His initial stumble happens a little before the one-minute mark, with the new lines coming at 1:40, to the delight of those actually paying attention.

Martin's delivery doesn't sound particularly poised, and the song is slow enough that he could plausibly have come up with that bit of self-mockery. If I'm going to be offended by anything in this performance, it's his prancing, which starts at 2:35 and can also be seen at the beginning of this clip.

Now that's inexcusable.

Coldplay Changes, and Stays The Same [NYT]
Fix You (live @ MSG 6.23.08) [YouTube]
Coldplay MSG Free Concert. June 23. Fix you. FRONT ROW! [YouTube]

Here's a list of Ice-T's issues with Soulja Boy.

• Unlike Young Jeezy, TI, Lil Wayne, Lupe Fiasco and Ludacris ("cats that take time to go in the studio, and really write something"), Soulja Boy doesn't give 110%. "This ain't no old school new school, this ain't no east coast west coast drama, you dig?

• That "Superman" bullshit is wack.

• Instead of taking the criticism and respecting his elders, Soulja Boy had the audacity to reply to Ice-T's mixtape outburst by LOLing at his Wikipedia page and screaming "dude, you old!" "You was supposed to take that!" says Grandpa Ice, since dissing Ice means having Hip-Hop itself on your ass.

And really, that's why Soulja Boy is pretty smart to keep mocking him. While the Ice-T of Rhyme Pays took pride in his knowledge and would have found "Crank That" embarrassing, he would be bummed to hear his older self is bitching about these young kids with their stupid dance moves and lack of respect for their elders. From his own experience with old-ass fucks, he know there's no point in trying to upbraid a youngster for his foolish nihilism, especially in hip-hop. We may roll our eyes when Soulja Boy confuses "Cop Killer" with "Fuck The Police" and says that "Wal-Mart wasn't even made" when Ice-T was born, but gleeful irreverence has always been one of rap's greatest weapons (i.e. "there's three of us but we're not the Beatles"). Ice should just sit back, enjoy his cake, and wait for the four elements of hip-hop culture to exact the same karmic justice on Soulja Boy that they did to Wacky D and Sunshine.

Solja Boy- Ice T APOLOGIZES!! to Solja Boy [YouTube]
Wacky D And Sunshine [YouTube]

ONE-LISTEN VERDICT: The album opens with Pharrell describing the origins of his synethesia before the band whispers "It's time for some action" over a beat that's thankfully more In Search Of... than Fly Or Die, while being In My Mind enough that folks who didn't enjoy Skateboard P's solo debut may not react positively. Despite tighter beats on songs like "Yeah You" and the discofied "You Know What," N*E*R*D is still the Neptunes' Ween-like rock reference move: "Windows" could be the Knack; the verse of "Happy" is like later Morrissey on helium. Sure, the vocals are reliably groan-worthy and the band still seems to think that bridges must stop the groove and transform a track entirely rather than build upon the verse, but if you can't handle these queasy qualities, you probably gave up on N*E*R*D a long time ago. It's hard to say which tracks will improve with time or wind up subsumed by the quirk, but the improved danceability compared to Fly Or Die is promising, and I can't think of a N*E*R*D album that had more immediately enjoyable music moments than this already has.

WHERE TO HEAR IT: Music Is The Heart Of Our Soul has it zipped.

Gawker Media polls require Javascript; if you're viewing this in an RSS reader, click through to view in your Javascript-enabled web browser.

Think about it this weekend. Vote with your hearts, people.

Earlier: Pete Wentz Wants Our Help

Superdrag are in full reunion mode, after lead singer John Davis' dalliance with Christian rock, and recording new material. Meanwhile, Hanley has been singing backup for Miley Cyrus and trying to teach herself how to properly use a curling iron. Either way, both acts were better than the Refreshments.

Superdrag - Destination Ursa Major:

Superdrag - Sucked Out

Letters To Cleo - Awake

Letters To Cleo - I See

Superdrag [homepage]
Kay Hanley [homepage]

"Everybody there (at J Records) is against [a country album], which makes me want to do it even more. Apparently, the idea didn't test well, whatever that means."



But the rocker, who is set to release the final LP in his Great American Songbook series later in the year, insists he will try and release a country record - so he can say he has tried everything in his music career.



He explains: "I want to do records for my own peace of mind. So when I do kick the bucket (die), I can say, 'I did that.'"



However, legendary music mogul Clive Davis - who is the CEO of J Records - intends on a more festive direction for the British musician.



He says: "Clive Davis wanted a Christmas album but I'm not into that so much."

Clive may not be the CEO of J anymore, Rod, but I'd suggest you forget about George Jones and settle for "Blue Christmas (feat. Tim McGraw)."

Label snubs Stewart's country dreams [IOL]

"Bull in the Heather" (Catherine Keener saw the video once)

"Sugar Kane" (Beck was soooo high when he saw them rock this at Lollapalooza)

"100%" (Video has skateboarding in it and Mike D was like, "yo!!!")

"Kool Thing" (Radiohead really thinks they shattered boundaries when this got played on MTV)

"Disappearer" (Portia DeRossi thinks Lee Ranaldo kind of looks like her girlfriend)

"Superstar" (If you like this, Diablo Cody also thinks you should check out the Juno soundtrack)

"Stones" (Allison Anders thinks people should get over the old stuff and pay more attention to their new ideas)

"Tuff Gnarl" (Mike Watt covered this once—it's the jam and Dave Eggers thinks "blah blah blah phbbbt")

"Teenage Riot" (Eddie Vedder likes to imagine some day kids will stand up, revolt, and go see the Fastbacks)

"Shadow of a Doubt" (Michelle Williams thinks this song is creepy and sexy, like seeing your ex dressed up like the Joker)

"Rain on Tin" (This song is so cosmically magical to Flea, it reminds him of 9/11 and makes him take off his shirt and cry)

"Tom Violence" (When he closes his eyes, the track makes Gus Van Zant see a beautiful blond boy looking bored)

"Mary-Christ" (David Cross likes this song because it sounds like Alvin & The Chipmunks)

"World Looks Red" (One of Chloe Sevigny's skeevy, demented director boyfriends used to play this every morning)

"Expressway to Yr Skull" (Flaming Lips are thinking about removing the distortion and making this sound like sloppy Styx)

"Slow Revolution" (a new Sonic Youth song about how they slowly transformed into the kind of band who would get famous pals to write kissy-faced intros to an ironically titled hits comp available only at coffee shops)

Sonic Youth Sets Track List For Starbucks Compilation [Billboard]

I know in the past you've felt bad for those poor bastards selling tickets in the primary market, who are forced to charge only the face value of the ticket (plus those exorbitant additional charges) while those bastards on the secondary market can force people to pay prices that are even more jacked up. Well, Live Nation has finally solved that problem; they'll make a direct deal with the scalpers themselves, or at very least, an eBay subsidiary that replaces the traditional role of the scalper with a web-based solution.

Madonna's coming concert tour is to feature what appears to be a first in the concert business: An official ticket reseller that will peddle seats at marked-up prices to fans who couldn't get them through normal channels.

In the U.S. and Canada, eBay Inc.'s StubHub will serve as the "official fan-to-fan ticket marketplace." In Europe, the role will be filled by Viagogo Ltd., a ticket reseller that also will sell "VIP packages" — higher-priced tickets that include amenities like backstage passes and meetings with performers.

The endorsements highlight the growing popularity and influence of so-called secondary ticketing companies, which let both fans and brokers sell tickets to others at prices that often far exceed their face values. Concert promoters and artists have long complained that they are locked out of the secondary marketplace, putting money in the pockets of speculators and middlemen who aren't involved in staging or promoting concerts....

"It's the future of the ticketing business," said Chuck La Vallee, StubHub's head of business development for music. "Promoters have always complained that we don't have skin in the game."

Sadly, this practice isn't all that new; Ticketmaster has pulled a similar stunt with their TicketExchange program over the last few years. So, Madonna fan, when you can't seem to get tickets for her upcoming shows despite hitting refresh on your browser repeatedly in the minutes before the on-sale time, at least you'll know where to look for the tickets you weren't able to buy on your own!

StubHub Enlisted in Resale Of Madonna Concert Tickets [Wall Street Journal]

After a few sluggish months of slow-rising hits, the past few weeks have seen some major movement on the Billboard rock charts, with several new entries making big impacts. And the biggest comes from Disturbed, the Chicago nu-metal band distinguished primarily by frontman David Draiman's resemblance to Howie Mandel with multiple facial piercings, as well as his usually annoying, occasionally awesome Korn-meets-Shudder-To-Think vocal tics. "Inside The Fire," the lead single from their forthcoming album Indestructible, entered the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart at a staggering No. 5, and moved up to No. 4 last week—pretty impressive, considering that even the biggest monsters of rock tend to take at least a few weeks to reach that high on the chart. This marks the band's tenth consecutive top 10 hit, and it's also quickly becoming one of its biggest hits to date on Hot Modern Rock Tracks, where it's historically had less traction. But since Draiman neither goes "oooh-wah-ah-ah-ah" nor covers Genesis on "Inside The Fire," the song is not one of the rare instances where I will refrain from changing the station when a Disturbed song comes on the radio.

Elsewhere on the Mainstream chart, a number of recent entries suggest the following theory: rap-metal is back, just without the rapping. The chart is still littered with holdovers from that widely maligned subgenre's turn of the century heyday, but right now three of those acts have hits rising up the chart without busting a single fresh rhyme: Linkin Park's "Given Up"; P.O.D.'s "Addicted"; and Kid Rock's "All Summer Long." Now, don't get me wrong. Mike Shinoda, Sonny Sandoval, and Bob Ritchie are not among my top five MCs of all time; they wouldn't even make my top 10. (Sorry, Sonny!) But these bands' early hits were at least a lot more fun than listening to these jokers and their bandmates decide to get 'melodic.' Please, nobody tell Fred Durst that all he has to do to get back on the radio is start earnestly crooning. He might cover The Who again.

As Chris Molanphy noted in his last 100 And Single column, the other big Modern Rock debuts come from the Raconteurs and Death Cab For Cutie. "Salute Your Solution," the lead single from the Raconteurs' Consolers Of The Lonely, is at No. 11 after entering the chart at No. 26 for the first week that anyone, including radio stations, had a copy of the song, given that the album it comes from was made available in "EVERY FORMAT AT ONCE" on March 25. Although Jack White's insta-release stunt was ostensibly done in part to circumvent the major-label "first-week sales" mentality, both the album and the single got off to very strong starts. Still, "Salute Your Solution" is one of my least favorite tracks off the album, and I can't see it topping the chart like "Steady, As She Goes" did in 2006. Death Cab, whose 2005 album Plans was just certified platinum this February, are right behind the Raconteurs at No. 12 with "I Will Possess Your Heart," an ambitious eight-minute single that most stations are presumably playing in its four-minute radio edit.

So what isn't on the Modern Rock chart? Two big rock hits currently in the upper reaches of the Hot 100 and the Pop 100.
• Three Days Grace's actually-kinda-good "Never Too Late" was one of the most-played Modern Rock hits of 2007, but it dropped off the chart well before its current crossover to VH1 and adult top 40 stations. That crossover was helped by program directors being made less squeamish about the song's anti-suicide theme through a new edit that changes the chorus line "you want to end your life" to "you want to change your life."
• Meanwhile, Fall Out Boy's cover of "Beat It," which has already been hailed by one Idolator contributor as potentially the best rock song of 2008, is all over pop radio, but it has yet to crack the rock charts. I'm not shocked, given that one of the big theories put forth in my '07 wrap-up was that FOB are quickly losing their rock radio support. But I wonder if those stations will keep holding out on this one, considering that many of them still play that damn Alien Ant Farm version of "Smooth Criminal." Personally, I think the band's take on "Beat It" is weak sauce—Patrick Stump earns his better-than-your-average-emo-frontman bona fides much more easily when he's not held to the higher standards of pop and R&B vocals. Nonetheless, when he hits the Rod Stewart Great American Songbook phase of his career in a couple of decades, he'll have a head start thanks to this cover, not to mention his previous work interpolating Supertramp and Jermaine Stewart with Gym Class Heroes and covering Go West with New Found Glory.

"Some dude, one of the extra guys, jumped another extra and started calling him a pu—- and punching him in the face," said one of the club's employees, who spoke to MTV News but did not want to be named. "They fell against the bar, and there were all these beer bottles up there which were being used as props, and the bottles fell over and broke. The guy who was jumped, his arm got cut, and he started bleeding all over the place. The other dude ran away. It wasn't such a big deal. The police did show up, and the dude that was attacked went to hospital and sat there for two hours before he was seen."

Menupages blogger Leila Cohan, who works next door to the shoot, can confirm that Lindsay Lohan was seen outside the location Wednesday night: "Her hair was strung-out and overprocessed, and she was orange. She gave us the bitchface. At first, my friend Mariel thought she was Rachel Zoe." Ouch! Doesn't sound like a good night for anyone.

N.E.R.D. Video Shoot — Featuring Lindsay Lohan — Erupts Into Brawl, Eyewitnesses Say [MTV]

From D'Mystro's Crib, his mind-sucking vortex of a website. Again, [sic]. [sic], [sic] [sic].

DMystro began recording in the early 1980's as studio musican at MTV studio's in frankfurt west germany.

D'Mystro is member of the 1985 Go Go /R&B/ Hip Hop"Icee Hott" Band signed under EMI/MANHATAN Records, and released a hit Maxi Single entitled "Hollar at me. " Also filmed a music video with Kurtis blow and billboard magazine and Major label executives.

DMystro musician skills took him in the studio with the group "Snap" to remix of the powerful and Platinuum song "the power" released on ARISTA. After returning to stateside in 1991, D'Mystro partnered up with Darryl Dash, (MCA-Universal songwriter) both founded DPE Records entity, nationally independent publishing label. This started to Kicked off a decade of songwriting and producing hits for some of the industries promising up and coming R&B Artists; Tanya Blunt Vocalist-Actress starred in (Sister act)and Tommie Johnson (Background vocalist for Patti Labelle, Rodney Mansfield, and Crystal Waters, Eric Gable, Keith Martin, Cliff Jones, Eric Roberson, Prophet Jones, William Becton, Kirk Franklin, Brian Moore , SOS Band and Mighty Clouds of Joy, Boyz to Menn,Female and the Black Birds.

The bio also claims he worked on Kanye's Graduation in 2007, which makes you wonder why he didn't notice West was adding vulgar and offensive imagery to his 20-year-old jam. Anyone want to transfer their 12" of Icee Hott's "Hollar At Me" to mp3? Please?

Songwriter to Kanye — You Jacked My "Good Life"! [TMZ]

The Roots Feat. Dice Raw, DJ Jazzy Jeff, And Peedi Crakk - "Get Busy" (Def Jam)
Judging by the pre-release leakage from Rising Down, the Roots' rhythm tracks are now pushing for all their life against a suffocating layer of static and an smothering low-end closing in from the bottom. (Without booklet credits, I don't want to call that noise a "bassline" only to once again find out it's Mr. Tuba Gooding, Jr.) Philly breakout-who's-yet-to-break Peedi Crakk leapfrogged across a string of Roc-A-Fella tracks earlier in the decade that treated his sing-song flow like a sound effects record, groomed like so many Dash/Carter pet projects to wind up routed to the mixtape circuit and growing a chip on both shoulders. (Perhaps he missed the 2007 memo that all Philly rappers needed a Swizz beat to see any sort of chart love.) Surveying his rough decade alongside some hometown all-stars, he's less manic on the mic, but perhaps that's fitting given the track in question. The big beats on Peedi's old collabos hopped, skipped, and jumped; "Get Busy" trudges two slushy miles up Broad Street in big black boots because SEPTA stopped running at the first sign of crappy weather. Cold fronting against the windswept scratching from a guy who used to run afoul of Philip Banks and the band's immobilizing groove, Peedi flips up his hood, his middle finger, and offers lawyers and label heads the following unsolicited advice: "Fuck the Internet / Buy a baseball bat / Break a bootlegger leg."

Trance Rap Antidote [Cocaine Blunts]

D1 - "I'm Loving" (Tempa)
Like an Anglo-Caribbean cousin to the snarling Eastern Seaboard ish of "Get Busy," British producer D1 usually comes moanin' at midnight with the darker-than-the-rest sub-bass and thudding beats of dubstep; Tempa is one of the South London labels that initially mapped the increasingly confining parameters for the latest post-rave sub-genre barely distinguishable to American ears. But D1's always been a little softer than his pitch-black brethren, clinging to memories of clubbing fun during dubstep's long ban on anything that smacks of Chic-approved good times; whether "I'm Loving," much more suited to the daylight hours than anything I've recently heard from a dubstep producer, is merely the man following his particular muse or a concerted effort to rethink the genre's gloomy boom, it's quite welcome. D1's intercontinental syncopation is cooked from the kind of skipping Detroit techno hi-hats beloved by U.K. broken beat producers and the palsied carnival bounce of Trinidadian soca; add a fresh coat of bright synths and a sweet soul vocal hook and you've got something more suited to chilling at a beach house than skulking through the drizzle-soaked concrete-and-steel landscape suggested by crit-darling Burial and a grown and sexy twist on adolescent bassline heads reattaching house to the garage.

D1 [MySpace]
D1 - "I'm Loving [Boomkat sound samples]

Guillaume And The Coutu Dumonts - "Les Gans (Philip Sherburne Remix)" (Musique Risquée)
Music critic pal conflicts of interest abound, but I'd be fibbing if I didn't say this remix was my fave rave from this round of Single Spinning. Simple in the heart-tugging way good melodic, minimal techno should be, something often easy forget about given the genre's current glut: a fragile Brian Wilson chime and a Perlon-esque shaker-and-pop pattern opens to let in bass and synth before the track drifts from good to great on gliding, sad-eyed horn charts more Cinematic Orchestra than Ricardo Villalobos. Comparisons to anything remotely trip-hop are tricky given the tendency for potential listeners burnt on blunted beat comps to instantly recoil, and Sherburne's remix has too much snap to sink into the background. But more build-up or come-down than set climax, this would indeed fit on one of the early, excellent (no, really) Future Sounds Of Jazz comps quite nicely. (Don't snort, minimal snobs; the maestro Villalobos himself appeared on one of the series' later installments.)

Philip Sherburne Productions [MySpace]

Andrew WK - "McLaughlin Groove" (Fair Game)
When I was a small boy, my grandfather (may he R.I.P.) subjected his Catholic grandchildren to endless Sunday mornings spent not in church but around the TV for secular worship of various network news idols sermonizing from the magazine or roundtable mount. The only one of these windbags who could have possibly entertained a pair of grade schoolers cranky because they couldn't even enjoy whatever off-brand cartoons were being aired on UHF was John McLaughlin, whose bellowing, bellicose interruptions and radiant smugness were like watching one of your jerky prepubescent peers be plucked from the recess yard and plopped in a leather chair between Washingtonian insiders, instilling in us both a love for news and a love for shouting. Under the aegis of public radio arts'n'news show Fair Game, our beloved Andrew WK has recorded this cranked-up, karaoke-ready throwback to his I Get Wet-era sound in awed appreciation of that special "McLaughlin Groove," and while there's no reasonable explanation for two of my favorite loudmouths to have come together, I can only hope this hints at a possible duets record between strapping young Andrew and the aging Mr. McLaughlin right quick, before AWK has to posthumously put it together in an icky Alicia/Frankie style.

Andrew WK - McLaughlin Groove [MP3]
Fair Game [Official Site]

"We are not idiots," he said."We wouldn't have launched the service in front of the whole music industry unless we had secured its backing. We feel we have been unfairly crucified because a competitor tried to damage us. Everyone is very upset."

A competitor? Is he hurling those accusations at the still-croaking ad-supported music site SpiralFrog, or is there another doomed company outfit that's trying to compete with QTrax out there? I'm guessing it'll be a while before we find out the details, given that the QTrax higher-ups don't seem to really be into focusing on the nitty-gritty based on this other quote from Klepfisz:

"As the world's first free and legal P2P service that has chosen to spend 4.5 years on licensing and not to violate IP rights, we have decided that we will provide activation keys shortly upon final execution of all pertinent contracts."

Four and a half years and yet you don't double-check to see if your contracts are signed on your big expensive press-blitzed launch day? I mean, I know the promise of a James Blunt concert could lead some people out there to get distracted by the stars in their eyes, but come on.
QTrax: We're Launching...Someday [Silicon Alley Insider]
Music file-share site Qtrax forced into humiliating U-turn [Times Online]

Bizarre Of D12 Sets Himself Up Via YouTube [ProHipHop]

^* May actually require selling of bodily fluids/organs/infant child.

1) Being ahead of the technology curve; preparing for a thinned out industry; and managing budget efficient acts is very noteworthy of my resume which is simple. I told these cats the online revolution was coming and they needed big adjustments. They relied on lawyers, courts, and accountants only to now look upward at Apple, etc.
2) Their cost factors didn't fit the times, I come from a world where the $50,000 investments resulted into 6 - 7 figures. Now it's a business where 7 figures are invested to make 6.
3) I would run it like sports. These artists would be busting their tails on tour and on the stage to gain a fan. They would be coached on how to do their thing right. Braintrust will be high, and subcontracting to the right contributors will be comparable of the efficiency of these labels like Jazz and catalog departments. You cannot have people working, that haven't the slightest clue of what they are in the middle of.
4) Any criminal mindedness in artistry, and management would have sit this one out, go their own way. It's like bad apples the long run ain't got nothing to do with entertainment. You can't mix the stage and off stage parodies.

So, in summary, Chuck wants to reverse all of the bad decisions the Def Jam has made over the last decade regard digital sales, dramatically scale back the label's budget, become a Berry Gordy-style figure grooming his artists for success, re-staff for efficiency's sake, and forcibly clean up the moral lapses of the label's roster. Suddenly toppling the whole racist government thing seems that much easier.

Chuck D Of Public Enemy Wants Def Jam Presidency [AllHipHop]

Although briefly mentioned in the Brian J. Barr installment of this series, Niki really deserves attention all to her Wolfmother-lovin' self, and this week's "How Can We Make Year-End Wrap Up Concept Even Less Interesting And Relevant" feature running across several VVM properties makes for a perfect opportunity. It's possible that some of the blame should go to Luke Y. Thompson, who introduces the concept, declaring:

Over the past few years, the availability of year-end critics lists has multiplied faster than the worry lines on Ben Bernanke's brow. By mid-December, the Net and the magazine rack at your Barnes & Noble were brimming over with a head-spinning, eye-glazing cornucopia of rankings of such de rigueur albums as The Arcade Fire's Neon Bible, The National's Boxer, Spoon's Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, M.I.A.'s Kala, Radiohead's In Rainbows, LCD Soundsystem's Sound of Silver, and Battles' Mirrored.
If you want to parse the exact sequence of those records in your favorite publication or Web site, feel free to do so. We're going in a different direction.
In five cities from Minneapolis to San Francisco, we asked musicians, comedians, athletes (and in one case, a Michael Stipe-impersonating electrician) to tell us what music they loved most this year. It could be albums, songs, or the collected works of an artist, and it need not have come out this year. We just wanted to know what was moving our interviewees right now.

While you have to wonder how many of those "de rigueur albums" will be atop a sister publication's own rankings in a few weeks, there's still hope to be held out. Maybe the freedom the premise offers will make for some interesting writing. Minneapolis interviewee Dan Wilson used to be in Trip Shakespeare, surely he heard something good this year while penning new Dixie Chicks songs, right? Right?

Feel free to judge for yourself the quality of the contributions from the four other cities, but leave it to Niki D'Andrea to use the opportunity to continue her in-print fantasy love affair with WNBA star Diana Taurasi. Earlier this year, Niki penned a mind-numbingly extensive cover story on Taurasi while the hometown Mercury were on their way to a WNBA championship. To summarize, the Mercury are awesome, and Taurasi, while apparently straight, is the dreamiest. While there's no evidence Ms. Taurasi returned the affection, she makes another appearance in the paper, even while unavailable to be interviewed, because she's somewhere in Russia, apparently. Have you ever wondered which rapper WNBA stars prefer, Kanye or 50 Cent, but didn't have the opportunity to vaguely cyber-stalk one via her blog to find out? Be sure to thank D'Andrea, because she saved you the trouble!

For basketball star Diana Taurasi, 2007 was a stellar year....The Mercury made it onto the Wheaties box, Taurasi re-signed a half-million dollar deal to play in Russia during the WNBA off-season, and now she's got one of the most popular athlete blogs on sports site yardbarker.com.
One of the reasons Taurasi's blog rocks is her candid banter about all sorts of things, but most often music — and the fact that she'll carry on conversations about music with her fans in the comments section.
Because Taurasi's bundled up and playing b-ball in the former Soviet Union right now, we'll refer you to some of her Yardbarker commentary on what rocked her world in '07:
Kanye West: (posted September 11): "So here we are, on the eve of 9/11 — still at war — and we're presented with one of the most important questions of our generation: Kanye or 50?
"Really. Kanye. Seriously. I'm buyin' that one and burnin' a copy for the car. Is there really a comparison? Fiddy? Are there recording studios at Shady Acres? For real, 'Stronger' is the jam of the summer. While you can question the sunglasses indoors, you can't fight Kanye's creativity. I won't venture to say lyrical genius (nobody is touching 'Pac in my book, most likely ever . . . in life), but the guy has undeniable talent. I like him. In the wasteland of what has become hip-hop (who can even listen to the radio anymore?), Kanye delivers."

Fascinating! A unique take, especially the part about the indoor sunglasses. You can't blame Taurasi, largely because she wasn't involved, but you have the question the judgment of a music editor who finds the two most interesting musical figures in the fifth largest city in the country to be Diana Taurasi and Jordin Sparks—who also addresses the Kanye/50 Cent controversy, thankfully—and when Taurasi wasn't available just took some offhand remarks about Alicia Keys out of her blog to fill the space. Admittedly, Phoenix might not have had a groundbreaking year for music, but with venues shutting down left and right and a few bands breaking nationally, I have to assume there's a bigger, better story out there than the crazy night they had a "post-hardcore" show at the church Jordin Sparks goes to. Then again, it spares whoever is picking up the New Times and not skipping straight to the listings of massage parlors and strip clubs the pain of suffering through another profile of Phoenix's own Nunzilla, who are notable for dressing like nuns, and for...well...nothing else, really, but they made the cover this year, too.

Niki D'Andrea, you were great this year in coming up with profanities to scream at the vending machine that wouldn't dispense any damn Mountain Dew, but sadly, you make our roll of the worst writers in the Village Voice empire.

Celebrity Playlist [Phoenix New Times]
Desert Heat [Phoenix New Times]

The second problem cropped up during the search, when the cops unearthed two live practice artillery shells, the type that are only meant to be handled by military personnel. Genius publicity stunt for the band, or unearthing of secret military-industrial-music-complex conspiracy? Their tour is still raging on after each member posted a $5,000 bond, so we're going to go with the former. Still, though, they may want to delete the blog post that says they "only update when they run out of coke" before the trial starts. Just a friendly suggestion!

Atlanta Rockers Arrested With Military Explosives [WSB, via Lucas Jensen]

Great review. But the 7.4 rating is not what this review supports and I'd be very surprised if the reviewer gave it the 7.4 rating. The 7.4 rating was a blessed gift from some other editorial squib who, in a moment of grand dyspepsia, said "Fuck Oxbow. They're dicks." And he/she might be totally right about that.

Robinson gives the review a 9.1, and the number rating a "square root of -2," which, if we remember our Sequential I Regents study guides correctly, is an imaginary number. Which opens up a lot of "was he hoping that the number grade doled out during a particularly feverish pre-deadline dream?" questions, if nothing else.

Get In The Ring: Oxbow's Eugene Robinson responds to his record reviews [Paper Thin Walls]

It actually took me a couple of hours to watch the clip because, as a friend noted, "He is Channel Zero." (He also included a sad-face emoticon, but those don't translate well outside the IM window.) And once I did watch, I realized that I'm going to be at a Public Enemy show this weekend, and it'll be hard for me to get the images from Flavor Of Love out of my head during the performance. To compare: I did have a few flashbacks to Rock Of Love during Poison's show the other night—particularly during "Fallen Angel," the lyrical content of which likely doubles as the backstory of half that show's contestants—but somehow it didn't seem like too much of a bummer, probably because Poison's music didn't have as many "important" aspirations. Or maybe it's only because two episodes of Rock of Love have aired so far, as opposed to four different reality series centered around Bret Michaels.

Ugh, I'm reading this over, and I feel like I'm coming off like a fuddy-duddy, or at least someone who can't laugh at things. I don't think I'm either—although I did prefer Charm School to either of the Flavor of Love iterations—and I know Flavor Flav wasn't the political fulcrum of Public Enemy, but is it wrong to be sort of appalled by his transformation into a go-to punchline whose name can't even get spelled correctly in copyedited publications? And is this what every musician who achieves some modicum of celebrity, then gets sent to the dust heap of faded stars, has to look forward to?

Video: Snoop Roasts Flavor Flav [Nah Right]

Clubs used to pay a copyrighted music licence fee of 7c a person per night, but from today the figure will soar to $1.05 a person.

The figure is based on capacity, so a club that holds 500 will pay $510 — even if only 100 people turn up.

Mr Glass pointed out such a club would lose nearly $200,000 per year under the capacity calculation system, regardless of how many patrons attended each night, and accused those responsible of having "no idea" of how nightclubs and DJs operate.

The Phonographic Performance Company of Australia responds:

The Phonographic Performance Company of Australia, which receives and distributes the copyright fees paid by nightclubs, said that nightclubs would not go out of business because of the ruling.

"I find that very unconvincing, as did the tribunal," said PPCA executive Stephen Peach.

"We're talking about the amount of money that is about half the price of checking a coat, or less than 20 per cent of your average beer.

"To suggest that is the difference between nightclubs being profitable and going out the back door is frankly ludicrous."

We haven't . But the fact that the figure is based on the club's capacity, and not its actual attendance, makes these comparisons seem a bit specious to us—sure, nightclub owners aren't the most ethical types around, and they probably aren't even 2,000th on that particular list, which makes the "estimated attendance" guessing-game a bit dicey. But how can a person's beer purchase and coat check offset music costs if that person doesn't exist? Or is this really a mission on the part of the PPCA to cull the country's nightclub herd?

Punters, proprietors to pay for 1500 percent gouge [NineMSN; hat tip FunkyJ]
[Photo via Los Cardinalos]

Waxman sent letters to LimeWire CEO Mark Gorton and StreamCast Networks CEO Michael Weiss asking them to explain what steps they've taken to ensure that users of the P2P services don't open up their computers to abuse.

The letters, the first steps in the investigation by Waxman's committee, come two years after copyright holders won a victory in the U.S. Supreme Court that found the Grokster P2P service illegally induced people to violate copyright laws.

While P2P services have faded from the news and congressional scrutiny, LimeWire and StreamCast are being sued for copyright infringement by the record labels.

Waxman appears to want to delve into reports that such sensitive data as loan applications, bank statements, credit reporting agency records, user ID and password lists and tax returns get inadvertently "shared" with millions of people. There also have been reports of sensitive government information being distributed through P2P.

In the letters, Waxman also asked if ".rar" is pronounced as either "rare" or "rarr, like a growl," and noted that several files labeled as "Chinese Democracy" were "way old, man—like Buckethead-era demos."

Waxman probes P2P services [HollywoodReporter.com]

D'Angelo - Really Love [MP3, link removed]

An article from today's New York Times looks at music videos' experimentation with 3-D:

A little past the two-minute mark, the music video for Gwen Stefani's recent single, "Wind It Up," finds her chained to a fence while a flurry of bubbles and snowflakes float by. Viewed from a certain perspective — that is, through 3-D glasses — it is a dreamlike moment in which the flurry seems close enough to touch.

The video begins with Ms. Stefani yodeling, a homage to "The Sound of Music," one of the her favorite films. But the idea of adding the bubbles and snow came from an unlikely source: James Cameron, the director behind effects-laden hits like "The Terminator" and "Titanic," who visited Ms. Stefani's set last October and shot a separate version of the video with 3-D equipment.

"I had mentioned to the director that any kind of atmospheric effects like snow or rain usually play in 3-D," Mr. Cameron recalled.

While "Wind It Up" was not initially planned as a 3-D video, Ms. Stefani probably won't be the last recording artist to follow Mr. Cameron's lead.

We rewatched the "Wind It Up" video with this bit of effects trickery in mind, and while it still didn't make much sense to us, we sort of understood why the bubbles/snow scene was there. One thought kept popping into our heads: Doesn't this seem like a lot of money to be spent on a video that, at this point, will probably only be watched via YouTube? Sure, the article goes on to say that the videos' 3-D effects will be seen in "specially equipped theaters," and that luring people into theaters to see them is basically an attempt to find a brand-new revenue stream for the ailing music industry. (Concert films were also mentioned as possible targets for the 3-D treatment.) But will it work? We highly doubt it—unless Cameron can somehow convince Panic! At The Disco to recreate Revenge Of The Creature for their next suite of videos.

A Comeback in 3-D, but Without Those Flimsy Glasses [NYT]
Gwen Stefani "Wind It Up" Video [YouTube]