Apple this week appears to have started uploading full “replays” of Beats 1 shows to its Connect social network. Apple Music hosts including Zane Lowe, Julie Adenuga, and Ebro Darden have all shared full, unedited replays of their shows on their respective Connect pages over the past two days.
Along with today’s announcement that Zane Lowe’s first Beats 1 interview will be with Eminem, a New York Times profile on the DJ revealed the titles and hosts for other shows on Apple’s upcoming music streaming service.
As you might expect, Apple’s own Dr. Dre will be hosting a show of his own called “The Pharmacy.” Rapper Drake, who appeared on stage at the Apple Music announcement, will also have a show on the streaming radio service.
Apple is aiming to sign up a massive 100M subscribers for its streaming music service, according to a source cited by the Associated Press (reproduced in the NY Times). This would be more than double the subscriptions for all other streaming music services combined.
The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry says that existing worldwide streaming subscriptions total around 41M across all services. The market leader, Spotify, has around 4.7M subscribers in the USA …
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Last week we noticed that Apple had started seeding Apple Watch review units to the media, and this evening the device is getting more promotion. On popular TV show “The Voice,” coach Pharrell Williams can clearly be seen wearing the Apple Watch. Likewise, Apple CEO Tim Cook is attending the NCCA national championship game with the Apple Watch clearly strapped on his wrist.
After bringing the iTunes Festival to the US earlier this year at Austin SXSW, Apple’s annual music event in London kicking off next week has been the focus of much of the company’s attention recently. Earlier this week, Apple’s newly acquired Beats Music began promoting the iTunes Festival with a contest within the app to attend the festival.
Apple will also use its retail stores to further promote the event with iTunes Festival Pins to be worn by retail employees to “spark conversation about the event,” according to an internal document obtained by 9to5Mac. Retail employees will also receive iTunes Festival wristbands and redemption codes for music. Select Apple Stores will also host “music-related events” with local artists, according to the document.
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Shortly after adding 19 more acts to the line-up for the iTunes Festival running in London throughout September, Apple has now pushed the iTunes Festival channel to Apple TV, ready for live HD streaming once the show begins …
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This morning, Apple announced a new iTunes Festival for the United Kingdom, featuring over sixty bands, for September. The iTunes Festival app has now been updated to relay this information and exhibits the design style and iconography for the 2014 show. Because this is a UK show, the app is only available in the UK iTunes Store.
Currently, the app doesn’t feature much content — simply linking out to the iTunes Store app to enter the raffle for tickets. When the 2014 iTunes Festival starts, the app will stream the gigs alongside other related content. The festival will also be shown on Apple TV.
The app was last updated earlier this year for the corresponding 2014 show in the US.
iTunes Radio has quickly become the best source for unreleased albums by huge artists, and today the service added yet another high-profile artist. Ahead of its highly anticipated release on May 19th, you can now stream Coldplay’s new album Ghost Stories in its entirety on iTunes via its First Play feature.
In the past, iTunes Radio has streamed albums by The Black Keys, Eminem, Pharrell, and Rick Ross, attempting to compete with services like Spotify and Rdio. Neither of those, however, offer any sort of early streaming capabilities like iTunes Radio.