If you're a new Nokia Lumia 800 owner, you'll doubtless have noticed that there are two music apps vying for your attention: Nokia Music and Windows Phone's own Zune. You might question whether that's necessary, but Nokia Music does a lot more than simply replicate Zune's functionality. Join us as we go through its key features and show you how to get the most out of Nokia Music.

Nokia Lumia 800: How to create, transfer and listen to music playlists

The Zune media app is a fine way to purchase and listen to your music on your Nokia Lumia 800, but Nokia Music provides a number of features that complement and enhance that default offering.

Let's go through them one by one.

My music

Possibly the one piece of duplication on offer in Nokia Music, My music is the simple media player through which you can access your music. It works in much the same way as the default Zune software, and even offers the same screen-lock functionality.

While it essentially does the same thing as Zune, it does make sense having a point to access your stored music alongside Nokia Music's other services. Speaking of which...

Mix Radio

Arguably the main feature of Nokia Music, Mix Radio is an entirely unique musical offering. It lets you stream themed music playlists to you Lumia 800 for free, with no sign-up necessary. These mixes are constantly being added to, and include genres such as Dance, Pop and Indie. Go into any of these and you'll be presented with a load of separate mixes incorporating various sub-genres. Go into Indie, for example, and you'll find separate mixes for Indie Folk, Britpop, Indietronica and the like.

From here you can either stream the mixes to your phone or even download them for offline listening. You're allowed to download four playlists every 30 days, so with around 50 tracks per mix that's around 200 free music tracks every month.

MP3 store

Wait, there's an MP3 store on Zune, isn't there? Yes there is, but this isn't the simple reskinning you might think it is. While both stores provide a similar service - allowing you to purchase and download music directly to your Nokia Lumia 800 - they are in fact completely separate. This means that you can shop around to find which is selling an album for a better price, and there will be certain tracks that one store stocks but the other doesn't. Ultimately, it means more choice, which is always good!

Gigs

Another completely unique feature for Nokia Music. Gigs very simply supplies a list of concerts taking place in or near your location. It'll show the artist, the date of the performance and the venue. Click into the entry and you'll be able to pinpoint the venue on a map and even get a link through to where you can purchase tickets to the event. Handy!

Have you used Nokia Music much since purchasing your Nokia Lumia 800? What's your favourite feature? Let us know in the Comments section below.