PJ Harvey Returns To Studio
Rock singer/songwriter PJ
Harvey will head into a UK studio next week to begin work on an album
tentatively slated for release this year, an Island Records spokesperson
said. Joining her will be previous collaborators Rob Ellis on drums
and Mick Harvey (Nick Cave) on guitar and keyboards. The
album will be Harvey's first since 1998's Is This Desire?
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000
5:36 PM EST]
Mike Watt Home
After Emergency Surgery
Mike Watt, former bassist for
punk innovators the Minutemen and fIREHOSE, was rushed by
ambulance to a Los Angeles hospital Feb. 28 when a large, infected abscess
burst in his groin. After emergency surgery, he came home Monday to rest
for the next six to eight weeks, he told fans in an e-mail. "A team of
surgeons ... cut me open, drained me and cleaned me up, leaving three huge
cavities," the 42-year-old bassist wrote. Watt is expected to record his
follow-up to the autobiographical punk opera Contemplating the Engine
Room (1997) later this year.
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000 5:36 PM
EST]
Dishwalla To
Release Third Album
Pop-rockers Dishwalla will
release their third album this summer, according to singer J.R.
Richards. The untitled disc follows 1998's And You Think You Know
What Life Is About. Richards also is putting together the soundtrack
to the upcoming drama from director Ami Canaan Mann called "Morning," in
which he stars as a musician named Jonny. The film tells the story of a
man who returns to his small-town roots, following the death of his
childhood friend. "Actors are nuts; they're the strangest people I've ever
met in my life," Richards said in comparing film work to music. "They do
more drugs — they're the true rock 'n' roll stars." Santa Barbara,
Calif.'s Dishwalla gained recognition for their song "Counting Blue Cars,"
the third single off their 1995 major-label debut, Pet Your
Friends.
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000 5:36 PM EST]
Chuck D Rock Disc
Planned For Summer
Public Enemy rapper Chuck
D plans to release the debut album from his rock outfit
Confrontation Camp in June or July, his manager, Walter Leaphart,
said. Objects in Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear will be issued
through Chuck D's own Slam Jamz label, in conjunction with another,
as-yet-unannounced, music company. Meanwhile, Slamjamz.com is on track to
launch by the end of May. The rapper and online music activist wrote in
his most recent "Terrordome" online column (www.public-enemy.com) that he
hopes to have digital deals with 100 artists by year's end. In addition,
Chuck D's Rapstation.com hip-hop site is now accepting hip-hop MP3
submissions from fans, with the goal of posting 3,000 songs online before
2001. "I don't care if you're screamin' in a tape recorder," the rapper
wrote.
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000 4:18 AM EST]
Santana Hit
Co-Writer Issues Remix LP
Electronica DJ/producer Big
Muff — also known as Itaal Shur, the Grammy-winning co-author
(with Matchbox 20 frontman Rob Thomas) of the Santana
hit "Smooth" — released a remix collection Tuesday (Feb. 29). Aurally
Exciting Remixes offers new takes on cuts from Big Muff's Music
From the Aural Exciter (1998) and features a few Big Muff tracks
previously available only on 12- inch vinyl. For the new disc, Big Muff
farmed out his music to prominent international remixers such as
Francois K & Matthias Heilbronn (Body & Soul),
Smith & Mighty, Farley & Heller and Big C of
Groove Armada. Shur was an early member of Groove Armada.
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000
4:18 AM EST]
Bon Jovi Ready
New Album
Bon Jovi's first record in five years, Crush, will be
released June 13, a spokesperson at Island/Def Jam said Monday (March 6).
The first single likely will be either "Say It Isn't So" or "It's My
Life," the spokesperson said. Another of the album's tracks, "The Next 100
Years," was recorded with a 64-piece orchestra. Bon Jovi, who have been on
hiatus since 1995's These Days, will perform March 25 in Germany
before kicking off a six-month tour in Japan. They're expected to play the
United States in September and October.
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000 4:18 AM
EST]
The Artist
Launches Web Site
The Artist launched the NPG
Online Ltd. Web site Saturday (March 4), the same day he was honored as an
Artist of the Decade (with Whitney Houston) at the Soul Train Music
Awards. In a press release, The Artist said the site
(www.NPGonlineLTD.com) will include music, politics, philosophy and news.
The Artist's new single, "Manowar," from Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic
(1999), is slated to hit radio this month.
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000 4:18 AM
EST]
Kiss To Extend
Farewell Tour
Kiss are planning to extend their Farewell Tour beyond its
last announced date in San Bernardino, Calif., on June 3, according to
singer/guitarist Paul Stanley. He added that the band is
rescheduling some dates, but no changes have been made at press time.
Stanley, who appeared in the Toronto production of "Phantom of the Opera"
last year, said he will return to the musical after the reunion tour
wraps. Saturday night, Stanley attended a party held at the Hollywood
(Calif.) Palladium by the hard-rock Web site KNAC.com, for which he and
Kiss bassist Gene Simmons are spokespersons. Hard-rockers
Anthrax and the Rollins Band performed at the event, which
also drew artists including Dave Navarro, former MC5
guitarist Wayne Kramer, Marilyn Manson bassist Twiggy
Ramirez, Hole guitarist Eric Erlandson and members of
Ugly Kid Joe, Poison, Iron Maiden and Mr. Big.
[Tues.,
Mar 7, 2000 4:18 AM EST]
Hammer Attacks
Proposition 21
Former superstar rapper Hammer, now a San Jose, Calif.,
preacher, entered a makeshift jail cell in the parking lot of San Jose's
Jubilee Christian Center on Sunday (March 5) to protest California's
Proposition 21. Hammer plans to stay in the cell until after the state's
primary election Tuesday (March 7), in which voters will decide the fate
of the ballot measure — also known as the Gang Violence and Juvenile Crime
Initiative — which would amend the state's penal code to treat some
youthful offenders as adults and increase penalties for gang-related
offenses. Hip-hop duo Black Star, Latin hip-hop/groove band
Ozomatli and singer/songwriter Meshell Ndegeocello played a
benefit concert in Santa Cruz, Calif., on Friday to raise funds and
awareness to fight the measure. Hammer is best known for his high-stepping
dance moves and catchy rap hits such as "Can't Touch This" and "Too Legit
to Quit."
[Tues., Mar 7, 2000 4:18 AM EST]
Universal Plans
New Digital Music Format
Universal Music Group, home to
artists such as Beck, DMX and Shania Twain, plans to
unveil its new digital-music distribution before June with about two dozen
songs, the Los Angeles Times reported. Under a partnership
announced earlier this year, the music will play initially only through
RealNetworks' RealJukebox program. About 12 new tracks will be available
in the new format each week through the end of the year, the Times
reported. Universal did not return a call for comment Monday (March 6).
[Tues.,
Mar 7, 2000 4:18 AM EST]
Radiohead To Play
London Fest
Radiohead will play the Meltdown Festival on July 1 at
London's Royal Festival Hall, the arty rock band announced on Monday
(March 6). Tickets for the show go on sale March 13, according to the
band's official Web site (www.radiohead.com). The festival's full lineup
is expected to be unveiled Tuesday at www.meltdown.co.uk, according to
hall spokesperson Caroline Miller. Radiohead's follow-up to their
critically acclaimed 1997 album, OK Computer, is expected to be
released later this year. Among the songs the band has been working on,
according to recent Web postings from band members: "I Will," "Egyptian
Song," "Kinetic," "True Love Waits," "Dollars and Cents," "Innocents
Civilian" "Feeling Pulled Apart by Horses," and "Keep the Wolf From the
Door."
[Mon., Mar 6, 2000 4:58 PM EST]
Bay City Roller
Admits Having Child Porn
Ex–Bay City Rollers drummer
Derek Longmuir admitted in a London court on Friday (March 3) to
possessing 6,000 images of child pornography he downloaded from the
Internet, the London Times reported. Police searching Longmuir's
home also had found 150 videos and six reels of film depicting children,
the newspaper reported. He was released on bail and is scheduled to be
sentenced in three weeks. The Bay City Rollers were bubblegum pop idols in
the mid-1970s on the strength of such hits as "Saturday Night." They broke
up in 1978.
[Mon., Mar 6, 2000 4:58 PM EST]
R.E.M. Plan
Summer Recording
R.E.M. are writing new songs with an eye toward returning to
the studio in the summer, manager Bertis Downs said. The band anticipates
releasing a new disc in spring 2001, he said. The album follows up the
experimental Up (1998) and the soundtrack work the guitar-rock band
did last year for the Andy Kaufman film bio, "Man on the Moon."
[Mon., Mar 6, 2000
4:58 PM EST]
|
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PJ
Harvey again will collaborate with drummer Rob Ellis and
guitarist/keyboardist Mick Harvey on her next
album.
|
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| The Artist, Whitney Houston
Honored
The Artist, formerly known as Prince, and Whitney
Houston were each honored as Artist of the Decade at the 14th Annual
Soul Train Music Awards, in Los Angeles, on Saturday (March 4). TLC
took home two awards, with "No Scrubs" winning Best R&B Single for a
Group, Band or Duo and their multiplatinum Fanmail nabbing Best
R&B Album for a Group, Band or Duo. DMX and Mary J.
Blige each won an Entertainer of the Year award — which were announced
in advance — while Blige also won for Best R&B Album, Female, for
Mary. "This is a really big black awards show, and I am the
struggle; I am black music; I am black people. So right now, as a woman, I
feel really good," Blige said backstage. "It feels like I did something
and that my work was not in vain."
[Mon., Mar 6, 2000 12:47 PM
EST]
'N Sync Touring
TV Shows
Orlando, Fla., boy band 'N Sync hope to whet fans' appetites
for their next album, No Strings Attached (March 21), by appearing
on 10 television shows during the next month, MTV News reported.
The TV tour kicks off this weekend with the multiplatinum act's appearance
on Nickelodeon's "Snick House" on Saturday, with the group expected to
perform its current hit single, "Bye, Bye, Bye." The band also will turn
up on MTV's "Total Request Live," NBC's "Saturday Night Live" and "The
Tonight Show With Jay Leno," ABC's "Good Morning America" and the
nationally syndicated "Rosie O'Donnell Show" in the coming weeks. No
Strings Attached is 'N Sync's third studio album. (SonicNet's
parent company, Viacom, also owns MTV and Nickelodeon).
[Thurs., Mar 2,
2000 11:34 PM EST]
Ruff Ryders Leads
Online Awards Nominations
Artists signed to hip-hop label Ruff
Ryders, including DMX and Eve, led this week's Online
Hip-Hop Awards nominations with six. DMX, whose album ... And Then
There Was X is at #10 on the Billboard 200 albums chart, is up
for Artist of the Year. Eve, whose debut album, Let There Be ... Eve —
Ruff Ryders' First Lady, entered the chart at #1 in September, is up
for Song of the Year for her hit "Gotta Man." The Ruff Ryders roster as a
whole — Drag-On and the LOX also are signed to the label —
is up for Best New Artist. The winners, determined by fan vote, will be
announced through the awards Web site (www.onlinehiphopawards.com) April
12.
[Sat.,
Mar 4, 2000 1:23 AM EST]
Travis, Robbie
Williams Top Brit Awards
Pop-rockers Travis,
flamboyant singer Robbie Williams and newcomer Macy Gray
each came away with two awards at Friday's Brit Awards 2000. Williams'
"She's the One" won Best British Single and Best British Video, while
Travis scored Best British Group and, for The Man Who?, Best
British Album. Gray, beaten by Christina Aguilera at the Feb. 23
Grammys, grabbed two awards, for Best Female Artist and Best Newcomer. The
London ceremony, slightly delayed because of an injury to one of rapper
Will Smith's dancers, began with a pounding rendition of "We Will
Rock You," performed by members of glam-band Queen, pop group
5ive and 30 drummers. Though the ceremony brought the Spice
Girls and former member Geri Halliwell into the same building,
they didn't share the stage. Halliwell performed separately, and she did
not join them when they received the Outstanding Contribution to British
Music award. (For a full list of nominees, see the Brit Awards Web
site, www.britawards.com.)
[Sat.,
Mar 4, 2000 1:23 AM EST]
Internet Expo
Packs 'Em In
For the second year in a row, they're packing 'em in at the New York
Music & Internet Expo, a show dedicated to digital music and the
people who love it. Promoter Steve Zuckerman said he's expecting 5,000
people to pass through the New Yorker Hotel ballroom by Sunday night
(March 5), when funkmaster Nile Rodgers delivers his closing
speech. MP3 and custom-CD companies are crowding the exhibit floor, and
Zuckerman said he had to turn down 150 more who wanted to rent space. Next
year, the show's moving across the street to Madison Square Garden, he
added. Danny Goldberg, ex-head of Atlantic and Polygram, kicked off the
show Friday morning by telling webmasters to promote music instead of
opinions about music, and stars instead of technology. "This is show
business," he said.
[Sat., Mar 4, 2000 1:23 AM
EST]
Peter Murphy
Plays SF's Warfield
Former Bauhaus frontman Peter Murphy played San
Francisco's Warfield Theater on Thursday night (March 2), the second date
of his U.S. tour behind Wild Birds: 1985–1995, a retrospective
released on Feb. 22. Backed by former Bauhaus/Love and
Rockets drummer Kevin Haskins, ex–Jane's Addiction
bassist Eric Avery, former Porno for Pyros guitarist
Peter DiStefano and Love and Rockets producer Doug DeAngelis
on keyboards, Murphy tore through tracks from all five of his solo albums,
beginning with his cover of Pere Ubu's "Final Solution," from
1986's Should the World Fail to Fall Apart; "Deep Ocean, Vast Sea"
and "Crystal Wrists" from Deep (1990); "The Scarlet Thing in You"
and "Huuvola" from Cascade (1995); and a moving rendition of
"Indigo Eyes," from 1988's Love Hysteria, with just Murphy and an
electric guitar. The tour, Murphy's first solo outing in five years,
continues through March and ends on April 5 in San Diego.
[Sat., Mar 4, 2000
1:23 AM EST]
Hole, Beck Items
In Online Auction
A gold album from Hole, a magazine cover signed by
Beck, an autographed Rage Against the Machine poster, a note
from Faith Hill and a Static-X tour jacket are among the
items the musicians' charity Sweet Relief is currently auctioning on
eBay.com. Also up for bid are items from the Chemical Brothers,
Air, Oasis, Filter, Mary Chapin Carpenter,
Limp Bizkit, 311, Backstreet Boys, They Might Be
Giants, Guns N' Roses, Robbie Williams and the
Offspring. Sweet Relief is a nonprofit organization established in
1994 by singer/songwriter Victoria Williams to provide financial
assistance to musicians unable to work because of illness, addiction or
advanced age.
[Fri., Mar 3, 2000 12:11 PM EST]
Dion Sues
Enquirer Over Twins Story
French Canadian pop singer Celine
Dion is suing the tabloid National Enquirer for $20 million for
falsely reporting that she is pregnant with twins. The suit, filed on
Monday (Feb. 28) in Los Angeles Superior Court, claims false invasion of
privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress and unfair business
practices. Dion said she was hurt by the article "Celine: I am pregnant
with twins" in the tabloid's Feb. 1 issue because she and her husband have
been trying to have a baby. "I am deeply affected by this story," Dion
said in a statement. "Since the publication of the news article, everybody
is congratulating me, and I have to endlessly repeat that it is not true."
In 1998, Dion sued a French paper for printing a story that suggested she
was unable to have a child.
[Fri., Mar 3, 2000 12:11 PM
EST]
MTVi Teams With
House Of Blues
The MTV Interactive Group, parent company to SonicNet, MTV.com and
VH1.com, has inked a deal to promote and co-host pay-per-view music events
with the House of Blues, the companies announced on Thursday (March 2).
The MTVi sites also will offer digital downloads from House of Blues and
add House of Blues Internet radio programs to the Radio SonicNet network.
Under the deal, MTVi has acquired an equity interest in House of Blues
Entertainment.
[Fri., Mar 3, 2000 12:11 PM EST]
Santana Says He
Was Molested As A Child
Grammy-winning guitarist Carlos Santana reveals in the
upcoming issue of Rolling Stone magazine that he was sexually
abused as a child. An American man who gave him presents brought him
across the border from Tijuana, Mexico, and molested him "almost every
other day" between the ages of 10 and 12, he told the magazine. "My first
encounter with sexuality was not a pleasant one or romantic or tender or
wonderful," he is quoted as saying in the March 16 issue. "It was more
like a shock kind of thing; gross, disgusting shock." At his wife's
urging, Santana entered therapy in 1995 to help him deal with the abuse.
"You want to get angry with yourself for not knowing better," he
reportedly said. "The mind has a very insidious way of making you feel
guilty: You're the guilty party, shame on you, you're the one who brought
this on yourself." Santana tied a record Michael Jackson set in
1983 when his namesake band won eight Grammys in one night last week for
the star-studded, chart-topping LP Supernatural.
[Thurs., Mar 2,
2000 9:04 AM EST]
Fiona Apple Cuts
Concert Short
Fiona Apple walked off stage after only a 40-minute set in
New York on Tuesday, apparently because of frustrations with the sound
system. A spokesperson for the Roseland Ballroom said the singer played
eight songs, including her new single "Limp," before telling the crowd she
was taking a "five-minute break." The singer never returned and later
reportedly said she could not hear her own voice and did not want to give
a subpar show. Apple also performed "Limp," from her 1999 album When
The Pawn ... on Wednesday night on CBS-TV's "Late Show With David
Letterman."
[Thurs., Mar 2, 2000 6:49 PM EST]
Perry Farrell
Performs For Stan Lee
Former Jane's Addiction frontman Perry Farrell
performed on Tuesday at a California celebration of the launch of a new
Web site founded by former Marvel Comics publisher Stan Lee, the
co-creator of such characters as Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, and the
Incredible Hulk. Veteran rocker Jerry Lee Lewis and R&B singer
Chaka Khan also performed at the event, which featured tributes to
Lee from President Bill Clinton and other luminaries, according to a
statement from Lee's company, Stan Lee Media. Pop group the Backstreet
Boys, who are featured as superhero characters in a new online comic
book produced by Lee, paid tribute to him via satellite.
[Thurs., Mar 2,
2000 10:08 PM EST]
--A
SonicNet Music News Staff Report
|
UPDATE: Eric
Clapton Re-Enters Rock Hall
AUDIO
NEWS
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