Jay-Z’s ‘4:44’ album makes its way to most streaming services

After a week of Jay-Z’s 4:44 being a Tidal and Sprint exclusive, the new album comes to most major streaming services. We say most as Spotify is missing from the list of services it’s available in. We’re not surprised as the hip-hop mogul pulled his catalog from the service a few months ago. He seems to be in better terms with Apple as 4:44 is available on both iTunes and Apple Music. The album is also available on Google Play Music and Amazon Music. Some of the services even have “The Story of O.J.” animated video.

Source: Engadget

Apple reportedly asking music labels to take smaller revenue cut from Apple Music

Apple is supposedly renegotiating its licensing deals for Apple Music and iTunes with major music labels. Apple is hoping the labels are up for reducing revenue shares from streaming to bring them closer to the rate that Spotify pays labels. The deals with the record labels are said to expire at the end of the month but there’s a likelihood it will be extended if the parties can’t agree on new terms—at least according to the sources of Bloomberg who asked not to be identified since they’re sharing private information.

Streaming has been seen to be a source of hope for the music industry after a decade of decline in this digital age. With the help of the likes of Apple Music and Spotify, the industry grew by 5.9 percent last year worldwide. Under Apple’s existing deal, labels get around 58 percent of revenue from Apple Music subscribers, which is considered a higher cut than other services. But labels are supposedly amenable to the cut, if Apple meets other requirements. Apple overpaid labels to placate those concerned that the streaming service will cannibalize iTunes, which as shown hasn’t quite happened. But labels are still asking for precautions. Apple won’t comment about the report.

Apple redesigns iTunes website, too

The Apple App Store isn’t the only one that’s gotten a new look. Apple has finally updated the iTunes website to make it look more like Apple Music and the iTunes app on Mac and PC. You see larger images this time and more information about the artists. You can now easily listen to song previews, read editors’ notes and artist bios, preview videos, and the like. It can prompt you to either check out the song or album on iTunes or Apple Music app. The site also now promotes Apple Music by giving you an option to start a free trial of their streaming service. And instead of saying it’s an iTunes Preview, it now shows that it’s an Apple Music Preview.

Source: 9to5Mac

Apple original show ‘Planet of the Apps’ premieres on Apple Music

Apple’s first foray into content production has finally made its debut on Apple Music. The first of 10 episodes of Planet of the Apps is now available on Apple Music. The show is hosted by Zane Lowe and features advisors Jessica Alba, Gwyneth Paltrow, Gary Vaynerchuk, and will.i.am. It revolves around different people presenting their app ideas to the panel of advisors. The show is co-produced by Apple and Propagate. The four advisors are executive producers of the show along with Ben Silverman and Howard Owens. Episodes of the show will be available exclusively on Apple Music and will drop every Tuesday evening.

To give you a look at what the show is about, the first episode is available for free on iTunes and planetoftheapps.com.