Search Results for: rob thomas

SANTA MARIA, Calif. – The judge in the Michael Jackson case delayed ruling Friday on a complex question involving search warrants, but reiterated he would start the pop singer’s child molestation trial Jan. 31. Santa Barbara County Superior Court Rodney Melville set up an exhaustive schedule of hearings to dispose of motions that may be filed before trial. He also shot down any chance of further postponements. Also Friday, lawyers on both sides spent hours poring over file folders seized by sheriff’s deputies from the home of Jackson’s personal assistant to sort out those that would be considered confidential. They… Read more »

Nashville – Billed as the Best of Both Worlds, the ill-fated co-headlining tour by Jay-Z and R. Kelly ended up with two worlds colliding. The tour’s implosion – at least as a co-headlining attraction – puts a damper on what could have been one of the year’s top-grossing R&B music outings, with a gross potential of about $30 million. Jay-Z is continuing without Kelly under the banner of Jay-Z & Friends. With such marquee artists as Mary J. Blige and P. Diddy in tow, the tour could still be a big winner. But few would argue that Best of Both… Read more »

If his bubble burst and all else failed, Benji Madden is sure there’d be more than a few regular jobs waiting for him. Flipping burgers, working in department stores, tending cash registers, living in small towns. That’s what Madden and his Good Charlotte bandmates were used to before rock stardom. “One thing I never worry about is money. Because I have my health and my family and I can always go back to work,” Benji said. “We’ve all had a million day jobs,” the 25-year-old guitarist/vocalist said during an interview at a Manhattan hotel. “We got by fine then. If… Read more »

Access to the new, improved and perfectly legitimate version of the Napster file-sharing software was given to students at Penn State University this semester as a way to show them that downloading music doesn’t have to run afoul of copyright laws. More than 17,000 students living in on-campus residence halls were offered access Napster 2.0’s premium service, which allows for unlimited streaming and tethered downloading (playback on only one machine) of the more than 500,000 songs comprising the Napster library. Should they want to burn a downloaded song, it would cost them about 99 cents, the industry standard for a… Read more »

Beyonce Knowles may be “Crazy in Love,” but she kept her cool Sunday at one of the more sober Grammy Awards shows in memory. She was the night’s big winner, taking home a record-tying five trophies to join recent Grammy queens Lauryn Hill, Alicia Keys and Norah Jones with the most wins in a single year by a female performer. OutKast’s Speakerboxxx/The Love Below won Album of the Year, giving the eccentric Atlanta funk/rap group three wins, including Best Urban Alternative Performance and Best Rap Album. British band Coldplay took home the prize for Record of the Year for “Clocks,”… Read more »

You say you want a revolution? Well, you know – we all want to change the world. Except for Chris Colus. He’s the drummer for a reggae-roots-rock band, freshly signed to a major record label, and he’s trying to explain that band’s name, which is O.A.R. – Of A Revolution. “There’s no political motive,” the 25-year-old Rockville, MD native insists. “This is the music we’ve wanted to play, the music we wanted to hear – that’s a revolution for ourselves and our fans.” The “Of A Revolution” name actually comes from “The Wanderer,” a short story singer-guitarist Marc Roberge wrote… Read more »

The big question as we enter 2004 is simply “Do you want some?” The answer will come when Liam Gallagher and elder brother Noel return to the fray with the new Oasis album later this year. Although to some the Mancunian brothers’ group may be too tied up with the hangover of ’90s Britpop to ever be a potent force again, they are still undoubtedly one of the biggest rock groups in the country. They do like to tread water, however, and a much-needed change in direction may finally come with the introduction of Death In Vegas man Richard Fearless… Read more »

Child molestation charges against Michael Jackson are being driven by “money and revenge,” said defense attorney Mark Geragos, who vowed to derail the alleged victim’s credibility and fight what he called a prosecutor’s vendetta. For District Attorney Thomas Sneddon, whose similar 1993 case against the pop singer evaporated when the accuser reportedly accepted millions in settlement money, the charges filed Thursday represent a second chance to convict the fading pop star before the prosecutor begins his planned retirement. Unlike the 1993 case, Sneddon says, this time he has a cooperative witness who isn’t interested in a piece of Jackson’s fortune.… Read more »

A 32-year-old producer has filed a $200 million lawsuit against Beyonce Knowles, her father and fellow members of Destiny’s Child, alleging they stole his music for the hit song “Survivor.” Terrence “T-Robb” Robinson, a Miami-based producer, claims he produced a song called “Glorious” in June 2000 and provided it to Mathew Knowles, Beyonce’s father and manager, later that year. Robinson’s lawyer, Peter J. Clarke, claims the producer later heard the song used in a commercial, without his permission. Robinson said the song would have been his big break in the music industry. “I know right now I would be one… Read more »

U2 frontman and humanitarian Bono spoke last night in New York in an effort to bolster his campaign to continue the Bush administration’s financial support of the fight against AIDS in Africa. “AIDS is still is a problem in the U.S. and Europe, but what’s going on in Africa is a different thing completely,” he said during at the UNA-USA Global Leadership Awards Dinner at the Sheraton Hotel. “It’s an emergency.” Bono, who in 2002 founded the AIDS awareness organization DATA (Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa – www.data.org), presented the UNA-USA Global Humanitarian Award to Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United… Read more »