UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP LAUNCHES SIX-STRING™ ON APP STORE

Revolutionary New App Enables iPhone and iPod touch Users to Play Along With Their Favorite Songs, Culled From Real Studio Masters

Universal Music Group (UMG), the world’s leading music company, today announced the launch of Six-String™ on the App Store. Six-String is a new iPhone and iPod touch music app that delivers a dynamic guitar experience and includes chart-topping hits culled from real studio masters.

Six-String™ authentically recreates the guitar playing experience using tracks gathered from the real studio masters. So for the first time ever, players are provided with a truly engaging musical experience as they are required to pluck, strum and change chords. And since no experience is required, anyone anywhere can now play the guitar like a pro along with their favorite songs instantly!

SIX-STRING™ comes with 6 chart-topping tracks, but players can easily add songs from the in-app store as they progress. The tracks included are: Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love A Bad Name;” Tom Petty’s “Runnin’ Down A Dream;” Fall Out Boy’s “Thnks Fr Th Mmrs;” Peter Frampton’s “Show Me The Way;” and Orianthi’s “According To You.” It also contains The Scorpions “Raised on Rock,” from their new album, Sting in the Tail, being released on March 23rd, which will be the first time a Scorpions’ recording has been included in any of the music game franchises.

The Six-String App also features more than 20 additional game tracks available for in-app purchase, including songs from 3 Doors Down, Angels and Airwaves, Beck, Dashboard Confessional, G.B.H., Gary Go, Hinder, Hollywood Undead, Kaiser Chiefs, Maroon 5, No Doubt, Papa Roach, Rise Against, Robert Palmer, Sum 41, Wolfmother and many more to come!  In addition, users can purchase the corresponding song, video and ringtone from iTunes through the app where available.

In Six-String™, there are 2 different play modes: Practice Mode or Studio Mode.  Practice Mode lets the player get familiar with a song and Studio mode allow the player to compete, earn points and work up to Six-String’s™ high-score rankings.  Moreover, there will be a contest running through the first month of the game’s release, whereby the person with the highest score on the Six-String™ Hall of Fame leaderboard via the Plus+ Network at exactly 6:00 PM PST on April 6, 2010 will be eligible to win a Fender American Deluxe Stratocaster.”

The app allows users to play each track at three different levels of difficulty.  The sound can be adjusted to hear only the guitar or the guitar against the full master recording. Additionally, the game offers a free, thriving Six-String™ social community (via ‘Plus+ Network’) which adds more excitement and competition to the game, allowing users to challenge each other’s prowess on any song.  In addition, players may choose to post score updates via Facebook, Twitter and email.

The Six-String App is available for $4.99 from the App Store on iPhone and iPod touch or at www.itunes.com/appstore/.

For more info about the Six-String App, go to:

Youtube: www.youtube.com/sixstringapp

Facebook: www.facebook.com/SixStringApp

Twitter: www.twitter.com/SixStringApp

MySpace: www.myspace.com/SixStringApp

About Universal Music Group

Universal Music Group is the world’s leading music company with wholly owned record operations or licensees in 77 countries. Its businesses also include Universal Music Publishing Group, the industry’s leading global music publishing operation.

Universal Music Group’s record labels include A&M/Octone, Decca, Deutsche Grammophon, Disa, Emarcy, Fonovisa, Interscope Geffen A&M Records, Island Def Jam Music Group, Lost Highway Records, Machete Music, MCA Nashville, Mercury Nashville, Mercury Records, Polydor Records, Show Dog–Universal Music, Universal Motown Republic Group, Universal Music Latino and Verve Music Group as well as a multitude of record labels owned or distributed by its record company subsidiaries around the world. The Universal Music Group owns the most extensive catalog of music in the industry, which includes the last 100 years of the world’s most popular artists and their recordings. UMG’s catalog is marketed through two distinct divisions, Universal Music Enterprises (in the U.S.) and Universal Strategic Marketing (outside the U.S.). Universal Music Group also includes eLabs, its new media and technologies division; Bravado, its merchandising company; Twenty-First Artists, its full service management division; and Helter Skelter, its live music agency.

Universal Music Group is a unit of Vivendi, a global media and communications company.

Riff Raters combines the fun of playing and listening to music into one cool app. Riff Raters gives anyone the ability to express their music creatively and get feedback from others. The functionality of the app is very simple… Riff. Record. Rate.  All music lovers welcome, even if you don’t play an instrument you can listen and rate the riffs and help the best ones get to the Top 25.

There are 5 reasons why Riff Raters is a unique app:

1. It is community and participation driven.  We have thousands of users or “riffers” recording riffs into the iPhone/iPod Touch.  The riffers listen and rate each other’s riffs, making comments and interacting with one another.
2. It gives musicians a way to be heard and spread their music.  If you like a riff, you can become a fan of the riffer and link to their website, Facebook page, Twitter and MySpace accounts to listen, purchase or just get to know the riffer.
3. You get notification of new riffs and location of the riffer.  If you are a fan of a riffer, you will be notified if the riffer uploads a new riff.  You can look at a map and see the location of where the riff was created.
4. Riff Raters was on the Apple’s “What’s Hot” list for 2 weeks in December 2009.

Riff Raters is donating 5% of its proceeds to a non-profit music camp for teenagers.

You can find out more about Riff Raters at www.riffraters.com and also in the iTunes store: iTunes Store.

Riff.. Record… Share…

Joy Glenwright

415.279.1379

joy@joyentertainmentllc.com

www.joyentertainmentllc.com

www.riffraters.com

Do you play any instrument and compose your own songs? Do you want keep track of those tunes that you created and usually forget them later? Here is an app for that. SongSketch is from Joao Moreno available for $1.99 in App Store. You can easily record songs that you composed or tunes that you created in this app. It can also annotate them with chords, lyrics and when you created.

This would be a perfect app to keep with you whenever you get inspired to create a tune or song and keep track of them so that you never forget them.

Price: $0.99
Compatible With: iPhone and iPod touch (2^nd generation)
Required OS Version: iPhone OS 3.1.2 or later
Download Link: iTunes

Do you listen to a favorite song or playlist very often? And, are you tired of navigating through iPod app to select and play that song? Here is help for you, in terms of an app. Podcut from Julien Duthe available for $0.99 in App Store.

This app allows you to play your favorite song, albums or playlist with just one click on the app. You can place Podcut app on your iPhone/iPod touch’s home screen then click it once and play your favorite song, album or playlist whenever you feel like listening.

Here are the 3 steps to play with one click.

• Select your song, playlist, or all your library
• Select playback options: repeat; shuffle
• Activate Podcut

Price: $0.99
Compatible With: iPhone and iPod touch
Required OS Version: iPhone OS 3.1.2 or later
Download Link: iTunes

AppleInsider reported latenight yesterday that Apple has reached agreement to buy Lala, the online music store and compact disc trading website company. It has been confirmed by the sources inside Apple.

Confirming earlier reports, sources inside Apple have confirmed that it has indeed acquired music streaming service Lala. The specific terms of the deal have not been released as of Friday evening.

According to reports by the New York Times, Lala had actively sought out Apple after Lala executives concluded that prospects for turning a profit in the short term were slim.

Lala allows its users to stream any song in its 8 million strong song library once, with the option for unlimited streaming at 10 cents per track and 79 cents for permanent MP3 download.

This acquisition would allow Apple to integrate full-song streaming into iTunes and opens up possibilities for Pandora-like streaming radio on anything that can run iTunes, including the iPhone, iPod Touch, and Mac systems.

[via AppleInsider]