popular thinking

LENNON VIA DIGITAL DOWNLOAD

Capitol, EMI give Web a chance at Lennon’s solo work (Boston Herald)
Imagine all the people who can download John Lennon songs now.
Capitol Records and EMI Music just began offering ”Working Class Hero: The Definitive Lennon,” a new 38-song retrospective of Lennon’s solo work, as a digital download this week through Napster, MSN, Rhapsody and Yahoo! Unlimited.
The rest of his non-Beatles music is slated to turn up online Dec. 6.
”I am very happy that John’s music is now available to a new generation of music fans,” Yoko Ono said in a prepared statement. ”New technology is something he always embraced and this is something he would have loved.”
The Beatles have remained the most important holdout in the conversion from physical retail record sales to online.
”This is a milestone in the sense that some of the crankier parties are coming to terms with technology,” said Newbury Comics chief Mike Dreese.
Dreese, who wrote his thesis on the poetry in John Lennon’s ”Imagine” album and calls the late Beatle ”my working class hero,” believes the music industry is still in the beginning stages of adapting to the online world.
Josh Bernoff, Forrester Research analyst and vice president, said it’s only a matter of time before all music gets sold digitally.
”Any artist who doesn’t buy into that is inviting people to pirate them,” Bernoff said. ”It’s not like this technology needs to be proven.”
Some artists, including the Rolling Stones and Madonna, only recently joined the online music market through exclusive arrangements with Rhapsody and iTunes.
”You have to wonder, if Lennon were alive, whether this would have happened sooner or would have happened later,” Bernoff said.
Nearly 25 years after his murder on Dec. 8, 1980, Lennon’s solo recordings and his work with the Beatles continue to sell strongly. And Paul McCartney is performing to sold-out arenas this fall.
”That’s the beauty of this,” Bernoff said. ”Now here’s another format that they’re going to make millions off of.”
But one online retailer isn’t celebrating this Beatles breakthrough: Apple’s iTunes. The Fab Four’s former record label, also known as Apple, has gone to court in a dispute with the computer company over use of the Apple name in music.
The only Beatles-related content you’ll find on iTunes remains Ringo Starr’s solo work and McCartney’s Live 8 performances, duets with Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson, an NPR interview and audiobooks about the band.