Los Angeles — After anxiously awaiting for months, it now appears that Google is finally taking the wraps off its new Google Music Store on November 16, which is said to have a deep integration with its recently introduced social network, Google+, tech sites reported over the weekend.
The Web giant has apparently begun sending out invitations to an event next week that it is dubbed as: “These Go To Eleven”, which will evidently unveil an authorized Google music store.
The invite Google sent out. (Credit: Google)
The “These Go to Eleven” event will occur on Wednesday, Nov. 16 in Los Angeles, according to The Verge tech news site who broke the news, reporting that its sources assert that the event will be the debut of Google Music.
In fact, that is a reference, to the mockumentary “This is Spinal Tap” and its lead guitarist Nigel Tufnel, who had an amplifier with volume knobs that went to 11, which will take place on November 16th.
Google declined the requests for comment.
The Verge site quoting sources who mentioned that the November 16 event for “Google Music” may have music purchasing and a sharing feature for Google+ among its promising new features.
No official information yet on what will be unwrapped, but we hope to see music purchasing included to the service as well as new Google+ sharing service following a glimpse in October of an HTML5-powered music player, it said.
In addition, the Google music store will reportedly be stacked with certified tracks from each of the four major music labels, including EMI, which agreed to join Universal Music Group Friday for approximately $1.9 billion paid to its owner, Citigroup.
According to the sources familiar with the matter quoted as saying that the search engine giant also had been negotiating with the labels, and sources have said that the top labels want Google in the market, but not all of them have been able to reach terms with the company. But it also cited sources who said last month that about a dozen large independent labels have reached agreements with Google.
Previous reports speculate that the service will empower users to buy tracks, just as they can from other online music stores. But Google will add a feature, according to those reports, that will let users give songs to their Google+ friends to listen to one time for free.
Google debuted a beta version of a music service earlier this year. Although, the service did not include the ability to buy songs from labels. Rather, users could upload their entire music libraries to Google’s servers, making those tunes available to stream from any browser or Android-based device, such as a phone, a tablet, or Google TV.
Google has earlier said that only licensed music would be allowed.
“To answer your first question, we make very clear in the terms of service that a user agrees to when signing up for the Google Music that the service is only intended for lawfully acquired music,” Jamie Rosenberg, director of Android product management at Google, said in a press conference in response to a reporter’s question. “And we will respond to requests from labels who feel their rights have been violated.”
However, at present, Google offers limited music downloads via one of its Google Music blogs and offers beta users with 20GB of free storage for its cloud-based MP3 catalog via its Google Music locker service. But the company has been working hard to secure licensing deals with the big four music labels in preparation for its new music store, which will be a direct iTunes competitor and will have to battle other popular services like the Facebook friendly Spotify.