He's had a kooky couple of years, chasing UFO's and growing a beard, but it looks like Robbie Williams is getting back to business with new album "Reality Killed the Video Star".

Available exclusively today to Spotify users before its November 9th release, it's been described as a career "turning point" for Stoke-on-Trent's favourite son.

Spotify users can click here to have a listen.

With The Beatles back-catalogue no closer to being digitally distributed online, Retro To Go have found this bizarre, officially sanctioned Beatles apple available in time for Christmas. The Beatles Stereo USB Apple will have the band's entire back catalogue in casing that will comfortable sit aside a packet of crisps in your lunchbox.

With a Fab-Four themed flash interface the 16GB stick will feature 14 digitally re-mastered albums, mini documentaries, album artwork and CD "visual elements" which will probably be something akin to expanded liner notes.

The tracks themselves will be getting a lossless FLAC 44.1Khz 24 bit format overhaul, and will also be on the USB in 320 kbps MP3.

There are only 30,000 of these limited edition USB Apples available, and at £200 they are sight more expensive than a Granny Smith.

Check The Beatles website for more information.

When word came out on Monday that Microsoft will launch a music streaming service by the end of the month, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek must have slumped in his chair with his head in his hands. Spotify was never going to be the only kid on the block - Ek would've known that - but for their first direct competitor to be the 'Soft is pretty bad luck. There's a lot that Spotify has done right but these are five good reasons why the global immovable object will be too much for music's current irresistible force:

1) Microsoft will have better content

We've all had quite a while to play with Spotify now and I'll challenge anyone not to have had several disapointments at the depth of their music catalogue. They've done a decent job but it just doesn't compare to any other good music service. Have a quick browse around on iTunes, Last.fm and even Nokia Comes With Music and you'll realise what a real music library is all about.

It's all about deals with the record labels and the fact is that Microsoft has a hell of a lot more clout than a Johnny-come-lately start up from Sweden. No offence Mr Ek. You have a fan in me but there's just no comparison.

Gates, Ballmer & Sons will bowl into all the offices of all the music people and walk out with as many tracks as they like and, at the end of the day, why would you bother with both music services as a consumer when one of them has all the tracks you want and the other doesn't?

What's more, there's a very good chance that they'll add video too. Now, that might be a paid for service, much in the same way that you can rent TV and films through BT Vision or the Apple Store, but it might also be free, provided the rest of the model proves financially successful.

2) Microsoft will make the model work

There's quite a few murmurings that Spotify isn't getting all that many people to sign up to the premium paid for service and I'm not hearing and seeing many different adverts on the player an in the music stream either. It all rather points towards the fact that the business model has yet to become fully viable. Now, I'm sure there's a long term plan that we're only seeing the tip of at the moment but those ad spaces now filled with voicemail messages from users aren't wildly encouraging.

The trouble is that Spotify may never get to the point where there business model starts to reap the dividends with Microsoft wading in as soon as they have. If you're an advertiser, where are you going to spend your money? Their profile is just too big and Spotify's only hope here is that Microsoft will be too greedy with their ad price. Still, I can see agencies stumping up the extra cash just to make sure they're getting the right exposure.

Yesterday was a big day for Microsoft. Office 2010 went into trials, they announced a suite of free cloud based applications to rival Google Docs, Zoho et al and the sneaky one that no one was expecting was the launch of a music streaming service to take on Spotify too. I'm surprised they didn't launch their own social networks to go after Twitter and Facebook.

It's not clear, as yet, as to how large the catalogue will be or quite how many ads, if any at all, we'll have to put up with. What has been indicated in an interview with the Telegraph is that you'll also be able to pay to download the tracks, much like 7Digital do for Spotify, and that the service will link in with the Xbox 360.

They'll be more details within days, no doubt, as the service is set to launch by the end of the month. Now, why do I have a nagging feeling that Microsoft are going to throttle the whole operation somehow and actually make it rubbish?

RIM continues on its mission to get down and funky with the consumers by offering some music for people to listen to on their QWERTYful phones. The tunes come courtesy of UK company 7Digital and their catalogue of 6 million tracks which will be available from 79p each on over-the-air download straight to your mobile.

Albums will cost you £7.99 but the frightening words spoken are that "most" of the tracks will be DRM free. Most? Most? When did 7Digital get into the DRM game and why?

The access will be as a downloadable app from the BlackBerry App World after which you'll be able to browse 7Dig's library provided you live in the UK, US, Canada, France, Italy, Germany or Spain.

For a closer inspection of App World, take a look at our app store comparison

BlackBerry App World | 7Digital (via Mobile Ent)

DRM-free is becoming all the rage, as well it should, and today Orange is the latest portal provider to jump on the digital music band wagon. So far they've persuaded EMI, Universal and " a number of independent labels" to offer up their tracks and doubtless the other two majors will follow at some point.

For now, there's 700,000 songs to chose from, which you can download over the air or to your PC, and do with as you will. You'll only pay the once and prices start at an iTunes sounding 79p.

You can start your downloading from today and it'll be interesting to see how this sits alongside services which Orange supports like the DRM-heavy Nokia Comes With Music. Still, always nice to have more options.

Orange (via @recombu)

Michael Jackson has become the first artist to sell over 1 million downloads in a single week obliterating all other acts on the Billboard charts.

A total of 2.6 million tracks by the great man and the Jackson 5 were snapped up in the week ending 28th June and the sadly demised King of Pop cleaned up in the album charts too. The Billboard Comprehenisve Album Chart takes into account both new release and catalogue sales for the week. MJ's albums occupy the top three slots with Thriller at three, Essential Michael Jackson at two and Number Ones, appropritately enough, at number one.

It's the first time a catalogue album has beaten a new release to the top spot. Not bad for a dead guy.

(via the Next Web)