London, Oct 16 (IANS/EFE): U2 frontman Bono has apologised to the public after the group's latest album was automatically loaded into the playlists of many iTunes users around the world, British media reported.

Bono said he was sorry for giving away U2's latest album, "Song of Innocence", to iTunes account holders and admitted that such a move suggested a "drop of megalomania, (a) touch of generosity, a hint of self-promotion".

His apology, which was reported Wednesday by the British music magazine NME, came during a question and answer session on the social website, Facebook.

A questioner on the Facebook session asked: "Can you please never release an album on iTunes that automatically downloads to peoples' playlists ever again? It's really rude".

Bono replied: "I had this beautiful idea and we got carried away with ourselves. Artists are prone to that kind of thing. Drop of megalomania, touch of generosity, dash of self-promotion and deep fear that these songs that we poured our life into over the last few years might not be heard."

"There's a lot of noise out there. I guess we got a little noisy ourselves to get through it," he said.

U2's latest album was made available as a free download for five percent (26 million) of iTunes users Sep 9.

The group has just released a new video clip, dubbed "The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)", the first single from the "Song of Innocence" album, to mark the release of the physical version of the album.