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The Beatles On iTunes
Yesterday Apple put a big old teaser up on their homepage for an unknown
announcement to occur today. Speculation ran rampant from the delayed
iOS 4.2, to iTunes Streaming to a release of the Beatles catalog on the iTunes
store. Well, it was the latter. They have 13 albums on the store now, and a $150
box set. So here's hoping that we get that iPad multitasking yet this November.
Oh, so now I've got to buy the White Album *again*?
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In a way, Apple and The Beatles are very similar. Both were pioneers in their industries. Both had throngs of loyal fans willing to do anything for them. Both are scarcely more than a thin veneer over the status quo.
It's a bit poetic that these two entities which have been at each other's throats over who has the right to call themselves a fruit now are hand in hand making money off the panting masses.
Apple's done it again.
Meanwhile, the CD box set is selling for $130 on amazon (and I thought I read recently someone was offering it for around $100). I thought downloads were supposed to be cheaper than the physical CDs.
And yet there's the trademark dispute over the Apple brand, the Beatles owning Apple Corps, and Jobs having Apple Computer.
When new sounds for System 7 were created, the sounds were reviewed through Apple's legal department and they objected that the new system sound alert "chime" had a name that was "too musical", under the recent settlement. The creator of the new sound alerts for System 7 and the Macintosh Startup Sound, Jim Reekes, had grown frustrated with the legal scrutiny and first quipped it should be named "Let It Beep", a pun on The Beatles' "Let It Be". When someone remarked that that wouldn't pass legal's approval, he remarked "so sue me." After a brief reflection, he resubmitted the sound's name as sosumi (a homophone of "so sue me"), telling the legal department that the name was Japanese and had nothing to do with music.
Meh. The Beatles are overrated.
Perhaps I just don't like the Beatles enough to think this is a good thing ... but ...
My solution to bands who 'refuse' to be put on iTunes, for any reason?
I don't buy their shit. I won't buy anything from the Beatles or Metallica ever again for that reason, even if they change their minds later.
You guys go cater to their self absorbed temper tantrums and sense of entitlement. I'll pass and buy things from people who actually appreciate my money.
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Meh. The Beatles are overrated.
I tend to agree, but only because they are so very, very, unquestioningly highly rated by so many.
It's also easy to dismiss them, as an overreaction to the adulation. Your post underrates them.
A few hours with Beatles Rock Band (which is a great motivator for attentive listening) will remind you that they *were* very good indeed.
If you don't already own every Beatles album, I feel sorry for you.
Does borrowing your grandfathers copies count? They are interesting, but with the cultural reference points being half a century ago, they are kind of hard to relate to like the kids half a century related to them. One of those "you had to be there" moments.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
It's a testament to baby boomer narcissism that this is such a BFD from Apple.
Big new software update? No. Verizon iPhone? No. ZOMG U CAN HAZ BEETULZ ON TEH iPhone NOW!
If Disney opened up its vault, that'd at least make sense since they stop publishing a lot of their animated classics for long periods of time.
That's not really true, though. Every generation has its superstars.
The Beatles are just your grandpa's Justin Bieber.
To be fair, no band could live up to the hype the Beatles get. Not even the Kinks.
Actually, this announcement's hype is testament to Steve Jobs' narcissism, and whatever is the corporate version of "narcissism" (monopolism?) over at Apple Records. Apple Records has been suing and attacking Apple Computer since the Apple ][, claiming "trademark" rights that don't exist (computers aren't music, even when computers play or sell music). "Beatles on iTunes" closes the "Apple vs Apple" spat that has kept Beatles music from Apple users for so long, even when it there was no possible combo. Which is probably a lot bigger deal to Jobs and Apple Records than it is to the public, even if Apple's music distribution is #1 and the Beatles recordings are still among the most popular music in the world.
Because Steve Jobs is a Baby Boomer whose narcissism crossed with Apple Records' narcissism is bigger than even the narcissism of the entire rest of the "Me Generation".
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make install -not war
And if I was an "audiophile" and cared about the pixie dust, I might care. Back in the real world, 90% of human beings won't be able to tell the difference between that rip that the "professional sound engineers" spent "months" on (which I highly doubt in the first place), and your 196Kbps rip using CDEX + LAME.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
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A few hours with Beatles Rock Band
And this is the extent of your musical knowledge, no wonder you like the Beatles.
I find their music uninteresting and the hype annoying.
I do play real guitar - among other instruments - and take pleasure in more complex forms than The Beatles, as well as in more minimal and direct music.
However I'll continue to defend Guitar Hero / Rock Band as a tool for music appreciation. It draws your attention to details of the parts that are easy to overlook. It's a good way to actually concentrate on music -- few people nowadays listen to music and give it their full attention.
I find it a bit strange that you could find the whole Beatles canon uninteresting. There's a hell of a lot of variety in there: She Loves You, Taxman, Eleanor Rigby, I am the Walrus, I Want You (She's So Heavy), Helter Skelter, I Got A Feeling ... all very different from one another.
Yay! Wow, the Beatles are finally available on iTunes! Thank goodness, because nobody has ever been able to listen to Beatles music on their computers. Their refusal to sell their music in one specific outlet has completely prevented all computer users from enjoying MP3 recordings of Beatles songs. Finally, a Beatles song will appear on an iPod for the first time. Finally!
Besides, they broke up 40 years ago, most of this stuff was recorded before a lot of the people posting here were even born. This is the kind of stuff that should be in the public domain, if we didn't have ridiculous copyright periods that perpetuate the right to make money from the same content ad infinitum. People who rush out to buy this stuff again just give ammo to the labels demanding ever longer copyrights.
That's because you're too young to be able to see what an effect the Beatles had on music and indeed, society (actually, societies) in general.
Yeah. Now get the fuck off his lawn!
Look where all this talking got us, baby.
Be that that as it may, and maybe I'm A Loser, I just don't Dig It. I Don't Want To Spoil The Party but I Want To Tell You, From Me To You, how I feel. You'd have to be a Madman to deny their impact and they certainly caused something of a Revolution but I've listened to them, Not A Second Time, but a hundredth time, and I'm So Tired of their sound I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Cry. Maybe When I Get Home I'll have another listen and I'll Get Back to liking them. From A Beginning to The End they certainly wrote a lot of songs but that was a Long, Long, Long time ago. But We Can Work It Out. Everyone has their own tastes. You just have to Think For Yourself and Let It Be. The Things We Said Today may not be true in a few years. I could be wrong but, hey, That'll Be The Day!
Anyway, I'll Be On My Way.
Brain surgery - it's not rocket science!
$150 for 40 year old music as degraded-format MP3's is totally worth it. (Abbey Road was released in 1970). Soon it will be super-classic (50 years old) and the Distributors will want $300.00
The fact that the laws allow corporate renumeration still for 40-year-old tunes is almost warrant enough to disregard copyright. We'll likely see it on blueray and the next format and the next. As is it's already seen 7 format releases: Album (78/45/33), 8-Track, Tape, CD, Album (vinyl-again), Rock-Band, MP3s
There are many bands who have excessive catalogs of music - that I just can't be bothered to wade thru. Any band that's survived 20 years has had their label push numerous "Best of" compilations. The same songs will appear again and again, yet each time there will be one or two new tracks.
Perhaps it's just me but considering all that, older CDs/Music are valued (by the owners/distributors) far too highly. If there were offers of "Buy this (new) Album get 1/2/3 previous albums for free, I would think many people including myself would purchase a lot more music.
I certainly can't afford to buy all the music I would want, so instead I buy a handful of albums a year.
There were no downloads then, and LPs are far superior to any lossily compressed music.
Yeah, that's the popular meme. But of course the process of making LPs is lossy, as is recording to magnetic tape. When the music was remastered in the 80s, they tried to boost the low gain frequency bands, which annoyed the LP listeners who like the "warm" sound you get without high frequencies.. But you can always fix that digitally if you want. With appropriate band cuts, and addition of some hiss and pop, you too can make a CD sound like an LP. You might have to add some more band modification and some 60Hz hum to model that 1970s era amplifier and speakers. I'll be surprised if you could tell "lossy" 256kbps MP3 from the CD.
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