U2 Paul McGuinness Says Radioheads’s ‘In Rainbows’ Backfired: U2 won’t be given an album away for free anytime soon. ‘McGuinness said that U2’s forthcoming new album, which he said is likely to be released in October, would not be released in the style of ‘In Rainbows’. McGuinness said that most fans who downloaded the album did so through illegal means, despite the album being available for a nominal amount legally. “60 to 70 percent of the people who downloaded the record stole it anyway,” he told BBC 6 Music’s Music Week, “even though it was available for free.”

McGuinness said, “We will obviously work with whatever technology is available to make the release of the new record as interesting as possible. “[But] for U2 physical sales are still an enormous part of our business and we still sell a lot of actual CDs.” No one can claim that Radiohead was thrilled with the results…

Trink Is Out: It has been confirmed that Capitol Records President Lee Trink is resigning from the label, and will step down from his position as of Monday, June 30.

Trink said the decision to step down was based on a based on a ‘philosophical difference’ with changes EMI’s new owners were making. Their view is that is no local management says Trink. There is no such thing as a president of Capitol Records going forward. I believe that’s a mistake – and not just because I happen to be the president of Capitol.

Also, Jason Flom could be entitled to a hefty settlement payout according to sources.

Signings: Indie Ambient act, Paper Route, has signed to Low Altitude Records and will be distributed through Fontana. Listen to All We Are Forgotten.

The Charts: Disturbed’s “Indestructible” lands on top of the Billboard charts with 250k in sales. That’s pretty darn good. This has to be one of the biggest opening weeks of the year.

The War on Piracy: Read this article written by Billboard’s Susan Butler titled ‘ Inside the music industry’s piracy battle’. The war isn’t going to be easy, but war is never easy. We are in a land where people feel they are ‘ENTITLED’ to steal music.

Quote Of The Day: I never hear new music in the right context to buy it says new EMI Digital exec.

He also says..

‘When I listen to radio, I’m listening to NPR to catch up on the news. The good local music stores are all gone. When I’m working, I want to hear music I like, so I have a very low threshold for experimentation. Coworker’s iTunes shares provide a hint at something new, but DRM and the hassles of being on the wrong computer – working on a desktop when my music is on my phone and laptop – keep me from jumping onto the iTunes Music Store to make a purchase.’ (Silicon Alley)

By the time you read this column, Lee Trink, the popular and affable president of Capitol Records, will be telling his troops his last day is June 30 says Fox News Columnist Roger Friedman.

Sources tell me Trink’s resignation will be followed in short order by that of Jason Flom, head of Virgin Records. Both labels are part of EMI Music.

And get this: Neither Trink nor Flom will be replaced. Guy Hands and the folks from Terra Firma, the new owners of EMI who have no experience in the record business, don’t believe in label presidents.

Friedman goes onto say that Coldplay, the Beatles, and Katy Perry who currently has the #1 song in the country will be left fending for themselves.

This is the way I am told all the EMI labels will be run. Nick Gatfield is coming in to take over as “president of A&R labels for North America and the U.K.” for all of EMI. But the individual labels will not have presidents. They will have “A&R presidents” and heads of marketing.

Unfortunately, right now there is no marketing chief for Capitol. And now there’s no president.

KOAR can’t confirm these reports, but, If this is truth, it is certainly stranger than fiction….

Canada claims no other country can boast such a successful record in nurturing and exporting female singers, songwriters and performers.

Some females rooted in Canada include Alanis Morissette, Céline Dion, Shania Twain, kd lang, Diana Krall, Alannah Myles, Sarah McLachlan, Jane Siberry, Loreena McKennitt, Martha Wainwright, Peaches, Avril Lavigne and Nelly Furtado.

“What Canada does best is meat-and-potatoes rock- and folk-oriented singer-songwriters says Larry LeBlanc.

So where do Canadian artists draw their inspiration in the midst of this technological soul-less society?

Canadian artists have a small beef with US record industry and feel they have to step it up according to BBC Radio 2 DJ Bob Harris.

“Historically, the US record industry has used smash-and-grab tactics – taking artists like Joni, Shania Twain and Avril Lavigne, then marketing them to the world as American artists,” explains the BBC Radio 2 DJ Bob Harris, a long-term supporter of Canadian artists. “There is a certain degree of resentment, in that Canadian musicians can feel swamped by American culture, so they love to show that they can match it.

Canadian artists may approach writing with more integrity because they know know they can’t sell a million records on their home turf. The label infrastructure is also smaller and the approach is grabbing one fan at a time. Also, radio networks and two industry bodies founded Factor (the Foundation to Assist Canadian Talent on Recordings), a not-for-profit organization loaning money to new artists.

Geography may be influence as well. Many parts of Canada gets rain and snow for a half a year.

“Canadians are instinctively modest and humble, sometimes to our detriment, sometimes to our benefit. We spend a lot of time hiding away in winter and associate ourselves tightly with people.”

“Even in this internet, cable-TV, connected world, girls with poetry in their souls will still retire to their bedrooms to write songs and escape their environment”.

(Times Online)

UK Festivals Suffer Slow Ticket Sales: Glastonbury, the biggest festival, still have plenty tickets available. Some blame the less in demand, Jay-Z, as the headline act. Others believe that people are choosing attend smaller festivals. ‘Most of the largest festivals are controlled by the American promoter Live Nation, which signed up acts including Madonna for $120 million (£60 million) and Jay-Z for $150 million.’

Poor ticket sales forced organizers to pull the plug on Norway’s Quart Festival which featured Death Cab For Cutie. Organizers blamed poor ticket sales and budgetary prblems. (Full read here)

Warner Music Pulls Songs From Last.fm: The website Last.fm, that claims it has 21 million users lost Led Zeppelin songs and hundreds of thousands of other tracks. Warner Brothers wanted more money and Last.FM’s parent company, CBS – was unwilling to pay. Warner was expecting to make more money from the deal but the fees related to the existing free service have been far less than it had hoped. Warner wants a cut of advertising, not just on the music player itself.

AC/DC and Walmart: AC/DC will be the next major band to sell a new album only through Wal-Mart Stores. AC/DC has not released its catalog to iTunes. The Eagles struck a deal with Wal-Mart last year with plenty of success.

Writing the Anti-Download Album: In this day age, music tracks are disposable as bubblegum. The key is writing an all encompassing album that people want to buy. All encompassing means great songs, great artwork and a unifying theme stringing everything together. Coldplay understands this well.

“X&Y was melodic and safe, but too many songs were trying to be anthems says Chris Martin. We still love big choruses but on Viva la Vida, no anthem dominates. The big thing this time was to write a complete and cohesive album. I call it our ‘anti-download’ album, in that there aren’t are two or three songs to dip into. Each song informs the next and they all have their own colour. The guiding principle was: ‘We can’t get any bigger, but we can get better.’

Chris Martin on producer Brian Eno…

We felt Brian was the man to reconnect us. Just listen to the production he has done for Bowie, Talking Heads or U2. I always view our albums in terms of U2 albums. Viva la Vida is our Unforgettable Fire in that it’s less straightforward, more oblique. It’s about sex and death and love and fear and travel and illness. There’s light and there’s dark.

Chris Martin on EMI…

“We delivered the last record late, and there were reports EMI’s share price had fallen because the album wasn’t going to be out in a certain financial quarter. How can I emphasise this? It’s Got Nothing To Do With Me. You can’t put that sort of pressure on a band.

“EMI has been through a lot, but when people are saying ‘the success of the new Coldplay album is vital to EMI’s future’, you just want to curl up and die. (Full article here)