West Ham Kid Nets Record Deal

According to this story in The Sun, a 16-year-old West Ham United prodigy has given up on football to sign a £1million deal with Universal Music to play the saxophone.



There are two things that I found notable here. First, that there is a choice to make between football and another career, given that even top professionals only train for about 3 hours a day. Surely you can fit in another job in the afternoon? I suspect some of Norwich's players have been for years, if their performances are anything to go by.

The second is the name of the record executive - Dickon Stainer. Dickon Stainer! If ever there was a better name for a jazz music record exec, I would love to hear it.

That is all.

SkyTunes vs iTunes

Sky are to step into the world of music downloads in a joint venture with Universal Music.

The satellite TV giant, who have extended into offering Broadband and telephone services as part of their package, will take on Apple's iTunes with a launch later this year, according to Brand Republic.

The monthly subscription model should at least provide a well-known alternative to Apple's iTunes service, which currently dominates the download market.

Universal boast the likes of Amy Winehouse, Girls Aloud, Razorlight, McFly, Kaiser Chiefs and Kanye West on their roster, which gives me a tenuous excuse to embed a Girls Aloud video below.



Incidentally, there is a version of this song, 'I Can't Speak French' which Girls Aloud recorded in French. Surely, logically, the last song of all songs in the world which should be re-recorded in French is a song called 'I Can't Speak French'. Just pointing it out.

McFlying off the shelves

Popular beat combo McFly (I love the phrase popular beat combo) are moving in the direction of Prince and Paul McCartney by giving away their new album with the Mail on Sunday.



While the newspaper's readership may seem far more suited to long-established acts, McFly, who are all in their early twenties and younger than many of their predecessors' biggest hits, recently split from record label Universal to set up their own label, Super Records.

The album, Radio:ACTIVE, will be their first on the new label and will go out with every copy of the newspaper on July 20th. It will differ from Prince's effort, Planet Earth in that it will also be available in 'deluxe' edition to buy through retailers in September. McCartney's Memory Almost Full was only available in Starbucks.