Search Results for: midnight show

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A small memorial started by a handful of fans blossomed into an outpouring of grief and celebration Thursday, less than 24 hours after the shocking slayings at the Alrosa Villa club where Pantera/ Damageplan guitarist “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott and three others were killed. Despite the rain and cold temperature, hundreds of fans gathered outside the weathered metal club to pay homage to their hero. They erected makeshift crosses, laid yellow roses in honor of Abbott’s Texas roots and burned candles in his honor, but mostly they shared stories, asked each other why anyone would do such a… Read more »

Record labels are embracing new technologies in search of music’s next big thing Joe Berman looks for new bands. Typically, that means hanging out in dive bars, enduring hours of unlistenable music by groups whose rock-and-roll dreams far exceed their talent, praying for the occasional act that shows promise. About 16 months ago, however, the Los Angeles-based talent-finder sat at home scouting the globe for groups. He typed “New Zealand indie rock bands” into his computer search engine and found Steriogram, five lads from the town of Whangarei in New Zealand. They had a song and a video posted on… Read more »

For the third time in his career, Eminem has a new album debuting atop the Billboard albums chart. Encore, the rapper’s fourth full-length LP, will bow at #1 on next week’s chart with more than 710,000 copies sold, according to SoundScan. What’s more impressive is that Shady pulled off the feat with less than a full first-week’s worth of sales. Because the album leaked online, Encore went on sale Friday, four days before the previously scheduled release of Tuesday. Since SoundScan ends each week’s tally on Sundays at midnight, Em’s 710,000 copies, which is also the year’s fourth-largest first-week total,… Read more »

New York – If there was an increase in the number of people who took the day off from work or stayed home from school Tuesday, it may not have been the flu that kept them at home and on the couch. “Halo 2,” the long-awaited sequel to the 2001 game that set the standard for first-person shooters, went on sale Tuesday (November 9) at midnight, and thousands of people around the country waited in line for hours, just to be among the first to get their hands on what promises to be the biggest video game of the year.… Read more »

Days after touching down in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sum 41 were forced to evacuate the African country when gunfire and explosions outside their hotel jeopardized their safety. The band was visiting the war-torn nation to film a documentary, in association with the charity War Child Canada, on the impact of the Congo’s longstanding civil war that has killed more than 3.5 million people since 1998. In Bukavu, near the Rwandan border, fighting erupted near Sum 41’s hotel between government soldiers and troops aligned with a renegade commander, according to a band spokesperson. “Bullets were coming through windows and… Read more »

Despite more than ten years difference in age, fellow Canadians Chantal Kreviazuk and Avril Lavigne formed a relationship of mutual respect and sisterhood – and become songwriting partners – after they met last summer. “We became really good friends, and no one knew we were writing together,” says Lavigne. “Every single night for two weeks, we would write a new song. And then I was like, ‘OK, I’m ready to record them.’” The pair co-wrote six songs on Lavigne’s forthcoming album, Under My Skin (due May 25th): “Slipped Away,” “Forgotten,” “Together,” “How Does It Feel,” “He Wasn’t” and “Who Knows.”… Read more »

What everyone always wants to know is: who’s the worst? Meaning: which really famous person out there is a berk whose lack of personality is in inverse proportion to their abundance of fame? And the answer is, of course, all of them. No, it’s not. It’s Jon Bon Jovi. The next question – who’s the best, of course – is more difficult. The interviewees I like are the ones that turn out to be more than you expected, whether that’s more intelligent, or honest, or bonkers, or fun, whatever. And there are plenty of those. Madonna (sharper), Björk (wilder), James… Read more »

Singer-songwriter Warren Zevon, who battled death with the same twisted sense of humor found in his songs “Life’ll Kill Ya,” “Werewolves of London” and “Excitable Boy,” has lost his yearlong fight against lung cancer at age 56. Zevon, among the wittiest and most original of a broad circle of performers to emerge from Los Angeles in the 1970s, died in his sleep Sunday at his home, publicist Carise Yatter said. “I’m just glad it was quick and he didn’t have to suffer for much more time,” said Zevon’s music producer friend Jorge Calderon, who worked with the singer on a… Read more »

With nary a Hells Angels member or flying pool cue in sight, the Rolling Stones played their first free concert in 33 years on Thursday, as a celebrity crowd headed by former U.S. President Bill Clinton looked on. The event at the Staples Center was a considerably more sedate affair than their last free show, at the Altamont Speedway near San Francisco in 1969. Then, security was handled by the local Hells Angels chapter, who clubbed fans with pool cues while the band looked on helplessly. A teenager was stabbed to death as he appeared to point a gun at… Read more »

Phish put its long-suffering fans out of their misery in style. Returning from a two-year hiatus, the Vermont jam band with the obsessive fan base played a long, high-energy show at Madison Square Garden on New Year’s Eve before a raucous crowd, with some fans paying more than $1,000 to get into the sold-out concert. A band known for its New Year’s Eve showmanship didn’t disappoint: Tom Hanks made a surprise stage appearance, and as the clock struck midnight costumed dancers on stilts spread through the audience and fake snow and white balloons tumbled from the rafters. But the crowd… Read more »