Paul McCartney has no positive digital news for fans: The Beatles’ back catalog will not be available on iTunes anytime soon, he recently revealed in London.

Former Beatle Paul McCartney was in London Monday talking with the press at the launch of his new album, “Electric Arguments,” released via side project The Fireman, when he touched on the subject of the Fab Four’s music catalog making its way on Apple Inc.’s iTunes Store – which apparently will not happen anytime soon.

McCartney said that Apple Corp. and the band’s label EMI could not reach an agreement regarding the release of The Beatles’ catalog to iTunes and other download services, describing the process as “heavy negotiations,” reports Reuters.

The 64-year-old musician said EMI executives had asked for something “we’re not prepared to give them” and that the “sticking points” existent in the situation are hindering the process. The musician added The Beatles – he and the other surviving member Ringo Starr, as well as the widows of George Harrison and John Lennon – very much want to have their music available for download.

McCartney left EMI last year to release a new album, “Memory Almost Full,” on Starbucks’ Hear Music label and confessed Monday he was glad of his move, in retrospective, as EMI was taken over by Terra Firma in August 2007 and he would have found himself in the middle of “a sale situation.”

The Fireman is Paul McCartney’s collaboration with Youth; the duo has released two albums of electronic music, “Strawberries Oceans Ships Forest” in 1993 and “Rushes” in 1998. This is the first album to include vocals, the majority belonging to McCartney. “Arguments” is released via independent label One Little Indian in the UK.

A long-running trademark dispute between Apple Corps. and Apple Inc. was resolved last year; furthermore, Apple Corps. is currently working with MTV’s Harmonix to develop a videogame with Beatles tunes, in the vein of Rock Band. There is still hope for the Fab Four’s songs to be available for digital download within this decade.