Search Results for: INXS

LOS ANGELES – Universal Music Group CEO Doug Morris resents that MTV and other cable music channels built multibillion-dollar businesses around videos given away by record companies anxious to promote their artists. So when he saw his own grandson watching 50 Cent’s “In Da Club” video on Yahoo, it got him asking: “How much are we getting paid for that?” The answer – nothing – led Morris to pull all of Universal’s videos from the giant Web portal until it agreed to a licensing deal in 2005. He wrangled similar arrangements from Time Warner Inc.’s AOL and other Internet portals… Read more »

New York – Radio’s playlist liberation movement hatched in late 2001 at a birthday party in Winnipeg, Manitoba. A radio was blasting when Howard Kroeger, director of operations and programing for CHUM Broadcasting’s Winnipeg stations, arrived at his friend’s 40th-birthday bash. It was a competitor’s classic rock station, and Kroeger used the occasion to conduct an informal focus group among the partygoers, most in their mid- to late 30s. Whenever Boston, the Cars, Meatloaf, Supertramp or some other ’70s staple came on, it got an overwhelming thumbs-up from the Molson-enhanced crowd. But there was a noticeable lack of enthusiasm when… Read more »

Though some artists have been known to exaggerate a broken heart for the sake of art, the All-American Rejects have no need for such artistic license. For them, the truth is often sadder than fiction. “There’s rarely a happy ending in any of my songs,” singer/bassist Tyson Ritter said. “As far as the guy getting the girl in the end, it’s all fictitious. It’s all made up in my mind, I guess; all wishful thinking.” Such weighty fare fills the self-titled full-length debut by Ritter, 18, and multi-instrumentalist Nick Wheeler, 20. Two kids from Stillwater, Oklahoma, shouldn’t know so much… Read more »

“I’m a pervert, I like watching,” Terri Nunn says, laughing, succinctly explaining Voyeur, the title of Berlin’s first album of new material in sixteen years. “There’s a song that was a bonus track on the live record [Berlin Live: Sacred and Profane] called ‘X Girl’ that had a line, “I’m the one standing on the sidelines/I’m the voyeur on your side,’ and that line really stuck with me.” With that, Nunn and Berlin are back, continuing what they started twenty years ago with the breakout singles “Sex (I’m A…)” and “Metro,” from the gold-selling debut EP Pleasure Victim. They continued… Read more »

One of the premier bands of the 1980s, Australia’s Midnight Oil is plotting a return to international prominence with that unmistakable big-bass, big-drum sound and the charismatic, herky-jerky flailing about of its 6-1/2-foot-tall bald leader, Peter Garrett. The band debuted a few new tunes Wednesday at the second of two packed L.A. club gigs that revealed a tonal softness, almost Beatlesque, that could permeate its new release, now slated for February. Generally speaking, though, the performance was more a re-acquaintance gig to remind fans that the act has not lost any of its ferocity. Garrett still possesses an enviable mix… Read more »

When the members of U2 walked off the stage on their 1997-1998 “PopMart” tour, the final image was a heart framed by the outsized “golden” arch – a juxtaposition that perfectly encapsulated that tour’s muddy concept, as the group had strained to find a balance between earnest emotion and smirking irony. On their current “Elevation” tour, the band wears their hearts on their sleeves or, to be more precise, on the heart-shaped runway that surrounds them and a portion of crowd, reaching halfway into the arena. Allowing much of the audience close contact with the band, the stage, along with… Read more »

Bon Jovi returned to Australia on Saturday Night playing a one off charity show to raise money for the State Emergency Services. 35,000 tickets were sold on the night guaranteeing SES will receive around $300,000 from the gig. The night featured Jovi’s full set from their upcoming One Wild Night World Tour. Australia’s working class man Jimmy Barnes joined Jovi for the 5 hour gig, returning at the end of their set to duet the song he originally recorded with INXS ‘Good Times” and his own ‘Ride The Night Away’. Bon Jovi will release their first ever live album next… Read more »