Search Results for: against the current

Figures. Guns N’ Roses reunites and then things go kabooey. Axl Rose reteamed with original Gun mates Slash and Duff McKagan for the purpose of a lawsuit against Geffen Records. The trio was trying to halt the label from releasing a greatest hits collection. In their lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, the Gunners sought a preliminary injunction against Geffen, a subsidiary of Universal Music Group, accusing the company of failing to consult with the band on the tunes, artwork and remixing of Greatest Hits. But a federal judge on Monday deep-sixed Axl & Co.’s call for… Read more »

The odds are stacked against Velvet Revolver. Their singer, Scott Weiland, is currently in drug rehab for the umpteenth time. Who knows if he’ll be a free man when it’s time to tour, and judging from his past history, it could be a struggle for him to stay clean when the band hits the road. As for his bandmates – ex-Guns N’ Roses members Slash (guitar), Duff McKagan (bass) and Matt Sorum (drums), and former Suicidal Tendencies guitarist Dave Kushner – they’re ready to rock, but there’s some question whether the rock community is ready to embrace them. Over a… Read more »

This copyright showdown isn’t as clear as black and white. Today has been dubbed Grey Tuesday by the music activist group Downhill Battle, which is heading up an effort by some 200 Websites to make available the Grey Album, a controversial new remix disc by hip-hop deejay-producer Danger Mouse. In the spirit of bastard pop bootlegs or “mash-ups,” the L.A.-based Danger Mouse lifted the vocal tracks from Jay-Z’s The Black Album and dropped them over new musical tracks created by reworking the Beatles’ White Album. The resulting disc, The Grey Album, was originally distributed undergound in very limited release but… Read more »

Anyone remember the ‘80s metal band Queensryche? They were a pretty popular band at the time, but tell that to the angry fans who basically shot down and pissed on the band night after night when they opened for Metallica. Playing with a variety of big name bands can help a smaller band raise their profile. But if they can’t deliver to the fans’ interest, then it’s like sending the proverbial lamb to the slaughter. Default have had the unenviable task of catering to different types of audiences ever since they broke on to the scene, but bass player Dave… Read more »

Janet Jackson’s Super Bowl flash lasted less than three seconds, but the impact continues to ripple through Viacom, the media giant that broadcast the game. Congress, the Federal Communications Commission, right-wing radio commentators and outraged citizens are calling for stricter decency standards – and the artists and executives who make a living from edgy music, performances and videos are in retreat. MTV in particular, which produced the Super Bowl halftime show, is in the midst of a wide-scale re-evaluation of its musical, news and dramatic content. Within a week of the game, MTV – no stranger to criticism, most recently… Read more »

Veteran Los Angeles punk outfit Bad Religion will release a new studio album, “The Empire Strikes First” June 8 via Epitaph. Like its predecessor, 2002’s “The Process of Belief,” the forthcoming disc was co-written and co-produced by guitarist Brett Gurewitz and frontman Greg Graffin. “It’s not ready for public consumption yet, but it’s basically recorded and finished,” Graffin told Billboard.com. “We really put a lot of pressure on ourselves to make the best album we could. ‘The Process of Belief’ is considered by many to be our comeback, since Brett and I started writing together again. After so many years… Read more »

A long-anticipated partnership with Pepsi that Apple hopes will help raise the profile of its iTunes Music store is launching during the Super Bowl on Sunday. ITunes already dominates the still-fledgling online music industry. Pepsi will run a commercial featuring 16 teenagers who have been sued by the RIAA for music piracy to promote its giveaway of 100 million free downloads from the iTunes Music store on Pepsi bottle caps. But in a coup for what has been one of the lower-profile competitors in the digital music space, MusicMatch announced that is has signed a partnership deal with Coca-Cola and… Read more »

On Jan. 6, San Francisco’s Moscone convention center pulses with all the energy of a rock concert. A crowd sprinkled with hip-hop teenagers, digerati, and aging hippies streams in to hear the annual state-of-the-Mac keynote from Apple Computer Inc. Chief Executive Steven P. Jobs. Every facet of the event bears the fingerprints of the obsessive Jobs – right down to the music that fills the air. This year, it’s the King himself, Elvis Presley. Later, Jobs rolls the tape of Apple’s famous “1984” ad that ran on Super Bowl Sunday that year – and hasn’t been broadcast since. Only this… Read more »

The future of the music industry is being held, quite literally, in the palm of a twentysomething’s hand. Not the “business” side of the music industry – you know, the folks you’ve perhaps heard weeping into their bowls of caviar over the 31 percent decrease in album sales over the course of the past year, a downturn the suits pin on the advent of digital music downloading and CD burning. No, the “art” side of music business is being forceably changed. Artists are either coming to terms with changes in the ways their music is distributed – or doggedly railing… Read more »

A new document leaked Tuesday (December 9) reveals that Michael Jackson was investigated on sexual abuse allegations in February and that investigators found those charges to be “unfounded.” A memo from the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services, dated November 26 and leaked on the Smoking Gun Web site, says a Los Angeles Unified School District official called the agency’s child-abuse hotline soon after the airing of “Living With Michael Jackson” on February 6. The Martin Bashir documentary depicted Jackson hanging out with the boy in question, who admitted to sleeping in the singer’s bed. In addition to… Read more »