Rolling Stones dig up rare songs for Starbucks CD
Wed Oct 26, 2005 01:31 AM ET
(adds new info, quotes paras 3-4 and final paragraph)
By Dean Goodman

LOS ANGELES, Oct 25 (Reuters) - The Rolling Stones will release an album of rare tracks next month in partnership with coffee retailer Starbucks Corp. (SBUX.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and the group's Virgin Records label, the partners said on Tuesday.

"Rarities 1971-2003" will be released simultaneously on Nov. 22 both in Starbucks-owned outlets and in traditional music stores across the United States and Canada.

Virgin, a unit of Britain's EMI Group Plc. (EMI.L: Quote, Profile, Research) , will handle the foreign release by itself.

Starbucks was involved in the manufacturing, distribution and marketing of "Rarities," but Starbucks Entertainment president Ken Lombard declined to offer financial specifics.

"We felt this was an exciting project and a perfect fit for what we're trying to provide to our customers," he said in an interview.

The non-exclusive deal differs from recent controversial arrangements Starbucks has had with other major artists.

Pop singer Alanis Morissette allowed Starbucks to sell her latest album six weeks before everyone else, resulting in the HMV chain in her native Canada pulling her other albums off its racks in protest.

The Stones, currently on a tour of North America, suffered a similar fate from some retailers in 2003 when they gave electronics chain Best Buy Co. Inc. (BBY.N: Quote, Profile, Research) an exclusive sales window for a DVD package.

Starbucks has enjoyed its biggest success with Ray Charles' Grammy-winning posthumous album "Genius Loves Company," which was a non-exclusive release.

The album has sold about 3.1 million copies in the United States with Starbucks accounting for about 730,000 copies, according to Charles' Concord Records label.

Additionally, Starbucks sold 75,000 copies of a holiday package that included the CD.

Not a bad business move this time by the Stones and Virgin (shock!)

HMV in Canada have also stopped selling Dylan albums in a fit of pique because Starbucks got the exclusive licence to sell his "Gaslight" CD (yet here in the UK, Dylan was 'artist of the month' in HMV stores and you couldnt walk more than a few yards in them without some special offer or sale on Bob items..)

>All things have a value in the commercial world. Even Bob Dylan charge money for his records. By the way he even sold out to Starbucks.


>Bjornulf

Not only Dylan. Even the Stones sold out now!!

Stones team up with Starbucks


NEW YORK (AP) - Coffee giant Starbucks and Virgin Records are co-releasing a CD of rare Rolling Stones remixes, B-sides and hard-to-find live recordings from the past 30 years, the band announced on its website Wednesday.

Rarities: 1971-2003 is to be released in Starbucks stores and in other retail stores in the United States and Canada on Nov. 22, according to the statement.

The coffee company's music arm, Starbucks Hear Music, worked with the record label and the veteran British rockers to comb through the band's extensive archives.

Among the tracks are a cover of Chuck Berry's Let it Rock, originally released as a B-side to the 1971 single Brown Sugar, and alternate takes of several of the band's biggest hits, including live versions of Tumbling Dice, Wild Horses and Beast of Burden, and a dance remix of Miss You.

"With every studio session, there are always songs that never appear on the final album and at the time you think, what a shame that song did not make it," Stones frontman Mick Jagger said in the statement. "Rarities is a collection of the best of these overlooked bits along with some rarely heard live recordings pulled together into a CD that offers a blend of original material and some of our favourite cover songs."

"When you listen to Rarities, you can hear that there is definitely some basic thread that runs through everything we've done since we were 19," Stones guitarist Keith Richards said in the statement. "Half of it is a feeling, and half of it is just the style we developed. That consistent feel comes through in the classic recordings on Rarities."

The 16-track CD also includes liner notes that include old photos and quotes from the band about the significance of each song.

"you're a starbucker, starbucker, starbucker, starbucker, starharharhar"!!!

That's great, LK. You know the original sheet music had "Starbucker" on it!!!! What a hoot!

If the Stones would only do this and release some cool stuff like Dylan did. Somehow the Stones can't manage to these sort of things right.. Live cds, greatest hits compilations and now ratities albums.

If the Stones would only do this and release some cool stuff like Dylan did. Somehow the Stones can't manage to these sort of things right.. Live cds, greatest hits compilations and now rarities albums.

I couldn't find the Dylan CD in NY Starbucks but found it in the Albany store so perhaps not every shop will stock it.

Will Starbucks be serving goat's head soup with their coffee/cd special?

No but you will recieve a free jar of vaseline for the hosing you just took in buying it .