Search Results for: EUROPE

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 »

Ozzy Osbourne fractured several bones including a neck vertebra in an all-terrain vehicle accident but the injuries are “not a major problem,” a doctor said Tuesday. Osbourne, 55, was “stable and comfortable” after emergency surgery that restored the flow to a blood vessel damaged in Monday’s accident, said Dr. Dick Jack, the medical director at Wexham Park Hospital in Slough, west of London. “When he was admitted, he had a fractured left collarbone, he had some damage to the blood vessel that is underneath it, he had eight fractured ribs on the left side and, in addition to that, an… Read more »

U.S. shock rocker Marilyn Manson is the target of a criminal inquiry in Switzerland, after a religious group made a formal complaint about his stage act. Zurich District Prosecutor Michael Scherrer told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the artist was under investigation for allegedly breaching Swiss law protecting religion as well as making incitements to violence during a concert in the city in February 2001. Manson – whose real name is Brian Warner – and his band members take their first names from pop culture icons and their surnames from famous serial killers. He also uses the sobriquet “Antichrist… Read more »

The Prince of Darkness is opening up about his dark past. In a candid interview appearing Monday in London’s Daily Mirror, Ozzy Osbourne revealed that he was molested as an 11-year-old schoolboy while growing up in the working-class city of Birmingham, England. “I was sexually abused when I was a kid,” the heavy-metal icon told the Mirror. “Two boys used to wait for me to come after school. Then they would f-k around with me. They didn’t f-k me, but they messed around with me. “They would force me to drop my pants and all that s-t. They felt me… Read more »

What do you get when you put a couple of pop-punk guys together with a few near-legendary dudes from New York’s underground hardcore scene? You get Hazen Street, a hard-edged but catchy, two-singer-fronted band that has become the first act to be signed to Benji and Joel Madden’s D.C. Flag imprint. The signing of Hazen Street is neither a leg up to a buddy band nor an attempt to cash in on a current trend. For the brothers who call Good Charlotte their day job, putting out the new supergroup’s debut is a chance to show some love to the… Read more »

Christina Aguilera will star in her own live performance television special on the U.S. WB network. Taped earlier this month at London’s Wembley Arena, the one-hour “Stripped… Live in the U.K.” will air Nov. 30 at 9 p.m. ET. According to Aguilera’s official Web site (http://www.christina-a.com), the concert will be released Jan. 13 on DVD. After a stint hosting last week’s MTV Europe Awards, Aguilera was forced to end her U.K. tour early, canceling Nov. 10 -11 shows in Newcastle and Manchester, England, respectively, due to illness. Her world tour will continue Dec. 1 with the first of three shows… Read more »

Cheered on by up to one billion pop fans around the world, American heart-throb Justin Timberlake was the big star of the MTV Europe Awards on Thursday night when he landed three top prizes. “If I could have had a picture perfect night, it could not have been better than this,” said the overjoyed singer after sweeping all before him to cap a memorable year. The Best Male Artist, Best Album and Best Pop Awards went to the former Mickey Mouse Club mouseketeer whose career has soared with the release of his critically acclaimed album “Justified.” “I feel really, really… Read more »

Splinter, the eagerly-awaited new album from The Offspring, will be released by Columbia Records on Tuesday, December 9. The first single from Splinter, “Hit That,” is the #1 most added track at modern rock and rock formats this week. Splinter is The Offspring’s 7th album and is produced by Brendan O’Brien – who worked with The Offspring on Conspiracy Of One and has helmed projects by Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Rage Against The Machine, Korn, and many others – and features legendary drummer Josh Freese (the Vandals, A Perfect Circle) on each of the album’s 12 tracks. “After seven albums, it… Read more »

Bertelsmann AG and Sony Corp. announced a preliminary plan to merge their music businesses Thursday, setting the stage for a music company that would vie for world primacy with Universal Music Group. A merger of Sony Music Entertainment and Bertelsmann’s BMG, if it comes to pass, would bring together the world’s No. 2 and No. 5 music companies as the industry struggles with losses blamed on music piracy. The new company, to be called Sony BMG, would be equally owned by Sony and Bertelsmann and run by Andrew Lack, chairman and chief executive of Sony Music Entertainment. Rolf Schmidt-Holtz, the… Read more »

R.E.M. made unique chart history today with “In Time: The Best Of R.E.M. 1988-2003” debuting at #8 and #16 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, the first time the same album debuts twice in the Top 20 in the same week. Released on October 28th, “In Time” is for sale as both a single compact disc and double CD featuring the same initial piece and a second disc with rarities and b-sides compiled by the band. The albums scanned 75,560 units and 51,163 units respectively with a cumulative total of 126,723 units according to Nielsen Soundscan which would put the… Read more »