“Ladies and Gentlemen! The Beatles!” With only days until the public debut of iTunes Radio as part of the iOS 7 release, Apple has finally brought the Beatles to iTunes Radio.
Since its initial introduction at WWDC in June, users of iTunes Radio would be greeted with an absence of Beatles music, even when creating a specific “Beatles Radio” station. No explanation was given from Apple. Perhaps what’s most interesting here is that from the launch of the iTunes Music Store in 2003 until late 2010, Apple struggled to reach an agreement with Apple Corps to get The Beatles onto the store. This was due to a long series of legal battles with Apple Corps and Apple Inc, stretching back multiple decades. Until this past weekend, it appeared that The Beatles wouldn’t make it onto iTunes Radio either.
Before now, if you created “The Beatles Radio” on iTunes Radio, you would be listening to a selection of 60s and 70s music, some instrumental covers of Beatles hits, and music from solo efforts by the band’s members. Apple apparently hit the switch over the weekend, and the Boys from Liverpool are now all over iTunes Radio, just in time for iOS 7’s debut this Wednesday.
It’s unknown at this time what caused the delay in seeing the Fab Four’s debut on iTunes Radio, however, the group has previously been opposed to appearing on online streaming music services, with only Pandora previously snagging the rights to the legendary group’s music.
