George Michael will have to pay a hefty $250,000 fine from his June 9th performance at Wembley Stadium. Wembley's
rules outline that a $20,000 fine is to be charged for each overrunning minute of a concert. Michael's concert
ended 13 minutes after the agreed on end time. According to a spokesperson for the venue, "Wembley can issue
fines for concerts that overrun, but that's between Wembley and the concert promoters."
Willie Nelson has postponed several of his July and early August performances due to exhaustion.
Pogues guitarist Philip Chevron will not be with the band during their North American tour as he was diagnosed
in early June with "locally advanced" throat cancer. The band have hopes that he will be able to return
to work later this year.
The U.K. newspaper The Mail On Sunday has threatened legal action against the Official UK Charts Company to get
Prince's new album, Planet Earth, into the official music charts despite it being given away with the paper on
Sunday (July 15th.) 2.9 million copies of the CD were included in the paper. The charts company has refused to
register sales of the album as they could not prove that newspaper sales were "genuine consumer purchases"
and that it could not audit sales accurately.
Guitarist/songwriter/producer Dick Wagner suffered a life-threatening heart attack on July 3rd, came off of life
support on July 8th and is recovering in a Scottsdale, Arizona, hospital. Wagner performed and wrote for acts like
Air Supply, Rod Stewart, Aerosmith, Steve Perry, Kiss, Meat Loaf, Burton Cummings, Ringo Starr, Lou Reed and many
others. Most notably, he performed on Alice Cooper's 1982 releases Dada and Zipper Catches Skin.
Bobby Brown has increased his security ahead of his planned Australian concert dates due to a supposed threat from
al-Qaeda. It has been reported that the reclusive terrorist leader is obsessed with his former wife Whitney Houston
and "holds a grudge" against Brown despite being divorced.
According to Sarah McLachlan's publicist, she and husband Ashwin Sood welcomed a baby girl named Taa-Jaa on June
22nd. They couple also have a 5 year-old daughter named India Ann Sushil Sood.
Alabama's Randy Owen was recently honored with the Founder's Award at the 50th anniversary celebration of ALSAC/St.
Jude Children's Research Hospital. The program has raised over $310,000,000 in pledges for the hospital.
Bon Jovi's Lost Highway dropped one spot to #4 on the Billboard 200 album chart selling 94,000 copies. Velvet Revolver's
Libertad debuted at #5 on sales of 92,000 copies.
The Traveling Wilburys' Collection climbed up a spot to #2 on the U.K. Album charts followed by the debut of Crowded
House's Time On Earth. Velvet Revolver's Libertad debuted at #6. The Police's The Police dropped 6 places to #14.
Queensryche's newly released live DVD, Mindcrime At The Moore, debuted at #1 on the Billboard Top Music DVD chart.
Capitol/EMI will be releasing Sign Of The Times: The Best Of Queensryche on Aug. 28th in CD, double-CD collectors
edition and digital download versions.
Siouxsie Sioux of Siouxsie & The Banshees will release her solo album, Mantaray, on Sept. 18th in the U.S.
featuring her new single, "Into A Swan," which is due out in August.
A West End musical is being adapted from the 1985 film Desperately Seeking Susan which starred Madonna and Rosanna
Arquette. The show is expected to open on Oct. 12th and feature several Blondie songs ("One Way Or Another,"
"Heart Of Glass," "The Tide Is High," "Dreaming" and "Atomic" as well as
a new song by the band's vocalist Debbie Harry.
According to Chavis Records, anyone purchasing American Angel's new CD will receive a new audio CD to replace it
as manufacturing and production issues created flaws with the original including skips, pops and a missing track.
They expect to have the issues fixed by the end of the month.
The Cult will release their new studio album, Born Into This, on Oct. 2nd. The first single from the album will
be "Dirty Little Rockstar" which heads to radio on Aug. 13th. You can hear a sample of the song at http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/Radio/music/TheCult-DirtyLittleRockstar(edit).mp3
A biographical exhibit at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, Marty Robbins: Among My Souvenirs, will open
on Aug. 3rd and run for 11 months in the museum's East Gallery.
Country artist Gene Watson and his Farewell Party band had an eventful Friday the 13th as their bus, traveling
from Houston, caught fire just outside of Nashville on their way to perform at the Grand Ole Opry. Watson reportedly
singed his hair trying to put the fire out for 30 minutes until firefighters arrived. "When we say we were
smoldering hot in Nashville, we really mean it," said Watson.
A 25th anniversary edition of the 1982 film Wild Style will be released on Sept. 25th via Rhino Entertainment.
The film chronicled the hip-hop explosion in New York's South Bronx. Among the new features are a mini-documentary
with artists from the original film, footage from the 20th anniversary concert and director commentary.
Big Country's Mark Brzezicki, Tony Butler and Bruce Watson will tour for the first time in 7 years in a celebration
of 25 years of Big Country starting this week. They are expected to debut some new material amongst fan favorites.
Today, The Levellers re-release remastered and expanded versions of their Hello Pig, Levellers, Levelling The Land,
Zeitgeist and Mouth To Mouth albums in the U.K.
A representative for Metallica's James Hetfield has told USmagazine.com, "It's false. It's not true."
responding to reports by Britain's The Times claiming he was being detained and questioned by U.K. airport security
last week on his way to the band's Live Earth performance didn't happen.
The current issue of Golf Week magazine features a section about Vince Gill. The singer/songwriter holds an annual
charity tournament named The Vinny which has raised over $3 million for junior golf in Tennessee. Gill also lists
his favorite places to golf in the state as well as favorite restaurants. Gill is also a guest on Leslie Satcher's
new album, Country, and he has filmed a video for "Daddy Was The Apple Of My Eye" with several of the
Fruit Of The Loom characters.
Barry Manilow will release his third decade-themed covers album, The Greatest Songs Of The Seventies, on Sept.
18th via Arista. The album will be released as an 18-track single-disc set and as a double-disc set (a 14-track
Dual-disc with a bonus CD containing 9 acoustic versions of his own 70's hits.) Melissa Manchester duets with Manilow
on "You've Got A Friend" for the album.
According to PageSix, Yes vocalist Jon Anderson has pulled out of a charity fundraising concert after he was advised
by his spiritual adviser not to perform. Anderson was due to play at the Paul Green School of Rock Music in San
Francisco (which was the inspiration of the film Rock School.) The schools' music director was asked to tell the
students that he had pulled out of the show due to health reasons.
Merle Haggard will release his new bluegrass album, The Bluegrass Sessions, on Oct. 2nd. Marty Stuart and Alison
Krauss guest on the album. The album includes many reworked versions of his previous hits.
According to Genesis guitarist Mike Rutherford, "At the moment we're avoiding making long-term plans."
But that doesn't mean short term plans aren't being announced. The band will see an official biography of the band,
Genesis Chapter And Verse, released this fall containing interviews with the band members, managers, others associated
with the group and the late Ahmet Ertegun. They are also planning to record their performance at the Circo Massimo
in Rome for a live DVD and possible live album from their current Turn It On Again Tour.
The bands that former Factory Records boss Tony Wilson has supported have come together to help pay the £3,500
a month treatment costs to keep his kidney cancer at bay with a drug called Sutent for which the Manchester NHS
Primary Care Trust has refused to pay. A fund was set up by former Happy Mondays manager Nathan McGough and their
current manager Elliott Rashman after hearing of Wilson's troubles.
Coinciding with the premiere of the 19th season premiere of Fox's The Simpsons, a collection of 41 songs (from
the first 9 seasons) on The Simpsons: Testify on Sept. 18th. The collection includes songs from the show by Los
Lobos, "Weird" Al Yankovic, Jackson Browne, the B-52's, David Byrne of the Talking Heads and many others.
Janet Jackson has left Virgin and will join Island Def Jam for her next studio album. Def Jam CEO Antonio "L.A."
Reid will work with Jackson on the disc. Her boyfriend Jermaine Dupri recently moved from Virgin to head up Island
Urban.
Queen guitarist Brian May has reportedly completed the work necessary for his PhD in Astrophysics that he abandoned
over 30 years ago for rock music.
ABC's CMA Music Festival: Country's Night To Rock, a two-hour special featuring appearances by Reba McEntire and
George Jones among others, airing on July 23rd. Meanwhile, McEntire and Charley Pride have duets with Red Steagall
that will appear on his new album, Here We Go Again.
Santana will release a new retrospective album, Ultimate Santana, on Oct. 16th via Arista. The collection includes
3 new songs including a new version of his 2002 hit with Michelle Branch ,"The Game Of Love," which now
features Tina Turner. According to Carlos Santana, Turner was originally set to preform on that song but label
politics got in the way. Also in the works is a double-disc set tentatively titled Multi-Dimensional Warrior due
out next spring that contains reworkings of earlier songs from some of his albums that he felt never got heard.
Motorhead's Lemmy Kilmister has recorded a new song, "You Don't Own Me," with his son Paul Inder. The
song can be heard at Inder's MySpace page (http://myspace.com/paulinder) and a message on the site says more is
to come.
Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics has been working on a new album with his live band. The video for one song, "Don't
Be Afraid," can be seen here: http://streaming.bitmax.net/asxgen/hosted/iemarketing/davestewart/video/dontbeafraid.asx
The Police have decided to postpone their taping of an episode of MTV Unplugged in Miami. The date will be rescheduled
but the date and venue have yet to be announced.
The Stray Cats will be releasing Best Of The Stray Cats Live on CD later this fall. The band plans to reunite to
tour with The Pretenders and ZZ Top this summer to help promote the disc.
Madonna has recently been working on her directorial debut with the short film Filth & Wisdom. Gogol Bordello
frontman Eugene Hutz accepted a role in the film and his band also performed "La Isla Bonita" with her
at the Live Earth concert in London.
Billy Bragg and former Clash guitarist Mick Jones performed at a London prison earlier this month as part of Bragg's
Jail Guitar Doors organization encouraging inmates to take up music in hopes to reduce re-offending among prisoners.
The organization gets its name from a 1978 Clash B-side.
Ozzy Osbourne's "I Don't Wanna Stop" and Hellyeah's "You Wouldn't Know" are among the songs
featured on the in-game soundtrack for the new video game Madden NFL 08 due out Aug. 14th.
NOFX plan to follow their 2006 album, Wolves In Wolves' Clothing, with a live album culled from their recent shows
in San Francisco to be released later this year.
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band member John McEuen will be releasing an album, The Music Of The Wild West, which is taken
from his score for the Emmy-nominated Warner Bros. TV mini-series, The Wild West.
Rapper KRS-One and Simone G. Parker's 23 year-old son, Randy Hubbard Parker, was found dead from a gunshot wound
to the head in his Atlanta apartment earlier this month. The cause of death was listed as suicide by the Fulton
County Atlanta Medical Center. His mother cited "severe depression" as the cause of her son's sudden
death in a recent press release. Plans for a memorial service in New York are underway and a private service will
be held on July 17th in Florida.