Buying music from the Catalina Music Store...?

[imrazor]

I just spent about 20 minutes trying to figure out how to buy songs/albums in the Catalina Music Store, and I was completely stumped. I just kept getting offers for a 'free' Apple Music trial. I finally said screw it and went to my Windows PC and bought the album I was looking for in the old/new iTunes Music Store. I was then able to download it on my MacBook Pro.

Have I contracted terminal stupidity? Why is there no obvious way to buy, rather than rent, music in the Music Store? I need actual tracks because I live in a rural area where Internet/cell service is spotty and unreliable. Besides, I already have another streaming service...

 

[Ritsuka]

Did you select "iTunes Store" from Music sidebar, right?

 

[imrazor]

That's right. I then searched for the album I wanted and it came up fine, but there wasn't a "buy" or "$9.99" button anywhere to be found. It was only when I went to the Windows PC that the option to buy came up.

 

[Regbial]

Damn dude... well I'm glad I didn't update to Catalina 😬 (still have to get through a lot of Steam 32 bit games in my backlog... though I wish I could sync my reminders to my phone (I'm on Mojave)... eh)

Best of luck.

 

[imrazor]

Well I figured it out with some help from the official Apple forum. If you look at this screenshot...

I was clicking on iTunes Store at #1, entering the band to search for at #2 and ever so naively assuming that would get me some songs to buy. But it's not that simple. You also have to click iTunes Store at #3 to actually get purchasable results.

That strikes as me as rather odd and unintuitive way to present songs for purchase. I'd think clicking iTunes Store once at #1 would be enough...

 

[DeepIn2U]

@imrazor I believe that's because you, like myself subscribe to Apple Music which is by default. It makes sense since you still have access to the entire Album (and ALL music in their repository) before purchasing it. Glad you resolve this because I first had to enable iTunes Store to be shown (Music > Preferences > General tab).

Tip (for anyone) ... if you subscribe to Apple Music yet want iTunes Store search results over Apple Music ... disable it within Music > Preferences on the Mac.

 

[edubfromktown]

I had the same challenge and eventually the ability to purchase individual tunes and albums reappeared... I did nothing (other than make a few purchases on an older MBP running Mojave in the interim).

 

[imrazor]

@DeepIn2U Actually, I don't have Apple Music. But that's still a great tip to cut down on the confusion. Only fly in the ointment is that search still defaults to "Your Library", which isn't necessarily what I'm looking for. Maybe if there are no results in your own library, it could show Store results?

At least I know how to buy music now. Really felt like an idiot at first...