Search Results for: Uk

LONDON – U.S. rapper Ja Rule hit gold on Sunday as his new release “Wonderful,” featuring R&B stars R Kelly and Ashanti, soared to the top of the UK singles chart, figures from the Official UK Charts Company showed. The song from Ja Rule, famous for his gruff voice, knocked Swedish DJ Eric Prydz’s “Call On Me” down to second place. Other new entrants also made their mark, with New Zealand-born Londoner Daniel Bedingfield’s “Nothing Hurts Like Love” debuting at No. 3 and singer-rapper Jay Sean jumping into fourth place with “Stolen.” Further down the list, Robbie Williams slipped from… Read more »

Sometimes, the heaviest rock can coexist with the purest pop. When garage-rock band the Mooney Suzuki started out in 1997, all they wanted to be was an ass-kicking group that paid homage to the Stooges, the Stones, the MC5 and the Nuggets box set. Then, in 2002, they got a taste of success with their roaring sophomore record, Electric Sweat, and suddenly they wanted more – way more. So the New York band hooked up with the Matrix – the production team that has worked with Avril Lavigne, Christina Aguilera and Hilary Duff. The move was a risky one: Diehard… Read more »

Gibson Audio, launched by the Gibson Guitar Corp. in May 2003, will introduce the Wurlitzer Digital Jukebox at the Consumer Electronics Show, to be held Jan. 8-11 in Las Vegas. Two of the three Wurlitzer Digital Jukebox models – a floor-standing, all-in-one design featuring a Klipsch speaker system and a component version designed for integration into existing home entertainment equipment – enable users to store 1,000 CDs as Windows Media files and feature a wireless touchscreen remote control. Both will be priced for less than $2,000. The third, which will sell for less than $1,000, is a tabletop model with… Read more »

The pixie boots, eye-liner and teased hair may have gone, but fans of Duran Duran – who announced a world tour on Thursday – will be pleased their icons are not pipes and slippers, yet. “The frilly shirts have been put away…but we take ourselves and how we look seriously,” band member Roger Taylor told Reuters. “We’re not into check shirts.” The 2004 World tour will kick off next April with their first British tour in 18 years, boasting the original line-up. The band may be older but some things have stayed the same. “The girls who followed us back… Read more »

A couple of years ago, a crazed Mooney Suzuki fan bum-rushed the band during a show and squirted mustard on singer/guitarist Sammy James Jr.’s fuzz box guitar pedal. The guy was apparently pissed that the garage rockers had “sold out” and signed with tiny indie label Estrus Records for their 2000 debut, People Get Ready, so he shouted, “Why don’t you have Estrus buy you a new one!” If that’s how he felt then, things could get much uglier next year when the band releases its as-yet-untitled third album, the first under its new deal with Columbia Records. Not to… Read more »

Aaron Carter says that he knows people think the oldies he’s performing in concert on his Jukebox Tour were chosen by older people who work with him. But Carter said he personally selected the songs from the ’50s through the ’80s, including favorites from Elvis Presley, the Beatles, Sammy Davis, Jr., the Rolling Stones, the Monkees, David Bowie, and others. “Oh yeah, definitely, these are definitely all my own choices,” Carter said. “These are songs that I was, like, I had to do, you know? I’m happy I picked these ones, you know, ’cause some people my age will know… Read more »

Age brings change, but the changes were decidedly for the better Tuesday when the Rolling Stones kicked off their Licks World Tour, named for an upcoming compilation that marks the British supergroup’s 40th anniversary. On their ’90s tours, the Stones had largely become a grizzled stadium jukebox. On this trip, however, in addition to mixing stadium, arena, theater and club dates – often in the same city – the band is taking new liberties with its set lists. Tuesday’s two-hour-plus tour opener at the FleetCenter included its share of rarely and never-played nuggets that thrilled and puzzled the arena crowd.… Read more »

Britpop veterans Oasis release their first single in nearly two years on Monday as they strive to recapture their 1990s glory years. “Hindu Times,” a typical slice of Oasis guitar-driven rock, goes on sale across Britain a month after a leaked copy found its way onto the internet. The band’s brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher have won mixed reviews for the single, their first since “Sunday Morning Call” in July 2000. “It is a welcome return to their heyday noize (sic)… resurrected as the sound of 100 bulldozers driving into a mountain of gemstones,” the New Musical Express said in… Read more »

The British pop charts are warming up for a struggle between good and evil as American Satanic rocker Marilyn Manson releases an album on the same day as stammering, squeaky-clean ‘Pop Idol’ runner-up Gareth Gates. Drawing up the battlelines on Wednesday, Manson said his years of drug and alcohol abuse were just as much of a handicap as Gates’ stammer, and he deserved a Number One hit. Manson, who bases his act around devil worship, releases “Tainted Love” on Monday, the same day as former choir-boy Gates cover version of “Unchained Melody.” But in an interview with music magazine NME,… Read more »