Search Results for: Download Fest

Alternative rock outfit Dashboard Confessional has unveiled plans for a fall tour, beginning Aug. 30 in Pittsburgh and wrapping Oct. 7 in St. Paul, Minn. The Chris Carrabba-led band will be touring in support of its upcoming Vagrant album, “A Mark, a Mission, a Brand, a Scar,” due Aug. 12. The first single, “Hands Down,” is now available for paid download from Apple’s iTunes Music Store. The new disc was produced by Gil Norton (the Pixies, Foo Fighters) and includes such songs as “Carry This Picture for Luck,” “Rapid Hope Loss,” “Ghost of a Good Thing,” “Several Ways To Die… Read more »

Assembling a promotional campaign for a veteran band that has been out of the spotlight is a tough enough feat. But Capitol Records is facing the daunting task of reintroducing a group that hasn’t released a new album in 13 years. Luckily, the campaign behind pioneering alternative rock outfit Jane’s Addiction’s “Strays,” due July 22, has had a huge prerelease boost from first single “Just Because.” The song is No. 4 on Modern Rock Tracks after four weeks, returning Jane’s Addiction to the top of the format at which it scored five top 15 hits between 1988 and 1991. The… Read more »

Independent music company FullAudio Corp. on Wednesday launched MusicNow, the latest digital music service to enter the race to woo music fans from the tempting free, song-swapping services inspired by Napster. Boasting an easy-to-use magazine-like format, FullAudio, which has been developing the service for several years as it has obtained licensing from the big five major labels, said that MusicNow is designed around 36 channels. “MusicNow is on the forefront of a dramatic market paradigm shift beyond the labor-intensive ‘search and browse’ database model developed by Napster,” said Scott Kauffman, president and chief executive officer of Chicago-based FullAudio, which is… Read more »

Nearly 7,000 music industry representatives and more than 1,000 bands are descending on Austin this week for the 17th annual South by Southwest Music Conference and Festival. Even for a place that calls itself the “Live Music Capitol of the World,” the planes, buses and vans arriving full of shaggy-haired men and tattooed women carrying guitars and drums adds a new dimension to the city. The musicians and industry representatives have come for four days of industry panels, discussions and trade shows. To balance out the shop talk, the festival features four intense nights of live music with 1,000 acts… Read more »

Record labels and artists were out in force Thursday to reiterate their blunt assessment of digital piracy’s effects on their financial well-being at a state government hearing in Sacramento. “I would like to begin with a simple proposition,” said Recording Industry Assn. of America president Cary Sherman. “The one-two punch of physical and digital piracy is threatening the livelihood of the music industry.” The hearing, convened by the California State Assembly’s Committee on Arts, Entertainment, Sports, Tourism & Internet Media, was the second piracy gripefest in as many weeks for the industry, which is increasingly turning to the government for… Read more »

Marcos Curiel has long been a fan of Carlos Santana, so when the P.O.D. guitarist discovered that the jam rocker wanted P.O.D. to record a song for his upcoming album, Curiel felt so alive he thought he could… well, you know how the song goes. “Every chance we get, we try to go to a Santana show because they just rock live,” enthused Curiel. “We’ve always been a band that’s open to so many different styles of music, so when we got the opportunity to work with Santana, we jumped on it.” P.O.D. got that opportunity after their producer, Howard… Read more »

The 16th annual South by Southwest music conference drew to a close Sunday, and the only thing that lasts longer than the seemingly perpetual hangover that results from four debauched days of a music industry on spring break is the buzz emanating from the bands and key moments that defined this year’s festival. Of the more than 1,000 bands showcasing their chops before press, radio programmers, managers, lawyers, label execs and promoters in 48 venues strewn throughout Austin, Texas, a handful traditionally rise above the chaff to become the targets of hype hucksters and topics of critical discussion for weeks… Read more »

The world’s largest record company will be the first of the major labels to release a copy-protected CD in the United States, signaling a new chapter in the industry’s efforts to stem music piracy. When Universal Music Group on Tuesday releases the soundtrack, “Fast & Furious – More Music,” consumers won’t be able to copy the music onto another CD or use their PCs to “rip” tracks in digital MP3 format. The copy-protection technology will also render the disc unplayable on Macintosh computers, DVD players and game consoles, such as Sony’s PlayStation 2. It might not even play in some… Read more »

No, this is not a story about an isolated incident. Although for years rock concerts have been drug and alcohol fests (come on, we’ve all been to them), for some reason dance music related events and clubs have recently been targeted by law authorities nationwide – from superclub Twilo in New York being shut down earlier this year to a yet unsubstantiated Federal case filed in New Orleans against club organizers. You even see the prevailing attitude on nightly news programs and in magazines like Time that dance music events are simply all about the drugs … perhaps all the… Read more »

Apple Computer Inc. unveiled on Tuesday a portable music player that can hold an entire music collection and takes Apple outside its core computer business for the first time in eight years. Apple’s “iPod” is the size and shape of a deck of cards, with a small LCD screen and round dial on a white front and a stainless steel back. It holds about 1,000 songs in the MP3 music format and has a battery life of 8-10 hours. Apple will begin selling iPods, which only work with its Macintosh computers, on Nov. 10 at a suggested retail price of… Read more »