Search Results for: THICK

A good bar band singer knows the importance of conversing with the patrons. “Did you come to have fun?” Justin Timberlake asked after taking the House of Blues stage early Tuesday morning (June 17) for his first crack at what he’s dubbed the Show After the Show. “The point of this is to have fun.” And fun it was, yet it certainly seemed there were other reasons for JT – as he was billed – to play a club show a few hours after the lights went up on the Justified and Stripped Tour at the Staples Center. Mainly, the… Read more »

After spending last fall on the road with Jay-Z, N.E.R.D. and Nappy Roots, 311 are catering their next tour to the more rock side of their fanbase. The hip-hop- and reggae-influenced quintet has lined up blues jammers G. Love & Special Sauce, piano punks Something Corporate and frat rockers O.A.R. as openers for a summer trek. The outing kicks off July 15 in Bakersfield, California, and hits mostly amphitheaters, crisscrossing the country until wrapping up September 5 in Santa Barbara, California. “We always want to make sure our fans know how grateful we are and what a blessing it is… Read more »

Joey McIntyre will make his television-series debut this fall, and fittingly, he’s playing a new kid on the block. Actually, the youngest of the New Kids is one of two new teachers on “Boston Public,” but very young ones at that. Jon Abrahams (the son in “Meet the Parents”) is the other. “We’re the two squirts coming in,” McIntyre said Wednesday, phoning from his temporary residence, a Los Angeles hotel suite. “My character lets kids call him by his first name and tries to relate with them on the same level, and that may or may not work. The sh-… Read more »

In an attempt to explain the evolution from SR-71’s major-label debut to their upcoming release, singer Mitch Allan suggested a similarity to the progression from the Beatles’ Revolver to Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Then he caught himself. “Not to compare our albums to those albums,” Allan said. “Maybe it’s more like the difference between Sugar Ray’s first and second albums.” It may not be Sgt. Pepper’s, but Allan couldn’t be happier about SR-71’s Tomorrow, which abandons the pop-punk focus of 2000’s Now You See the Inside for a more anthem-rock approach. “When people hear the first single they’re… Read more »

Mega-nü-metal bands are kinda like Microsoft. Every time they unveil a product, it’s gotta be more advanced than the last, and each new offering is accompanied with a celebration that upstages the one before. On November 15, 1999, as Korn prepared to release their fourth album, Issues, the band played a rock show at the legendary Apollo Theatre in the Harlem neighborhood of New York, a site usually foreign to rock shows. On Monday night, to christen the release of their new disc, Untouchables, the band simulcast a one-hour concert from the Hammerstein Ballroom to 40 movie theaters across the… Read more »

Bennett Zier has a fine idea for a new radio format. His eyes light up as he tells you about it. “We play Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Bobby Darin,” he says. “The great thing about it is what we call it. You ready?” He pauses. “Vegas Radio! Is that great or what?” Zier can imagine the whole scene – the deejays, the jingles, the ironic retro-swinger patter. It’s his music, the kind he plays in his car. He’s in love with this idea, and with his natural salesman’s charm, he’s making you love it, too. So why doesn’t… Read more »

John Forté conducts all of his interviews by mail. Not because he’s shy or eccentric, but because he doesn’t have a phone. See, he’s the only Grammy-winning convict at Pennsylvania’s Lorreto Federal Penitentiary with a new album to promote. Forté, 27, was behind bars when his confessional second album, I, John, was released in April. That’s why he’s done most of the interviews about it via letters from his cell. “Spiritually, I’ve never been more free in my life,” wrote the former Fugees confidant, who was sentenced to 14 years in prison in November after being found guilty of possession… Read more »

The first family of metal turned reality TV darlings the Osbournes hit midtown Manhattan to unveil a new album Wednesday and conjured up the requisite amount of vulgarity and bickering. Between f-bombs and friendly put-downs, patriarch Ozzy (greeting the press via satellite from London), matriarch Sharon, daughter Kelly and son Jack introduced The Osbourne Family Album, a collection of tracks handpicked – and in some cases recorded – by the family. The compilation, due June 11, runs through more mood changes than your average Osbournes holiday dinner, slamming tracks from System of a Down, the Kinks and Ozzy himself against… Read more »

Alice in Chains’ Layne Staley was found dead in his Seattle home on Friday evening. The King County Medical Examiner positively identified Staley’s body on Saturday (April 20), following an autopsy. Exact time and cause of death are pending, as laboratory results could take several weeks, a spokesperson said. Staley was 34. Police responded to a call to check on a person’s well-being at Staley’s address in Seattle’s University District at 5:41 p.m. PT on Friday, according to the police report. Upon discovering the body, which is presumed to have been there for several days, officers called investigators from the… Read more »

Nelly has plan of attack together now. After going back and forth while choosing what type of a song he wanted to go with for his first single off of Nellyville, the St. Louis MC decided to keep the party going with “Hot in Herre,” produced by the Neptunes. “It’s pretty banging,” Nelly said Monday (April 15) of the track, the title of which incorporates his thick vernacular – “There” is “Derre,” while “Here” is “Herre.” Working with the Neptunes, whom he’s known since the days when he had no record deal and they sold tracks for “dirt cheap,” was… Read more »