That’s just music

Until the last moment Sir Paul McCartney’s concert in his hometown of Liverpool  was under the danger of being cancelled.

As it became known to BBC News, the company which is taking care over his deals McCartney Productions Ltd (MPL) was unhappy with the financial side that surrounded this concert. Eventually the city council of Liverpool agreed to pay MPL 1,7 million pounds in order to turn the concert into a reality. Also, it was specifically underlined that an ex-Beatle shall not gain any profit out of it; all the resources are going into organizing and staging of a show. 

During last year, not even looking at the lack of any agreement between two sides organizers have sold twenty five thousand tickets.  After the contract was finally signed eleven thousand additional tickets were put on sale.

This concert in Liverpool is confined to the city’s status of the cultural capital of Europe 2008.  A show will take place on June 1 at the Enfield stadium, which is “the home base of the Liverpool football club”.

The British band Muse is ready to cooperate with rapper Mike Skinner who is more famous around the world as The Streets, says Digital Spy.

The leader of Muse Matthew Bellamy said that Muse would like to record a composition in rap-rock style which shall become a number one “English equivalent to Rage Against the Machine”. “Rap-rock from London – it is something very funny”, said Bellamy pointing at the fact that he didn’t contact Skinner yet.

Above all, Bellamy has confessed that he also wants to work with a new British sensation, the band called “Does It Offend You, Yeah?” from Reading which has recently released it’s debut album.

American alternative band Jane’s Addiction was granted an honoroble award from the British magazine New Musical Express for “nearly godlike talant or so called Godlike Genius Award” says Digital Spy.

Godlike Award will be given to musicians on April 23 in Los Angeles during Shockwaves NME Awards. On the occasion of getting this ‘prize’ Jane’s Addiction will reunite for a little while and make a short concert. 

Magazine’s editorial staff confessed that they’ve chosen Jane’s Addiction to be a winner right after the first idea of granting this award in the United States came up. 

Just for a reminder – in Britain NME Awards (since 2005 also known as Shockwaves) is given since 1953.  The list of British owners of Godlike Genius Awards includes Sir Paul McCartney, BBC DJ John Peel, Glastonbury festival’s founder Michael Eavis, bands Primal Scream and Manic Street Preachers. 

The band Jane’s Addiction was founded in 1985 by a singer Perry Farrell, guitar player Dave Navarro, bass Eric Avery and drums Stephen Perkins.  Musicians have released four studio albums, and started to organize popular alternative festival Lollapalooza.  The band was falling apart twice – in 1991 and in 2004. 

Members of Guns N’ Roses have announced that their work with long awaited album “Chinese Democracy” is over.

This album is already given to Geffen Records. Company representatives proved that they’ve received this record keeping talks with the band members about copy rights and financial side of the deal.  It was said that the album took thirteen million dollars to be made.

Work with “Chinese Democracy” spent fourteen years.  In the end of March company Dr. Pepper spreaded press release posting promises that if this album is not going to be released by the end of 2008 than every american shall get a free drink.  An exception should be made only for two ex-Guns N’ Roses guitar players. 

U2 is planning to make another release of their first three albums, says Billboard.

Albums “Boy” (1980), “October” (1981) and “War” (1983) will be seen in music stores on June 22.  Every release shall be integrated with a vinyl copy, and two disks with rare song versions and concert records of that time.

Just for a reminder, last autumn the band also was re-releasing it’s classic 1987 album “The Joshua Tree” adding bonus, second CD and DVD.

In the meantime musicians have returned to their studio in Dublin where together with producers Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois they’ve continued recording 12th album.  Musicians are planning to release it before the end of 2008, and start the world tour. 

Duran Duran is looking at the possiblity of collaborating with prize-winners of the Brit Awards 2008 DJ Mark Ronson and Arctic Monkeys.

A joint work between Duran Duran and Ronson may start on the following summer.  Right now musicians are discussing various details of their cooperation.  Arctic Monkey’s drummer Matt Helders helped to create a remix of the Duran’s song Skin Divers from their last album “Red Carpet Massacre”.  Following various rumours Helders and the leader of Arctic Monkeys Alex Turner will take part in recording vocals for a remix.

This year Mark Ronson was announced to be the best performer at the Brit Awards.  He became the first not singing winner of the nomination.  Talking of Arctic Monkeys, their album “Favourite Worst Nightmare” was proclaimed to be the best album of the year.  Billboard is calling Ronson and Arctic Monkeys, “the hottest names in the British music”. 

Music made by the band Coldplay is recognized as the most sleepy one.  This was a conclusion of the study carried out by the British hotel net Travelodge among it’s 2248 clients. 

Top five musicians who’s records people are listening before going to sleep include James Blunt (Snow Patrol), Take That and Norah Jones.

The first place among books that British are reading more often before going to sleep belong to an autobiographies of Jordan (a model), David Beckham, Jodie Marsh and Sharon Osbourne.

87 percents of people who were asked in this study said that they’ve stopped traditional method of fighting insomnia – counting sheep.  Women usually plan their next day and man count money they’ve spent.   

The British band Portishead will make presentation of their new studio album “Third” on TV.

On April 11th three weeks before an official release musicians are planning to perform eight songs. This live concert will be broadcasted by the British channel Current TV.  A show should be recorded in a little town of Portishead in Somerset county which gave the original name to the band.  The record from this concert is going to be available on the channel’s web site for two months after performance. 

The release of “Third” is planned for April 28^th. However, bad quality tracks already exist inside the net since the end of March. Their previous studio album was recorded back in 1997. 

Popular Scottish band Franz Ferdinand played at a secret concert in their native Glasgow during which they’ve represented seven new songs.

This show was taking place in Admiral Bar pub on April 2^nd. Posters at the entrance where including experimental rockers Please and dj set. 

Franz Ferdinand’s performance took only half an hour, but at this time they’ve played only new songs: “Lucid Dreams”, “Send Him Away”, “A New Thrill”, “Katherine Kiss Me”, “Bite Hard”, “What She Came For”, “Ulysses”.

Tracks “A New Thrill” and “Katherine Kiss Me” singers have already included in their performance programs, and “Ulysses” was also heard at the London’s exposition of an Albanian artist Anri Sala.  The rest of four songs were absolutely new to the light. 

All of these new songs shall be the part of Franz Ferdinand’s third album that should most likely be released in October 2008.  Following some rumours the first single from this album which did not get a name yet will be “What She Came For”. Their previous album “You Could Have It So Much Better” was released in 2005.

British hard-rockers Deep Purple headlined the list of bands who have made the best guitar riff in the history of rock music. This is “Smoke on the Water” from 1972 album “Machine Head”.  Current survey was carried out by The Telegraph among London’s music school students. 

The second place in this chart was taken by the infamous composition “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana (“Nevermind” 1991).  The ‘bronze’ belongs to Aerosmith with their song “Walk This Way” of 1975. 

First ten places are also include three Guns N’ Roses’ songs: “Sweet Child O Mine”, “Paradise City” and “Welcome to the Jungle” (5^th, 6^th, and 10th).  Also there is Jimi Hendrix (“Purple Haze” number 4), Motorhead (“Ace of Spades” seventh place), Metallica (“Enter Sandman” number eight) and Red Hot Chilli Peppers (“Under the Bridge”, 9^th). 

Full list of songs looks like this: 

1. Smoke On The Water - Deep Purple (1973)
2. Smells Like Teen Spirit - Nirvana (1991)
3. Walk This Way - Aerosmith (1975)
4. Purple Haze - Jimi Hendrix (1967)
5. Sweet Child O Mine - Guns N Roses (1987)
6. Paradise City - Guns N Roses (1987)
7. Ace Of Spades - Motorhead (1980)
8. Enter Sandman - Metallica (1991)
9. Under The Bridge - Red Hot Chili Peppers (1992)
10. Welcome To The Jungle - Guns N Roses (1987)
11. Run To The Hills - Iron Maiden (1982)
12. Walk - Pantera (1992)
13. Johnny Be Goode - Chuck Berry (1958)
14. Back In Black - AC/DC (1980)
15. Immigrant Song - Led Zeppelin (1970)
16. Wake Up - Rage Against The Machine (1992)
17. Highway to Hell - AC/DC (1979)
18. My Generation - The Who (1965)
19. 7 Nation Army - The White Stripes (2003)
20. Born To Be Wild - Steppenwolf (1968)
21. Give It Away - Red Hot Chili Peppers (1991)
22. Paranoid - Black Sabbath (1970)
23. Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) - Jimi Hendrix (1967)
24. Eye Of The Tiger - Survivor (1982)
25. Money For Nothing - Dire Straits (1984)