Welcome to CraveOnline's weekly music news roundup! Covering all the latest in the hits, the bombs and the trainwrecks, we sift through the headlines and bring you just what you need to know about musical current events.
Metallica's new Death Magnetic album has skyrocketed to the top of the Billboard 200, moving 490,000 units in a 3-day sales window, according to Nielsen Soundscan. This makes the revived metallic thrashers the first band to see five albums top the charts.
Outkast's Andre Benjamin is hard at work on a solo album that could be out by the end of the year, but don't expect the standard guest-heavy hip-hop record. “It should be dropping by the end of this year or early next year. I’ve pretty much been working with myself,” he explains. “I’ve never really been that big on collaboration.” Andre didn't divulge any specifics, but mentioned that he does have a specific direction in mind.
“I have a concept, and all the soundscapes are already in my head, so I just have to figure out how to get there,” he said.
Activision is taking a cue from Rock Band and upping the ante by adding several new features to the upcoming Guitar Hero World Tour, including a drum kit, a microphone, new touch-sensitive guitar designs and a feature that allows users to create their own tracks in a virtual studio.
The playlist is a formidable one as well, but the five-track home studio feature is likely to be one of the most popular for young gamers. Guitar Hero World Tour hits stores October 26.
Speaking of which, the wizards that came up with Guitar Hero are now looking to corner the market on virtual turntables as well. DJ Hero is said to feature e a simplified plastic scratch deck instead of a mini plastic guitar to hit prompted cues. Users will follow the half-arc of a vinyl record on the screen.
The game will take a while to get to stores, undoubtedly because it's going to take a damned miracle to secure the rights to sample-heavy hip-hop tracks. Another delay could be due to Activision’s plan to make DJ Hero playable with Guitar Hero gear, allowing users to create mash-ups between the rap and rock genres.
The Cure’s Robert Smith has issued a blistering attack on both iTunes UK and his record label, after the band’s new remix EP Hypnagogic States hit the digital music service with an LP price tag. “5 tracks for £7.99? For fucks sake!” rants Smith in an open letter to his label before complaining that the overpriced package is also missing a bonus remix of new song “The Only One.” “Who the fuck is going to pay this and not feel ripped off?” Smith asks. He's got a right to be pissed: nobody in hell is going to spend 10-11 bucks on a remix EP.
After ten years of pillaging and whoring out the fertile, impressionable musical tastes of teenagers, MTV's "Total Request Live" will finally get the hell out of the TV game.The show will close with a two-hour blowout special in November that you're definitely not going to watch.
TRL's audience peaked in 1999 when 757,000 kids willingly ruined their potential for developing attention spans that last more than ten seconds.
Richard Wright, founding member and keyboardist for Pink Floyd, died Monday after a brief struggle with cancer. He was 65.
Wright's most well-known credited works with PF include "Us & Them," "Breathe," "The Great Gig in the Sky," and "Summer '68," among others. He left the group after a rift with bandmate Roger Waters following the release of their masterpiece, The Wall.
The Smashing Pumpkins reunion has been chronicled for the upcoming double-disc DVD "If All Goes Wrong," due Nov. 11 on Coming Home Media. One half is a documentary that chronicles the Pumpkins' residencies in Asheville, N.C., and San Francisco in the summer of 2007, which were the band's first shows in seven years. Included in the bonus features are an interview with the Who's Pete Townshend, which makes about as much sense as James Brown being featured in a Slipknot DVD.
The second disc of the project is "The Fillmore Residency," a collection of individual performances that will collaboratively comprise what a typical Pumpkins setlist looks like these days, post-Iha. [Update: this is, evidently, not true - they hardly play any of the songs on this disc live. Had we continued paying attention after Corgan stopped writing good songs, we might know that - sorry] In addition to a collection of songs you'd in no way recognize if you stopped listening after 2000 or so, the DVD features seven songs previously unreleased in any form, like the 30-minute "Gossamer," "99 Floors" and "No Surrender." "Starla" is one of the only vintage Pumpkins song to make the cut for the disc.
The Pumpkins will release a new single, "G.L.O.W.," via the "Guitar Hero: World Tour" video game in late October. Yippee.
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