Sheryl Crow - Crow Finds Love With Restaurateur & other: June 2008

Friday 27 June 2008

Chris Mills

Artist: Chris Mills

   Genre(s):
Other

Discography:

L.I.V.E.

Year: 2004
Tracks: 1

Americana singer/songwriter Chris Mills was born an Army brat, disbursement his formative days surviving in both the U.S. and Germany; as a stripling he settled in southerly Illinois, where he was open to the groundbreaking ceremony guerrilla land good of local heroes Uncle Tupelo. While in high schooling, Mills too fronted a pep pill alloy band, only in the long time to fall out his music took an more and more rootsy turn; upon signing to Chicago indie Sugar Free, he issued his debut EP Nobody's Favorite in 1997, followed in early 1998 by the full-length Every Night Fight for Your Life. Kiss It Goodbye arrived in mid-2000.

GT Jams: A New Sound on the Playground

Thursday 19 June 2008

ABC's remake of Life on Mars destined to crash and burn

MARS ATTACKS: Bashing ABC�s version of Life On Mars, the hit BBC time-travel police drama, is getting to be like self-abuse for me � I know it�s probably wrong and definitely far from productive, but it�s a nice stress release and I probably can�t stop myself now, can I?

And right on cue comes a story on the U.K. Guardian�s film and TV blog judging the show by its apparently-scrapped pilot � the one they made before original producer and showrunner David E. Kelley dropped out and the setting was changed from Los Angeles to New York in the �70s. James Donaghy, the paper�s TV writer, calls it �pretty damn bad.� Particular disapproval is reserved for Jason O�Mara, the Irish actor who took the role of Sam Tyler -- played by John Simm in the BBC original.

Donaghy calls O�Mara �an identikit beefcake of no notable ability,� whose initial response to discovering that a car accident has rewound him back to 1972 is �as cliched as his blandly rugged mug. He shouts, he barges, his eyes pop. It's all quite tiresome.�

Neither does he have much in the way of praise for Rachel Lefevre, who plays the love interest role of Annie Cartwright� a fellow police detective in the U.S. reworking who is based on a lowly Women�s Police Constable played memorably by Liz White in the original. She�s a �swimwear model with a police badge who appears to have wandered into the building by mistake,� and she and O�Mara share a �flatlining sexual chemistry.� So far, so not good.

Apparently, the only good choice made by the show�s original producers was casting Colm Meaney as Gene Hunt, a role made memorable � frankly, it was the best thing about the show � by Philip Glenister in the BBC original. Any actor would relish the bombastic leeway Glenister carved out for Gene Hunt, and Meaney is certainly up for the challenge, but according to Donaghy, the Hunt role in the ABC version is �criminally underwritten ... he feels like an afterthought. He needs to be rewritten with the understanding that he, not Sam, is the most important character in the show and that it lives or dies on his success. It is remarkable that the producers don't seem to have grasped this.� At this point, if this thing makes it to air, I�ll perform all of ABBA�s Arrival album in a jumpsuit and blonde wig.

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Friday 13 June 2008

HFA en Espanol Debuts Online

NEW YORK, May 29 -- The Harry Fox Agency, Inc. (HFA), a
leading U.S. music rights licensing organization, has added a Spanish
language section to its website, http://www.harryfox.com/espanol. HFA en Espanol
has answers to frequently asked questions regarding HFA and music
licensing, along with a direct email, esp@harryfox.com, which goes directly
to the company's Latin Licensing agents.

"HFA is aware of the significant demand for Spanish language recordings
in the U.S., and we have a dedicated team of licensing agents for the Latin
market who are fluent in Spanish and are ready to assist labels and
publishers with their mechanical licensing needs," said Gary Churgin,
President & CEO, HFA. "We will continue to develop our specific Spanish
language service as needed to best serve this market."

According to RIAA reports, almost 7% of CDs shipped in the U.S. in 2007
were in the Latin music genre, defined as having 51% of material in
Spanish. Mechanical licenses are required under U.S. Copyright Law if one
wants to duplicate and distribute a recording of a song that is owned by
someone else. U.S. mechanical licenses are also required for recordings
made abroad and imported into the country. Through proper licensing, the
publisher, and ultimately, the songwriter, are compensated for the use of
their work.

About HFA

Established in 1927 by the National Music Publishers' Association, HFA
represents over 35,000 music publishers for their licensing needs in the
United States, issuing licenses and collecting and distributing the
associated royalties. In addition to being the premier mechanical licensing
agent in the U.S., which includes CDs, ringtones, digital downloads,
interactive streams, limited downloads and more, HFA is dedicated to
finding new ways for its affiliates publishers to recognize value for their
catalogs, including lyrics and tablature. Further, HFA provides collection
and monitoring services to its publisher clients for music distributed and
sold in over 95 territories around the world. For more information about
HFA, or to become an affiliate publisher or a licensee, see
http://www.harryfox.com.

Songfile(R) is a registered trademark of The Harry Fox Agency, Inc. All
rights reserved.

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Saturday 7 June 2008

SumOne

Artist: SumOne

   Genre(s):
Jungle

Discography:

Sprengstoff (SPRENGSTOFF010)

Year: 2005
Tracks: 4

Murdarah Freak Out Hush

Year: 2005
Tracks: 3

Makaveli

Monday 2 June 2008

Anuna and The Ulster Orchestra

Artist: Anuna and The Ulster Orchestra

   Genre(s):
New Age

Discography:

Behind The Closed Eye

Year: 1997
Tracks: 13

Little Richard

Classmates give hero's welcome to Cannes winners

PARIS (Reuters) - Flush with glory but shrugging off stardom for now, the teenage actors who triumphed at the Cannes film festival came back to school on Monday to a hero's welcome.

The amateur cast of classroom drama "Entre les Murs" (The Class), crowded the stage in Cannes when their film won the top award on Sunday, sharing the limelight with the likes of Robert De Niro, Sean Penn and Catherine Deneuve.

After an overnight bus from the French Riviera, they arrived back to their inner city school on the fringes of Paris on Monday afternoon to be mobbed by schoolmates and reporters.

"I'm so excited, there are so many people. It's bizarre," said young actor Franck Keita as he stepped off the coach to huge cheers and applause.

Teachers and students waved from classroom windows as a crush of television crews and balloon-carrying fans temporarily blocked the busy street where the documentary-style film about life in a tough Paris school was shot last summer.

"We knew there would be a prize when (the judges) asked the students to stay for the awards ceremony, but no one expected the Palme d'Or," said school principal Jean-Claude Defaux, who applauded the film for its realism.

It was the first time a French film had won Cannes' coveted top prize in 21 years, and came at a time when the problems in the country's often crowded classrooms have been highlighted by massive teacher and student protests.

Hailed as an insider's look at France's difficult "priority education zones", or ZEP, the film touches on many of the issues shaking modern French society, including immigration, ethnic integration and scholastic under-achievement.

Psidream

Artist: Psidream

   Genre(s):
Drum & Bass

Discography:

Habit (HBT004)

Year: 2004
Tracks: 2

Public Enemy - Chuck D Forgets Public Enemy Lyrics

Chain

Artist: Chain

   Genre(s):
Metal

Discography:

Chain.exe

Year: 2004
Tracks: 12

Over 40 musicians have been a member of Chain, i of Australia's chancellor blues bands that has been sledding firm for over trey decades.

Formed from the remnants of Perth band the Beaten Tracks in 1968, the Chain were named by singer Wendy Saddington after the authoritative soul track "Chain of Fools." Saddington presently left and the circle released one of Australia's start progressive vapors singles, "Present Me Home," in 1969. Soon later, the Chain sawn-off their byname to Chain. In June 1970, Chain recorded the classic live album, Live Chain, at Caesar's Palace discotheque, and along with other Australian acts like Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs, Carson, and the Adderley Smith Blues Band, were considered at the head of the Australian blues movement.

Signing a new carry on with Infinity, the blues foot soldier of Festival, Chain released the single "Black and Blue," which reached number x on the national charts in May 1971. The classical record album Toward the Blues poorly at number six in 1971 and is considered one of Australia's sterling blues albums. The review single, "Legal opinion," established Chain as the nation's leading progressive vapors band. Chain Live Again was released in October 1972 and Chain went on to appear at the first-class honours degree Sunbury Festival in January 1972.

In 1973, the band singed with the new Mushroom label and issued the 2 of a Kind album. Chain's rotating lineup broke up in 1974 and Mushroom issued the retrospective History of Chain album. Six geezerhood later, interest in Chain was still warm and they played at the Mushroom Evolution Concert in January 1982 to keep Mushroom's tenth day of remembrance. They re-formed for good in 1983 and released Child of the Street in October 1985. Their following record album, Australian Rhythm and Blues, was released in April 1988, followed by Blue Metal in May 1990. Several members undertook a tour of Australia in 1991 as Blues Power, while some other member, Matt Taylor, toured as Matt Taylor's Chain, world Health Organization released the record album Walls 2 McGoo (Trouble in the Wind) in 1992. The original Chain again undertook a national tour in 1995.

Madonna: 'Pharrell made me cry'

Madonna has revealed that producer Pharrell Williams reduced her to tears during the making of her recently-released �??Hard Candy�?? album.

�??He made me cry. I�??ve never told that to anybody!�?� the singer said during an interview in Cannes this week. �??You know when you get angry with someone and you start spitting snot?�?�

In an interview with ABC�??s �??Nightline�?? TV show which aired last night (May 22), Madonna explained she was in a sensitive mood, and did not like the way the producer spoke to her while she was recording vocals.

�??I was in a sensitive mood, I was singing and I didn�??t understand the rhythm that he wanted me to sing in, and he was kind of giving me a hard time and I was sort of taken aback by the way he was talking to me, so I said 'You know what? we need to talk'�?�, she said �??So we went upstairs and I�??m like �??You can�??t talk to me that way!�?? and then I just burst into tears and he was like �??Oh my god, Madonna has a heart!�??, and I was like �??What?!�?? and I started crying even more, and we had it out. Now I love him and we make great music together, but I think we had to go through that.�?�

The singer is in Cannes to promote her documentary �??I Am Because We Are�?? during the film festival.

--By our New York staff.
Find out more about NME.

R. Kelly Trial: Three Jurors Selected, But Bathroom Smell Distracts From Court Proceedings

CHICAGO — R. Kelly's defense nearly got a juror who worshipped him and thought the only bad thing that could be said about him was that he and Jay-Z don't get along. They almost had a juror who thought the criminal justice system hadn't given the singer a fair shake because the trial had taken so long to start. And they could have had a juror who thought age-of-sexual-consent laws were "ludicrous."

But predictably, these prospective jurors were weeded out of the jury pool for Kelly's child-pornography trial as questioning began in earnest on Monday. By day's end, three jurors had been selected — one white man, one black man and one black woman — out of the 16 people who had been questioned.

Jurors who said they knew (or knew of) someone on the witness list, were quizzed about that, too. Sun-Times writer Jim Derogatis' name came up for one witness, and former R. Kelly manager (and Aaliyah's uncle) Barry Hankerson came up for another. In both instances, the jurors knew of the witnesses only in a general sense and weren't aware of anything that was relevant to the case. ("He was married to Gladys Knight, right?" the potential juror asked about Hankerson.)

Some of those questioned mentioned personal hardships that could prevent them from serving on a trial that's estimated to last four weeks. The reasons ran the gamut from being a Jehovah's Witness (whose religion doesn't allow them to sit in judgment) to working nights to having a daughter who might have cervical cancer. This last juror cried as she explained that she might have to drag her daughter back and forth to the doctor over the next few weeks, as she didn't know the results of the tests yet.

Personal biases or opinions also mattered. One man whose granddaughter had been molested at the age of 5 didn't think he could be fair to someone accused of a sexual crime. Anyone who had been the victim of a crime was asked how it affected the person's view of the justice system. What did they think about lawyers? Did they think people with money got better treatment? What about celebrities? One prospective juror brought up the O.J. Simpson trial as an example, saying that he believed that celebrities were more likely to "get off." Another prospective juror said that he disliked celebrities "showboating around," just to be photographed by paparazzi. "Like Britney Spears?" the judge asked. "Yes," the juror said.

Most of the jurors also expressed their distaste for pornography, particularly child pornography. One juror who was selected for the panel said that as the father of two small children, he thought that "child porn is as low as it gets." Jurors were asked if they would be able to discuss graphic sexual material, including urination in a sexual context, even if that act repulsed them. When one said, "It would be hard," the judge told him, "Life's hard."

One prospective juror surprised both the defense and the prosecution with his views on age-of-consent laws. "It's ludicrous," the juror said. "There's no consistency from state to state, and I don't think that's fair. The age of consent is too high. I was discussing this with my son, and he said nature has provided an age of consent. It's called puberty, and that makes a lot of sense to me."

For the most part, Kelly seemed disengaged from the process, staring at the table, often holding a tissue to his face as if he had a runny nose or was warding off a bad smell (the men's bathroom was only a few feet away from him, and at one point, deputies scrambled to find Lysol to spray in there, though no one else seemed to be affected). But as each juror was asked, "Can you look Mr. Kelly in the eye and tell him you can give him a fair trial?" the singer would put down his tissue, look straight at them, and nod.

A few times, Kelly nodded as if in agreement to a few answers, and sometimes even cracked a smile or two. One prospective juror was asked if he had any experience with crime, so he told a story about how his car had been stolen for a joy ride, only to be returned a week later. Judge Vincent Gaughan then said, "And you know Mr. Kelly had nothing to do with it, correct?" To which the juror turned to Kelly and joked, "Or did you?" Beaming, Kelly put his hand to his face to prevent himself from laughing out loud.

When the state's attorneys asked that this last juror be dismissed as one of their peremptory challenges (their third of the day), the defense objected, noting that all three of the prosecution's challenges has been of African-American jurors. Gaughan ruled that the state's reasons were "race neutral." When the day's remaining four jurors (two of whom were African-American) who had yet to be questioned were rotated to the bottom of the list, the defense objected once again.

"I don't care what color they are," Gaughan said. "That doesn't make any difference. That's the procedure that was agreed to. That's really out of order."

Nine jurors and four alternates remain to be selected. Check back for a more detailed report once the full jury has been chosen.

Look at a complete timeline of the events leading up to R. Kelly's trial here.

For full coverage of the R. Kelly case, see The R. Kelly Reports.

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Massachusetts Revving Up Film Business

With film making in Massachusetts accelerating since the state enacted a new package
of tax breaks for producers, the citizens of Plymouth voted overwhelmingly on Saturday
to build a full-scale studio in the town. As reported by the Plymouth Patriot
Ledger, 88 percent of voters approved the plan. It noted that the town also faces
competition from Weymouth, where plans are afoot to convert a former air base into
a studio, and a Quincy legislator has introduced a bill that would grant tax incentives to dev
elopers of a studio in that city.

12/05/2008

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