Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:50 | By CMU Editorial

GaGa song is gay anthem of the year

Awards

Lady GaGa has proved she’s the chief pop icon of the moment as far as gay clubbers are concerned, with her chart topping song ‘Just Dance’ being named Anthem Of The Year at the Gay Times Reader’s Awards. The song beat Britney Spears’s ‘Womanizer’ and Lily Allen’s ‘The Fear’ to take the prize. Elsewhere in the poll, drag star Lady Lloyd beat Scott Mills and Boy George to be DJ Of The Year.

Dillinger sign to Season Of Mist

Business News Deals Labels & Publishers

American experimental mathcore types The Dillinger Escape Plan, previously signed to US metal indie Relapse, have announced they have signed a new deal with another metal-specialising independent, French/American indie Season Of Mist. The indie will release Dillinger’s fourth long player in partnership with the band’s own label, Phonogetic Records.

Confirming the deal, the band’s guitarist, Ben Weinman, is quoted by Blabbermouth thus: “It is becoming clear that as the music industry standard continues to morph and change on a daily basis, artistic and operational freedom has become a band’s most valuable asset. 100% free of all previous contractual ties, Dillinger is in an amazing position to collaborate with some interesting partners which will continue to nurture the ethic that we have been doing our best to stay true to for over ten years now”.

He continues: “While touring Europe in support of our record ‘Ire Works’, I had the pleasure of meeting Michael Berberian, distributor and owner of the independent record label Season Of Mist. It quickly became clear that we had very similar ideas about Dillinger’s music and its place in the underground. Season Of Mist has always been a leader in releasing some of the most extreme and interesting metal and experimental music. We look forward to releasing our next full length effort in association with Season of Mist as the very first chapter of this new journey. Also, Michael’s last name almost spells out Barbarian which Greg was really excited about”.

General Fiasco sign to Infectious

Business News Deals Labels & Publishers

The recently resurrected Infectious Records has announced its second signing – Northern Irish three-piece General Fiasco. Their deal with Infectious, run by former Warner UK chief Korda Marshall, follows a single release last year by London indie Another Music=Another Kitchen.

Confirming the deal, one of the band’s managers, Jamie Oborne, told Billboard: “[This] felt like a natural step following the last twelve months of groundwork my co-manager Jimmy Devlin and I have undertaken with the boys. Korda’s reputation speaks for itself and needless to say we are all very much looking forward to working with him and his team”.

The band are currently working on a debut album before going out on a summer tour. Infectious, of course, was relaunched by Marshall earlier this year, with their first signing being Aussie band The Temper Trap, of whom I now own the official badge. I have my finger of the pulse, oh yes.

Infadels to headline next Insomniacs Ball

Gigs & Festivals

CMU favourites Infadels have just been added to the bill for the next edition of the Insomniacs Ball, which will take place at the Corsica Studios in Vauxhall, London on 5 Jun (running all night into 6 Jun, obviously). Infadels are added to a line up that already includes Everything Everything and Hook And The Twin, plus DJ sets from Late Of The Pier, God Don’t Like It, Cocknbullkid and Ezra Bang. Tickets are a mere £12.50 – more info at www.myspace.com/insomniacsball

Jamie T-our

Gigs & Festivals

Jamie T is going to get up on stage and make music and stuff. And release an extra play thingy. He’s a cool guy. The ‘Sticks And Stones EP’ is out on 29 Jun, with the preceding gigs as follows…

11 Jun: Leeds, Cockpit
12 Jun: Cambridge, Junction
13 Jun: Northampton, Roadmender
14 Jun: Nottingham, Rescue Rooms
16 Jun: Newcastle, Stage 2
17 Jun: Aberdeen, Moshulu
18 Jun: Edinburgh, Studio 24
19 Jun: Coventry, Kasabah
21 Jun: Bristol, Tehkla
23 Jun: Manchester, Moho
24 Jun: London, Electric Ballroom

Festival goers need to shun the car more

Business News Gigs & Festivals Live Business

God, you’re a lot of petrol guzzling world threatening maniacs aren’t you? Well, you might not be, but two thirds of the UK’s festival-goers are. And I thought tree hugging, not tree slaughtering, was meant to be part of the hippy festival experience.

New research from Julie’s Bicycle, the body which aims to make the music business more eco-friendly, has found that while many festival promoters have been trying to make their events more green in recent years, over two thirds of festival-goers attending music events within or near cities or towns still travel there by car. And 60% of those going by car had two or less people in the car.

With the carbon emissions of all those cars one of the main polluting factors of any one music festival, the report recommends the festival sector work together to develop ways to encourage more festival-goers to find alternative ways to get to an event. Suggested methods include working with local travel operators and local authorities to offer bespoke public transport, and developing information resources to help those choosing to shun their cars plan their trip. Making sure Network Rail don’t shut down the main rail connection to a festival on the very weekend it takes place – as often happens with the Reading Festival – might also help.

As previously reported, AGreenerFestival.com has teamed up with VirtualFestivals.com to offer festival-goers with tips for being more eco-friendly when attending music events.

Springsteen had never heard of Glasto

Artist News Gigs & Festivals

Everyone wants to play at the Glastonbury Festival at some point in their career, don’t they? Well, everyone except this year’s headliner Bruce Springsteen, it would seem, who apparently had never heard of Britain’s uber-fest. Or at least his agent hadn’t. Bloody Americans.

Glasto co-organiser Emily Eavis told 6Music: “It’s been our mission for quite a long time to get Bruce. I thought it was quite unlikely, especially when the agent said, ‘Glaston-what?’ We put together a document for him and spoke to his people a lot and they were really up for it. He’s never done a festival before so we didn’t expect him to know much about it. The pack included quotes from lots of different people, musicians who have played etc”.

Eavis added that another difficulty in securing the likes of Springsteen is the growth in big-budget one-off gigs that offer phenomenal sums of money to premiere league artists. Eavis says that these days “it’s quite hard to understand why you should play a festival for not much money when you’re being offered quite a lot to go elsewhere. We put together some information and said ‘This is what happens, this is all the money that goes to charity’. Pretty quickly he said: ‘Yes’. It’s amazing”.

Springsteen will headline the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury on 27 Jun. Elsewhere in Glasto news, Eavis also revealed that one more “huge band” will play this year’s festival, but their involvement will be kept a secret until the day. She told the Beeb: “There’s a really top surprise on The Park which will definitely not come out because otherwise we’d have a health and safety issue. You can start guessing”.

Festival line up update – 28 May 2009

Artist News Festival Line-Up Update Gigs & Festivals

DOWNLOAD, Donington Park, Castle Donington, 12 – 14 Jun: The final line up for the metal fest has been announced and includes In Case Of Fire, Hardcore Superstar, Symphony Cult, The Crave and Billy Boy On Poison. Bleed From Within, Sleepcurve and Sabbat have also been confirmed, along with Blackhole, New Device, Outcry Collective, Tripswitch, The Ghost Of A Thousand plus many more added to the Red Bull Bedroom Jam Stage. www.downloadfestival.co.uk

GUILFEST, Stoke Park, Surrey, 10 – 12 Jul: Toploader have been confirmed to play the Main Stage at this year’s Guilfest along with The Charlatans, Athlete and Linda Lewis. Ginger, Lisa Hannigan, Neck and Simon Friend are also set to play. www.guilfest.co.uk

LATITUDE, Southwold, Suffolk, 16 – 19 Jul: Datarock, Marnie Stern, iLiKETRAiNS, Wildbirds And Peacedrums and 65 Days Of Static have all been announced for this summer’s Latitude, joining previously confirmed Pet Shop Boys, Grace Jones and Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds. www.latitudefestival.co.uk

READING & LEEDS, Little Johns Farm, Reading, Branham Park, Leeds, 28 – 30 Aug: Little Boots, Lethal Bizzle, Crystal Castles, Passion Pit, Metronomy and Frank Turner are among the latest acts confirmed for Reading and Leeds this year. The Airborne Toxic Event, The Virgins, Manchester Orchestra and Dananananakroyd have also been added to the bill. www.readingfestival.com, www.leedsfestival.com

OFFSET FESTIVAL, Hainault Forest, Essex, 30 – 31 Aug: The Futureheads, Kap Bambino, The Ghost Of A Thousand and Good Shoes have all been confirmed to play this year’s Offset Festival, joining previously confirmed The Horrors, The Slits, A Certain Ratio and Future Of The Left. www.offsetfestival.co.uk

PRS For Music: new rates clarification

Business News Labels & Publishers

By the way, well done to those of you who spotted our, erm, deliberate mistake in yesterday’s CMU Daily.

The new PRS For Music rates for streaming music services are, obviously, 0.085p per stream, down from 0.22p, and not what we said in yesterday’s CMU Daily, where a slip of the decimal point would have been good news for songwriters but would have pretty much bankrupted every streaming music service. Which was never our intention. Well, it would have been nice to make songwriters a hundred times richer. They might have bought us a cup of tea to celebrate. Maybe even a slice of cake too.

As previously reported, the songwriter collecting society announced the not insignificant cut in its per-stream royalty rate yesterday, though upped its revenue share demands from 8% to 10.5%, which is relevant to the more profitable streaming music operations, if such a thing exists. Whether the cut in per-stream fees will satisfy YouTube, or any other streaming services who have left or resisted entering the UK market because of PRS’s royalty rates, Pandora for example, remains to be seen.

PPL appoints new member services head

Business News Industry People Labels & Publishers

Talking of collecting societies, recording rights society PPL has appointed a Head Of Member Services, which is a new role designed to help the body better service the needs of both its record label and performer members.

And the person appointed into that new job is Penny White, who joins the collecting society from Sainsbury’s, where she was Head Of Online Customer Services. Whether that means PPL members will now be able to request to get their royalty payments delivered to their door in an orange van, possibly in the form of groceries, I don’t know. It would be a nice touch.

Confirming the appointment, PPL Exec Director Peter Leathem told CMU: “Penny is a very experienced customer service professional and I am delighted that PPL will benefit from her experience of many years of providing excellent customer service in the highly competitive retail environment”.

Met Police Authority to discuss Form 696

Business News Live Business

As you receive this edition of the Daily, a meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority will be underway where the controversial Form 696 is due to be discussed.

The MPA supervises London’s police force, and according to Music Week, one of its members, Christopher Boothman, who has worked with the Notting Hill Carnival and other music events, is expected to raise the issue of the form, which promoters of live music in London are now expected to fill out as part of the licensing process. The form has been criticised for asking far too much information about performers, and for very specific genre information which many suspect is used by the authorities to guess what kind of ethnic demographic will attend an event. Boothman is expected to ask police commissioner Paul Stephenson to justify the form, which a parliamentary select committee recently said should be abolished.

UK Music chief Feargal Sharkey has also written to Boris Johnson, who as Mayor Of London chairs the MPA, urging him to take up the issue of the form with police chiefs.

Prime announce new label deals

Business News Deals Labels & Publishers

Prime Direct Distribution has announced deals with three new labels, US based Soulshine and Large Music, and Italian indie Ego Music.

Prime will handle UK distribution for all three labels.

A statement from the indie distributor said: “We are pleased to announce these exciting new additions to our label roster – proving once again that we’re the market leaders in what we do”.

Samsung partner with Bebo for music projects

Brands & Merch Business News Deals Digital

Samsung Mobile have signed up as sponsors of music activity organised by social network Bebo, and will support a new Samsung Bebo live music night at the Gibson Guitar Studio in London, featuring live performances from established and up and coming bands. The first one will be next week with White Lies and The Maccabees expected to play. Footage from the shows is expected to be presented on the Bebo website.

Confirming the deal, which promotes Samsung’s music phone range The Beat Edition, the technology company’s UK Marketing Director Mikah Martin-Cruz told reporters: “We are an innovative company that pushes the boundaries of technology to entertain and improve people’s lives. The scale of this partnership is a first for Samsung and is testament to how seriously we take social networking and the need to pioneer new ways of engaging our core audiences. We will work closely with Bebo, the music industry and our network partners to use these platforms to build closer artist fan relationships”.

Bannister says pre-recording Ross is not a solution

Media

Former Radio 1 chief Matthew Bannister has said that Radio 2’s decision to pre-record the Jonathan Ross radio show in a bid to ensure he doesn’t say anything that might piss off more sensitive listeners is “odd in a number of ways”.

Speaking to Radio 4’s ‘The Media Show’, Bannister, who was at one point tipped to take over at Radio 2 after former chief Lesley Douglas was forced to resign after the Ross/Brand Sachsgate debacle, said: “I think it is the safety-first choice. The issues behind the Ross-Brand affair were about the balance of power between the broadcaster and talent. It is another example of the BBC saying ‘We are in charge here, not the talent'”.

But, according to the Guardian, Bannister continued: “I am not sure if it is a long term solution to sorting out the balance of power between the BBC and talent because you can’t pre-record most of your music radio. This is a sticking plaster solution”.

Asked why more of the station’s music output couldn’t be pre-recorded, Bannister argued that non-live music radio shows were “less spontaneous and less exciting”, adding: “Once you have taken the decision to pre-record a music radio sequence, it does make a change to the show and to the adrenaline that not only the presenters but the guests feel. If you are recording it, you can go back and retake stuff. You don’t have that sense that every word you say on air counts. The audience will have a subtly different reaction to it. Somehow you can tell when a show has been produced a day before or a week before. [And] one of the joys of listening to Jonathan Ross has always been for me anyway to listen to him walk the tightrope between what is acceptable and what is not acceptable”.

Of course, another problem with pre-recorded shows on BBC radio these days is that after various ‘scandals’ over non-live Beeb shows encouraging listeners to text in when, in fact, there was no point, presenters of pre-recorded programmes that might appear live, or which usually are live, have to keep on stressing the fact they’re not actually there as the programme airs. Whether the Ross show, now a permanently pre-recorded affair, will have to follow that rule isn’t clear.

New weekend appointments at Radio 2, plus Mitchell joins Xfm

Media

Staying with Radio 2, and the station has just announced some new signings for its weekend breakfast strand, with Zoe Ball taking over an early slot on Saturdays (6-8am), and Emma Forbes on Sunday (5-7am). The latter will take over from Pete Mitchell, the former Piccadilly Radio and Virgin Radio presenter, who is set to return to local radio in Manchester having been signed up to present the breakfast show on Xfm Manchester.

Former Chrysalis colleague to join Riley at LDC

Media

Phil Riley has announced he will be joined by a former Chrysalis Radio colleague at his new Midlands-based radio firm.

As previously reported, a Riley-led consortium last week bought eight local radio stations in the Midlands, including BRMB, off Global Radio, who were forced to sell the stations by the Competition Commission in return for approval of their purchase last year of GCap. Riley’s new company is called LDC Midlands, and he has appointed former Chrysalis Radio exec David Lloyd as Group Programming & Marketing Director. Riley will return to commercial radio after a very brief stint with the BBC.

Riley and Lloyd both previously worked at Chrysalis Radio, which was bought out by Global Radio back in 2007.

MTV2/MySpace Chart – w/c 25 May 2009

Artist News

It’s the MTV2/MySpace chart, based on votes by MTV2 viewers on MySpace. The top ten this week is as follows…

1. [7] Everything Everything – Photoshop Handsome
2. [5] Baddies – Holler For My Holiday
3. [6] Placebo – For What It’s Worth
4. [8] Enter Shikari – Juggernauts
5. [4] The Blackout – Children Of The Night
6. [3] The Chapman Family – The Kids Are Not Alright
7. [NE] Lacuna Coil – Spellbound
8. [1] The Joy Formidable – Whirring
9. [10] You Me At Six – Finders Keepers
10. [NE] Taking Back Sunday – Sink Into Me

Meanwhile, added to the list for viewer voting this week are…

Florence & The Machine – Rabbit Heart
Jamie T – Sticks And Stones
Manic Street Preachers – Jackie Collins Existential Question Time
The Enemy – Sing When You’re In Love
The Killers – The World We Live

More at www.myspace.com/mtvtwo

Meg White marries

And Finally

White Stripe Meg White has reportedly married fiance Jackson Smith at a double wedding held in the back garden of Jack White’s Nashville home. Meg reportedly tied the knot with Jackson, son of Patti Smith and the late MC5 guitarist Fred ‘Sonic’ Smith, at the same time The Raconteurs bassist Jack Lawrence married his girlfriend Jo McCaughey. Celebratory ice creams all round I say.

Listen to Calvin’s music, it’ll cheer you up

And Finally

Calvin Harris reckons a depressed Britain needs more dance music to cheer it up. He’s slightly biased of course, I mean, I reckon that what depressed Britain really needs is more insightful and occasionally irreverent music news – that’d sort everyone out. But for Harris dance music is the solution.

To be fair, what Harris was saying is that a depressed nation would be better off listening to cheerful dancey songs rather than angsty indie rock. Speaking to the Beeb, Harris said: “Things [in the charts] got very depressing, things got very boring with indie band after indie band – it became known as indie-landfill. There’s no more accurate description for the state that music was in. I think people have just realised they just want to have fun for a while. I think the summer’s coming around… we’re in a recession, people want to have fun, people want to forget about their worries. I love happy music”.

Allen to guest in Neighbours

And Finally

Lily Allen is set to make a cameo appearance in ‘Neighbours’ later this year, despite previously claiming to be more of a ‘Home & Away’ fan. The soap’s makers, Aussie network Channel 10, says Allen will guest on the show when she is in Melbourne on tour later this year.

Chris Brown defends himself in new video

And Finally

Chris Brown has released a video informing us that he “ain’t a monster” and that he’s working on his new album. Which is nice of him. Chris Brown, of course, if currently facing charges of beating his ex-girlfriend Rihanna unconscious in the street.

In the video he says: “I just wanna say what up ’cause I ain’t been out there, but a new album’s gonna be coming soon, called ‘Graffiti’. I’m about to drop a single this summer for y’all, we ain’t going nowhere. Everybody that’s been haters, they always been haters. All my real fans, I love y’all, I ain’t a monster”.

You better all go watch the video message at this URL, you wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of Chris now, would you? Especially all you haters.

Approved: BBU (SNAP Of The Day)

CMU Approved

Streaming from the finest beach in Chicago, BBU (acronym for either the un-PC Bin Laden Blowin’ Up or Brown, Black and Ugly) have made a classic summer hip hop record in ‘Chi Don’t Dance’. Chant-a-long chorus, billowy synth loops and some finely tuned lines about MTV giving them ADD make good of what’s probably a Garageband creation at heart. It’s pure fun and streets ahead of all the crap house-meets-hip hop records rustling the UK charts – Flo Rida should be taking note. Only criticism? Their avatar looks like it was made from a collage of MIAs last album cover.

www.myspace.com/binladenblowinup

PRS cut streaming rates

Business News Labels & Publishers Top Stories

NOTE: Check this subsequent correction re figures in this story.

Songwriter collecting society PRS For Music yesterday announced it was rejigging its rate card for online streaming royalties, with the revenue share rate set to increase but the crucial per-stream rate set to fall by more than half. The collecting society says it hopes the new prices, and especially the large reduction in per-stream fees, will help stimulate growth in the digital music market.

The new rates come as part of the collecting society’s revamp of its online licence, the so called Online Music Licence, which will replace the old Joint Online Licence (‘joint’ because it was the first licence to give licensees rights to both make mechanical copies of and broadcast performances of songs – rights previously managed by two separate although allied collecting societies, MCPS and PRS). The old JOL rates were not without controversy, though were endorsed by the UK’s Copyright Tribunal in 2007.

The new rates will see PRS look to increase its over all revenue share from any digital music service from 8% to 10.5%, however in terms of per-stream fees, the rates will drop from 22p per stream to 8.5p per stream. Given most digital music services are not yet profitable, and therefore revenue share splits are not substantial, the per-stream fees are what matter to both the society and their licensees – for the former because it provides a guaranteed minimum income based on how much music is consumed (10.5% of nothing isn’t worth much), for the latter because they have to find the money to pay the per-stream fees oblivious of their advertising or subscription income. The cut is substantial, though given some of the bigger online service providers have been pushing for fraction of a penny rates, 8.5p will still seem over priced.

The new rates were passed by the collecting society’s board on 20 May, and will be in place for three years. Confirming the new rates, PRS For Music MD of Broadcast And Online, Andrew Shaw, told reporters: “We believe these new streaming rates will stimulate growth in the digital music market and will benefit our licensees and our members. The Copyright Tribunal established the principle of a per-stream minimum to protect creators; maintaining this principle will ensure that writers, composers and music publishers continue to be rewarded every time their music is enjoyed. As new entrants join the market and existing providers expand, music creators will reap the rewards by sharing in the success that their talent is generating. This is a good deal for music creators and for music lovers”.

In reality, many start-up streaming services have negotiated special rates with PRS, though it’s often when start-up arrangements come to an end and the collecting society start to point to their standard rate card that negotiations start to falter. The most high profile faltering negotiations, of course, have been between PRS and YouTube, with the video service pulling premium music videos off its UK website after failing to reach a deal with the collecting society.

Insiders say 8.5p per stream is still a lot more than Google and YouTube want to pay, so yesterday’s announcement won’t really make any difference in terms of that fallout. YouTube were non-committal yesterday, saying simply: “We’re still in discussions with the PRS to agree license terms for YouTube”.

Brown estate finally settled

Legal

A settlement of the estate of the late great James Brown has finally been agreed, after two and a half years of squabbling between family members, alleged family members and the estate’s original and subsequent trustees.

A South Carolina judge yesterday approved a deal whereby half of the singer’s assets will go to a charitable trust, a quarter to his sort of widow and her son (‘sort of’ because the legality of Brown and Tomi Rae Hynie Brown’s marriage was disputed), and the rest to Brown’s six adult children. The trust will fund education for Brown’s grandchildren and “needy children” in South Carolina and Georgia.

Brown’s legal reps say there isn’t actually all that much cash in the late singer’s accounts as we speak, and indeed some of his possessions had to be sold off last year to pay off a number of debts. But the future income from his intellectual property is, of course, potentially very valuable, and it is that future income that is really at stake here. That income will also mean the Trust should be able to fund educational initiatives for many years to come.

Welcoming the settlement, one of Brown’s daughters, Deanne Brown, told the Associated Press: “It has been a struggle, but God has blessed us and we are thankful. We look forward to working towards the goals of our father by providing education scholarships for impoverished students and his own grandchildren and making his home a museum for the world to come and see”.

Nesson plans to fight RIAA’s “unconstitutional abuse of law”

Legal

The Harvard law professor who is helping one Joel Tenenbaum fight one of the Recording Industry Association Of America’s final individual file-sharing lawsuits has written an article about why he has taken the case on, accusing the record industry trade body of an “unconstitutional abuse of law”.

As previously reported, although the RIAA has now announced that it will stop suing individual music fans who access or upload unlicensed music on the internet, it is planning on seeing existing litigation through to completion. The highest profile lawsuit is the one against Tenenbaum, because he is defending himself against the copyright infringement lawsuit, and has enlisted the support of Harvard legal man Charles Nesson and his students to fight his case.

Writing for Ars Technica, Nesson positions the litigation as a David v Goliath battle, and argues the whole RIAA litigation campaign against individual file-sharers is ethically wrong, saying: “I believe that the RIAA litigation campaign against Joel and the millions of his generation like him is an unconstitutional abuse of law. Imagine a law which, in the name of deterrence, provides for a $750 fine [the lower threshold for statutory damages] for each mile-per-hour that a driver exceeds the speed limit, with the fine escalating to $150,000 per mile over the limit if the driver knew she was speeding. Imagine that the fines are not publicised, and most drivers do not know they exist”.

He continues: “Imagine that enforcement of the fines is put into the hands of a private, self-interested police force that has no political accountability, that can pursue any defendant it chooses at its own whim. Imagine that almost every single one of these fines goes uncontested, regardless of whether they have merit, because the individuals being fined have limited financial resources and little idea of whether they can prevail in a federal courtroom”.

Explaining why he is supporting Tenenbaum, Nesson continues: “Joel, who was a teenager at the time of the alleged file-sharing, is like the 35,000 other individuals who have been sued and cannot afford an attorney to defend themselves. Justice demands, however, that one man not be pilloried without the process due him as a civil right, without good counsel, and without the most rigorous proof that he has committed the wrongs alleged”.

You can read Nesson’s whole argument, and nod you head energetically in agreement, or tut loudly and mutter “you just don’t understand, what’s the use in having intellectual property rights if you can’t protect them?”, at this URL.

Morrissey gig cancellation due to ill health

Artist News Gigs & Festivals

Morrissey has had to cancel another gig because of ill-health, even though and possibly because he ignored doctor’s warnings not to go ahead with a show in Manchester last Friday that coincided with his fiftieth birthday.

He proceeded with the birthday bash despite having to cancel two shows earlier this month because of a mystery ailment. But he’s still seemingly under the weather and cancelled a show in Salisbury on Monday night.

The promoter of that show said: “We would like to apologise to fans for the disappointment and are working to reschedule this show, so advise ticket holders to hang on to their tickets”.

Official Secrets Act drummer steps back over back injury

Artist News

Also not gigging because of ill-health is Alex McKenzie, drummer with One Little Indian signed Official Secrets Act, though his illness is due to bad luck rather than a mystery virus – he was hurt in a cycling accident two months ago, when he was struck by two cars.

He was back in hospital last week for a check up in relation to injuries incurred in that accident, and an MRI scan revealed a broken vertebra.

That discovery meant the band had to cancel their set at the Dot-To-Dot festival last weekend, though they have recruited Brakes drummer Alex White to help them fulfil all other upcoming tour dates while McKenzie’s doctors consider whether he needs surgery. We wish him a speedy recovery.

Global Radio chart show gets bigger

Business News Media

Global Radio will relaunch the flagship chart show aired on its FM pop stations, the show I continue to insist on calling “The Network Chart Show with Kid Jenson”, because I am old. The all-new chart will be compiled based on radio airplay stats and download sales, though, crucially, the top ten will be based just on downloads from iTunes, and will be calculated live during the actual show.

In fact the initial top ten will be announced at the start of the show, with updates given during the programme as listeners are encouraged to go online and buy their favourite tracks via the Apple music store to boost a song’s overall chart position. Or something like that. Most importantly this chart is going to be big. Yes, big. Bigger than any other chart you’ve ever come across before. We know this because the new programme will be called the ‘Big Top 40 Show’ instead of ‘Hit40UK’, which was, let’s face it, always a rubbish name for a chart.

Confirming the revamped chart show, Global Radio programming man Richard Park told reporters: “Everybody here is extraordinarily excited about the potential of being involved in first real-time chart, where the listener can do what viewer does on ‘American Idol’ – they can help create a star. With 96% of sales in the UK’s official chart now being from downloads alone, it’s important we reflect the future of purchasing music, and there is no more significant partner [in that domain] than iTunes”.

Stooges to reunite with Raw Power guitarist

Artist News

Iggy Pop has announced that he plans to reunite with James Williamson, the guitarist who played on and co-wrote The Stooges’ (then known as Iggy & The Stooges) third album, ‘Raw Power’.

Williamson replaced original Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton (who rejoined in 1972 on bass) in 1971 and played with the band until 1974. The band reformed in 2003 with Asheton on back on guitar and later recorded their fourth album, ‘The Weirdness’ with that line up. The announcement that Pop is working with Williamson again comes five months after the death of Asheton from a heart attack.

Pop told The Australian: “There is always Iggy & The Stooges, the second growth of the band. I had a meeting in LA last week with James. It was the first time we had seen each other in 30 years. So we talked about doing something together. ‘Raw Power’ would be the repertoire”.

As well as the only other remaining original member of the band besides Iggy, drummer and brother of Ron, Scott Asheton, it is expected that the latest incarnation of the Stooges will be completed by saxophonist Steve McKay and former Minutemen bassist Mike Watt, all of whom were involved in the previous reunion.

Winehouse gets the boot from Quincy Jones tribute

Artist News

A cover version of Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ by Amy Winehouse has been dropped from a forthcoming Quincy Jones tribute album, which will feature covers of songs originally recorded by the legendary producer.

Winehouse’s contribution to the album was another collaboration with Mark Ronson, and he’s revealed that, although work on the track began a year ago, it’s still not anywhere close to being finished and so has been scrapped. Ronson told The Mirror: “The track isn’t finished and she’s not around. If she’s not here then, unfortunately, there’s nothing we can do about it”.

Padding out the story a bit, an anonymous source added: “Basically after Amy’s horrendous gig in St Lucia, and then pulling out of the Island 50th birthday gig, everyone realised she wasn’t going to get it together. Quincy Jones is one of the most respected men in the music industry, so it was a huge honour for Amy to be asked to record for him. To snub him is a big no-no. The frustrating thing is what there is of the track sounds really good, but it looks like no one will ever get to hear it”.

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:50 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:49 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:48 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:47 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:46 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:45 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:44 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:43 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:42 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:41 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:40 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:39 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:38 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:37 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:36 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:35 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:34 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:33 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:32 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:31 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Thursday 28 May 2009, 11:30 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:50 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:38 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:37 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:36 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:35 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:34 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:33 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:32 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT:

Wednesday 27 May 2009, 11:31 | By CMU Editorial

READ MORE ABOUT: