U2 Manager Discusses $100M 'Songs of Innocence' Marketing Deal and Future Plans With Apple

As part of its iPhone 6 and Apple Watch announcement, Apple featured U2's latest "Songs of Innocence" album, making it the company's biggest album release ever by providing the title to 500 million iTunes customers for free. The album and its lead single "The Miracle (Of Joey Ramone)" are the cornerstone of an upcoming marketing campaign by Apple that is worth an estimated $100 million, although the deal has received some criticism from users who do not wish to have the album added to their iTunes accounts and in some cases automatically downloaded to their devices.

But the deal is a significant one by any measure, and Billboard Magazine sat down with U2's new manager Guy Oseary to talk about the deal and the band's future plans with the Cupertino company.

cook_u2
In the Billboard interview, Oseary shot down criticism that the deal was disruptive to the music industry and detrimental to other artists, arguing that the release is a "big concept" and should serve to inspire other musicians to innovate in their own way.

Well first of all, when music becomes a piece of the conversation at an Apple event, that’s always a good thing. Two is, the power of music and the fact that it can actually be shared with 7 percent of the planet in one push of a button. That’s a pretty big concept. Any sort of innovation may inspire other people to do things that are innovative. We may see someone sitting with another manager, or another band going, "Hey, what can we do that's interesting maybe with our lyrics or our videos or something interactive with the ticketing to our shows?"

Oseary also confirmed that the Apple-U2 deal is a "long-term relationship", with the parties working together to promote innovation in music.

We're working on other things as well with Apple that have to do with how music is heard and innovation, with [iTunes VP of content] Robert Kondrk leading that charge. There’s a lot of things still to come that are really interesting. The band really wants people to engage with albums, they want them to support the art form of artwork and lyrics and video content and just get into their music in a much different way than an MP3 file.

Focusing on the deal itself, Oseary stopped short of confirming that Jimmy Iovine played a role in negotiating the deal, saying only that the Beats co-founder and now Apple employee has long been "a source of support and guidance" for the band. Given Apple's long-standing interest in music and its dominant position that has been threatened in recent years by subscription services, Iovine has been viewed as a key reason for the Apple-Beats deal for his extensive relationships within the music industry.

Related Forum: Mac Apps

Popular Stories

iPhone 17 Pro Lower Logo Feature 1

iPhone 17 Pro Coming Soon With These 14 New Features

Monday June 30, 2025 1:08 pm PDT by
Apple's next-generation iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are less than three months away, and there are plenty of rumors about the devices. Apple is expected to launch the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Air, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max in September this year. Below, we recap key changes rumored for the iPhone 17 Pro models:Aluminum frame: iPhone 17 Pro models are rumored to have an...
Apple Watch Ultra Night Mode Screen

Apple Watch Ultra 3 Launching Later This Year With Two Key Upgrades

Wednesday July 2, 2025 1:13 pm PDT by
The long wait for an Apple Watch Ultra 3 appears to be nearly over, and it is rumored to feature both satellite connectivity and 5G support. Apple Watch Ultra's existing Night Mode In his latest Power On newsletter, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said that the Apple Watch Ultra 3 is on track to launch this year with "significant" new features, including satellite connectivity, which would let you...
iPhone 17 Pro Lower Logo Magsafe

iPhone 17 Pro's New MagSafe Design Revealed in Leaked Photo

Wednesday July 2, 2025 8:37 am PDT by
The upcoming iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are rumored to have a slightly different MagSafe magnet layout compared to existing iPhone models, and a leaked photo has offered a closer look at the supposed new design. The leaker Majin Bu today shared a photo of alleged MagSafe magnet arrays for third-party iPhone 17 Pro cases. On existing iPhone models with MagSafe, the magnets form a...
Wi Fi WiFi General Feature

iOS 26 Adds a Useful New Wi-Fi Feature to Your iPhone

Wednesday July 2, 2025 6:36 am PDT by
iOS 26 and iPadOS 26 add a smaller yet useful Wi-Fi feature to iPhones and iPads. As spotted by Creative Strategies analyst Max Weinbach, sign-in details for captive Wi-Fi networks are now synced across iPhones and iPads running iOS 26 and iPadOS 26. For example, while Weinbach was staying at a Hilton hotel, his iPhone prompted him to fill in Wi-Fi details from his iPad that was already...
iPhone 17 Pro in Hand Feature Lowgo

iPhone 17 Pro Max Battery Capacity Leaked

Thursday July 3, 2025 5:40 am PDT by
The iPhone 17 Pro Max will feature the biggest ever battery in an iPhone, according to the Weibo leaker known as "Instant Digital." In a new post, the leaker listed the battery capacities of the iPhone 11 Pro Max through to the iPhone 16 Pro Max, and added that the iPhone 17 Pro Max will feature a battery capacity of 5,000mAh: iPhone 11 Pro Max: 3,969mAh iPhone 12 Pro Max: 3,687mAh...
iOS 18

Apple Releases Second iOS 18.6 Public Beta

Tuesday July 1, 2025 10:19 am PDT by
Apple today seeded the second betas of upcoming iOS 18.6 and iPadOS 18.6 updates to public beta testers, with the betas coming just a day after Apple provided the betas to developers. Apple has also released a second beta of macOS Sequoia 15.6. Testers who have signed up for beta updates through Apple's beta site can download iOS 18.6 and iPadOS 18.6 from the Settings app on a compatible...
maxresdefault

New MacBook With A18 Pro Chip Spotted in Apple Code

Monday June 30, 2025 8:05 am PDT by
Apple is developing a MacBook with the A18 Pro chip, according to findings in backend code uncovered by MacRumors. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. Earlier today, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reported that Apple is planning to launch a low-cost MacBook powered by an iPhone chip. The machine is expected to feature a 13-inch display, the A18 Pro chip, and color options...

Top Rated Comments

Nunyabinez Avatar
141 months ago
Considering 99% of customers are complaining about having U2's album put on their iTunes and iPhones, I don't think they should be discussing future plans of any kind.

Proving again that 87.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
Score: 46 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Patriot24 Avatar
141 months ago
The deal is fine. Apple should have just set the album to "Free" on the store and let everyone download it as they pleased rather than putting it in "Purchased", which had a lot of undesirable ramifications.

My guess is that they won't do that again.
Score: 31 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Harrycooke Avatar
141 months ago
Considering 99% of customers are complaining about having U2's album put on their iTunes and iPhones, I don't think they should be discussing future plans of any kind.
Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)
HenryDJP Avatar
141 months ago
Yep it's selling so well that they had to force Apple users to have the album on iTunes even if we didn't like it or want it. Really, on my Purchased Songs Apple? :rolleyes:
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
X-X Avatar
141 months ago
I will never forgive Apple for forcing this into my personal Library.

That sets a horrible precedent - next time they push Justin Bieber onto everyones devices because they struck a deal with the label...

Or all of a sudden apps that you don't want show up on your devices, because of a marketing campaign.

NEVER TO THIS AGAIN.

Fire Robert Kondrk immediately!
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)
gugy Avatar
141 months ago
U2 rocks!

Love the new album.
Great marketing strategy by them and Apple.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)