Search Results for: columbia records

Britney Spears is certainly not the first celebrity to go off the rails in full view of her once-adoring public. But hers is one of the most spectacular falls from grace in recent memory, meticulously documented by paparazzi and bystanders, and uploaded instantly for the titillation of the masses. At 25 she’s certainly young enough to resume her career after she regroups, and for perspective, we’ve compiled some of the most notorious celebrity flameouts of the past 10 years, along with the success (or not) of their efforts to get back on track. We’ve rated these 1-4 in ascending order… Read more »

Around the time Brett Gurewitz was launching Epitaph Records in 1981, his father was lecturing him to take guitar lessons. The Bad Religion guitarist and punk-rock entrepreneur never sat down for courses with a guitar instructor, although he did go to school to learn to be a recording engineer. However, no amount of schooling could have prepared Gurewitz for the next 25 years of his life. Epitaph Records brought a new era of punk rock to the masses in 1994 when the Offspring’s “Smash” turned into one of the biggest rock records of the decade. The success of the label’s… Read more »

Washington D.C.-based metallers DARKEST HOUR will travel to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada on February 19 to start the pre-production and recording process for their new album with producer Devin Townsend (STRAPPING YOUNG LAD, LAMB OF GOD, SOILWORK). A June/July release via Victory Records is expected. The band has issued the following update:  “All is good from the underground bunker where DARKEST HOUR is riffing out our new songs. We have nine songs (that’s a full album, dudes!) and we will definitely have a few extra tracks that will be floating around after the record is recorded to so we hope… Read more »

Los Angeles – Don’t tell Hot Hot Heat keyboardist/vocalist Steve Bays that press coverage doesn’t matter: The reviews for “Make Up the Breakdown,” the band’s 2003 effort for Seattle-based Sub Pop Records, had a direct influence on the act’s major-label debut. “People said we sounded like Dexys Midnight Runners, so I went out and bought a Dexys Midnight Runners album,” Bays says. What he heard resulted in the current single “Goodnight Goodnight.” The song, which Bays describes as a cross between OutKast’s Andre 3000 and early Beatles, takes a keyboard-laced dancehall groove into a chorus that downshifts the song. The… Read more »

New York – The title track and first single from Bruce Springsteen ‘s upcoming album, “Devils & Dust,” will premiere beginning 12:01 a.m. Monday (March 28) via AOL Music’s First Listen initiative. The next day, it will be available for download exclusively from Apple’s iTunes Music Store for a week. “Devils & Dust” is due April 26 via Columbia as a DualDisc with the audio tracks on one side and various bonus content on the DVD side. A deluxe edition featuring expanded packaging also will be available, as well as a double-vinyl version. On the heels of a playback session… Read more »

“SYNERGY AND OTHER LIES” would be a good first reading assignment for Sir Howard Stringer, Sony’s new chief executive, to be followed by “The Synergy Myth.” Then Sir Howard should recognize that the Sony he inherits is constitutionally incapable of making one (electronics) plus one (entertainment) equal three. Both books were written by Harold Geneen, the number cruncher who directed International Telephone and Telegraph during its heyday in the 1960’s. He engineered 350 mergers and acquisitions, which brought such names as Hartford, Avis, Sheraton and Madison Square Garden under one roof. Mr. Geneen, however, harbored no illusions that ITT’s individual… Read more »

New York – Aerosmith will reconvene in late August or early September to prepare for a tour that will begin in the fall, guitarist Joe Perry told Billboard. The group also has begun sifting through material for a prospective live CD/DVD. “We’re trying to find a show that has been recorded from beginning to end,” Perry said. “That’s something the fans have been requesting: a stone cold live record with a video.” “Some of the shows we’re looking at are from the last year, but who knows,” the guitarist continued. “We just heard about somebody who had a bunch of… Read more »

For the past year, Hot Hot Heat frontman Steve Bays’ life has been an endless stream of numbers: one departed guitarist, two epiphanies, 30 scrapped songs, 42 hectic studio days, 168 hours of tape, 365 nights between shows and 4,000 used T-shirts. And out of all that came one herky-jerky new record called Elevator, which, according to Bays, is about as appropriate a handle as any. “There were so many ups and downs that went into making this record. It was a manic period, and it was extremely stressful,” he said. “It was a year of tripping hard, a year… Read more »

Los Angeles – Rock band 3 Doors Down earned its first No. 1 on the U.S. pop albums chart Wednesday with its latest CD, “Seventeen Days.” The Republic/Universal release sold 231,000 copies in the week ended Feb. 13, according to Nielsen SoundScan, the best sales week of the band’s career. The Mississippi-bred combo’s previous high came with 2002’s “Away From the Sun,” which opened and peaked at No. 8 with 115,000 and has sold 3.3 million to date. 2000’s debut “The Better Life” has sold 5.2 million copies so far. Previous champ, rapper the Game’s “The Documentary” (Aftermath/G-Unit/Interscope), slipped to… Read more »

Los Angeles – Nearly 10 years into his career, Xzibit is on a roll. Now in the second season of hosting the popular MTV series “Pimp My Ride,” the West Coast rapper is busy promoting his fifth album, “Weapons of Mass Destruction,” which Columbia will release Dec. 14. His acting chops are also getting a workout. His cameo in Eminem’s “8 Mile” has segued into a role alongside Ice Cube in the upcoming “XXX” sequel, “XXX State of the Union.” Xzibit also has a part in the forthcoming Jennifer Aniston/Clive Owen suspense thriller, “Derailed.” While he enjoys the wider audience… Read more »