I’ve always enjoyed rain. Whether it’s a soft, gentle spring rain or the deluge of a summer storm, the sound of falling water is soothing. So it’s no surprise that I’m a sucker for a rainstick. And, like an uncommonly large fold-up umbrella, Frontier Design Group has me covered.

Rain Stick is an interesting app that does exactly what it claims to do. For those that aren’t familiar, a rainstick is basically a hollow tube filled with beads. When tilted the beads move along the surface of the tube creating the sound of rain. Likewise tilt your iphone up, down, side to side,  or give it a gentle flip to move the “beads” and make a storm of your own.

I really enjoyed Rainstick’s innovating use of images. As you tilt to create the “rain” the background image  (there are three to choose from) also tilt and sway giving you a full ’round the world view of the rainforest.

The sound from this app is very realistic. It works and sounds much like a real rain stick. I only have two small gripes.

One, “gentle rain” doesn’t work as well as “fast rain.” My preference is the uneven sound as a shower starts or stops. This is usually achieved by tilting at a slight angle so that the beads drop more slowly. However, in Rain Stick a slight tilt makes the rain “softer” but not slower.

And two, I wish that, like a real rainstick, this app could function as a shaker to use a percussion instrument. Maybe future versions will have this feature. Until then, I’m going to check out Cowbell Plus also from Frontier Design Group.

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app category: Entertainment