Another veteran musician joins Starbucks record label

In two months time, another musician will join Paul McCartney on Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX) Hear Music record label. Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell is set to release her first album of new material in five years, Shine, through the coffee chain's label on September 25. Mitchell is poised to return to the music world following the success of a compilation album through Starbucks in 2005.

In the meantime, McCartney's album with Hear Music, Memory Almost Full, has sold nearly 500,000 copies less than two months after its release. Starbucks Entertainment Ken Lombard told Billboard.biz that the company intends to make Mitchell's album as successful by generating similar levels of excitement for the album. Lombard also noted that Joni Mitchell contacted Hear Music about the release following the success she had seen with her own compilations. The executive was enthusiastic that Mitchell fans will see "the return of her as a storyteller."

If Starbucks can maintain the level of excitement before the album is released, and duplicate the experience of walking into a Starbucks and hearing the album on September 25, the coffee chain will certainly keep their end of the deal. McCartney's new album enjoyed so much success that any duplication of the efforts for it would seem to be profitable. It's hard to say what will happen in two months, but Starbucks seems to be getting the music industry right with Hear Music, while the "record industry" faces much uncertainty.