Search Results for: Alan Day

College senior Kyla Berry was looking forward to voting in her first presidential election, even carrying her voter registration card in her wallet. “Vote suppression is real. It does sometimes happen,” said Daniel P. Tokaji, a law professor at Ohio State University. But about two weeks ago, Berry got disturbing news from local election officials. “This office has received notification from the state of Georgia indicating that you are not a citizen of the United States and therefore, not eligible to vote,” a letter from the Fulton County Department of Registration and Elections said. But Berry is a U.S. citizen,… Read more »

Hard rock band AC/DC has extended its Black Ice tour of North America into early 2009. New dates begin December 20 in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, and run through January 31 in Nashville. Tickets go on sale Saturday. Eighteen previously announced shows have already sold out, according to the band’s label, Columbia. The tour is in support of a new album of the same name, due October 21 exclusively via Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club stores and AC/DC’s Web site. “Black Ice” won’t be the only AC/DC title available exclusively at Wal-Mart. In November, the retailer will be the only U.S. source… Read more »

In what is being billed as the first time they’ve ever played at the same concert, Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel have signed on for a benefit for Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama on October 16 at New York’s Hammerstein Ballroom. Other performers have yet to be announced. Tickets range from $500 to $10,000. Springsteen, who endorsed Obama this spring, recently finished a tour with the E Street Band in support of his 2007 album, “Magic.” On Sunday, it was confirmed that the group will play during the Super Bowl halftime show February 1 in Tampa, Florida. Joel, meanwhile, begins… Read more »

Wolf Blitzer is a John Legend fan. After CNN aired a live performance of Legend’s new song, “If You’re Out There,” from the floor of the Democratic National Convention, Blitzer promised to continue to interrupt the network’s reporting or analysis for musical acts as good as Legend. Legend was the most visible of the entertainers who flowed into Denver for the convention, which opened Monday. A choir backed him for the song that fits neatly with Barack Obama’s campaign themes. “We’ve been looking for the world to change,” Legend sang. “If you’re out there, sing along with me. Stand up… Read more »

When Hartmut Ostrowski was an up-and-comer in Bertelsmann’s printing and services division in the 1990s, his bosses were discouraged from speaking at meetings of the top executives. In the glamorous world of Bertelsmann, a global media empire with music, television, and publishing properties – Germany’s answer to Time Warner – services were viewed as strictly a backstage function. Now, with Mr. Ostrowski at the helm of Bertelsmann, the stagehands are striding into the spotlight. Two weeks ago, he named Markus Dohle, a 39-year-old German who runs the company’s printing operations, as chief executive of Random House, the world’s largest consumer… Read more »

Napster Inc. on Tuesday opened what they claim is the world’s biggest MP3 download store with more than 6 million songs in a direct challenge to Apple Inc’s iTunes store. The new Web-based music store will have digital songs from all major music labels as well as thousands of independent labels. The MP3-format songs will be compatible with the vast majority of digital media devices and mobile phones including Apple’s popular iPod as well as its iPhone. Before now Napster has focused on selling all-you-can-eat monthly streaming music subscription packages but has struggled to win over the majority of fans… Read more »

Madonna won’t know until next week whether a Malawian boy she found in an orphanage in 2006 will become a permanent member of her family, her lawyer said Wednesday. Lawyer Alan Chinula had expected the judge to rule on the adoption Wednesday but said the hearing was delayed after a Malawian human rights group presented arguments on “shortcomings” in the southern African nation’s adoption laws. Chinula said the group was not challenging the adoption and he expected it to be approved next week. The pop star and her husband, film director Guy Ritchie, were not present at Thursday’s hearing in… Read more »

Actor Joaquin Phoenix, who played Johnny Cash on the big screen, is cutting an album with Charlatans frontman Tim Burgess, Billboard.com has learned. But whether the set will be released remains unclear. According to U.K.-born Burgess, who has lived in Los Angeles for several years, the album came about after Phoenix learned to play guitar in preparation for his role in the 2005 film “Walk the Line,” for which he received an Academy Award nomination. “Once he learned guitar, he found that he had quite a lot of demons inside himself that he wanted to expel through music,” says Burgess,… Read more »

A stark truth facing any aspiring digital music service these days is that working with record labels is going to carry a hefty price. The last 18 months have seen the major music labels accept new technological and business models — such as dropping digital rights management and allowing ad-supported free music — that have given rise to a new generation of digital music services. But the flip side of this willingness to experiment is a demand for higher upfront advances for licensing music and in some cases a substantial equity stake in the company. Ad-supported download service SpiralFrog, for… Read more »

“PRETTY. ODD.,” the eagerly awaited sophomore album from Decaydance/Fueled By Ramen recording group Panic At The Disco, has made a stellar debut on this week’s SoundScan/Billboard 200 album chart. The critically acclaimed collection enters in the #2 spot with sales of 139,000. “PRETTY. ODD.” — which follows the Las Vegas-based band’s RIAA platinum-certified 2005 debut, “A FEVER YOU CAN’T SWEAT OUT” — debuted at #1 on SoundScan’s “Current Alternative Albums” chart and #2 on the “Digital Albums” chart. In addition, “PRETTY. ODD.” debuted at #2 in the UK, Canada, and Mexico, with top 10 debuts in New Zealand, Austria, and… Read more »