Maybe other guys get booty calls. What I’ve gotten for most of my adult life is music trivia booty calls. Friends calling from some bar or restaurant at 10 p.m. or so wanting to know who does a particular song. Rarely have these been accompanied by an apology for calling late (or not inviting me along). When I got married, my best man jokingly designated another music trivia junkie friend as the person to call while I was on my honeymoon.

With Google and now services like Shazam and Verizon VCast Song ID that offer pattern recognition to anybody with a smartphone, the trivia booty calls have slowed down (but not entirely gone away). That’s mostly good news, particularly at 11 p.m. But I’m not ready to entirely surrender my “guy who knows every song” status to a smartphone app.

I already knew that in a hockey arena, say, I could at least beat the apps for speed—if I knew a song, and could hear it above the crowd. By the time the app booted, listened for 10 seconds, sent the audio back to the server and came up with an answer, I probably had it. Then again, for the songs being plucked from indie label obscurity by TV and movie music supervisors, even I needed some help.

So when I got a Blackberry Curve this week, the first thing I did (besides the streaming radio apps—more about those to come elsewhere) was to start testing Shazam and VCast Song ID against the depths of my iTunes library. (Shazam and VCast were almost identical in what they were able to identify and give many indications of using the same library—although album titles are sometimes different.)

So far, I’ve been reasonably impressed by some of the odd nuggets that the apps have been able to come up with. If something is still in print on CD somewhere, or available on the iTunes Music Store, the apps will probably be able to ID them. There have been exceptions (discussed below), but the “gets” are pretty impressive. Alicia Bridges’ “Body Heat,” the 1979 follow-up to “I Love The Nightlife,” should be too obscure. But the “Nightlife” album is still in print, so both Shazam and VCast caught it.

Because the songs are usually credited to whatever compilation they came from, the apps have also been good for finding new compilations I didn’t know about. VCast credits Middle of the Road’s U.K. hit version of “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” to a compilation of the “worst records ever”—an assessment shared by many other people with normal good taste.

Judging from the compilation albums cited, the libraries are often heavily dependent on what’s in print in Europe. Canadian hits didn’t do so well. “Tonight Is A Wonderful Time To Fall In Love” by April Wine, a song that still plays on most Classic Rock stations in Canada, couldn’t be matched. (Sadly, they also didn’t do so well with the Ukranian station where I occasionally like a song that I have no possible hope of identifying.)

The apps did OK with some new songs. Sade’s “Soldier Of Love” ID’ed right away in VCast; Adam Lambert’s “What’ya Want From Me,” in print for an extra week or two, did not, however.

So, for anybody who’s brave enough to find out what’s in Sean’s iPod, here’s how the apps fared against an hour or so of my iPod on shuffle:

• Skillet, “Monster” – Relatively new Active/Modern rock release. Yes, recognized by both. (I’ll only mention both apps if there’s a difference in the results from here in.)

• Nightcrawlers, “Push The Feeling On”—Yes. Neither app thought they were hearing Pitbull’s “Hotel Room Service,” which samples the early ’90s dance classic.

• Fugees, “No Woman, No Cry”—Yes, no surprise.

• Gonzales, “Slow Down”—Indie-label Canadian R&B/pop from last year. Yes.

• B.W. Stevenson, “Down To The Station” – 1977 obscurity (and local Buffalo hit) from the guy who gave us “My Maria” and the original “Shambala.” Not in print now. Not surprisingly, no.

• Gorilla Zoe, “Lost”—Hip-Hop hit from recent years, yes.

• Sex Pistols, “Anarchy In The U.K.”—Yes. They use the N.M.E. and they use new technology.

• John Anderson, “If Her Loving Don’t Kill Me”—John Rich-produced comeback attempt barely registered on the Country chart a few years ago, but it was on a major label album, so, yes.

• Nazareth, “Shot Me Down”—No, surprisingly. This Country/rock gem from 1977 is nevertheless from a major-label album and still available on iTunes.

• Nightcrawlers, “Let’s Push It”—Another surprising no. This subsequent single from the “Push The Feeling On” guys was from the same U.K. album (which doesn’t appear to have been loaded because the first hit came from a compilation).

• ESG & Slim Thug, “Get’cha Hands Up”—A local Houston rap-hit from the early ’00s, before Slim Thug was signed to Geffen. No. And VCast thought it was DMX’s “X Gon' Give It To Ya.” (Shazam just came up blank.)

• Jermaine Jackson, “Let Me Tickle Your Fancy”—His 1982 semi-hit with the guys from Devo, yes.

• Johnny Mathis, “Heaven Must Have Made You Just For Me”—Late ’70s R&B from the same collaboration with genius producer Thom Bell that led to “Too Much, Too Little, Too Late.” No, and no surprise.

• Johnny Bristol, “Love No Longer Has A Hold On Me” – Early ’80s R&B chart record in America and a bigger U.K. hit. Surprisingly (given its British status), no.

• Pointer Sisters, “Should I Do It”—Their early 1982 cover of a Tanya Tucker mid-charter in Country. Yes.

• Akon, “I Wanna Love You” – Big recent hit, yes.

• Another Bad Creation, “Playground” – A true lost ’90s song, but easily found here. Both, however, credit it to “[TM] Gold Disc 4019.”

• Ann Peebles, “I’m Gonna Tear Your Playhouse Down”—Medium-sized ’70s soul hit that became a medium sized ’80s pop hit for Paul Young. Yes.

• Rihanna, “Umbrella”—Yes, and Shazam was even able to tell that I was listening to the no-rap edit.

• 3 Doors Down, “Runaway” – From the last album, yes.

• Usher, “Trading Places” – R&B chart hit of recent years, yes.

• Myles Goodwyn, “Caviar” – Late ’80s obscurity by the (then on hiatus) lead singer of April Wine. This did come out in the States, but like Goodwyn’s group, this one was a “no,” however.

And a few more obscurities that VCast Song ID did manage to figure out:

• Jean Wells’ ’60s soul nugget, “After Loving You”

• Scottish singer Frankie Miller’s much covered late ’70s song, “Darlin’”

• James Brown’s “Talkin’ Loud & Sayin’ Nothing” – not the R&B hit version, but the more rock-flavored predecessor that was withdrawn from the market almost immediately. This was one of the more impressive “gets.”

• “Tap Turns On The Water” by CCS – Slightly perverse British hit from the group best known here for somehow also having a chart hit with Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love.”

And, to be fair, there are also a few songs on that hour of shuffle that the apps might have actually gotten before me. Even though I load songs, not full albums, I still might, like most people, put something in and not go back to it for a long time. In Part II, it’s Sean against the Apps on songs not in his library … maybe.