Search Results for: The Aces

The seductive R&B star, along with fellow musicians Macy Gray, Jill Scott and Zap Mama, served up five hours of sultry, come-hither jams to a 15,000-plus capacity crowd at the DTE Energy Music Theatre in Clarkston, Michigan, Wednesday. “Ladies, women, bitches, hos, hoochie mamas,” Gray addressed the crowd, “we’re here to celebrate one of the most magnificent, most miraculous, things ever created. We want to celebrate the dick!” With many male audience members covering their faces, Gray then led the women in the house in a chant of, “Dick, dick, dick…” Unrestrained sexuality was the theme of the festival, meant… Read more »

There might be a better setting for a Tool concert, but it doesn’t exist in waking life: The prehistoric, rugged beauty of Red Rocks Amphitheater felt almost threatening when serving as the physical backdrop for the band’s volcanic performance on Friday night, which opened a brief tour with prog-rock veterans King Crimson. Flanked by rock formations pushed up from the bubbling earth more than 60 million years ago (and donning a bald head, sporadic body paint and a black leather bodice), Tool frontman Maynard James Keenan looked like an androgynous ambassador of the apocalypse. Judging by the capacity crowd –… Read more »

While lip-synching on a four-wheel Honda motor bike during his “Livin’ It Up” video shoot late last month, Ja Rule took a little time to count his blessings. No, not because he narrowly escaped being shot by voluptuous, water-gun-toting models who served as eye candy for the clip’s barbecue/party setting, rather, because Ja has finally shaken a beleaguering hex. “It’s been a jinx with me and Case,” he said, referring to his collaborations with his crooner labelmate and the song’s guest star. “Everything we’ve done hasn’t got cleared. We made a record in like ’95, ’96. We did a song… Read more »

For many local fans, the enduring concert memory of goth-metal rock band the Cult is of the already-declining group being thoroughly upstaged at the Forum in 1995 by Lenny Kravitz and his band, an event followed by the Cult’s breakup a few months later. But an unexpected reunion in the late ’90s, culminating in a triumphant two-week, sold-out run at the West Hollywood House of Blues, signaled the desire of singer Ian Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy to recapture the band’s lost glory days. They haven’t quite come back that far, but the Cult, mach II, is a worthy beneficiary… Read more »

Capitol Hill politicians supportive of getting tunes flowing on the Internet are expected to push legislation Thursday ordering music companies to offer the same price when cutting various deals with Web denizens. Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Va.), whose home state includes tech giant AOL Time Warner, is slated to hold an early morning press conference detailing the bill, which is being co-sponsored by Rep. Christopher Cannon (R-Utah). The recording industry is expected to launch a massive counteroffensive once the measure is presented in final form. Music execs said it is ridiculous to make a company cut a deal with one venture… Read more »

Rumors of teen-pop’s death have been greatly exaggerated, as genre standard-bearers ‘N Sync showed convincingly by posting the second-best debut-week sales numbers in history. Nearly 1.9 million copies of the superstar quintet’s Jive release “Celebrity” flew from retail shelves in the week ended Sunday, according to data compiled by SoundScan. That’s about a half-million short of the group’s record-breaking sales week with its prior LP “No Strings Attached,” which bowed in March 2000 and has sold 10.6 million copies nationwide to date. It’s more than enough, however, to top 2001’s second biggest bow, the Dave Matthews Band’s “Everyday” (RCA). The… Read more »

Picture this: A kind of “MTV Unplugged” on The Travel Channel. Then you have an idea of what to expect from “Music In High Places,” airing 10 p.m. EDT Friday on MTV. This week’s outing offers an unusual and entertaining acoustic performance by the Deftones, a band whose ear-shattering, in-your-face music won a best metal Grammy this year. “This is a group that really played into the philosophy of ‘Music In High Places,”‘ said the show’s executive producer, Parvene Michaels. That philosophy was to take the Deftones out of their concert venues, unplug their electrical guitars, microphones and amplifiers and… Read more »

Incubus have named their upcoming album Morning View, after the street on which they recorded it, guitarist Mike Einziger said Wednesday. Due October 23, the album will feature a blend of styles similar to their breakthrough 1999 release, Make Yourself. “It’s really musically diverse, but it’s not like a patchwork quilt with tons of pieces put together. It’s pretty seamless,” Einziger said backstage at the Area:One festival. “There are some very heavy moments, and there are some very melodic, beautiful moments on the record. There’s everything from the entire spectrum of sound incorporated into it.” The first single from Morning… Read more »

Maybe it’s a sign of ‘NSYNC’s maturity, the reason they appear to have risen to the top of the teen pop class. Whatever the answer, having both Hugh Hefner (arm-in-arm with six Playboy playmates) and the 15-year-old Olsen twins (Mary-Kate and Ashley, of “Full House” fame) at their album release party Monday night at least proves that their demographic has widened. Those were just a few of the celebrities joining the boys from Orlando, Florida, at the club Moomba on the eve of Celebrity’s arrival in stores, amid almost unreal expectations (not to mention whispers of vulnerability). Industry insiders predict… Read more »

Those awaiting a new Limp Bizkit album will have to wait a little longer. Fresh from directing the debut video for Puddle of Mudd, the new act on his Interscope imprint Flawless, Bizkit frontman Fred Durst has gotten the green light from Intermedia Films to direct his first feature film, “Wanna-Be,” the story of teenage mobsters in New York. “I was stuck in a room for two days,” Durst tells Billboard.com. “It was this test to see if I can withstand [the filmmaking process]. Everyone at the company had these poker faces, so I left not knowing what was going… Read more »