That’s just music

The University of Plymouth, which is located in the British county of Devonshire had granted an Honorary Doctorate of Arts to all three members of the band Muse, said New Musical Express. Matt Bellamy, Chris Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard (all three were born in Devonshire) have received this honour for their impact on music.  During a ceremony Bellamy has told everyone that his band is most likely not deserving this kind of thing, but of course they’re extremely happy. “It’s nice to be part of something down here in the West Country. We never went to university so it really means a lot to us,” he noted. Lots of musicians these days are getting similar things for their activities, and some of them are really working in the academic field. The best example is Brian May. This guy is heading the Liverpool John Moores University.

Robert Plant had officially denied any information about his reunion with Led Zeppelin, said BBC News.  During the last week the British press was constantly saying that once Plant had heard about the band’s plan to hire a new vocalist in order to move on, he suddenly agreed to sing with them. However, it turns to be false, and Robert Plant is not doing anything of this sort. “It’s both frustrating and ridiculous for this story to continue to rear its head when all the musicians that surround the story are keen to get on with their individual projects and move forward,” he said.  Led Zeppelin is planning to go for the world tour during the following year, and it is very sad that these rumours turned to be untrue. Even after Plant finishes his touring with Alison Krauss, he shall not take any part in Led Zeppelin’s career anymore. Nevetheless, anything is still possible, and let’s just believe that he will change his mind.

Robert Plant had agreed to perform together with his former bandmates, said The Telegraph. Right now reunited Led Zeppelin is planning on touring around Europe and North America. Shall they get to other countries is not known yet, but most likely they may do it. Rumours about their world tour began to leak sometime in December last year when Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, John Paul Johns and John Bonham (a son of Jason Bonham) have performed at O2 Arena in London. However, Plant had decided not to continue and went on touring with a country singer Alison Krauss. Previously they’ve recorded and released the successful album “Raising Sand”. Recently, some journalists have acquired an information about the fact that the other band members are seeking for another vocalist to replace Plant. After he realized that their plans are quite serious a musician had agreed to reunite with the rest of the band.

It became officially known that T-Mobile G1 (Goodle Android – also known as the Googlepne) lacks the standard 3,5mm headphone jack, said Engadget. Definitely engineers from T-Mobile or Google were rushing as fast as possible to make this product going, but right now it will create some unexpected difficulties. The technical side of G1 was produced by HTC (High Tech Computer Corporation). After that inconvenience came out producers began to recommend using ExtUSB turning this smartphone into a “laptop”. Those who are planning to get this phone will either change their headphones or use the adaptor. Besides that, such adaptors shall not appear in stores by the date of G1’s release (October 22). T-Mobile G1 was already presented on September 23. It contains a sensor screen, keyboard and many software programs produced by Google. This model also allows it’s possessors to buy and download music from the Amazon MP3 service.

SanDisk Corporation is now promoting an alternative to the traditional compact disc, said NME. This new sound carrier is called slotMusic and soon it may replace something what people used for decades. SlotMusic is the memory card which can contain up do 1Gb of music written in MP3/320klbs format. This device should be able to work with the cell phones, all kinds of mp3/video players and so on. Practically, it’s not going to create any revolution in the music listening process because the mp3 player revolution is already on the way and there is nothing more convenient than iPod. However, the idea behind the slotMusic card was (of course!) widely supported by the major record labels like EMI Muisc, Sony BMG, Warner Music Group, Universal Group and so on. It means that they’re going to try fighting mp3’s with this new hardware device on the basis of ‘once we cannot stop the process, we shall try leading it’. It’s already known which artists will be presented on the slotMusic format – Oasis, Amy Winehouse and Coldplay.

The Scottish post-rock band Mogwai had cancelled it’s American and Canadian tour due to their drummer’s heart problems, said Pitchfork. On September 21 Martin Bulloch was rapidly hospitalized to one of the New York’s clinics right after the band’s performance at the All Tomorrow’s Parties festival. The reason for hospitalization was Bulloch’s continuous heart sickness because of which he is suppose to use an electronic cardiostimulator. Doctors asked him to go back to Scotland in order to take care of this painful situation. This guy needs better and more serious treatment right now. After this incident musicians have decided not to continue their North American tour promising to catch up in the beginning of the next year. European tour dates (October/November) are still not changed. On September 22 the band had released their sixth studio album, “The Hawk is Howling”.

Reunited Spice Girls were declared to be the best out of all other groups which have made the act of reunion during the last two/three years. Their 2007/2008 tour was included as the indicator of their “superiority” over the others. This fact became known to the world during the last Vodafone Live Music Awards ceremony that took place in London on September 28. BBC News is noting that the “reunion” category was also planned to be taken by Led Zeppelin, The Verve and James. The last two bands are good and quite respected, but how Spice Girls could overtake Led Zeppelin is quite unknown. Led Zeppelin’s reunion was possibly the biggest event of all times, which cannot be even compared to the ‘Girls’. At least out of respect to the age and history Led Zeppelin had to get beyond everyone.

Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl had announced the fact that his band is going to take a long vacation, said Gigwise. Something similar had recently happened to Red Hot Chilli Peppers, they’ve decided to move onto their separate projects and weekend-like activities. Following Dave’s words, his band is active for the whole fourteen years, and now it’s time to take a rest from each other. Also, he added that they have achieved everything they could possibly dream about. “It’s a funny place being in the band now because we’ve been a band for about 14 years,” was his exact phrase. Seems like something quite normal and regular for the bands who stay together for more than ten years. This summer Foo Fighters have performed at the ‘good bye’ concert in London (Wembley stadium) together with Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page and John Paul Johns (Grohl is admiring LZ). They’ve played Zeppelin’s legendary “Ramble On” and “Rock and Roll”. Personally, Foo Fighters leader has admitted that he had the best time in his life during that performance. “After doing Wembley we shouldn’t come back there for 10 years because we’ve played to everybody. We’ve gone from playing the Astoria, to playing Earls Court to playing Wembley. That wasn’t really the goal but hey, we’ll take it. We’re over in the UK every year, every summer so I think it’s time to take a break and come back over when people really miss us.” he added.

The new studio album produced by Metallica called “Death Magnetic” began to dominate American and British music charts. This was quite expected due to the great thing Metallica has done with this new and definitely heavy album. They are not trying to make another “St. Angler”, by moving towards their more traditional style, which is somewhat similar to “And Justice For All” (1988). Only in the states the new album sold 490,000 copies so far, said Reuters. It is getting closer to 1996 when the innovative work “Load” sold 680,000 copies during the first six days. It is not very well known how many copies were sold in Britain right now, but Metallica was able to move Glasvegas from the first place, and put Rihanna away from the second, says NME. The official release of “Death Magnetic” began on September 12, but ten days prior to that it became available online. At least tens of thousands could download it and see the greatness of this new album as early as the beginning of September.

The Who is planning to release their best live performance on DVD. A disc under the name “The Who”: At Kilburn 1977” (this legendary concert took place in London) will appear in music stores on November 18 this year, said NME. This performance is considered to be the most artistic and self sacrificing in the band’s history. Simply nothing can match this record in value. During that concert The Who were playing in their classic line-up, Roger Daltrey (vocals), Pete Townshend (guitar), John Entwistle (bass), and Keith Moon (drums). The upcoming double DVD will also include another concert played in London back in 1969, and their first live performance of the rock opera “Tommy”. The Who was formed in 1964 in London. Today the original line-up includes only Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend. A drummer Keith Moon has died in 1978, and John Entwistle had passed out in 2002.