Music may have gone digital, but The Beatles have long been one of the most defiant holdouts. Even in the early days of the online music marketplace, it took them somewhere in the realm of six years to make their songs available for purchase on iTunes.
It was announced today (Wednesday, December 23rd) that on December 24th at 12:01 am local time The Beatles’ music will be available for streaming worldwide via the following services: Apple Music, Deezer, Google Play, Microsoft Groove, Napster/Rhapsody, Amazon Prime Music, Slacker Radio, Spotify and Tidal. (Their catalog was previously available on Pandora.)
The new arrangement covers the Fab Four’s’ entire original U.K. catalog of 13 studio albums, along with the so-called “Red” and “Blue” collections, Past Masters and 1.
One of the biggest music industry stories this year has been about the growth of streaming as a revenue source for record labels. Warner Music Group was the first major label to announce that they received more revenue from streaming than downloads in the second quarter of 2015. Despite eschewing new technology, the iconic band is still a top seller this holiday season, beating bigwigs like Taylor Swift and One Direction in December album sales.
#TheBeatlesStreaming
