Nine Inch Nails began their Wave Goodbye tour with a pair of small venue concerts in New York City this weekend. The group performed Saturday at the Bowery Ballroom and last night at Webster Hall. Yesterday’s performance was especially noteworthy as Trent Reznor and Co. played their entire 1994 classic The Downward Spiral from start to finish, plus nearly a dozen more of NIN’s greatest hits. These 11 shows represent the last time Nine Inch Nails will perform live. Rolling Stone was crammed up near the side of the stage Saturday night at the Bowery Ballroom near an army of… Read more »
Coroner’s office investigators found lethal levels of the fast-acting, powerful anesthetic Propofol in Michael Jackson’s body, a search warrant unsealed Monday in Houston revealed. The documents reportedly quote the Los Angeles County coroner’s office conclusion after Jackson’s autopsy, according to the Los Angeles Times, although L.A. County officials have put a security hold on the official autopsy results in the Michael Jackson case until police complete their investigation. The warrant revealed that Jackson’s personal physician, cardiologist Dr. Conrad Murray, told Los Angeles Police Department detectives that he had been treating Jackson for insomnia for six weeks and that he’d been… Read more »
The history of rock is full of “Eureka!” flashes of brilliance. Chuck Berry had the idea to fuse country with the blues. Bob Dylan took folk music electric. Nikki Sixx realized that the line “I’d say we’ve kicked some ass” could rhyme with “I’d say we’re still kickin’ ass.” For the Arctic Monkeys’ Alex Turner, the big light bulb idea came in 2005: Get huge by thinking small. Write scrappy little Brit-punk tunes about the humdrum town you’re stuck in, the pissy little pubs you can’t get into, the local girls who aren’t desperate enough to dance with you. Give… Read more »
Superfans often compare listening to their favorite band to a religious experience. A church in Florida is taking that sentiment to the next level by introducing its congregation to a Sunday service that features the music and lyrics of Bono and Co., reports Twenty Four Bit. The rockin’ First United Methodist Church of Pensacola, Fla. will host the U2charist – a play on the word Eucharist – which includes U2’s “One,” “With or Without You” and the service-opening prayer of “Beautiful Day.” The debut U2charist in Pensacola took place August 23rd at First Methodist. The U.S. Episcopal Church first developed… Read more »
TLC members Rozonda ‘’Chilli’’ Thomas and Tionne ‘’T-Boz’’ Watkins will perform their first concert together in over six years when the pair take the stage at the annual Justin Timberlake and Friends concert at Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay on Oct. 17, People reports. TLC were chart-toppers in the ’90s with hits like “Waterfalls,” “Creep” and “No Scrubs,” however the group disbanded after Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes died tragically in a car accident in 2002. T-Boz and Chilli only performed together one last time, at a June 2003 concert for New York radio station Z100. However, the pair will once again… Read more »
While the Red Hot Chili Peppers slumbered, the band’s members have been keeping busy these last couple of years, what with drummer Chad Smith joining all-star group Chickenfoot, frontman Anthony Kiedis developing a series for HBO and bassist Flea enrolling at USC to study music theory. But things are about to change in Pepperland. Smith recently told Billboard the band would reconvene in the studio this fall, and Keidis and Flea confirm to Rolling Stone they are indeed ready to rock again. “We’ve decided to write some songs,” Kiedis told us at a benefit for the Silverlake Conservatory of Music,… Read more »
Lenny Santiago has a rich history in the rap game. His hands have been in almost all Roc-A-Fella Records releases (sans Kanye West’s), and now he is running things over at Def Jam as vice president of A&R. He signed DJ Khaled and also spearheaded the A&R work on Jadakiss’ The Last Kiss and Fabolous’ upcoming Loso’s Way (due July 28th), and his big fall project is the new one from Ghostface Killah. But hold up: There’s been some controversy over whether Ghostface will really live up to early descriptions that the record that will be an R&B album. Tony… Read more »
Michael Jackson fans paid tribute to the King of Pop the best way they knew how last week: by buying his music. In the first full week following the death of Jackson at age 50, and with retailers fully prepared for the onslaught of buyers, the fallen pop idol sold an astonishing 800,000 solo albums, dominating the charts in a way not seen since his heyday in the early 1980s. According to figures provided by Nielsen SoundScan, Jackson’s sales nearly doubled from the week before, with his music occupying all 10 spots on the Top Catalog Albums chart, led by… Read more »
Today marks 17 years to the day that rock juggernaut MxPx performed its first show in the backyard of Mike Herrera’s former Bremerton, Wash. home. In that very suburban spot, the band created a recording studio out of the free-standing garage. The Clubhouse, which has since become a memorable and historic location for the group, will be host to a live greatest-hits performance this Wednesday. “I’ve spent over half my life in MxPx. Let that blow your mind a little!” drummer Yuri Ruley exclaimed. With bands sprouting up left and right, longevity is an attribute found in few and far… 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 »
