music

As was widely speculated, at WWDC 2013 today Apple unveiled iTunes Radio, its entry into the already-crowded streaming-music field.

Like the popular streaming-music service Pandora, iTunes Radio lets you create personalized radio stations based on one or more artists, albums, songs, or genres of your choice. This makes it an attractive alternative to your iTunes library if you're looking to discover new music. And if you are already using iTunes or the built-in Music app on iOS as your media player of choice, then jumping onto iTunes Radio is almost a no-brainer, since it will come built into these … Read more

After more than a year of negotiations with the music labels and publishers, Apple Monday unveiled its much-talked about free, streaming radio service -- called iTunes Radio -- at WWDC in San Francisco.

"It is the best music player we have ever done," said Apple iTunes chief Eddy Cue, who showed off the product.

Apple's product aims most squarely at Pandora, which has more than 70 million active monthly listeners but is available only in the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand. iTunes Radio will launch in the U.S. this Fall, but Cue said it will roll out in other countries soon after. … Read more

Tunebash combines many of the most popular features from other music discovery and curation apps to create a fun, easy-to-use music-social experience on your iOS device. Tunebash offers a range of different options from music matching to finding new playlists and sharing them with friends.

The basic interface for Tunebash is well designed, and when you first open it you will be presented with a short, onscreen tutorial that shows you exactly what each button does. Even without this tutorial, the app is easy to use and responsive, connecting you with fellow Tunebash users, either with their own accounts or … Read more

Great-sounding albums are becoming increasingly rare, so when I find noteworthy efforts I'm happy to share the news. The goal is highlighting new stuff -- or at least newly recorded/remastered music, and this time I'm going to make separate digital and analog lists. This one covers digital standouts on CD and SACD; next weekend I'll cover LPs.

The list is based on music that I played at home, so I'm sure I've missed some great albums. Share your finds in the comments section.

Doug MacLeod, "There's a Time" (CD)

Bluesman MacLeod … Read more

The Pirate Cinema chaotically visualizes the most popular video torrent files found on The Pirate Bay in a mesmerizing and sometimes visually overwhelming way.

Created by artist Nicolas Maigretto and programmed by Brendan Howell, the cinematic collage involves a custom-programmed box that intercepts real-time peer-to-peer file sharing among the top 100 torrent files (on The Pirate Bay) and projects flashes of the actively downloaded video content on one of three screens.… Read more

At this point, Apple is all but certain to unveil iRadio -- or whatever it calls its Internet radio service -- at Monday's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.

Early Friday, Apple reached a deal with Sony Music, the last of the three major labels it needed to sign up, according to people familiar with the deals. And now Apple has also signed up Sony/ATV/ That deal, first reported by Billboard, was confirmed to CNET by a Sony/ATV spokesperson.

An Apple spokesman declined to comment.

Sony/ATV, the world's largest publishing house, is jointly owned by … Read more

After more than year of off-and-on negotiations, Apple has now reached deals with all three major music labels, making it increasingly likely that Apple will unveil its free Internet radio service at next week's WWDC event.

The latest deal is with Sony Music, according to industry sources who said the two sides struck a deal Friday morning. Sony had been the lone holdout of the three major music labels, haggling over some details that frustrated execs at the other labels. The world's largest label, Universal Music, was the first to sign on, followed by Warner Music and its publishing arm, Warner/Chappell. … Read more

Maybe I'm a creature of habit, but in spite of all the great new streaming-music services out there, I still find myself settling back into my love of Pandora. It's just a solid service that demands none of my attention and best of all, none of my money.

And while Pandora may be an old dog compared with the whelps of Spotify, Rdio, and Twitter Music, it actually has includes a number of ways to share your favorite music on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter.

To see how it's done, watch the video tutorial above. … Read more

Apple struck a licensing deal Sunday with both Warner Music Group and its publishing arm, Warner Chappell, bringing Apple's free Internet radio product that much closer to launching, according to sources familiar with the negotiations.

The deal suggests that Apple is working hard to unveil what's been dubbed iRadio at its Worldwide Developers Conference, which begins June 10.

Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr declined to comment.

Warner is the first of the major labels to reach deals for both recorded music and publishing, sources say.

Apple last month reached a deal to license music from Universal Music, the world'… Read more