Reviews of ‘Lightsaber’ and ‘Keep Sweet: Pray & Obey’… and we LOVE the targeted Instagram ads we get. Seriously.
Spotify, a virtual digital jukebox and Europe’s largest legal online music site, aims to start U.S. operations in the third quarter of 2010.
As Internet reports suggested, Pearl Jam was indeed recording a Target commercial under the direction of Cameron Crowe last week at Seattle’s Showbox theater. But there is more to the story than an exclusive retail relationship. It has been known that Pearl Jam is no longer under contract after 18 years of recording for Sony-affiliated labels, and there has been a good deal of speculation about who would release the rock act’s next album. Kelly Curtis, who has managed Pearl Jam since its inception, conducted a wide-ranging interview Sunday night, confirming that the band’s next album — rumored to be… Read more »
An independent Miami label says it plans to release never-before-heard Beatles live recordings made in 1962 at the Star Club in Hamburg, Germany. Fuego Entertainment has partnered with British producer/promoter Jeffrey Collins to put out his catalog holdings. They say those include a live Beatles performance of 15 songs at the club. No release date has been set for the recordings, which the label claims are the first to feature drummer Ringo Starr as part of the group. Other Beatles recordings from the Star Club have been released, but Fuego says its collection includes previously unheard tracks, such as covers… Read more »
Stress runs rampant among college kids this time of year, but the Door to Dorm tour, the College Mega tour and Campus Invasion Music Festival are aiming to give students some springtime musical relief. Hinder will headline the Door to Dorm outing, which hits 17 colleges and three music festivals starting April 13 at the University of Pittsburgh in Johnstown, Pa. The group’s drummer, Cody Hanson, jokes that nonstop worldwide touring for its 2005 album “Extreme Behavior” has made the quintet “severe alcoholics,” but that won’t prevent the Oklahoma City act from throwing a party for its hardcore college fan… Read more »
MONTEREY, Calif. – U2 frontman and global activist Bono targeted worldwide poverty in his wishes as he was a recipient of the inaugural TED Prize from the Technology, Entertainment, Design conference. The three winners were given four months to come up with their wishes, with TED agreeing to spend $100,000 on each winner to help make them come true. Bono wished Thursday night for the creation of ONE, a social movement he hopes will have more than 1 million Americans fighting worldwide poverty. He also wished to tell people of this movement 1 billion times and wants TED to help… Read more »
A New Jersey woman is accusing the major record labels of making her an offer she can’t refuse. Michele Scimeca, of Rockaway Township, N.J., has filed a civil lawsuit accusing them of attempting to blackmail her when she was named as one of the 531 people that trade group the Recording Industry Assn. of America (RIAA) accused of illegally downloading sound recordings off peer-to-peer networks. “Essentially they are saying, ‘Pay a little now, or pay the full monty later,”‘ said her attorney, Bart Lombardo. “This really looks like extortion, and the facts fit under RICO.” Scimeca filed her lawsuit in… Read more »
Marilyn Manson was the target of a protest Thursday (October 16) by dozens of bible-waving evangelical Christians in Monterrey, Mexico, according to Reuters. About 100 people prayed and sang hymns for the soul of the shock rocker, who performs in the northern Mexican city on November 5. Organizer Arsenia Campos, whose daughter was murdered last year by a young man claiming to be involved with a Satanic cult, said, “We are praying for him so that he can know God and become transformed.” Despite the protest, concert promoters said the show would go on. Meanwhile, Manson brought his live show… Read more »
Making good on its promise to sue online pirates, the recording industry filed a round of lawsuits against computer users in federal courthouses Monday. More than 260 civil lawsuits were levied against people targeted by the cutthroat campaign, which the Recording Industry Association of America hopes will stamp out the rampant piracy believed to be causing a slump in record sales. The users’ identities were given to the RIAA by their Internet service providers, who were compelled to do so by the more than 1,500 subpoenas that have been filed since July. The first of what may amount to thousands… Read more »
Target is offering an exclusive six-track CD featuring songs from RCA artist Christina Aguilera and Jive’s Justin Timberlake, who are on tour together. The CD contains the new Aguilera track “That’s What Love Can Do” and remixes of her “Beautiful” and “Fighter,” as well as Timberlake’s new song “Why, When, How” and remixes of “Rock Your Body” and “Cry Me a River.” The CD was made available earlier this week. Since it appears to be a specially made licensed set, music retailers do not decry this practice as vigorously as they do when labels give mass merchants exclusive windows on… Read more »
