it up if you're feeling the beat and want to sing, even if you can't. Yeahhh-eeeyeaahh-yeah.