What Does Apple's Shutdown of Lala Mean for Streaming Music?

It was announced today that Apple will be shutting down Lala.com by the end of May. When they purchased the music streaming service a few months ago, many speculated that they would use it to jump-start their own cloud-based music service. However, no such announcement has been made as of yet. This leaves us with even fewer streaming options here in the US. We still have Mog.com, Napster and Rhapsody, and Spotify has yet to grace our shores.

If this development means that Apple will soon be rolling the Lala technology into iTunes, this is great news! However, there is also a chance that the opposite is true, and we have just lost another option for free streaming of music. What do you think?

Related articles:
Wired - Apple Kills Lala Music Service
PC World - Apple's Shutdown of Lala Fuel Rumors of Web-based iTunes

Read Write Web - Apple Shuts Down Lala: Here are 5 Alternatives

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Metal Machine Music Revisited

The Quietus has an extremely entertaining and informative interview with Lou Reed regarding his noise masterpiece "Metal Machine Music." It's a must-read! (via New Music Reblog.)

The Quietus.com: Lou Reed Interview: Metal Machine Music Revisited

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Is the iPad a New Musical Instrument?

Below are two videos for iPad drum machine apps. I see great potential for the iPad as a music device, especially for live performance, and here are just two early examples (via iPad Studio Blog.)

I have no doubt we will also soon see more apps for interactive, improvisatory, or algorithmic music-making, and it won't be long before we start to see laptop orchestras using the device with customized software! Say what you will about the closed nature of the device, etc., but I believe that Apple has just created a new musical instrument.

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