Reports on Tuesday have just revealed that negotiations have bogged down between Apple and The Beatles. Paul McCartney is still pushing for the band’s music to be available through Apple’s service and EMI, the band’s former record label, would have to agree to a deal song with Apple, which was set up by The Beatles to manage their body of work.

In March, McCartney agreed to make the group’s catalog of songs available on iTunes for about $400 million, and the deal would include the payment of royalties to McCartney, Ringo Starr and the families of John Lennon and George Harrison. Furthermore, some payments may go to Michael Jackson and to EMI and Sony because of various ownership agreements linked to some of the songs.

Paul McCartney has spoken yesterday at the launch of his new Electric Arguments album, saying that an agreement was yet to be reached between EMI and The Beatles. He told the media: “This is constantly being talked of – we’d like to do it. What happens is, when something’s as big as The Beatles, it’s heavy negotiations.” EMI and the Beatles are unable to secure a deal on terms to release the Beatles full roster of songs to iTunes and other download services. Paul has left EMI in June 2007 in order to release his solo album Memory Almost Full on Starbucks’ Hear Music label.

Apple has long declined to allow Beatles music to be offered over the Web, but an EMI representative told CNET News late Monday that it hopes to have an agreement soon, saying: "We have been working very hard to secure an agreement with Apple Corps to make The Beatles' legendary recording catalog available to fans in digital form.”