Paul McCartney Talks iTunes, Apple


An interview with Paul McCartney at the Chicago Tribune [free registration required, Google cache here] touches on Apple, Steve Jobs and digital music.

McCartney says "'I've known [Apple founder] Steve Jobs for a little while, and he's a hands-on guy who I can talk to. Strangely enough, that's not always the case. I often met layers of secretaries before I could talk to the guy in charge at my old label. If I call Steve Jobs, I get Steve, and you talk like guys, like a couple of people. That element was great. They became interested in me doing a commercial for the Apple thing. All I had to do was sing the first track of my album. That was more like a music deal than a commercial for me. I didn't have to say, "And I believe in iTunes and Apple, and the iPod is the greatest invention ever." I didn't have to do any of that. So that suited me."

In the interview, McCartney claims he's not an audiophile and disses iPod earbuds. He says he prefers to listen to music on the radio or in the ca

Steve Jobs is well-known Beatles fan from way back and the individual Beatles' solo catalogs are all available on iTunes. McCartney indicated recently that the Beatles' songs would all appear on iTunes (whether exclusively or not is unknown) next year. The delay appears to have had less to do with the Apple Corps v. Apple Computer Inc. lawsuit from a couple of years back, than the time it has taken to digitally remaster the Beatles' catalog. It is also unknown whether the tracks will be available DRM-free.

The former Beatle also sees digital music as artists 'taking back control'. McCartney (and the rest of the Beatles) famously lost the publishing rights to most their catalog, with the bulk of the publishing rights going to Michael Jackson in the mid-1980s in the multi-million dollar sale. McCartney has managed to reacquire the rights to a few of the early Beatles' songs in the meantime.