Search Results for: owl city

Ticket sales are down, and big tours are scaling back to smaller venues. It looks to be a long, hot summer for the touring industry. On the cusp of the industry’s peak period, a number of high-profile tours and festivals have already hit snags, among them highly touted outings from Mariah Carey, the Field Day Music Festival, Lollapalooza, and Beck and Dashboard Confessional. Faced with a crowded tour market combined with high ticket prices, permit hassles, a sluggish economy and poor buzz, these tours and a handful of others have either had to scale back the size of the venues… Read more »

Modern rock quintet 311 will embark next month on its 41-date summer Unity tour. The outing comes in support of the group’s seventh studio album, “Evolver,” due July 22 from Volcano Records. The outing is set to kick off July 15 in Bakersfield, Calif., and criss-cross the country before closing Sept. 6 in San Diego. Opening acts on the tour include Something Corporate, G. Love & Special Sauce, O.A.R. and DJ P. Something Corporate will accompany 311 from the start, through an Aug. 29 date in Denver. G. Love & Special Sauce will join for shows on July 29, July… 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 »

John Houston, the father of singer Whitney Houston and a theatrical manager since the early days of rhythm and blues, died Sunday after a long battle with diabetes and heart disease. He was 82. Houston died at a New York hospital, family spokeswoman Nancy Seltzer said Monday. She said Houston’s health had been deteriorating for several years. Well before his daughter’s rise to fame, Houston managed the career of her mother and his ex-wife, Cissy Houston. She sang with The Sweet Inspirations, a backing vocal group to artists including Aretha Franklin. Relations between Houston and his daughter, who has acknowledged… Read more »

While half the country is braving an intense Arctic front, some of those shivering are warm with the knowledge that summer can’t be too far away if the annual Vans Warped Tour trek is taking shape. Less Than Jake, Finch, the Ataris and Andrew W.K have been added to the lineup of the ninth annual outing, which will commence June 19, according to promoters. The latest additions to the bill have all toured with the punk-rock summer camp before, except Andrew W.K, who performed on Ozzfest last summer. Taking Back Sunday, Dropkick Murphys, Mest and the Suicide Machines are also… Read more »

If “DVD Jon” Lech Johansen, creator of the DeCSS DVD descrambling program, had been tried in a U.S. court instead of in Norway, he might have been found in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. But a bill reintroduced in the U.S. Congress would allow consumers to defeat anticopying measures on digital content in some cases. The Digital Media Consumer Rights Acts, reintroduced Tuesday by Representative Rick Boucher, a Virginia Democrat, and three other lawmakers, would trump the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s anticircumvention provisions, allowing consumers to break copy controls in order to do such things as make personal… Read more »

‘Tis the season for holiday radio shows. As much a tradition as eggnog, mistletoe and broken resolutions, December always brings a bumper crop of all-star shows in which bands give back to their fans (and the radio stations that play their music) by jetting around the country and serving up short hit-heavy sets. The month of December will be especially star-packed for those living near Indianapolis, San Diego or Philadelphia. If you love Good Charlotte, Coldplay, Destiny’s Child and Queens of the Stone Age, you might want to cash in some frequent flyer miles, because those bands are among a… Read more »

Florida punk rockers New Found Glory are gearing up to release their first DVD, The Story So Far, next month. Due October 15th on MCA, the DVD features live footage showing the quintet’s rise from playing backyard shindigs to European tours. Also included are interviews and a number of videos including “Hit or Miss,” “Friends Over You,” and new single “Head Over You,” which features a cameo from Vandals bassist Joe Escalante. “There’s this company called Troma and they do like B-horror movies, but cheesy, almost like silly, so we got them to do the special effects on our video,”… Read more »

After a raucous summer tour, the pride of NYC hardcore’s scene, H2O, is back with a spankin’ new EP, “All We Want.” Set for release on October 29, 2002, this low-priced CD is sure to keep the band’s rabid fanbase satisfied until the release of their fifth full-length, tentatively scheduled for spring ‘03. “All We Want” is packaged in a special digipak and contains three new studio recordings, two live tracks and a video. True to the band’s DIY ethic, and harkening back to their earliest indie days, the EP’s recording session started August 25 and finished mixing a short… Read more »