2004

Apple has teamed with U2 to create a customized iPod pre-loaded with every one of the Irish rock act’s studio albums. In all, the portable music player will contain more than 400 U2 tracks, including 25 rarities previously only available to subscribers to U2’s official magazine, Propaganda. The device comes in black with a red click wheel and is engraved with band members’ signatures.

In addition, Apple’s iTunes Music Store will in late November make available “The Complete U2,” allowing fans to download the tracks pre-loaded onto the customized iPod in one click. The bundle will sell for $149; the 20GB U2 iPod, which can hold 5,000 songs, will be available in mid-November for $349.

“We want our audience to have a more intimate online relationship with the band, and Apple can help us do that,” says U2 frontman Bono. “With iPod and iTunes, Apple has created a crossroads of art, commerce and technology which feels good for both musicians and fans.”

U2 and Apple had already partnered on an iPod television ad campaign featuring “Vertigo,” the first single from the band’s upcoming Interscope album, “How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb.”

Apple today (Oct. 26) also unveiled the new 40 and 60GB iPod Photo models, which feature a color screen and can store up to 25,000 digital photos and 15,000 songs.

Souce billboard.com.

Veteran British broadcaster John Peel has died while on holiday in Peru, the BBC and the British Embassy said Tuesday

Peel, who discovered dozens of major bands during 40 years as a radio disc jockey, suffered a heart attack Monday night in the ancient Inca city of Cuzco, the BBC said.

Peel, 65, was on holiday with his wife, Sheila.

“John Peel was a broadcasting legend. I am deeply saddened by his death as are all who work at Radio 1,” said BBC spokesman Andy Parfitt.

“John’s influence has towered over the development of popular music for nearly four decades. He will be hugely missed.”

Born John Ravenscroft near Liverpool in 1939, Peel said his life was changed when he was a teenager by hearing Elvis Presley singing “Heartbreak Hotel.”

He moved to Dallas, Texas, where he landed a job as a DJ on WRR radio.

Returning to the UK, Peel became one of the country’s first pirate DJs, who broadcast from ships outside British waters in the 1960s. He joined the BBC in 1967, becoming the longest-serving DJ on BBC Radio 1.

Peel was among the first DJs to play demo tapes by little-known bands –championing acts ranging from Jimi Hendrix to The Smiths, The Fall, Pulp and Northern Irish punks The Undertones.

He was a strong supporter of punk rock in the late 1970s, as well as reggae music. He also promoted hip-hop.

Since 1998, he hosted Radio 4’s “Home Truths” program, a whimsical show about the travails of family life.

Peel is survived by his wife and four children.

Source CNN.com.

As reported on rollingstone.com –

WILCO, the FLAMING LIPS and SLEATER-KINNEY are already set to ring in the New Year with a stellar joint show at New York’s Madison Square Garden..

Independent online music retailer CD Baby has now paid over $10 million
dollars directly to musicians for CDs sold worldwide through their online
store at http://www.cdbaby.com.

CD Baby’s easy consignment system has given every musician access to
worldwide sales and distribution, without having to sign away their music to
a record label.

While record labels are blaming piracy for a lack of sales, music sold
through CD Baby has almost doubled every year for the past six years.

“It’s easier than ever for music fans to find great non-mainstream music,”
says CD Baby founder Derek Sivers. “So what’s reported as a sales decline
for a huge pop star is actually a sales boost for the less-famous but
more-talented musicians of the world. We sell thousands of CDs a day by
artists you’ve never heard, but will love when you do.”

Now, as one of the primary suppliers of music to digital download services
such as Apple iTunes, MSN Music, Napster, Rhapsody, Sony Connect,
MusicMatch, and more, CD Baby is helping artists everywhere get their music
out into even wider distribution.

CD Baby has been a launching pad for later-famous acts such as O.A.R., Jack
Johnson and Gary Jules. Other already-famous artists such as Thomas Dolby, George Clinton, Grant-Lee Phillips, and Beach Boy Al Jardine have chosen to use CD Baby’s unique distribution service to release smaller projects directly to their fans.

CD Baby now represents over 75,000 artists and labels, making them the
largest seller of independent music on the web.

Conor Oberst will release two new albums in January under his Bright Eyes moniker, one a collection of acoustic songs and the other a more rock-oriented affair. “I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning” and “Digital Ash in a Digital Urn” will be issued by Saddle Creek, and preceded by Oct. 26 by the respective singles “Lua” and “Take It Easy.”

The releases will serve as a simultaneous follow-up to 2002’s “Lifted or the Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground,” which reached No. 2 on Billboard’s Heatseekers chart and has sold 174,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

The 10-track “I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning” is described as a “country-tinged melange” that sports guest appearances by Emmylou Harris on three tracks and My Morning Jacket’s Jim James on one other. “Digital Ash” boasts five tracks with Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner.

Additional guest appearances spread across the two sets include the Postal Service’s Jimmy Tamborello, producer Mike Mogis and members of fellow Saddle Creek bands Rilo Kiley, Cursive, Now It’s Overhead and the Faint, among others.

Oberst recently wrapped a run of dates on the Vote for Change tour. A six-date European swing begins Nov. 7 in Stockholm, to be followed next March by a 10-date support slot on R.E.M.’s tour of Australia and New Zealand.

Here is the track list for “I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning”:

“At the Bottom of Everything” (featuring Jim James)
“We Are Nowhere and It’s Now” (featuring Emmylou Harris)
“Old Soul Song (For the New World Order)” (featuring Emmylou Harris)
“Lua”
“Train Under Water”
“First Day of My Life”
“Another Travelin’ Song”
“Landlocked Blues” (featuring Emmylou Harris)
“Poison Oak”
“Road to Joy”

Here is the track list for “Digital Ash in a Digital Urn”:

“Time Code”
“Gold Mine Gutted”
“Arc of Time (Time Code)”
“Down in a Rabbit Hole” (featuring Nick Zinner)
“Take It Easy (Love Nothing)”
“Hit the Switch” (featuring Nick Zinner)
“I Believe in Symmetry” (featuring Nick Zinner)
“Devil in the Details” (featuring Nick Zinner)
“Ship in a Bottle”
“Light Pollution”
“Theme From Pinata”
“Easy/Lucky/Free” (featuring Nick Zinner)

Source billboard.com.

Mos Def will next month return to famed New York jazz nightclub the Blue Note’s Another Side Series, at which he performed last year. The rapper-turned-actor will perform two shows a night Nov. 3-5 backed by an acoustic band featuring Living Colour drummer Will Calhoun and pianist Orrin Evans.

The artist’s musical diversity comes through on his just-released Rawkus/Geffen album “The New Danger,” which debuted this week at No. 5 on The Billboard 200. While there is plenty of hip-hop throughout the set, the Blue Note stand will likely find Mos Def singing and scatting more than rapping.

On the acting front, Mos Def will next be seen in “A Confederacy of Dunces” and “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,” both set to premiere in 2005.

Source billboard.com.