Search Results for: Alan Day

In more bad news for the music industry, album sales declined for the second straight year in 2002, down 10.7 percent from the previous year. Nielsen SoundScan reported this week that 2002 album sales fell from 763 million in 2001 to 681 million. Overall music sales in 2001 had been down 5 percent – the first decline since SoundScan began tracking music sales in 1991. Hilary Rosen, chairman and CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America, blamed the decline mainly on illegal downloading of music off the Internet. “There’s no question that the availability of free music on the… Read more »

Hip-hop phenomenon Eminem trounced all comers in 2002 and tentatively claimed top album of the year honors after selling more than 7.4 million copies of “The Eminem Show” (Interscope/Shady) in the U.S., according to figures released Thursday by Nielsen SoundScan. The album’s performance defied a sharply downward trend in the industry as a whole, as CD album sales tumbled by 9% to 624.2 million for the year through Dec. 22. In fact, Slim Shady beat his nearest rival, Universal Music Group label mate Nelly by more than 2.6 million discs. Nelly’s “Nellyville” (Universal) shifted just under 4.8 million albums and… Read more »

A man who racked up nearly $33,000 on credit cards while using Will Smith’s identity can forget about any independence days for the next three years. Carlos Lomax of Duquesne, who pleaded guilty in September to one count of using unauthorized credit cards, was sentenced Thursday to 37 months in federal prison. Assistant U.S. Attorney Margaret Picking said Lomax, 42, opened 14 bogus credit accounts at Pittsburgh-area stores as Willard C. Smith, the full name of the actor-rapper who’s starred in movies including “Independence Day,” without Smith’s authorization. All the accounts used Lomax’s home address, where authorities in January found… Read more »

Oasis has postponed two German concerts, following a brawl in a Munich hotel over the weekend. The English band has postponed its November 4 show in Dusselfdorf and a date in Bremen, Thursday December 5. The postponement of the shows came after the group had already postponed appearances in Munich Sunday and in Hamburg on Monday. The further postponement came about because the band’s singer, Liam Gallagher, required further medical attention after sustaining facial injuries and several broken teeth in the nightclub fight. A official statement on the band’s website (oasis.net) says: “Following the events of last weekend, Oasis have… Read more »

Though some artists have been known to exaggerate a broken heart for the sake of art, the All-American Rejects have no need for such artistic license. For them, the truth is often sadder than fiction. “There’s rarely a happy ending in any of my songs,” singer/bassist Tyson Ritter said. “As far as the guy getting the girl in the end, it’s all fictitious. It’s all made up in my mind, I guess; all wishful thinking.” Such weighty fare fills the self-titled full-length debut by Ritter, 18, and multi-instrumentalist Nick Wheeler, 20. Two kids from Stillwater, Oklahoma, shouldn’t know so much… Read more »

After a long struggle marked by false starts, frustration and fan indifference, commercial online music services see this year as the crucial second act of a hit show in the making. Since launching a year ago, subscription music services headed by the major label-backed ventures Pressplay and MusicNet have taken heat from music fans who compared them unfavorably with free peer-to-peer networks like now-idled Napster. But after expanded licensing deals and platform upgrades, these services and rivals Listen.com’s Rhapsody and FullAudio, are better armed to take on free services like Kazaa and Morpheus, which emerged in the wake of Napster’s… Read more »

Singer Liam Gallagher and several other members of the British rock band Oasis and its entourage were held for questioning after a fight that left Gallagher with several broken teeth. Gallagher’s injuries over the weekend forced the band to cancel concerts in Munich on Sunday and Hamburg on Monday. Munich police said they’d detained three members of the group, including Gallagher and drummer Alan White, and two of their bodyguards on suspicion of assault, resisting arrest and damage to property. All were released Sunday afternoon after posting bail. Munich prosecutor Anton Winkler said his office would decide before the end… Read more »

Kelly Osbourne proved she’s every bit her father’s daughter at her first full-fledged concert on Tuesday. Any questions about her authenticity – that recording her album, Shut Up, was simply the easiest way to boost her celebrity – were wiped away soon after she emerged beneath a giant pink neon sign that read “Kelly Osbourne,” visibly moved at the enthusiastic applause. Unlike her previous live performances – at a radio-sponsored festival and a “Tonight Show” gig – on Tuesday the crowd was all hers (the “I love you, Kelly” cries might have given it away), and she grabbed the reins… Read more »

I spent 24 hours on the road with Good Charlotte recently. Most of what I saw I already knew from TV reports on tour-bus life, probably from episodes of “Diary”: You can’t do much in the bathroom, it’s eight grown men living in the space of a large bedroom, running water is a luxury and the food sucks. That’s not, however, what I went to report on. Good Charlotte are a band with punk values – they look it, they grew up on the music and they believe in the punk ethos. At the same time, though, their video has… Read more »

Vivendi Universal said third-quarter revenues for Vivendi Universal, excluding its utilities unit Vivendi Environnement, grew by 1 percent to $7.4 billion, despite revenue declines in its publishing and music divisions. The report, released Monday, comes as the media, entertainment and utilities conglomerate faces continuing pressure to improve its balance sheet and convince investors that its business is sound. For the three months ending Sept. 30, Vivendi’s Canal Plus subscription television group showed some improvement, with revenue growing 4 percent to nearly $1.2 billion in the third quarter. But Vivendi’s Universal Music Group saw revenues fall 9 percent to 1.3 billion… Read more »