An excerpt from U2 vocalist Bono’s biography had him admitting sole responsibility for the ill-fated iTunes record giveaway of 2014.
Apple’s offer of a free copy of the U2 album “Songs of Innocence” was widely regarded as a big misstep for the music-streaming service, prompting Apple to issue instructions for removing the item from user libraries.
The rock leader describes discussions between the band and Apple officials in 2014 in excerpts from his memoir “Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story” published in The Guardian. During the discussion, Bono chatted with manager Guy Oseary, Eddy Cue, Phil Schiller, and Tim Cook, with the notion of a giveaway coming from Bono’s side of the table.
“You want to give this music away free? But the whole point of what we’re trying to do at Apple is to not give away music free. The point is to make sure musicians get paid,” Bono was told.
Instead, Bono asked that Apple pay U2, giving it out as a gift. “Wouldn’t that be wonderful?” he added. When questioned by Cook, Bono equated it to “Netflix buys the movie and gives it away to subscribers.”
“But we’re not a subscription organization,” Cook fired back, before Bono offered “Not yet. Let ours be the first.”
Cook was allegedly still doubtful of the bargain and inquired whether it was just available to U2 fans. “I think we should give it out to everyone,” Bono suggested, “since it’s their option whether or not they want to listen to it.”
Bono accepts full responsibility for the album’s reception. “Not Guy O, not Edge, not Adam, not Larry, not Tim Cook, not Eddy Cue.” Bono believed that if the music was made available for listening, people “might choose to reach out toward it.”
Bono previously apologized for the event, which resulted in automatic album downloads for millions of customers, in the weeks following its occurrence.
“At first I thought this was just an internet squall. We were Santa Claus and we’d knocked a few bricks out as we went down the chimney with our bag of songs,” he offers. “But quite quickly we realized we’d bumped into a serious discussion about the access of big tech to our lives.”
Following that, Bono takes a time to compliment Cook on his deeds. “You talked us into an experiment,” the CEO told the rocker.
Bono then mentions Cook’s “probably instinctively conservative” leadership approach, and how, while he wanted to attempt to address an issue, he was also willing to accept responsibility.
The excerpt also mentions another Apple CEO contact 10 years before, when Bono and Edge paid a visit to Steve Jobs with Jimmy Iovine. While U2 never made ads, it was suggested that the band would be a natural fit for Apple’s advertising style at the time.
Jobs did not believe Apple had the pay budget that such a band would demand. Bono responded that they merely wanted to be in the commercial, but while they weren’t seeking for money, they proposed a “symbolic amount” of Apple shares, which Jobs labeled a “dealbreaker.”
A customized U2 iPod in black and red was proposed as an option, but Jobs said “You wouldn’t want a black one. I can show you what it would look like, but you will not like it.”
After the band saw the initial iteration and approved of it, design head Jony Ive was called to look at the device’s design a second time. The special edition iPod in red and black was eventually made available to the public.