A November 4 release has been set for Ruben Studdard's upcoming gospel album, the start of a barrage of "American Idol" music. Clay Aiken's holiday record is due November 16, Fantasia's debut album is due November 23, Kelly Clarkson's sophomore set will follow November 30, and Diana DeGarmo's debut will round things out on December 7. ...

At least half of Metallica know what they'll be doing in early 2005: entering the studio. In two separate newspaper interviews, guitarist Kirk Hammett and drummer Lars Ulrich said that the band plans to log studio time sometime after the completion of its North American tour on November 20. ... Vanessa Carlton will embark on a 17-date tour next month in support of her new album, Harmonium, due November 9. The singer/pianist is bringing a full orchestra with her on the outing, which begins October 21 in Minneapolis and ends November 21 in Portland, Oregon. ...

Like Slipknot? Old enough to drive? Fluent in German? If you meet those three qualifications, then head on over to the German version of eBay, where you can bid on an official Slipknot Mercedes-Benz. The car features the Slipknot logo on its hood and doors and was used to promote the band's latest album, Vol. 3: (The Subliminal Verses). Bidding — in Euros — was at the equivalent of $1,473.30 as of press time. ... Like countless bands before them, Yellowcard are getting in on the live DVD market. "Beyond Ocean Avenue: Live at the Electric Factory," in stores November 2, features concert footage taken from the band's two sold-out performances at Philadelphia's Electric Factory in May. Also included on the DVD is the "Beyond Ocean Avenue" documentary, a behind-the-scenes look at the band's rise to fame. ...

The Reverend Al Sharpton, Styles P and Marsha Ambrosius, one half of Floetry, all took the stage Sunday night at the Anthony Hamilton and Angie Stone concert in New York. ... The ill-fated Field Day festival is having another go at it. A year after plans for a two-day festival in a pasture on Long Island, New York, were downsized to a miserable, rain-soaked single-day affair at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, promoter Andrew Dreskin has gotten permission from the town of Red Hook, New York, to put on the show next July. Although bands have yet to be confirmed, he hopes to get Radiohead, Beck and the Beastie Boys — all of whom played Field Day in 2003 — to return. ...

P. Diddy, Dame Dash and the rest of the music moguls may need to make room for one more. Joe Simpson, father and manager of Jessica and Ashlee, has formed JT Records, named for Joe and his wife, Tina Simpson. The first act signed to the imprint, to be distributed by Ashlee's label Geffen, is the band Barefoot. ... California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed an executive order on Friday demanding the state chief information officer develop a policy regarding the illegal use of peer-to-peer file-sharing applications on state computers. Schwarzenegger, much to the delight of the recording industry, is the first state executive to enact such an order. ...

"Something the Lord Made," the HBO television movie starring rapper Mos Def as surgical pioneer Vivien Thomas, picked up three Emmy awards Sunday night, including one for outstanding Made for Television Movie. While he didn't win, Mos Def had been nominated for Outstanding Actor for a Made for Television Movie. ... Television are re-forming for a concert at New York's Roseland on October 2, and Patti Smith and her band will share the bill. ...

Former Dead Kennedys frontman Jello Biafra plans on joining Ministry onstage in the next few days to perform some tunes by Lard, Biafra and Ministry singer Al Jourgensen's side project, which released two albums in the '90s. The five-date string of shows begins Friday in Los Angeles. Ministry are on the road to support their latest album, Houses of the Molé, which dropped in June. ... Even with three solo albums under her belt, Moldy Peaches member Kimya Dawson remains relatively unknown, but a crop of her friends, including Third Eye Blind's Stephan Jenkins, Vanessa Carlton, Daniel Johnston and GN'R/ Primus drummer Brain, is trying to change that. They all appear on Dawson's fourth LP, Hidden Vagenda, due October 5. ...

Brooklyn, New York, production team/record label DFA — a.k.a. Death From Above — will release DFA Compilation #2 this November. The 18-track LP collects music previously released on a series of 12-inch singles over the past two years. Artists on the album include the Rapture and LCD Soundsystem. ... Collective Soul are returning after a four-year hiatus with Youth, due November 16. The album's first single, "Counting the Days," was released to radio earlier this month. ...

09.17.2004

Phil Spector's new lawyer, Bruce Cutler, who is best known for representing mobster John Gotti, convinced a Los Angeles judge this week to delay a preliminary hearing for the producer's murder trial to December 16. "I think Bruce Cutler is a genius," Spector, who has fired several lawyers since his arrest in February 2003, told reporters. "There was no crime committed, and I'm sure he'll bring forth evidence that the district attorney has been hiding." ...

Fabolous has a little bit more breathing to do before he gives birth to his next LP. Fab's Real Talk has been pushed back to November 9. ... 4AD has announced that it will reissue the first three Pixies albums on heavyweight 180-gram vinyl. The 1987 mini-album Come on Pilgrim, 1988's Surfer Rosa and 1989's Doolitte will all get the deluxe treatment. All three re-releases come with original artwork, except for Doolitte, which will now come with an insert including the lyrics. ... Proving he's a true Renaissance man, Marilyn Manson will not only release his greatest-hits album, Lest We Forget: The Best of Marilyn Manson, on September 28, but he's staging a second exhibition of his paintings. The exhibit, called "Trismegistus," features more than 20 paintings, many of them new. The first show was held on Tuesday in Paris, and a second is scheduled for September 21 in Berlin. U.S. dates for "Trismegistus" are expected to be announced shortly. ...

When's the last time you went to a party and saw porn stars Heather Hunter and Janet Jacme hangin' with Lil' Kim and Foxy Brown? Well, all the women were at Harlem's Cherry Lounge Thursday night to celebrate the opening of DJ Clue and Timbaland's new club. P. Diddy, Fat Joe and Bruce Willis made sure the fellas had ample representation as well. ... Having dropped frontman Jon Spencer's name from atop their moniker, the Blues Explosion are getting ready to hit the road in support of their upcoming album, Danger. The tour starts November 3 in Madison, Wisconsin, and concludes November 30 in the Blues Explosion's hometown of New York. ... Bay Area slang master E-40 has signed with Lil Jon's BME Records. Jon is already working on the album with the help of producer Rick Rock (Tupac, Busta Rhymes). ...

"Scarface," the 1983 Al Pacino drama that has inspired numerous hip-hop lyricists, is being turned into a video game. Due in the fall of 2005, the game will allow users to navigate Tony Montana through Miami's drug culture. ... Instruction, the Long Island rockers featuring former Quicksand guitarist Tom Capone along with former members of Errortype: 11, will open for Helmet from October 20 in Vancouver, British Columbia, to November 10 in Toronto. The band's debut, God Doesn't Care, produced by Bob Ezrin (Pink Floyd, Kiss), was released last month. ... Razorlight, whose debut album is favoring well in the band's home country of England, have set an October 26 U.S. release date for the record. The first single, "Golden Touch," has just been shipped to radio. ...

• Ruben Studdard
• Clay Aiken
• Kelly Clarkson
• Metallica
• Vanessa Carlton

A few details about the long-delayed Guns N' Roses album, Chinese Democracy, surfaced in IGN Music's interview with film composer Marco Beltrami, since he did some work-for-hire on the album, arranging orchestral sections for four tracks. "A couple of them I did more than orchestrating," he told IGN. "I actually wrote some melodies and stuff. On one song, I actually wrote a guitar part." Song titles, he said, included "Seven," "Thyme," "The General" and "Leave Me Alone." ...

New albums by Coldplay and Radiohead are the odds-on favorites to win the U.K.'s critically evaluated Mercury Music Prize. Other nominees include LPs by the Thrills, the Darkness, Athlete, Dizzee Rascall, Terri Walker, Lemon Jelly and Floetry. The winner will be announced September 9. ... Wyclef Jean, Bone Crusher and Bounty Killer will appear in dancehall reggae newcomer Elephant Man's debut video, "Pon De River," which was shot recently at New York's Club Float. Elephant Man's album, Good 2 Go, is due September 23 and features cameos from Mariah Carey, Da Brat, Lil Jon and Juelz Santana. ...

Murphy Lee of the St. Lunatics will be in New York on Tuesday (July 22) at Champs Sports to not only sign autographs and cop a few more fitted caps, but to debut his new video, "Wat Da Hook Gon Be." The song is the first single from his September solo debut, Murphy's Law. ... Blindside, best known for their rock hit "Pitiful," have begun to work on their follow-up to Silence. The Swedish emo-metal band is teaming with producer Howard Benson for About a Burning Fire, according to a statement posted on Blindside's official Web site. "We have learned so much over the past year," the band wrote, "and we feel inspired ... to make this record more than we can even imagine right now." The group expects to release the album in late 2003. ...

Grandaddy and Super Furry Animals are teaming for a fall tour, from September 18 in San Francisco to October 4 in New York. Grandaddy's latest, Sumday, was released in May, while the Super Furry's sixth album, Phantom Power, is due July 29. ... Beginning with Ben Harper's "Diamonds on the Inside," Fox will premiere music videos during the first six episodes of the new Tuesday night drama "The O.C." The clips will then be available exclusively on America Online for 48 hours. ...

The first two albums by early New York punks Television, 1977's Marquee Moon and 1978's Adventure, will be remastered and reissued with bonus tracks on September 23. For a hint at just how influential Tom Verlaine and company were, look no further than the Strokes. Coinciding with the reissues will be a live album, Live at the Old Waldorf, recorded June 29, 1978. ... Reality, David Bowie's 26th studio album, is scheduled for a September 16 release. Three weeks later, the chameleon of rock will launch his A Reality Tour world trek in Copenhagen, Denmark, on October 7. ...

They Might Be Giants might have a tangential career as children's entertainers. The duo's "Clap Your Hands," from last year's children's music LP No!, will be used in an upcoming TV spot for GapKids. ... As he prepares to launch the Lottapianos Tour with Tori Amos on July 26, Ben Folds has scheduled a succession of EPs for release on his Web site, www.attackedbyplastic.com, as well as available on tour. The first, Speed Graphic, features a cover of the Cure's "In Between Days" and is scheduled for a July 22 release. The second EP, Sunny 16, is slated to surface in September, and a third in November. A full-length LP is expected by early next year. ...

07.21.2003

It's six months away and organizers have already locked in Metallica to headline Big Day Out 2004, the annual tour of Australia and New Zealand. No other artists are confirmed for the trek, which begins January 16 in Auckland. ...

Juvenile and Run-DMC's Reverend Run are two of the hip-hop stars scheduled to come out August 1-3 for Russell Simmons' next Hip-Hop Summit. The event, set for Birmingham, Alabama, will once again try to encourage major players within the genre to use the power of hip-hop as a catalyst for social change. ... Bono is among several celebrities who gave a recipe to Bill Clinton's cookbook, "The Clinton Presidential Center Cookbook: A Collection of Recipes for Family and Friends." Don Henley and Muhammad Ali also contributed. ...

Hatebreed will headline this year's second annual Rise of Brutality Tour, scheduled to begin in mid-September, with support coming from New York hardcore heroes Madball, death metal stalwarts Hate Eternal, Southern California hardcore band Terror and Cephalic Carnage. The 'Breed, who feature "Headbangers Ball" host Jamey Jasta on vocals, will support Slayer later in the year on the Jägermeister Tour. ... Former Failure/ A Perfect Circle guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen, currently touring the country on Lollapalooza with Queens of the Stone Age, joined self-confessed Failure fanatics Cave In onstage at a recent Lolla stop in Columbus, Ohio, for a cover of Failure's "Magnified." "[Failure are] the band we've not-so-secretly ripped off for years and years," reads a post on Cave In's Web site. ...

Goth metal band Type O Negative will launch their summer tour July 25 in Worcester, Massachusetts. Dates run through August 23 in Anaheim, California. The group will be touring to support its new record, Life Is Killing Me, which came out June 17. ... Twiztid will launch a North American tour August 15 in Louisville, Kentucky, in support of their just-released The Green Book. The outing, featuring openers Society 1 and Marz, wraps September 28 in Indianapolis. ...

Brandon Cruz, the former child star of "The Courtship of Eddie's Father" who's been touring as the singer of the Dead Kennedys, has left the group to spend more time with his family and work on other material. Jeff Penalty, a former member of Vaz Hoil & Stupid Ferrets, has replaced him. ... Drummer Mario Calire has left the Wallflowers and joined Ozomatli. Calire will join the Latin rock band for its next album, due early next year. ... Singer Mike McColgan, who quit the Dropkick Murphys to become a Boston firefighter, has formed a new group, the Street Dogs. The band's debut, Savin Hill, is due September 23. ...

• Guns N' Roses
• Coldplay
• Bone Crusher
• Radiohead
• Television

Thurston Moore performing at a benefit for Kosovo, 5/99
Photo: Dylan Stableford

Eddie Vedder, Stereolab, and Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks are among the acts scheduled to play the third incarnation of All Tomorrow's Parties, a U.K. festival that will hit these shores for the first time in October.

The lineup — which also includes '70s art-punks Television, alt-rock hipsters the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and airy-voiced songstress Cat Power — was chosen by festival curators Sonic Youth, who will also perform at the event, according to their publicist. All Tomorrow's Parties will be held October 19 and 20 at UCLA.

Other bands confirmed for the festival include indie-rockers Le Tigre, U.S. Maple and Neil Michael Hagerty; techno duo Autechre; solemn songcrafters Smog and Papa M; free-jazz guitarist Derek Bailey and pianist Cecil Taylor; Japanese noisemakers Merzbow and the Boredoms; and '70s deconstructionists Destroy All Monsters. More artists are expected to be added.

Screenings by such filmmakers as Jim O'Rourke of Gastr del Sol fame will also be part of the eclectic gathering, as will spoken-word performances, the publicist said.

All Tomorrow's Parties, named after a Velvet Underground song, debuted in England last April. Curated by Stereolab, the lineup featured Sonic Youth, Shellac, Mogwai and Plaid, among others.

The event's second coming occurred in April of this year, with a lineup assembled by Tortoise that included Yo La Tengo, the Sun Ra Arkestra, Calexico, Television, Broadcast and the Sea and Cake.

Festival organizers created a live album from April's festival, released only in the U.K., and they're planning on similarly documenting the U.S. version.

• Sonic Youth
• Stephen Malkmus
• Stereolab
• Pearl Jam
• Television

Television's <i>Marquee Moon</i> was released in 1977.

Visionary '70s band Television — who are reuniting in England next month for their first show since 1993 — also have scheduled a U.S. show for May at the Noise Pop Chicago festival.

The five-day festival, to be held in the Windy City from May 9 to 13, will feature Guided By Voices, Yo La Tengo and Creeper Lagoon, the festival's publicist said Wednesday (March 21).

Other confirmed performers are Anti-Pop Consortium, Autechre, the BellRays, Couch, Eleventh Dream Day, Goldfrapp, Jah Wobble & Deep Space, Konishi Yasuharu of Pizzicato Five, Luke Vibert, Mike Ladd, Saul Williams, Sonic Sum and Suicide.

More bands will be announced. For updates, fans can check www.noisepop.com.

Yo La Tengo and Eleventh Dream Day will play the opening event, at Metro on May 9.

Television's first scheduled show is set for April 8 at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in Camber Sands, England. They also have shows in Gijon, Spain, scheduled for April 12 and in London on April 15.

The band — singer/guitarist Tom Verlaine, guitarist Richard Lloyd, bassist Fred Smith and drummer Billy Ficca — was at the center of New York's CBGB punk scene in the 1970s. Television broke up in 1978, after releasing their second album, Adventure. They regrouped to record 1992's Television but disbanded the following year.

• Television
• Guided By Voices
• Yo La Tengo