In the past weeks, it's become apparent that Coldplay update their Web site with all the tenacity of a 15-year-old blogger hopped up on too much Jolt! cola. After spilling the beans on the first single from their upcoming album, X&Y, and breaking news of a massive European tour on their official site, they've now posted the album's cover (lots of colored squares) and track list, too. Song titles on the album include "White Shadows," "A Message" and "Swallowed by the Sea." X&Y is due in stores on June 7. ...

Green Day, who recently sold out Milton Keynes Stadium in the U.K., have added three stadium dates to their North American tour itinerary. Tickets for the shows -- September 1 at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey; September 24 at SBC Park in San Francisco; and October 8 at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California -- go on sale this weekend. Meanwhile, Green Day will perform this weekend on "Saturday Night Live." ...

Jermaine Dupri has announced the lineup for Atlanta's Midtown Music Festival Urban Stage, which he was tapped to curate this year. Ciara, Black Eyed Peas and Slim Thug will headline the stage on June 11; the day after will be dedicated to hip-hop's old school, with Biz Markie, MC Lyte, Doug E. Fresh, Slick Rick and Whodini scheduled to perform. ... Canada's equivalent of the Grammy awards, the Junos, had its televised ceremony Sunday night. Big winners included Avril Lavigne (Artist of the Year), K-Os (Single of the Year) and Billy Talent (Album of the Year). The highly touted Arcade Fire, who recently made the cover of Canadian Time magazine, were shut out. Other big winners included Feist (Best New Artist, Best Alternative Album) and Alexisonfire (Best New Group). ...

A cover of the David Bowie/ Queen collabo "Under Pressure" -- recorded by goth-punks My Chemical Romance and dirt-punks the Used -- will be available for download on iTunes beginning April 12. Why is this news? Because it's for a good cause: All proceeds from the sale of the single go to the Tsunami Relief Fund. ... "American Idol" second-season alums Ruben Studdard and Kimberly Caldwell are reuniting -- as guest stars on the new FOX show "Life on a Stick." The singers play mall food-court employees who compete with the workers at Yippee, Hot Dogs, using songs to bait customers on the "Fish Song" episode, airing Wednesday at 9:30 p.m. ET. ...

Chingy is getting in the Final Four spirit by hosting a party Monday night (April 4) in St. Louis after the college basketball game. Chingy's Championship Celebration party at Velvet is part of a "Finest 4 Parties" series throughout the city. ... The Dave Matthews Band announced a whole host of support acts for their upcoming U.S. summer tour. Jurassic 5, Robert Randolph & the Family Band, Yonder Mountain String Band, Howie Day, Blue Merle, Drive-by Truckers, Galactic, G. Love and Special Sauce, Marc Broussard, O.A.R., Ray LaMontagne, Slightly Stoopid and North Mississippi Allstars will all take turns as openers. ...

Jewel's hitting the road for a string of acoustic shows, to road-test material she's currently working on in the studio for her sixth album, due out in September. Her 11-date trek, which primarily hits the West Coast, starts June 15 in Denver and wraps June 26 in Temecula, California. ... Sorta alt-country rockers Rilo Kiley are embarking on another North American tour in support of last year's More Adventurous. The jaunt begins on April 28 in San Diego and makes stops all across this great land before coming to an end June 19 in Los Angeles. Veteran indie rockers Nada Surf will provide support on some of the dates in May. ...

04.01.2005

Hilary Duff isn't letting the criticism from her fellow Harvard (not Extension) students dampen her enthusiasm for her studies -- she's having fun balancing cramming for tests with promoting her career, according to the most recent diary post on her Web site. "Today me and [older sister] Haylie have to watch a lecture and take notes for our test next week," she enthused Thursday. That test comes smack in the middle of her guest-host stint on ABC's "The View" next week, when she fills in for Elisabeth Hasselbeck during her maternity leave. The following week, Duff wrote, she's heading to Caracas, Venezuela, for a performance. ...

Ashanti's been talking up her role as Dorothy in the upcoming made-for-television movie "The Muppets' Wonderful Wizard of Oz" for so long, the only question remaining was, when would it air? ABC has just announced that it will televise the special -- also starring Queen Latifah and Miss Piggy -- on May 20 at 8 p.m. ET. ... Damon Dash's new Damon Dash Music Group is staging a contest in conjunction with the release of Ol' Dirty Bastard's upcoming posthumous album in which fans will have a chance to remix the first single, "Dirty Dirty." The winner's version, as determined by RZA, DJ Clark Kent and Dash, will appear as the B-side to the official single. Details on how to enter are available at dashmusicgroup.com. ...

Neil Young remains hospitalized after being treated for a brain aneurysm earlier this week, the The Associated Press reports. Young was treated Tuesday in New York and is expected to remain hospitalized for a few more days, his spokesperson told the wire service. Young had been scheduled to perform at Sunday's Juno Awards in Canada. His spokesperson said the aneurysm was discovered after the 59-year-old rocker's vision became blurry last month. ...

Michael Jackson's defense team moved for a mistrial on Friday, since a witness for the prosecution admitted to violating a gag order by discussing his story with another witness prior to testifying. Psychiatrist Dr. Stan Katz -- who was the first to interview the accuser about the alleged molestation -- said on Thursday that he'd had a conversation with Larry Feldman, the accuser's family attorney. Judge Rodney Melville told the Jackson defense team to put the motion in writing and give it to him by Monday. The prosecution will have until Tuesday to respond. When Feldman took the stand on Friday, he testified that the family never asked him to file a lawsuit against the singer, though he acknowledged that the boy -- who is now 15 -- has until he turns 20 to file a civil suit. ...

Dave Meyers, the veteran director best known for his Missy Elliott videos, recently helmed the clip for the Dave Matthews Band's new single, "American Baby." The song, written just after the election last fall, hit radio this week. ... Jason Nevins has remixed Kelly Clarkson's hit single "Since U Been Gone." The track is available on iTunes and other Web sites. ... Chingy recently shot a guest appearance on the UPN sitcom "One on One." The episode will air in May. ...

New Found Glory love to pick cheesy pop songs as covers, but who knew they actually listen to the originals in their free time? Journey's "Faithfully," Cyndi Lauper's "Money Changes Everything" and Phil Collins' "Can't Stop Loving You" are just three of the 12 songs that they're loading into an iPod -- along with their own tunes -- that fans can win online. The iPod contest will run on peta2.com through April 28, and the winner will also get autographed CDs and T-shirts from the band. ... Maria Sharapova -- the first Russian woman to win the Wimbledon singles title -- is celebrating not only her victory but her birthday in style. Maroon 5 will perform at the tennis ace's "small" party in New York on April 9, which she's throwing for 250 of her closest friends. ...

Scottish alterna-rockers Snow Patrol have replaced bassist Mark McClelland, whom they booted from the band last month. Paul Wilson, who left the band Terra Diablo back in mid-February for reasons that were never made public, has taken McClelland's place, according to an Interscope Records spokesperson. ... The dates for the inaugural Sounds of the Underground festival have been announced. The summer tour, featuring Opeth, Lamb of God, Clutch, Poison the Well and others will kick off on June 25 in Lowell, Massachusetts, and make stops in Philadelphia, Cleveland and Montreal before wrapping up in Orlando, Florida, on July 14. The trek's also scheduled to make some "blacktop" appearances: on July 2 at Sayreville, New Jersey's Starland Ballroom parking lot, and on July 8 in the lot of Chicago's Tweeter Center. ...

Alicia Keys, Fantasia and Mo'Nique are among the women gracing the cover of the May issue of Essence magazine, which is celebrating its 35th anniversary. The cover girls are part of a celebration of the "35 Most Remarkable Women in the World," which also includes Beyoncé, India.Arie and Queen Latifah. During the cover shoot, Keys said, "We were all kind of looking at each other and pinching ourselves." ([article id="1499469"]Click here to see pictures from the photo shoot.[/article])... Sheryl Crow, who happens to be the vice president of the Recording Artists' Coalition, is speaking out on behalf of her fellow artists about downloading in light of the U.S. Supreme Court Grokster case. In a statement, she says illegal downloading via such services as Grokster is unfair to the "ordinary people who work hard to support themselves." It's not the stars who will be hurt by Grokster, she says, but the singers, arrangers, engineers, producers and songwriters, and other folk who work in the music business. "If nobody pays for [a download], how do they get paid? How about the people who create the CD and DVD artwork and photography? What about the people who work in the plants that manufacture the CDs and DVDs?" She calls it a "question of balancing the rights of creators with current technology," and suggests incorporating filters to prevent illegal downloading of copyrighted material. ...