By Chris Scott Barr

For years people have been predicting that The Beatles would finally make their way onto the iTunes store. Fans collectively held their breath when Apple announced a press conference on 9/9/09, the same day that the remastered collection of tunes was to be released on CD. Unfortunately it seems that the two still haven’t gotten over that fruit-based trademark issue. Well if you’re wanting your digital Beatles fix, there is a different way to go about it.

The entire remastered collection is being released digitally on a limited edition apple. No, it’s not a real apple (though it does look rather tasty), but a 16GB flash drive. It includes the exact same songs as the CD collection, but encoded in FLAC to achieve the best sound quality possible. They’ve also included 320Kbps versions of each song. Why? Because lossless music can take up a good bit of room on your portable media player. The flash drive will be limited to a run of 30,000 and will set you back $280. Strangely enough, it will be released on December 8th, which Beatles fans will recognize as the day John Lennon passed away.

[ The Beatles ] VIA [ CrunchGear ]

By Chris Scott Barr

New album releases aren’t usually something we cover here at OhGizmo, but this one is a bit of an exception. If you’re a huge AC/DC fan, then you’re probably excited for their new Backtracks release. In case you’re not familiar, it includes 3 CDs and a pair of DVDs that feature rare tracks from the band, along with a 12-inch vinyl LP, 164-page book and some other cool memorabilia. That might seem pretty interesting, but the case is what we’re here to talk about.

The box that holds all of the aforementioned items is made to look like a guitar amp. However, when examined closer, you’ll find that it is in fact, a real amp. Granted, it’s a measly 1-watt amplifier, but it’s still very cool nonetheless. The box set will run you $199 and no, it doesn’t go to 11.

[ AC/DC ] VIA [ Dvice ]

By Chris Scott Barr

Being the geek that I am, I have computers scattered all through my house. It’s something that people tend to notice when they come over for the first time, not because they’re ugly and out of place, just that there seems to be a lot of them. A couple of them are used almost primarily for playing music, namely the ones in my kitchen or garage. Usually I’ll either have them playing music from my iTunes, or Pandora. If you’re not familiar with Pandora, I highly suggest checking it out. Essentially it’s free internet radio. You can create stations with the exact artists and genres that you want.

I little while ago I learned of the Livio Radio, which allows you to play music from your Pandora stations without a PC. I was given the opportunity to review one, so I could find out if this was really as awesome as it sounded. Hit the jump for my thoughts.

Features

The Livio isn’t exactly packed full of features, mostly because it doesn’t really need them. It picks one thing and sticks to it. It streams your Pandora stations either via Wi-Fi, or an ethernet cable (included). You can browse through your Pandora stations, and use the “Thumb-up” or “Thumb-down” buttons just like you would on your PC. A headphone jack is located on the front along with aux in and out on the rear.

First Look

This is probably one of the most simplistic radios I’ve seen in a while. They were going with the old adage “less is more.” On the front you’ll find a rather large speaker, an LCD screen, large knob, six buttons and a headphone jack. On the rear you’ll find the auxiliary in and out ports, an ethernet jack and a spot for the power cord. There’s really nothing else to be seen.

Setup

At no point do you ever connect the Livio Radio to your computer, which would make you think that setup could be a little difficult. In all honesty, it really isn’t. You do have to use your computer to go to the registration page, which will eventually program your Livio for you. You do have to spend a bit of time either turning the knob or poking buttons on the remote when you’re setting things like the WEP key for your wireless network. It can be a little annoying, but it’s over rather quickly. Once finished, you’ll have access to all of your Pandora stations, or you can make new ones if you’re new to the service.

Ease Of Use

Once you’ve setup the Livio, it is easy as pie to use. You just hit the power button, select the station that you want, and it starts playing your music. You can skip songs and use the thumb-up or thumb-down button when you so desire. Changing stations is also only a few clicks away.

Sound Quality

Having only a single speaker definitely has its drawbacks. The quality isn’t bad, but it isn’t going to blow you away either. If you’re just listening to it in the kitchen, or other smaller room you’ll enjoy it just fine. Thankfully they included an auxiliary output so that you can hook it up to a larger set of speakers when you need some extra power.

Other Thoughts

I noticed that if you left the device powered off for a while, it would occasionally lose the time. On more than one occasion I noticed that it was off by a few hours. It pulls its time from the internet, so simply turning it back on fixed the issue.

Verdict

Overall, I love the Livio Radio. It is a simple device that looks good in just about any room and pumps out my Pandora stations. I don’t need any fancy wires, and I don’t have to mess with using my iPhone to output music (Since all but one of my docks requires me to put it in Airplane Mode). The audio could be better, but you can always hook it into your home theater if you want. The $199 price is a bit steep, but if you’ve got the cash and love music, it’s worth it.

[ Livio ]

It’s hard to find someone that doesn’t appreciate The Beatles. Many would argue that they are the greatest band of all time, and though I might put Led Zeppelin right there with them, I’d have to agree. These four guys changed the world of music as we know it, and now they’re finally coming to Rock Band.

I was able to score a little face time with some of the Harmonix crew to get a hands-on look at the latest iteration of Rock Band, which is dedicated to The Beatles. The Harmonix guys played a 3 song set which showed off a couple of the historic venues, as well as one custom venue for Back in the USSR. The graphics for the game look great, with each of the band members looking just as good as you would hope.

Gameplay is mostly the same, with a few changes. The biggest of these is that you can now have up to 3 people on vocals at the same time. This opens up two and three-part harmonies, which really add some depth to the game, which also creates another dimension for scoring. Another minor tweak is that the “No Fail Mode” can be easily turned on when you’re selecting band members, instead of digging through submenus in the main game screen. Also, any player who selects “Easy” mode will automatically be set to “No Fail.” They’re doing this because they expect new people to be picking up the game, and it will remove some of the intimidation factor, allowing them to just enjoy the game.

After the mini-performance I got to get up and play with the instruments, which were just as solid as the previous ones. Personally, I think the new guitars are a little more comfortable, and the buttons were more springy and responsive. The Beatles: Rock Band will be hitting stores on 09/09/09, with extra DLC like Abbey Road and more hitting soon afterwards.

By Evan Ackerman

We covered Ben Lewry’s LCD guitar back in 2007 when it was a prototype, but here at Maker Faire we got to check out the latest version in person. The “LCDetar” took him 3 months to build at a cost of about $5000; it comes with a Wiimote built into the headstock that communicates with the visualizer built into the body of the guitar so that you can alter the patterns with a thrash or two:

Each guitar is a custom job, but you can contact Ben Lewry at Visionary Instruments for more info.

[ Visionary Instruments LCDetar ]

By Chris Scott Barr

There’s no denying that iTunes is one of the more popular music players out there. This of course makes things easy for iPhone users such as myself, since there’s no real hassle when importing your tracks. Unfortunately the iPhone is really the only phone that plays nice with Apple’s music player. (Yes, I’m choosing to ignore the very existence of the motoROKR, and for good reason)

Well we know that Palm is trying to edge into some of Apple’s market share with the Pre, and it seems that they’ve found one place to hit them. It seems that the Pre will in fact sync iTunes straight out of the box. For those on the fence, this could be something to push them towards Palm’s flagship phone. The only downside is that you won’t have access to music purchased through the Apple Music that’s still infested with DRM (which shouldn’t be an issue for music purchased now, as it is DRM-free).

VIA [ Fortune ]

By Chris Scott Barr

I love the power of press. If something gets enough coverage (positive or negative) then something usually comes out of it. Remember that Nine Inch Nails iPhone app that was denied earlier this week by Apple? Well we weren’t the only place to cover the story; in fact, it spread like wildfire throughout the internet. It was a perfect example of everything that’s wrong with the App Store approval process. Well it’s only been a few days, and change has come.

Apparently all of the negative press lead to Apple taking a second look at the app. For whatever reason, this time they decided that everything was peachy and gave it their stamp of approval. It’s just sad that it takes this much bad publicity for Apple to approve an app that had nothing wrong with it in the first place.

[ Twitter ] VIA [ Engadget ]

By Chris Scott Barr

If you live in a small apartment or even a dorm, you know just how valuable every square inch of space can be. If you’re also a musician, you might have a hard time finding room for all of your equipment. Well here is a simple device that will give you somewhere to keep your guitar that’s out of the way.

Guitars can be a bit awkward to store since they are bulky, and even in a case they make it hard to store other items around them. Well if you’ve got a little space free on your coat rack, then you might check out this Guitar Hanger. Now your guitar takes up little more room than a winter coat. Of course you’ll need to make sure that the bar is sturdy before you go dropping a Les Paul or two on there. Try as I might, I couldn’t find a price for one of these. Surely we’re not talking more than $20 or so.

[ TheGuitarHanger ] VIA [ BoingBoing ]

By Chris Scott Barr

Not long ago I warned you that Apple might finally be caving in to the record labels by hiking the prices of some of their new tunes. Unfortunately it appears that I was correct, if you hit up some new tracks in iTunes, you’ll find the new $1.29 price tag staring back at you. But it isn’t actually all bad news.

Before the changes, there were two types of music available. You had your regular stuff, and iTunes Plus. The ‘Plus’ tracks used 256 kbps AAC encoding and were DRM-free. You paid an extra thirty cents for these bonus features, which added up to $1.29. Now all of your music, even the $0.99 stuff, is higher-quality and DRM-free. As for your old tunes that you previously purchased, you can go ahead and convert those to the better versions for free.

As we stated before, the price of your track is determined by how popular it is. There are three tiers; $0.69, $0.99 and $1.29. The more popular the track, the higher price bracket. To be honest, I’m really a lot less upset about this change than I thought I would be. People have been turning to Amazon because they offer 256 kbps DRM-free tracks at $0.99, but now Apple has leveled the playing field. And for those wondering, Apple isn’t the only one raising prices on new tracks. A quick look around the Amazon site showed some new tracks with a $1.29 price as well.

Update: Looks like you’re still going to have to pay that $0.30 charge to upgrade your old music to iTunes Plus.

VIA [ Apple ]

By Chris Scott Barr

It’s hard to disagree with anyone that says iTunes forever changed the way we buy music. Their simple $.99 per song pricing made it cheaper than ever to buy just the songs you like. It didn’t matter if the song was brand new or three decades old, $.99 was the price. Unfortunately starting next month that will no longer be the case. If you’re looking for a current chart-topper, expect to pay a premium.

According to sources, Apple has begun telling record labels that on April 7 they will introduce the new $1.29 premium price for popular tracks. This has been discussed off and on for some time, but this is the first we’ve heard of a date for the new pricing.

I won’t pretend to know all of the inner-workings of the record industry, but I’m pretty sure their business model is to bend potential customers over a table and attempt to extract cash rectally. I mean, it’s not like we’re going through a recession or anything. Oh well, looks like we’re just going to have to listen to music the old-fashioned way. Speaking of which, I believe we can look forward to a ruling on the big RIAA vs ThePirateBay case just 10 days after this new pricing scheme goes public.

VIA [ GearFuse ]