U2 announces new album -- and it’s already in your iTunes

While the rest of the world was imagining the prospect of buying an even bigger iPhone that can pay for things, U2 released a new album.

And if you use iTunes, you probably already own it.

The Irish rock superstars tried a new promotional gambit for “Songs of Innocence” as part of Apple’s ballyhooed new-product announcement event. The company has pre-posted the album, the band’s first since 2009’s “No Line on the Horizon,” into the iTunes libraries of 500 million worldwide users.

Apple didn’t place the files directly onto their hard drives or phones. The album listing will show up in their Albums and Purchased folders in iTunes and in the Music app on their iPhones. It’s available to stream or download with one click in iCloud until Oct. 13 (instructions to find it in your library are here).

The album was produced by Danger Mouse, with contributions from Adele’s producer Paul Epworth, Ryan Tedder and Flood, among others. It’s slated for a physical release on Interscope Records on Oct. 14. It’s the latest in a decade-long collaboration between Apple and U2, whose track “Vertigo” soundtracked one of the original iPod commercials that helped launch the then-new product.

The novel release will make “Songs of Innocence” a tricky album to score for chart purposes. Obviously, 500 million preloaded downloads will make it the largest album release ever in terms of raw numbers of people with it in their media libraries. But it’s an involuntary release that looks more like an iTunes update than a purposeful album purchase. Representatives for Interscope Records said that Apple paid the label and the band upfront for the rights to release the album exclusively on iTunes for this timeframe.

Is it a benevolent gift from one of our finest rock bands and corporate innovators, or a peek into your personal media library by a company with what critics say are flexible attitudes about your data?

The move follows Jay Z’s attempt to pair the release of “Magna Carta Holy Grail” with an exclusive Samsung app, a move that received as much attention for its data-mining capabilities as its music.

It’s too early to tell if this is a genius way to acquaint Apple’s massive user base with a new U2 album, or a distraction for an enormously popular band trying to reassert its relevance.

For better or worse, you can likely decide for yourself right now. If you’re an Apple user, it’s already on your phone and in your computer.

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