Search Results for: sting

Maybe honesty really is the best policy… for placing high on a Billboard chart. The unabashedly sincere Dashboard Confessional’s third studio album, A Mark, a Mission, a Brand, a Scar, will come in at #2 on next week’s Billboard albums chart. Sales of more than 122,000 copies affords the follow-up to 2001’s The Places You Have Come to Fear Most a first runner-up slot, right behind Alan Jackson’s Greatest Hits Volume II. The most popular country singer of the last decade after Garth Brooks sold more than 328,000 copies of his third best-of set, according to SoundScan, to place above… Read more »

Velvet Revolver singer Scott Weiland dodged a bullet on Thursday when a judge sentenced him to three years of probation for his May drug arrest. Weiland appeared in a Pasadena, California, courtroom on two felony possession charges and was sentenced to probation, which includes court-monitored individual and group counseling sessions, mandatory Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and random drug testing, according to a spokesperson for the Pasadena district attorney’s office. The singer must also continue to attend a drug-rehabilitation program as a condition of his sentence. If he completes all the terms of his probation within the first year, the case could… Read more »

Insane Clown Posse, the Detroit rap duo beloved by teenage boys for their creepy face make-up and X-rated lyrics, have been named the worst band ever by Blender magazine. The music publication’s September issue said Insane Clown Posse “sound even stupider than they look,” and derided them for rapping about “40-ouncers and venereal disease.” Officials at the band’s Psychopathic Records label were less than enthusiastic about the rating. “They’ve brought themselves up from nothing to become an international musical phenomena (sic), and yet, somehow, they still get no respect from fine mainstream publications such as Blender Magazine,” they said in… Read more »

At the most recent Bionic show in Toronto, I had the pleasure of chatting with guitarist Ian Blurton for a few minutes. Not only does Blurton wail with Bionic, but he’s also got producer credit on the upcoming Weakerthans album, Reconstruction Site. Now, I had enjoyed a few beverages at this point, and I’m not going to try to quote Mr. Blurton, but the general gist was that he was pretty pissed off because the Weakerthans record was leaked onto the Internet well before its release date on August 26. For those of you who went and downloaded the album… Read more »

One reason A Perfect Circle resonate with such power is because the bandmembers are dedicated to their art – whether it’s catchy and commercial or sprawling and inaccessible to the mainstream. They immerse themselves in their songs, which are as much a part of themselves as a reflection of their personalities. And they present their vision in a striking and unconventional manner, singing from behind a screen, performing in near darkness and greeting the media with complete indifference. The band’s new album, The Thirteenth Step, due September 16, is textural, evocative and moody – metallic art-rock for the clinically depressed.… Read more »

The White Stripes rocker, banged up in a car crash last month, makes this perfectly clear on the band’s Website (www.whitestripes.com), posting actual footage from a surgery that inserted three screws into his broken left index finger. Really, a note from the doctor would have sufficed… But, no, White says he wanted fans who bought tickets to shows either canceled or postponed by the dinged digit to “better understand the complexity of the situation.” “A bone in the index finger of my fretting hand was shattered…making it absolutely impossible to play guitar,” White writes on the Website. “I’ve been instructed… Read more »

Britney Spears, casting off the remnants of her sweet-as-pie image along with most of her clothes, says she’s relieved she didn’t settle down with fellow pop star Justin Timberlake. Spears tells British Elle magazine for its September issue that the breakup made her a better artist. She also says she hated seeing Timberlake talk about their relationship and that she’s actually quite shy. On the cover, the 21-year-old singer appears in a seductive pose wearing only a pair of tiny black briefs. “I’ll always have feelings for Justin,” she says. “OK, not feelings for him, but he’ll always have a… Read more »

With little pomp and no showboating, A Perfect Circle were all about the music in the first headlining performance in support of their upcoming album, Thirteenth Step. That shouldn’t surprise any APC fans or those familiar with shows by singer Maynard James Keenan’s other band, Tool. Never once did he holler, “Hello, New York” – in fact, he jokingly made a reference to New Jersey – nor did he ask if fans were ready to rock. It didn’t matter. He obviously was. And so were his bandmates, who took the stage in formation: guitarist Billy Howerdel at the front of… Read more »

Times are getting ugly in the music world. Fans are getting subpoenaed for digital downloads. Internet Service Providers are getting muscled into handing over suspected pirates’ names. And parents are worried about having to spend their kid’s college fund on defending him for downloading one too many Michelle Branch songs. It seems like no one is winning the amorphous battle over music online. But, contrary to the rising red tide, there are plenty of companies heading into the black. There’s no question that digital music is here to stay. As a result, the companies who will benefit most directly are… Read more »

It looks like Eminem’s finally planning to stand up to his old schoolyard tormentor-in court. Slim Shady wants a Michigan judge to dismiss a lawsuit brought by a playground peer who allegedly taunted and terrorized the then-prepubescent hip-hopster back when the two were in grade school, the Detroit News reports. Eminem, born Marshall Mathers III, is expected to appear in Macomb County Circuit Court before Judge Deborah Servitto on August 18 to ask her to toss the suit filed in 2001 by DeAngelo Bailey. Bailey’s seeking $1 million for the injury he claims to have sustained to his reputation when… Read more »