Music Ally

Amazon has stealthily launched its MP3 Store in the UK this morning, with some major, major reductions on frontline albums. For example, Take That’s The Circus, which came out this week, is being sold for £3, as are the most recent albums from Kings Of Leon, Coldplay and Girls Aloud.

On an individual track basis, the store has variable pricing, with songs starting at 59p, but other categories for tracks costing 60p-69p, 70p-79p, and over 80p. Albums are more variable, although £6.49 appears to be one popular price point for new albums.

There’s some indie-sized holes in the catalogue at the time of writing – no Oasis apart from the spoken-word Wibbling Rivalry EP, no Arctic Monkeys, a single live track from Franz Ferdinand. Interestingly, the same artists that were missing from Nokia’s Comes With Music when it launched in the UK recently. It’s not like there are no indie artists on the store, but the lack of these big-name UK acts is something that Amazon will want to patch as soon as possible.

However, Amazon’s launch into the UK market is a big deal for the industry, and from our initial tests (our boss Paul Brindley just bought the Take That album) the user experience is very slick indeed, including one-click purchasing for existing Amazon customers.

The launch comes at a great time for digital, too. In the UK, high-street chain Woolworths (which recently went into administration) has 10% of the CD market, while its EUK distribution arm supplies CDs to the likes of Asda, Zavvi and Sainsbury’s. So just at the time when there’s a bottleneck in physical supply, Amazon is weighing into the UK digital market.

We think Apple knew this was coming too – it’s made a bunch of albums available for under £4 today in a limited price promotion, including the likes of Oasis and Fleet Foxes.