$5 Album Downloads from Amazon
Amazon.com is offering downloads of 100 different albums for just $5 each through the end of July. This is a good deal considering these album downloads usually cost $10 or more. There are albums available from several top artists including Pearl Jam, Kelly Clarkson, Joan Jett & The Blackhearts, Carrie Underwood, Norah Jones, Lenny Kravitz, Beastie Boys, Justin Timberlake, Aerosmith, R.E.M, Miley Cyrus and many more.
Amazon.com is a good alternative to iTunes for music downloads. Many Amazon titles are just $0.99 as compared to $1.29 on iTunes. If you’re an iTunes user, songs downloaded from Amazon will automatically show up in your iTunes library. Amazon downloads can be played on any MP3 player.
Not Much in the iTunes Bargain Bin
On January 6, 2009, Apple announced changes to the pricing structure of their iTunes music service. In their press release, Steve Jobs was quoted as saying “And in April, based on what the music labels charge Apple, songs on iTunes will be available at one of three price points-69 cents, 99 cents and $1.29-with many more songs priced at 69 cents than $1.29.”
The tiered pricing changes went into effect on Tuesday, April 7th. We thought we’d take a look to see if there are truly many more songs priced at 69 cents rather than $1.29. We searched for several musicians from the Milwaukee area on iTunes. The BoDeans, Paul Cebar, Danny Gokey from American Idol, The Gufs, Liberace, The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Willy Porter, and the Violent Femmes all had songs selling for 99 cents. No 69 cent songs. (Note: there were two Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra albums selling for $3.99, which appears to be a really good deal!)
On the home page of the iTunes store they are advertising fifteen Rock songs and twenty five Classic R&B songs for 69 cents each. The lists do contain well known songs such as Blue Suede Shoes by Elvis Presley and Cover Me by Bruce Springsteen. However, the number of songs in the “Bargain Bin” is very limited at this time. Perhaps iTunes users will just need to be patient and over time Apple will hold true to Steve Jobs’ statement. After all, Apple will need to please their customer base of well over 50 million people in order to maintain their title as the largest music retailer in the US.
Also, yesterday Consumer Reports wrote that Amazon.com followed Apple and raised the price of their top hit songs to $1.29.