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UNIVERSAL CITY, California – If you’re Panic! at the Disco, how do you end a year in which you went from relative unknowns to one of the hottest bands on the planet? “I might get a tattoo that just says ‘2006,’ ’cause it was such a big year,” bassist Jon Walker said. “Really, just the whole year in general has been amazing to us.” So a tattoo (maybe?) and “a little time off for the holidays,” added drummer Spencer Smith. “Then we’re going to start writing a new record over the winter and hopefully we have something out next fall.”… Read more »

One sunny afternoon not long ago, Dick Copaken sat in a booth at Daniel, one of those hushed, exclusive restaurants on Manhattan’s Upper East Side where the waiters glide spectrally fro table to table. He was wearing a starched button-down shirt and a blue blazer. Every strand of his thinning hair was in place, and he spoke calmly and slowly, his large pink Charlie Brow head bobbing along evenly as he did. Copaken spent many years as a partner at the white-shoe Washington, D.C., firm Covington & Burling, and he has a lawyer’s gravitas. One of his bes friends calls… Read more »

Virgin Records has announced the signing of acclaimed punk-pop outfit the Starting Line via a worldwide deal. The Philadelphia-based quartet will record and release their much-anticipated follow-up to 2005’s smash Drive-Thru/Geffen release, “BASED ON A TRUE STORY” later this year. “I cannot express how excited we all are about this,” says TSL guitarist Matt Watts. “Everyone at Virgin that we’ve met with are fans of the band and we’re looking forward to this relationship and making the best TSL record possible. To have a new life with Virgin adds a fresh level of enthusiasm to our band and to our… Read more »

Modern-rock promotion finds itself at a crossroads as a growing number of terrestrial radio broadcasters tune out the ratings-challenged format. Record companies are attempting to adapt to modern rock’s recent marginalization on the airwaves in major markets like Philadelphia, Miami, New York and Washington, D.C. by emphasizing other options for building buzz. In lieu of airplay, touring, blogs, ringtones, downloads, Internet and satellite radio, videogame tie-ins, alliances with brand marketers, film and TV exposure, sponsorships and placements in commercials all are growing in value. The marketing strategies for a number of big-name rock artists with current or upcoming releases show… Read more »

London – Sharon Osbourne and her daughter Aimee have withdrawn from performing in “The Vagina Monologues” because Aimee is ill, a spokeswoman said Friday. Aimee, 21, had been set to begin her run with her mother in the West End production of the show on Tuesday. The spokeswoman, in a statement, said the family was flying to Los Angeles over the weekend so that Aimee could have “further treatment and rest.” There were no details about her illness. “They were both very much looking forward to appearing in the show, but Sharon’s focus now has to be on the family… Read more »

For months now Canadian pop princess Avril Lavigne and Sum 41 frontman Deryck Whibley have been sidestepping rumours that they’re snuggling up and making some sweet Can-Rock love. Well, deny all you want kids, but when a guy decides to move to Los Angeles, which just, by coincidence, happens to be the home of a certain lady friend, it usually means the dude wants to do more than just jam. According to the Globe And Mail, Whibley recently sold his Toronto home to move to the land of the fake and famous, high-tailing it to La La Land. If the… Read more »

Los Angeles – A few days ago, a colleague asked if it would be possible to get a Green Day poster for his 12-year-old daughter. “She’s always listened to nothing but rap and hip-hop,” the editor said, “but lately she’s been obsessed with the Green Day album ‘American Idiot.”‘ Warner Bros. Records chairman/CEO Tom Whalley relates a similar story. He says a couple of his teenage daughter’s friends who stopped by the house were evidently unaware that the red-hot punk trio is the prize act of the moment on Whalley’s label. But they knew the band was cool. “They said,… Read more »

Somewhere between the slight goofiness of the barbershop quartet and the life-or-death dramatics of the opera, there lies a cappella, a form of harmonized singing usually reserved for bow-tie-clad lawyers-to-be at Ivy League colleges across the Northeast. But one group of students at George Washington University is aiming to change all that, by bringing a cappella to the hoodie and studded-belt set. They’re called Emocapella (spelled with one “p,” which, in itself, is way emo), a bunch of sensitive lads who harmonize tunes by emo faves like Dashboard Confessional, Taking Back Sunday and Saves the Day at nearly sold-out concerts… Read more »

Los Angeles – Los Angeles-based Collectors’ Choice Music is carving a very successful niche with the rerelease of some old albums that probably aren’t in your record collection. Among 24 titles pouring forth this month from CCM – which issues its sets through its mail-order operation before taking them to stores – are the late producer Terry Melcher’s 1974 solo album, singer-songwriter Jamie Brockett’s 1969 cult favorite “Remember the Wind and the Rain,” four collections by ’70s L.A. pop tunesmith Andrew Gold, Sonny Bono’s 1967 solo record “Inner Views” and three entries by the ’80s cowpunk act Rank & File.… Read more »

The message posted in an Internet chat room read, “Seeking well-built man, 18-30 years old for slaughter.” A few months later, a user responded: “I offer myself to you and will let you dine from my live body. Not butchery, dining!!” It wasn’t a joke, and what followed was far more gruesome and bizarre than the plot of nearly any horror film. In March 2001, Armin Meiwes, a 42-year-old computer technician in Hesse, Germany, killed, dismembered and ate 43-year-old microchip engineer Bernd Juergen Brandes. While Brandes was still alive, the two dined on parts of his flesh together, then Meiwes… Read more »