Industry sources last week revealed that music mogul Jimmy Iovine is planning to leave Apple this summer. Iovine, if you recall, joined the Cupertino-based company in mid-2014 alongside music producer and rapper Dr. Dre as part of its $3 billion acquisition of Beats Electronics.

The music veteran has since shot down those rumors.

In a recent statement to Variety, Iovine said he is almost 65, has been with Apple for four years and in two-and-a-half years, Apple Music has gotten to well over 30 million subscribers. But, Iovine added, there's still a lot more they'd like to do [with Apple Music]. The executive said he is committed to doing whatever Eddy Cue, Tim Cook and Apple need him to do to take the service all the way.

"I am in the band," Iovine said.

Last week's report claimed Iovine's planned departure was likely timed to his Apple shares fully vesting. During a recent speaking engagement at the Grammy Museum, Iovine had the following to say on the matter:

"All this stuff you're seeing in the newspapers, let me tell you, my stock vested a long time ago. We need Donald Trump here to call it 'fake news.' There is a tiny portion of stock that vests in August, but that's not what I think about. My contract is up in August, but the funny thing is, I don't have a contract. I have a deal, and certain things happen along that deal. The bottom line is I'm loyal to the guys at Apple. I love Apple, and I really love musicians. That's why those articles annoyed me, because it had nothing to do with reality. It made it out to be all about money."

Iovine added that the next chapter in his life will be to help streaming come to scale. He also warned that the music industry may be relying too heavily on technology to fix its issues:

"The record industry right now is expecting technology to fix their problems, like they always have, and I'm not sure technology is going to fix their problems this time. It will make music better, it will make it sound better, and improve access and delivery, but I'm not sure that benefits the labels unless the labels do something to make the proposition more interesting."

Lead photo via WireImage