Search Results for: 2003

The North American touring business is breathing a sigh of relief as the curtain drops on what many call the industry’s worst year in a decade. The final Billboard Boxscore tally shows the industry finishing with a microscopic increase in gross ticket sales of 0.2% in 2004. But that does not tell the full story of a year in which profitable shows were hard to find and promoters scrambled to fill seats, especially in an oversaturated summer season. As promoters lick their wounds, the big question facing the industry is whether the flat performance of 2004 was a blip on… Read more »

New York – The year began with the Super Bowl halftime show fiasco and ended with aftershocks from Howard Stern flipping his detractors the bird and taunting the Federal Communications Commission with a just-try-and-get-me-now move to satellite radio. Between those two seismic events, the FCC levied a record number of indecency fines, responding to an avalanche of complaints carefully orchestrated by conservative zealots and election year political pressure. The results from the government crackdown were widespread. Top-rated personalities were fired. Zero-tolerance edicts were issued. On-air delays and indecency tutorials became commonplace. Warhorses like Pink Floyd’s “Money,” Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer”… Read more »

Hoobastank’s lead singer, Doug Robb, has a pretty good reason why he is canceling the remainder of the band’s December tour: pneumonia. The band’s label announced Robb is still ill with bronchial pneumonia Thursday, though the condition is not said to be serious. Robb’s management insists that the singer is on his way to a full recovery, despite a trip to the hospital over the weekend. He is expected to take the rest of the month off in order to recuperate at his home in Los Angeles. Some of the shows affected by the alt-rock singer’s illness include KROQ’s annual… Read more »

Bad Boy for life? Not if you’re Loon. The MC has left Bad Boy Records. “I definitely want people to know that this was amicable,” Loon said. “It’s both beautiful and empowering to see that Puff can be the bigger man.” According to Loon, who released his self-titled Bad Boy debut in 2003, he simply wanted more attention. “Being that [Puff] has so much going on, I didn’t want to be the nagging artist,” he said. “I was happy for all his success, but I was at a crossroads as an artist. I wanted to put forth the same effort… Read more »

Los Angeles – Michael Jackson’s lawyers have filed a motion to dismiss the child molestation charges against the pop star on grounds of “vindictive prosecution and outrageous government conduct.” They also want to push back the Jan. 31 trial date that Superior Court Judge Rodney Melville has pressed lawyers to meet for starting jury selection. The motions, filed Dec. 10 and made available Monday, are scheduled for argument in hearings to begin Dec. 20. The defense also asked Melville to suppress all evidence seized under the latest search warrants in the case. That motion and the others likely stem from… Read more »

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. – Fingerprints belonging to both Michael Jackson and the boy accusing him of child molestation were found on pornographic magazines seized from Jackson’s Neverland ranch last year, the Santa Barbara News-Press reported Saturday, citing sources it did not identify. Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Chris Pappas did not immediately return a call Saturday from The Associated Press. Jackson’s attorney, Thomas Mesereau Jr., declined to comment. The prosecution and defense are prohibited by a court-imposed gag order from discussing the case. If the reported evidence is admitted during Jackson’s trial, prosecutors would be expected to argue that… Read more »

COLUMBUS, Ohio – The man who shot former Pantera guitarist “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott and three other men to death at a nightclub was obsessed with the heavy metal band and made bizarre accusations against the group, a one-time friend said. Nathan Gale apparently believed Pantera musicians were trying to steal his identity and the lyrics to songs he had written, former friend Jeramie Brey told The Columbus Dispatch in Friday’s editions. Gale, 25, charged the stage Wednesday at a show by Abbott’s new band, Damageplan, and gunned down four people including Abbott before a police officer shot him to death.… Read more »

Las Vegas – Maroon 5’s members cannot wait to begin work on the follow-up to their multi-platinum debut, “Songs About Jane,” but guitarist James Valentine told Billboard.com, “We just can’t beat the life out of this record yet.” Since its early 2003 release, “Jane” (J Records) has sold 2.9 million copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan, and spawned the hit singles “This Love” and “She Will Be Loved.” “As long as there are opportunities to go out and play, we’ll do that,” Valentine said. “But we’re tremendously antsy to get in the studio. We’ll be in there… Read more »

I’m about to save the music industry from shelling out hundreds of thousands of dollars for consultants and research reports, by revealing the marketing secret behind the five-year-long surge in illegal online swapping of songs: People like to get things for free that would otherwise cost them money. And they won’t stop taking them for free just because there’s a convenient legal alternative, if that alternative requires opening their wallets. Stunned by my unique powers of insight? You shouldn’t be, yet this obvious lesson seems lost in the squabbling among record labels, quasi-legal peer-to-peer file-sharing networks and start-up companies hoping… Read more »

Record labels are embracing new technologies in search of music’s next big thing Joe Berman looks for new bands. Typically, that means hanging out in dive bars, enduring hours of unlistenable music by groups whose rock-and-roll dreams far exceed their talent, praying for the occasional act that shows promise. About 16 months ago, however, the Los Angeles-based talent-finder sat at home scouting the globe for groups. He typed “New Zealand indie rock bands” into his computer search engine and found Steriogram, five lads from the town of Whangarei in New Zealand. They had a song and a video posted on… Read more »