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Retailing

It’s official: this week’s Billboard album sales chart has Kanye West’s “Graduation” in first place, selling a stunning 957,000 copies in its debut week and in the process scoring the 15th highest weekly sales total since 1991 and the biggest debut of the year. As we all know, 50 Cent had threatened to retire if […]

Tags: 50 cent, kanye west, radiohead, spiralfrog

Multiple sources have been reporting over the past few days that shoegaze legends My Bloody Valentine are on the verge of reuniting to tour in 2008. They are expected to kickoff their reunion with an appearance at Coachella, which is scheduled for the weekend of April 25-27, 2008.
A much less interesting return is scheduled for […]

Tags: allofmp3, bloc party, britney spears, dmx, itunes, my bloody valentine

British singer Amy Winehouse has canceled her planned North American tour, which was scheduled to begin next month, “due to the rigors involved in touring.” Why would a young singer be unable to cope with the “rigors” of touring? Peruse any of our previous “Music briefing” posts over the past month or so to find […]

Tags: amy winehouse, babyshambles, bob dylan, reading festival

Universal Music Group announced Thursday that it would experiment over the next six months with selling digital music with no copy protection. Although the DRM-free downloads will be available through a number of online retailers, Apple’s iTunes Music Store will not be one of them.
Speaking of Apple, iPod owners will be able to play a […]

Tags: 50 cent, amy winehouse, apple, dfa, ipod, itunes, kanye west

Marilyn Manson is being sued by former bandmate Madonna Wayne Gacy (known to his parents as Stephen Bier) for failing to share profits in accordance with a 1993 agreement. Gacy believes that Manson was hiding much of the band’s profits from his fellow musicians, and using the money to acquire such items as a skeleton […]

Tags: amy winehouse, brian wilson, danger mouse, jay-z, john cale, lee hazlewood, marilyn manson, paul mccartney, robbie williams, rolling stones, shortwave set, van halen

You know you want this shirt…

Tags: none

In the same week that probably-illegal (but cheap) Russian music download sites allofmp3.com and mp3sparks.com folded, very-legal-but-not-so-cheap American download site iTunes has reached out to the adventurous music-buying public and lowered some of its prices. CMJ is reporting that iTunes is offering albums by certain up-and-coming artists (such as The View, Digitalism, and LCD Soundsystem) […]

Tags: allofmp3, digitalism, itunes, lcd soundsystem, mp3sparks

Not-exactly-legal music download site MP3Sparks.com, which is operated by the same Russian company behind AllOfMP3.com, is no longer operational. Although the latter site was shut down by Russian officials in response to international government and music industry pressure, it is unclear whether MP3Sparks folded due to government pressure or for other reasons (such as a […]

Tags: allofmp3, mp3sparks

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (we know you are big IFPI fans) has released its 2006 sales figures for the music industry, and the good news is that online music sales nearly doubled last year vs. 2005. The 85% increase in online sales brought the total revenues in that category to $2.1 […]

Tags: album sales, downloads, ifpi

Dubiously-legal Russian online music retailer allofmp3.com is no more. In its place: an identical site, located at mp3sparks.com. What’s the deal?
First reported by the UK’s Times Online, the corporate owners of the English-language allofmp3.com, MediaServices, quietly discontinued their service under the old domain and moved it to mp3sparks.com recently in response to criticism from copyright […]

Tags: allofmp3, iomoio, itunes, mp3sparks