The boss of Starbucks' recently stepped up music operation Hear Music told Music Week's MusicMeetsBrands conference yesterday that he had been in discussions with Prince about them releasing the singer's new album 'Planet Earth' before he signed a global deal with SonyBMG and that controversial UK deal with the Mail On Sunday. According to Music Week, Ken Lombard said Prince was just the sort of artist his coffee-shop-chain aided music operation would look to work with in the future - before adding that his company's next big artist deal would be announced in the next few weeks. On the Mail On Sunday cover-mount, still a big talking point among record industry types, Lombard said he thought Prince's decision to release his album that way in the UK was "unfortunate", adding: "I think it really shows that there's a lot of challenges going on in the industry. However, there really needs to be a balance between something that's fair to the artists but fair to the label as well".
For EMI UK chief Tony Wadsworth, of course, Lombard's HearMusic is probably a bigger threat than the Mail On Sunday. EMI, after all, did its own deal with MoS with the cover-mount release of 'Tubular Bells', while HearMusic stole away Paul McCartney from the major's Parlophone division. He also gave a talk at MusicMeetsBrands, and while he acknowledged the success Starbucks had had with the recent McCartney release, he questioned the long term value the coffee giant could offer artists. According to Music Week, Wadsworth said: "The experience that he's [Macca] had there was probably a good one. It was a much-talked-about album. My question would be, will the same sort of fanfare that was attracted from being the first be attracted the next time?"