Search Results for: Basement

Pete Wentz was treated to dinner a few months ago by Lyor Cohen, the renowned rap promoter and U.S. music chief of Warner Music Group. Wentz, 28, is the eyelinered heartthrob and bassist of punk band Fall Out Boy; but this dinner was in celebration of the hit single just released by another band, Panic! At the Disco, which records on Wentz’s own label, Decaydance. “He asked me, ‘What do you want out of life, Pete?’” Wentz says. His answer was flip: business cards. The next day he received a stack of cards listing his name and a new title:… Read more »

Recently, Maureen Callahan wrote a piece for the New York Post about Crush Management, the NYC cadre that shepherds the careers of Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco, the Academy Is … , Boys Like Girls and Armor for Sleep (or, as Callahan puts it, “basically any band that a 13-year-old girl with a blog and a Hot Topic habit obsesses over”). Aside from providing readers with some genuinely bananas quotes from songwriter/ rock-and-roll vampire Butch Walker about credibility (especially considering this is on his résumé), the article is excellent primarily because it floats the hypothesis that the artists… Read more »

Before the tour van and the record deal, before the girls begging for autographs, they were middle school mall rats who made a terrible racket practicing in their parents’ homes.

Small webcasters are crying foul over new royalty rates they must pay for streaming recordings. After a two-year proceeding, the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) has set rates for commercial and noncommercial webcasts and Internet simulcasts, which some executives say will put them out of business. “This is going to be a major problem for the little guys,” says Robert Kimball, senior VP/general counsel for RealNetworks. “For small webcasters and companies that have built their models around free ad-based radio, it’s going to be an absolutely massive increase in royalties owed.” Under copyright law, owners of sound recordings must license their… Read more »

Independent record labels behind artists like The White Stripes, Deep Purple and Arctic Monkeys announced a global deal Saturday to pool access to their catalogs, seeking to grab a bigger share of online music sales from the major record companies. Indies and their trade groups from more than a dozen countries signed up to Merlin, a nonprofit licensing agency that will cut deals on their behalf with download sites under the terms of the agreement unveiled at Midem, a music industry gathering in the French Riviera town of Cannes. Smaller record companies with just a handful of successful artists fear… Read more »

The Academy Is… and Plain White T’s recently announced a series of dates with Days Away and June: July 6, 2005 – Des Moines, IA – House of Bricks July 7, 2005 – Minneapolis, MN – The Ascot Room July 8, 2005 – Freeport, IL – Freeport Convention Center July 9, 2005 – LaCrosse, WI – The Warehouse Nightclub July 10, 2005 – Grand Rapids, MI – Intersection July 12, 2005 – Toledo, OH – Headliners – 650 July 13, 2005 – Columbus, OH – The Basement at Newport Music Hall July 14, 2005 – Lancaster, PA – Chameleon Club… Read more »

OAKLAND, Calif. – Music retailers are turning to high-tech firms that combine computer analysis with the art of listening to come up with new music suggestions for consumers based on what they already like. In a computer-crammed space at Savage Beast Technologies, divergent melodies seep softly from headphones worn by young men and women who listen to music with the intensity of submarine sonar operators. Their job is to discern and define attributes in tunes by artists as diverse as teen diva Hilary Duff and jazz legend Miles Davis. The listeners classify hundreds of characteristics about each song, including beat,… Read more »

Lately, it seems like Travis Barker’s schedule consists of puking in his bathroom, taking illicit smoke breaks before meeting with his wedding planner, chewing out said wedding planner and then buying punky Dior purses for his wife, Shanna. At least, that’s what we’re led to believe on “Meet the Barkers.” But it turns out the former Blink-182 drummer and current star of reality TV has been really, really busy as of late, cranking out tunes for his electronic side project, Plus-44, which he formed with Blink’s Mark Hoppus and Carol Heller, formerly of Cali-punks Get the Girl. When MTV News… Read more »

Some of the greatest hard-rock bands in history have thoroughly awesome – and thoroughly undead – mascots. Iron Maiden have toothy demon Eddie. Megadeth have a similarly toothy yet blind demon named Vic Rattlehead. And Motörhead unleash yet another toothy, snarling hellion: a bulldog/gorilla named Snaggletooth. So you can’t blame My Chemical Romance for wanting to get in on the act. By now, you’ve probably seen the video for “Helena,” in which MCR play pallbearers at a funeral for a young girl who just happens to rise from her casket about halfway through the clip to bust into a ballerina… Read more »

Ever since that fateful February day when Blink-182 announced they were going on an indefinite hiatus, fans of the band have been clamoring to know just what the future holds for their beloved Mark, Tom and Travis. For the most part the guys have remained silent, aside from a few vaguely worded statements from drummer-turned-reality-TV-star Travis Barker. So MTV News sat down with singer/bassist Mark Hoppus, and while he claimed the group’s current hiatus had been planned for some time, he also made it sound like Blink fans shouldn’t hold their breath for a reunion. “We’ve always planned to have… Read more »