Search Results for: a day to remember

Travis Barker finally unveiled the full version of his much-hyped, gravity-defying, head-spinning drum solo Tuesday night during Blink-182’s show at General Motors Place in Vancouver, British Columbia. A week earlier, during a “friends only” warm-up gig at the Forum in Los Angeles, Barker had done the routine – which features his drum riser levitating, swinging from side to side and turning upside down – and shaky camera-phone footage of the stunt quickly began to make the rounds. During Blink’s first two shows in Las Vegas, Barker did a stripped-down version of the solo, as the venue was too small for… Read more »

In early 1984, when Epic Records executives presented their slate of upcoming releases at the convention in Hawaii of parent company CBS Records they couldn’t resist playing up the success they were experiencing. So between the pitches for new albums, Epic inserted stock footage of semi trucks and a voice-over that thunderously announced, “There goes another load of Michael Jackson’s Thriller albums!” Trucks weren’t really leaving the warehouse every few minutes, but Thriller was still shattering expectations more than a year after its November 30, 1982, release. Epic was selling more than 1 million copies per month in the United… Read more »

The show’s era as an icon ended with the death of Johnny Carson, but as long as his “hi-yo” sidekick, Ed McMahon, was still with us, some part of the era was as well. Tuesday, at age 86, McMahon died, taking what was left of the old Tonight Show with him. McMahon put himself through college pitching products on the Atlantic City boardwalk, which may have been a more useful education than college itself. In a way, that’s what McMahon did with startling success for 30 years: He pitched Carson to the public. His laugh made Carson’s jokes seem funnier;… Read more »

Kanye West might not be able to tell you the complete background of one of his newer artists, Big Sean, but he can see his guy’s future. Sean may be the next mainstream hip-hop star coming out of Detroit. “He put out mixtapes… His story for me was I heard him rap, he killed it and he got signed,” West said. One cannot script Sean’s introduction to West any better. Sean took a page right out of fellow Detroit native Eminem’s handbook and lost himself in the moment. When he was alerted by a friend that West would be at… Read more »

As Internet reports suggested, Pearl Jam was indeed recording a Target commercial under the direction of Cameron Crowe last week at Seattle’s Showbox theater. But there is more to the story than an exclusive retail relationship. It has been known that Pearl Jam is no longer under contract after 18 years of recording for Sony-affiliated labels, and there has been a good deal of speculation about who would release the rock act’s next album. Kelly Curtis, who has managed Pearl Jam since its inception, conducted a wide-ranging interview Sunday night, confirming that the band’s next album — rumored to be… Read more »

There was a point – midway through the writing process of Paramore’s new album – when they almost gave up. Racked by doubts that they had anything left in the tank, struggling to write material that matched the ferocity of their breakout Riot! album and smothered by unspoken tensions that had simmered ever since they nearly split in early 2008, they were treading water in their hometown of Franklin, Tennessee. And with deadlines – not to mention a tour with No Doubt – looming on the horizon, the situation was getting dire. “We went through a lot of heavy stuff… Read more »

MIAMI — The little girls who made the New Kids on the Block a boy band sensation in the late 1980s and early 1990s are all grown up, and now they’ve got disposable income. So what better way to show their love for Jordan, Jonathan, Joey, Donnie and Danny than spending three days with them on a Caribbean cruise? About 2,100 women, most in their 20s and 30s, paid more $1,000 each for a sold-out, three-day Carnival Cruise Lines trip that left Miami for the Bahamas on Friday. The voyage kicks off the band’s summer concert tour, when they’ll dust… Read more »

NEW YORK –  Longtime New York radio newsman  George Weber  was found stabbed to death in his  Brooklyn  apartment Sunday morning, cops said. The bloody body of Weber, a passionate fan of the city who spent a decade doing local news on WABC morning radio, was found just after 9 a.m. when he didn’t show up for work. “I used to hear his voice in the top and the bottom of the hour. It’s a voice New Yorkers know. Now that voice has been silenced,” said  Aaron Katersky, 33, an ABC colleague who found himself covering a friend’s murder. Weber,… Read more »