Update: The Beatles Finally Hit iTunes

UPDATED 10 a.m.: Yes, The Beatles have finally come to iTunes. The above image appears on the iTunes landing page, and the band takes up the top section of the iTunes Store.
- - - - - - -
The Beatles catalog is finally coming to iTunes for real, if the strongest rumors to date are to be believed.

In a story that was reported first by The Wall Street Journal Monday, Apple's iTunes announcement scheduled for Tuesday seems clear to the the long-awaited, often-premature addition of music by The Beatles to the iTunes catalog.

The story has been reported in the New York Times and Billboard as well, with different sources pointing to clues in Apple's invitation to the iTunes announcement (seen above on the landing page of the iTunes Store), including the invite's wording and design.

Could the Beatles/iTunes speculation be wrong? Billboard has an article offering seven possible developments Apple could spring on us at the iTunes announcement, from streaming music to longer music samples and Ping/Facebook integration.

The Year's Best Tunes? Here's a Whole Bunch of "Best Music of 2009" Lists...

The end of the year is a time to reflect on the best (and sometimes worst) music of the past year. And in the case of 2009, it's also the end of a decade (or not, as some would argue), so there are a lot of lists tallying up the best of the '00s, or aughts, or whatever the hell this decade is to be called.

Here's a sampling of some best-of lists of the year and the decade, from music business sources and the general-interest press.

* L.A.'s KCRW considers the top 10 live performances that took place on its flagship program, Morning Becomes Eclectic.

* Also, KCRW's music librarian, Eric J. Lawrence, offers a preview of music forthcoming in 2010.

* At another one of my favorite radio stations, New York's WFUV, the DJs and staff weigh in on their favorite songs and albums of the year.

* MTV, which now seems more of a reality TV network than a music channel, surveys the best music (and artists, and films, etc.) from 2009 (which they have dubbed "The Year of Gaga")

* NPR Music, which produces a number of fine music podcasts, live concerts, and more, offers several lists detailing different staff members' favorite music of the year.

* The Dallas Observer reviews the year in Latin music.

* Time magazine's top 10 albums of 2009.

* Entertainment Weekly's 10 best albums of the decade

* Amazon.com lists 88 "Outstanding 2009 Albums You Might Have Missed." Looking through the first page of the listing, I can honestly say I've heard of only one or two of these albums/artists. Will have to check them out.

* Rolling Stone gives its picks for the best albums and songs of the Aughts... I mean, 2000s ... you know, the still-unnamed first decade of the 21st century.

* NME magazine offers its 50 top tracks of the year.

* And Idolator lists the top-selling songs and albums of the year at iTunes, along with its editors' picks.

Onward to 2010...

Free Streaming Christmas Music Online

If you're looking for some new Christmas music to get you in the holiday spirit but don't want to spend money on tunes you'll only listen to a few weeks of the year, check out these sites where you can stream Christmas music online for free.

* Live365.com: One of the leading online audio sites, Live365 has one of the biggest and broadest selections of holiday music channels (106, according to the site), with genres including jazz, instrumentals, easy listening, bluegrass, New Age and Celtic, and any more.

* AOL Music Christmas music: AOL is another major player in streaming music. Though it's best known for offering new pop CDs, it has more than a dozen Christmas offerings. Among the more unique options: Christmas songs from kids TV shows, holiday comedy tracks, winter solstice songs, and holiday songs from around the world.

What's more, AOL Music also enables you to listen to more than 30 full Christmas CDs free, including collections by current artists such as David Archuleta, the Beach Boys, the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, and A Fine Frenzy to Nat King Cole, Aretha Granklin, Ray Charles, and Frank Sinatra. Oh, there's also "We Wish You a Metal Christmas" (featuring Alice Cooper, Dave Grohl, and others).

* OnlineRadioStations.com: You'll find more than 30 streaming Christmas stations here spanning such genres as adult contemporary, instrumental, Latino, R&B, Top 40, country, jazz, rock, traditional oldies, and soundtracks.

* Radio.about.com: The Christmas music page of this Web site has links to 20 online radio channels, some from live365.com (see above). The stations cover everything from classic Christmas songs to holiday songs from the 1940s through 1960s and even a station that "plays only one thing: versions of 'Blue Christmas.'"

Whether you're into traditional Christmas carols, rock tunes, heavy metal songs, or endless versions of "Blue Christmas," you'll find something to suit your taste in these free online streaming Christmas channels. Happy listening, and Merry Christmas!

Last Call for Amazon.com's 50 $5 MP3 Album Downloads for September

(Meant to post this much earlier, but forgot. But if you're on the U.S. West Coast [or an earlier time zone], you can still get in on these deals.)
- - - - -
The end of the month means that time is running out for the September edition of Amazon.com's 50 MP3 albums for $5 each.

New-ish releases include Bible Belt,the acclaimed album by pop-folk singer Diane Birch, the self-titled debut by country-rock band Gloriana,and the album by rockers Billy Boy on Poison.

As usual, there are classics by bands such as the Rolling Stones (Black and Blue), Soul Asylum (Grave Dancers Union), Shawn Colvin (Steady On), the Cowboy Junkies (The Caution Horses), The Frames (The Cost),Lou Reed's self-titled album, Steely Dan (Gaucho), and Beatles covers on the "I Am Sam" soundtrack.

Free Music: Downloads and/or Streaming from Japandroids, Yo La Tengo, Lou Barlow, Yorn & Johansson

Looking for some free tunes to listen to? Here are some fine recent choices I've come across...

Yo La Tengo is the latest band to have a live concert recorded and offered free as a podcast from NPR Music. You can read a brief story about the band and download or stream the Yo La Tengo concert here. It clocks in at nearly two hours, so YLT fans will find plenty to like.

NPR Music also has a (briefer) live set of music from Canada's Japandroids, for download or streaming. The frenetic two-piece band from Vancouver recorded a 20-minute set at Seattle's KEXP radio. You can download individual songs or the entire set.

The new albums by the Avett Brothers and Lou Barlow (of Sebadoh and Dinosaur Jr.) are now available for free streaming on the site's "First Listen" series. Tomorrow the site will begin streaming Rosanne Cash's new album, "The List." Each album is offered for streaming for a limited time; check the link above for dates.

NJ native Pete Yorn, one of my favorite singer-songwriters of the last few years, has come out with his album of duets with Scarlett Johansson (yes, the actress) called Break Up. You can find a story on the Yorn-Johansson album here, and stream three songs from it.

Download Free Music Samplers for Newport Folk and Jazz Festivals

The Newport Folk Festival and Newport Jazz Festivals are among the biggest celebrations of these music genres, and the folks at NPR Music are offering a free MP3 sampler of 12 songs for each of them. This is a good way to get up to speed on some of the musicians who are playing at this year's festivals and hear some of their tunes for free.

You can download the free Newport Folk Festival and Newport Jazz Festival samplers at this site, and see what tunes are included in each collection. Among the songs in the Folk Festival sampler:

• "I and Love and You" by The Avett Brothers from I and Love and You
  
• "I Keep Faith" by Billy Bragg from Mr. Love & Justice
  
• "Easy" by Deer Tick from Born on Flag Day
  
• "Chains, Chains, Chains" by Elvis Perkins in Dearland from Elvis Perkins in Dearland
  
• "Mykonos" by Fleet Foxes from the Sun Giant EP
  
• "Look at Miss Ohio" by Gillian Welch from Soul Journey
  
• "Belated Promise Ring" by Iron & Wine from Around the Well
  
• "God Is God" by Joan Baez from Day After Tomorrow

As usual, NPR Music will be covering the Newport Folk Festival (which is celebrating 50 years) with live broadcasts and Webcasts, and will also be checking on on the Newport Jazz Festival. Check these sites for details and schedules.

Also, check out FolkAlley's list of the 100 most essential folk songs, and stream them on your computer.

Last Days for July's Amazon.com 50 MP3 Albums for $5 Each

Each month Amazon.com offers a selection of 50 MP3 albums for $5 each, and as you've probably noticed from the calendar, July is almost over.

As usual, the 50 span a range of musical genres and time periods. I picked up Bob Mould's new Life And Times album. Among the other titles you can find for five bucks for the next few days:

• alt and indie rock including Grand Duchy (with Frank Black), Interpol, Matt & Kim, Meat Pupets, Coldplay, and Gomez;
  
• classic rock such as Billy Joel, Aerosmith, the Beach Boys, Heart, and David Bowie;
  
• soul and R&B including Marvin Gaye, Ray Charles, Louis Armstrong, and L.T.D.

I miss not having the liner notes with info on who's playing what instruments, who sang on which tracks, lyrics, etc., but you can't beat the price. And if this Apple/record label project to offer digital albums with liner notes and other features pans out, as I mentioned yesterday, that may no longer be a problem.

May's 50 MP3 Albums for $5 at Amazon.com Ends Tomorrow

Amazon.com has been offering a great selection of 50 albums for $5 each throughout May, and a glance at the calendar will tell you that that ends tomorrow!

The selection ranges from current pop/rock/hip-hop favorites like Neko Case's "Middle Cyclone," Kanye West's "808s & Heartbreak," Asher Roth's "Asleep in the Bread Aisle," "Dear Science" from TV on the Radio to older rock albums from Aerosmith and the Grateful Dead, and even jazz (Ornette Coleman and Etta James) and opera (Maria Callas).

I picked up "Fantasies," the great new album from Canadian band Metric, and you can't beat five bucks for a new album from a hot band.

Amazon says there will be a new selection of $5 albums up in June, and I'll definitely be checking into their selection on a regular basis.

The Campaign to Save Paste Magazine Gets Musician Support; Give Yours and Get Great Music

Paste Magazine has for years been a favorite source of new music and stories about the people who make it. But now Paste is facing hard times because of the economic downturn, and some top musicians are offering their tunes in order to help keep the magazine afloat.

More than 100 artists have agreed to contribute rare tunes to people who donate to the campaign to save Paste, including The Decemberists, Neko Case, She & Him, Cowboy Junkies, the Jayhawks, The Hives, Matthew Sweet, The Avett Brothers, Joe Henry, John Roderick of The Long Winters, Over the Rhine, Bob Mould, and many more. (If additional songs are added, contributors will get those, too.)

Paste is an every-other-month printed magazine that comes with a CD sampler (though many subscribers now get the sampler tunes via digital download).

Paste says that its current financial problems are caused by a drop in advertisers, and they expect it to be just a short-term problem. "We just need a little cash infusion to make up for running at a loss for a while" they write. "We’re excited about finally getting to a sustainable level that puts us in a great position when the economy comes back—whenever that is."

You can get all the answers at the Save Paste FAQ.

You can also follow news from Paste at its Twitter page, www.twitter.com/pastemagazine.

Music News: New iTunes Pricing, Beatles Remasters

Digital music and reissues are a couple of the leading music-related news stories this week...

iTunes pricing: This week iTunes finally introduced its new pricing structure. While much of the attention has been on the new $1.29 price for popular tracks, there's been much less mention of the fact that many tracks will remain at 99 cents, and some songs will sell for 69 cents. As iPod Observer notes, all iTunes songs are now DRM-free and encoded at 256kbps (which the store calls iTunes Plus).

On a related note, I've read that Amazon has increased the price of some of its MP3 downloads to $1.29, but a quick scan through some of their offerings showed tracks at the usual 99 cents. Anyone come across Amazon.com tracks costing more?

Remastered Beatles albums coming: The music industry is expected to get a big boost in the Fall when all of the studio recordings by the Beatles are to come out in remastered versions. Sept. 9th is the expected date for the reissues, which many music fans say is long overdue. As for digital versions of Beatles music... well, no news on that, unfortunately.

Yahoo Unveils New Yahoo Music with Artist Pages

Yahoo has been involved in online music for years, but now they've revamped their Yahoo Music division to better compete in the digital music space. Released today, the new Yahoo Music features both paid and free music services and partners with other online music providers. Yahoo is the second leading online music destination, after AOL Music.

It offers different modules (which you can drag and move around) such as free audio streaming services from Last.fm and Pandora, videos from Youtube, and the ability to buy music downloads from iTunes and Amazon.com. Yahoo Music also offers a new feature called Artist Pages that gives access to information and products from various musicians (500,000 in all, Yahoo says), including concert dates and tickets, photos, lyrics, and blogs.

I'll post more about Yahoo Music after I get the chance to kick the tires and take it for a spin.

New iTunes Prices (Higher, That Is) Coming April 7th

The iTunes price increase for songs it deems the "hottest" selections will go into effect on April 7th, it's been confirmed. Record labels have long wanted variable pricing (and higher prices) for digital downloads. Steve Jobs has never seemed to be in a hurry to raise the cost of a song, since Apple is using the iTunes store as a loss leader for selling iPods.

But now you'll pay 30% more if you want the latest hits or certain classic or in-demand backlist titles (not sure exactly how they've going to determine which older tracks should have the higher price).

If you don't like the new higher prices, CMT.com (Web site of Country Music Television) suggests checking out Spun.com, which will buy your old CDs that you no longer want, and sell you new ones. CMT gives some examples, saying that you can get many country CDs for less than eight dollars, and get three dollars or more for the ones you sell... meaning you can get a full-length CD for about the cost of five songs on iTunes.

Sounds like a good deal to me.

New iPods Expected at Apple Event Sept. 9th

New iPods are expected to be announced that the Apple Inc. event that's now been officially confirmed for next Tuesday, Sept. 9th. The invitation sent to the media as a silhouette of a man listening to an iPod jumping in the air, as in iPod ads, and has the slogan "Let's Rock" on the front.

Rumors have been flying around that new iPods were in the works from Apple, including a redesigned iPod Nano that ditches the new stubby format and returns to the longer format of the original Nano. Case designs shown on various Web sites have shown a video screen that is viewed when the iPod is held horizontally, rather than vertically.

So if all goes as planned, we'll all be able to listen to our tunes, podcasts, and audiobooks on brand new iPod models that have higher capacity and maybe even lower prices, if the rumors are correct.

New MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops have been rumored to be announced, but some observers have suggested that these might be announced later in September or even October.

Amazon.com Starts MP3 Store: Cheaper than iTunes

Amazon.com is the latest challenger to Apple's iTunes store, announcing that it has started its "Amazon MP3" service that sells songs and albums for less than iTunes... and without digital rights management (DRM) restrictions.

That means that the songs you download from Amazon can be copied and played on any music player, and copied as many times to as many devices as you want.

Single songs will sell for 89 cents and up; albums range from $5.99 to $8.99. On iTunes songs sell for 99 cents, with albums going for $9.99 and up. You can buy DRM-free songs from iTunes, but it'll cost you $1.29.

Amazon MP3 doesn't have nearly as large a selection as the iTunes store, however. Of the music mega-giants, Sony BMG and Warner Music are not offering any titles on Amazon's store; Universal and EMI are offering only certain titles.

The home page of Amazon MP3 lists the top-selling songs and albums, giving you an idea of the digital downloads that are available.

With its extensive market reach and marketing power, Amazon MP3 may become a true competitor for the iTunes Store.

Record Labels Try MySpace, Other Sites to Sell Music

Record labels are desparate to recover some of the money lost to lower CD sales, and one option they're checking out is selling tunes through social networking sites. An article today in iPod Observer looks at how the labels are seeking options to compete with iTunes, which they have long complained charges too low a price (99 cents per track)... and of course, iTunes takes a cut out of that amount.

One leading choice for the record labels, the story notes, as been SnoCap, which runs a service on musicians' MySpace pages. I've seen these SnoCap "MyStore" options on more and more MySpace pages, and I recently bought a new single from The Donnas via SnoCap. When it first appeared on the band's MySpace page, the SnoCap store didn't work. Clicking on buttons for "register" and "buy" didn't take me anywhere. A few weeks after that I tried it again and, presto, it worked flawlessly, and I had The Donnas' latest single for 99 cents. The tracks are in MP3 format, so they'll play on iPods and just about any other music player.

I'm all for SnoCap and similar ventures, especially if they mean more of my payment goes to the artist (which I'm not sure about).

Steve Jobs Shakes Up the Tech World

It's been quite a new year for Steve Jobs, and we haven't even reached Valentine's Day yet. Jobs, the chairman of Apple Inc. (which recently dropped the word "Computer" from its corporate name), first shook up the cellphone/PDA industry in January when he introduced the iPhone at MacWorld. Cellphone makers immediately began looking at their product portfolios and models in the pipeline, to see what changes they might want to make in response to them.

Also at MacWorld, Jobs introduced the further evolution of AppleTV, the company's system for playing video and TV content over a Mac computer that serves as a digital entertainment hub.

More recently, Jobs poked a finger in the eye of the record labels and recording industry when he called for the elimination of digital rights management (DRM), the security technology that prevents audio recordings from being copied. Many people saw this as an odd call for Jobs to make, since Apple's online iTunes store includes DRM intself, meaning that music bought from that store can only be played on Apple's iPod devices.

Computing, audio and video, home entertainment, cellphones, and more... what's next for Jobs?

Russian Download Site– Great Deal or Pirated Music?

Russian Web site All of MP3 has been pleasing customers but irritating the recording industry by selling low-priced MP3 music downloads. The site charges as much for an entire album as other sites charge for a single song, and also lets users download music in a variety of formats and quality levels, but it has been accused of violating copyright laws.

Mediaservices, the Moscow firm that owns All of MP3, recently held an online news conference with reporters to counteract the criticism and to insist that it is running a legal business, not a pirated music site. All of MP3 addresses the issue head-on at its Web site, insisting that its business is authorized by the Russian Multimedia and Internet Society (ROMS) and by the Russian copyright agency.

The company also claims to pay 15% of each sale to ROMS for royalties, which it says is responsible for paying the copyright owners. Mediaservices says that it has offered to pay royalties to the record companies but has been rebuffed. But Mediaservices has never had a license from the major recording companies to sell their music to begin with, which experts have said is a requirement under U.S. law.

The major record companies have copyright infringement lawsuits pending in Britain against the operators of All of MP3.

All of MP3's Web site says that the license fees for all downloaded materials are paid in accordance with Russian copyright law, but notes that the buyer is solely repsonsible for the use and distribution of materials from the site. "This responsibility is dependent on the national legislation in each user's country of residence," the site notes. It continues, "The Administration of AllOFMP3.com does not possess information on the laws of each particular country and is not responsible for the actions of foreign users."

So basically they're putting the onus of legality on the user. I know a number of people who have bought entire music libraries from the site; at pennies per track, it's very affordable to do so. Will the recording industry go after people who buy music from All of MP3?

Not likely; the site is still a relatively little-known player in the music download market. Sounds like the record companies will instead institute more lawsuits like the one in England, seeking to shut down All of MP3's operators in individual countries. For now the company seems to be operating in a legal gray area. We'll need to stay tuned to see what happens next.