Judas Priest's <i>Screaming For Vengeance</i>
Photo: Sony

In what is said to be the first of a steady stream of announcements, MTV Games announced Friday (April 18) that Judas Priest's 1982 album, Screaming for Vengeance, will be the hit video game's first fully downloadable, playable album. The album will be available next week.

"That album was an important, seminal heavy-metal album in the early '80s," Alex Rigopulos, co-founder of MTV-owned development studio Harmonix, told MTV news during a Thursday phone interview. "It was on the short list of albums that had to be available on the platform."

Following Priest will be the Cars' The Cars in May and the Pixies' Doolittle in June.

While more than 100 tracks have been offered for download since "Rock Band" was released in November, albums — promised shortly after the game was announced — have yet to be offered.

Rigopulos said that it has taken time for record companies to find full masters for classic albums and for the material to then get encoded into songs that can be played via his game's guitars, drums and microphone.

The idea of offering a full album clicks with him, even if he recognizes that it's not the most modern of ideas. "In the last decade or so, we've gotten primarily used to listening to music as singles in our iPod," Rigopulos said. "But a lot of this music was composed and structured to be listened to as an album." Playing through the album can transform or enhance one's appreciation of a band, something that has already happened for him with the Judas Priest record. "I only knew about four of the songs on the album before this whole process started. It was by playing it in 'Rock Band' that I first experienced it as an album. It struck me how powerful it is to play through an album. ... Doing it as a play experience gets this music inside you."

If you've been a follower of the "Rock Band" hype, you might be confused why Judas Priest is getting the debut slot. The first album announced for the game was the Who's Who's Next?, which Rigopulos said is still caught up in the process of a record company delivering the master music assets to the game developer. And what of Nirvana's Nevermind? Rigopulos said that one is just a rumor.

(Regarding the Who, Rigopulos added that there has been so much interest from fans that there will be "another announcement of something" regarding that band and the game.)

The developer wouldn't tease any albums beyond the three announced, but when asked if more recent bands like Fall Out Boy could also get the "Rock Band" album treatment, he said, "I think we're going to be doing all of the above, [keeping] in line with the platform strategy that will include all decades of rock and all subgenres of rock."

Downloading an album for "Rock Band" won't be much different than downloading a song. The download will not include any special play-the-album mode or add-ons based on the band. It will strictly provide a new slate of songs. So don't expect to download Judas Priest avatars or anything. Rigopulos said Harmonix sees the character a "Rock Band" gamer plays as a projection of that player. "For us, the idea of injecting licensed characters doesn't make a lot of sense for 'Rock Band.' "

While singles are released weekly for "Rock Band," Rigopulos said his team could not yet promise a regularly scheduled offering of albums, not even at the monthly rate. And in the weeks that albums do come out, no other singles may be offered. In the longer term, however, the offering of music will ramp up.

Albums will be offered as $15 downloads on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. The tracks can be bought individually for $1.99; Screaming for Vengeance has 10 songs. It will be downloadable on Tuesday on the Xbox 360 and on Thursday for the PS3.

And to owners of the PS2 version of "Rock Band" or the upcoming Wii version? Downloading the albums won't be an option, but those gamers aren't being forgotten. "Suffice it to say that all of this content we're amassing for next-gen consoles, we want to make it available to as broad an audience as possible as we can."

Also on Friday, MTV Games announced that more than 8 million songs have been purchased as paid downloads for "Rock Band" via the PS3 and Xbox 360, a significant increase from just three weeks ago, when the 6 million mark was achieved.

Check out the Multiplayer blog, updated daily, for even more gaming coverage.

• Judas Priest
• Nirvana
• The Cars
• The Pixies

Fu Manchu
Photo: Mammoth

WEST HOLLYWOOD — If Fu Manchu were hoping to find a few friendly faces when unveiling new material Tuesday night at the Troubadour, the stoner rock outfit was undoubtedly stoked by the warm welcome it found.

By the time the band hit the stage at 11 p.m. to kick off its U.S. tour, the club was packed and the crowd was by all indications "into it," if otherwise meditatively subdued in their devotion.

Those in attendance, including former Guns N' Roses bassist Duff McKagan, were clearly devotees of the Fu, nodding their heads along to the band's low-end celebrations of surfing, skating, B-movies and '70s culture in quiet satisfaction, murmuring lyrics to themselves.

Fu Manchu hit the stage with a comfortable swagger, visibly jam-oriented players telepathically in tune with one another. Singer/guitarist Scott Hill (dressed Jeff Spicoli-style in a colorful, striped, oversized shirt), bald bassist Brad Davis, lead guitarist Bob Balch and new drummer Scott Reeder (formerly of Smile) tore through more than 14 songs spanning their decade's worth of rock and roll archeology.

The band launched its attack with the one-two punch of "Evil Eye"— the lead track from 1997's The Action Is Go — and "King of the Road" from the 1999 album of the same name.

But despite the vintage sounds, the crowd may have been most blown away by the suddenly short 'do adopted by Hill, who recently shed his appropriately straggly coiffure.

"Holy haircut!" came a cry from the back of the room early in the band's set. By the middle point of the night, the good-natured heckling had reached a noticeable crescendo, prompting Hill to lean into the mic and quip, "Yeah, so I cut my hair. ... Be into it."

With the new look came new music, courtesy of California Crossing, which hits stores next week. The album's title track, like most of the collection, drops much of the band's formulaic fuzzy guitar tone in favor of cleaner sounds without sacrificing Fu Manchu's combination of kitsch and strangely ominous heaviness.

Reeder, who recently replaced Brant Bjork and does not appear on the new album, was a definite standout, pounding his toms mercilessly beneath Davis' studied and controlled finger-picking. Hill and Balch's body movements were often as in tune with each other as their instruments were, with the band's frontman swinging his axe from side to side during the handful of open-ended power chords his buddy handled alone.

Hill smilingly apologized to the crowd for a small mistake during "Weird Beard," a barely perceptible mishap during an otherwise flawless and casual execution of a smattering of the band's back catalog. The set also included "Hell on Wheels" and another new track, "Squash That Fly" — a song that sees Fu Manchu continuing to build their musical Frankenstein monster from the discarded body parts of Black Sabbath and less obvious influences such as ZZ Top, Devo and the Cars.

Perhaps seeking additional support, Hill and Balch brought their parents out for the gig. Judging from the kind buzz that greeted the band, they didn't need the backup.

Read about all of the shows we've recently covered in Tour Reports.

• Fu Manchu
• Black Sabbath
• Devo
• The Cars

Benjamin Orr, singer and bassist with new wave hitmakers the Cars, succumbed to cancer at his home in Atlanta on Tuesday night. He was 53.

As previously reported by MTV News, Orr, born Benjamin Orzechowski on September 8, 1947, had been hospitalized last May with what turned out to be inoperable pancreatic cancer (see "The Cars' Benjamin Orr Hospitalized").

According to former Cars keyboardist Greg Hawkes, Orr was surrounded by his friends when he passed away just before midnight (ET).

Orr co-founded the Cars with Ric Ocasek in Boston in 1976 and sang lead on many of the band's most recognizable songs, including "Drive" and "Just What I Needed." The Cars disbanded in 1988. Orr also released a solo album in 1986 called "The Lace."

A management spokesperson for Ocasek spoke on behalf of the singer-guitarist, telling MTV News, "He's very devastated by the loss of a close friend."

The singer had been playing with his new band, Big People, right up until late September, including a final show in Alaska on September 27. His Big People bandmates, Jeff Carlisi (formerly of .38 Special), Derek St. Holmes (Ted Nugent), and Rob Wilson, along with Orr's manager, Billy Johnson, and Orr's fiancee, Julie Snider, were with him in Atlanta when he died.

"Ben kept rocking," bandmate Carlisi told MTV News. "From the time he was diagnosed, he told us he wanted to keep playing until the end. He said, 'If I fall down one day and can't get up, you'll know its over."

The group will now turn a planned March of Dimes benefit concert scheduled for this Friday at the Tabernacle in Atlanta into a memorial performance. According to Orr's manager, another event is being planned to take place in Orr's hometown of Cleveland.

Orr had reunited with his former Cars bandmates -- Ocasek, Hawkes, Elliot Easton and David Robinson -- this past summer for an interview to be included on a new DVD documentary, "The Cars Live," scheduled for release through Rhino Home Video on November 1. Rhino will now be donating a portion of the profits to the National Pancreas Foundation.

Tributes to Benjamin Orr and cards to friends and family will be accepted by Crossover Entertainment Group, 2020 Howell Mill Road, Suite C, Atlanta, GA, 30318.

Donations to the Benjamin Orr Memorial Fund can be sent to at Box 600590, Newtonville, MA, 02460.

• The Cars
• Ric Ocasek

Former Cars bassist Benjamin Orr, who sang lead on the band's classic singles "Just What I Needed" and "Drive," has been hospitalized in Atlanta with a growth on his pancreas.

Derek St. Holmes, Orr's bandmate in the group Big People, has posted a message on his official Web site (www.dstholmes.com) reading, "Ben Orr is awaiting diagnosis at Piedmont Hospital regarding a growth found on his pancreas."

Get-well e-mails sent via St. Holmes' site will be hand delivered to Orr, the statement notes. Cards, flowers, and well wishes can also be sent Orr's way via the following address:

Benjamin Orr 1400 Bank One Center 600 Superior Avenue Cleveland, OH 44114

As a member of The Cars, Benjamin Orr shared vocal duties with guitarist Ric Ocasek and played bass guitar on the group's self-titled 1978 debut as well as the hit albums "Candy-O," "Panorama," "Shake It Up," and "Heartbeat City." He also released a solo album, "The Lace," in 1986.

More recently, Orr has performed with Big People, an Atlanta-based group which has included current and past members of the Ted Nugent Band, Damn Yankees, .38 Special, the Pat Travers Band, and Lynyrd Skynyrd, among others.

• The Cars
• Ric Ocasek

November 14 [10:00 EDT] -- Onetime Cars frontman Ric Ocasek recently released his latest solo album, and is about to kick off his first ever solo tour to back it up.

As we first reported in February, Ocasek turned to Smashing Pumpkin Billy Corgan for help on the album, titled "Troublizing." Corgan produced and played guitar on five tracks after meeting the former Car backstage at a club.

Ocasek also got some help from Hole bassist Melissa Auf Der Maur, Bad Religion guitarist Brian Baker, and Nada Surf drummer Ira Elliot, as well as former Cars keyboardist Greg Hawkes.

"I chose the band members because I had just recently produced all their albums, the bands that they were in," Ocasek told MTV News about the musicians on the album. "When I sat down with them individually to kind of go over their parts and everything, and I made a mental note of... I thought, 'Oh, Brian Baker would be really good if he played on some of these songs I'm going to do on this record, and I think Melissa would be great on bass.'

So that's kind of the way it happened. I kind of looked at it like a party that I would have where you would invite people that really don't know each other, but once they got there they would become instant friends." [650k QuickTime]

Ocasek and his new instant friends will hit the road (with the exception of Corgan) this Sunday.

• The Cars
• Hole
• Ric Ocasek
• The Smashing Pumpkins