These days, it’s hard to find anyone (let alone a musician) who’s willing to go for very long without their mobile devices. As you probably already well know, musicians and technology are practically inseparable.

And if you haven’t realized it already, your smartphone or tablet offers much more than the ability to constantly check your email or play a multitude of games. Particularly if you’re using iOS, you have myriad music-making applications at your disposal. Here are five of the best ones available.

Image via Flickr by Rob Boudon

Songwriter’s Pad ($19.99, iOS/Android)

If you’re looking for a lyric writing tool that you’ll find useful practically anywhere, then Songwriter’s Pad is a great choice. Not only does it offer you the ability to write lyrics and create audio recordings of your ideas, the app also has numerous features to kickstart your creativity.

These include the idea tool, which generates clusters of words and phrases; and a fully functional rhyming dictionary, which will help you in nailing down a perfect piece of wordplay. You’ll find these features crucial whenever you encounter a nasty case of writer’s block. This app is also currently available on iTunes for the discounted price of $4.99, so there’s no time like the present to download it.

Garageband (Free, iOS)

Although this app has been available on Mac for years, Garageband for iOS recently became available for mobile devices on iTunes. The app includes a wide range of touch instruments, audio recordings, and loops. It’s basically a miniature portable recording studio that will allow you to use your iPhone’s mic (which is actually fairly decent) to record audio. You can arrange and mix songs up to 32 tracks, and it allows musicians to fine-tune tracks by setting echo, volume and reverb. There are also numerous effects you can add to your songs.

This app is perfect for doing quick demos and for fine-tuning your own sound, and it syncs with all other versions of Garageband thanks to its cloud-based functionality. Just make sure you’re connected to your home wifi via an ISP like hughes internet when you start syncing this app. Otherwise, you’ll probably run out of data with a quickness.

Nanostudio ($13.99, iOS)

If you’re looking for something a little more full-featured than Garageband, then Nanostudio is arguably a good option. It’s filled with cool features such like advanced mixing tools, sequencers, and sample trigger pads. This app also lets you upload your mixes directly to Soundcloud.

While an app like Garageband will probably meet most musicians’ needs, this one will definitely appeal to the music tech geek set. Just make sure you already know what you’re doing with a soundboard, or you could find yourself wasting money on this one.

ProChords ($8.99, iOS)

For those times when you’re really trying to concentrate on a new composition, ProChords is just a great all-around app. You begin by setting the key in which you want to write, and then the app makes chord suggestions based on the chords you input. It also displays a rating for each of your options.

The suggestions will change as you continue writing the progression, so it’ll save time in trying to figure out where to take your song next. You might find this app to be really useful if you aren’t familiar with song structure and theory; otherwise, it really works as a time-saver and a good rule of thumb.

Cleartune – Chromatic Tuner ($3.99, iOS)

There isn’t really too much more to this app than the name implies — Cleartune is simply a chromatic tuner and a pitch pipe. It’s nice, though, because it’s just one less device that you’ll have to carry around with you to your gigs. And it’s really helpful if you either haven’t yet developed an ear for tuning, or if you just want to save a little time before your show begins.

Check out these five useful apps, and you’ll likely find that they’re a real asset when it comes to your songwriting process. And of course, once you’ve written your songs, you’ll want to make sure you register your song copyright as soon as possible. After all, who wants to spend all this money on mobile songwriting apps if you’re just going to have your songs stolen from you by some unoriginal hack?