That’s just music

Popular British retro-soul singer Amy Winehouse has divorced her husband Blake Fielder-Civil, said BBC News on July 16. Following the given information, the whole process of separation took only a few minutes, so making it pretty easy case of it. Fielder-Civil had pleaded for divorce in the midst of January 2009 motivating it by a presumable cheating on Winehouse’s side. During that exact time it also became know that the owner of five “Grammy’s” is staying at Caribbean island of St. Lucia together with so far unknown actor Josh Bowman. While recently Winehouse was answering various questions regarding this issue, she kept on underlining the fact that it’s better not to think about her relationship with Fielder-Civil at all. “Blake was exactly like me. We were doing drugs together. But when I’m with Josh I don’t need any stimulating substances”, noted Winehouse. Despite the fact that during the last winter she had stopped taking drugs, she still could not beat her drinking habit. This girl is not planning to settle down in the nearest future, even though some of her worst addictions may be slowing down. Amy Winehouse and Blake Fielder-Civil have met in one of the London pubs in 2005, and soon after fell into a lot of legal troubles.

Actress Emma Watson famous for her role of Hermiona Granger in “Harry Potter” is planning to act in Marilyn Manson’s show, which is now being directed by this eccentric rock musician, said Monsters and Critics. The project is going to look like the gothic version of “Cinderella”, and for sure it will look awesome if MM does his director’s job properly. After all, he is not doing what he was used to do, it’s totally new for the guy, but let’s hope things turn out good for him. As the unnamed source close to Watson had recently said, she wants to demonstrate that her image can go further than what became typical of her after “Harry Potter”, she simply want’s to be known somewhere else too. “She’s saw how Daniel Radcliffe managed to branch out into something completely different when he starred in ‘Equus’ and thinks this could do the same for her,” added a source. In one of her latest interviews, Watson had confessed that she really wishes to continue her acting career. In the upcoming time she may accept offers to participate in the projects that will arouse as much enthusiasm as “Harry Potter”.  Many other sources keep on telling that Watson also plans to go to college/university, but it’s not known where, so let’s wait to see it.

On Tuesday the American blogger who in June 2008 stole all nine Guns N’Roses  songs from their new album “Chinese Democracy” was sentenced for one year on probation, said Associated Press. According to the decision made by Los Angeles Federal judge, Kevin Cogill will spend two months under the house arrest and will give up all his computers for check. Besides that, blogger had promised to produce a video for the Recording Industry Association of America were he is going to call for the online anti-piracy actions, notes Wired.com. Absolutely hard and difficult for someone who was doing something totally opposite, but in order to escape jail he will do even this thing. A twenty-eight years old Cogill had presumably understood his wrongdoing and began to co-operate with RIAA in December 2008, so they’ve dropped the orginal claim that could force him to pay three hundred seventy one thousand dollars. Prosecutor was insisting on some real jail time, but the judge has come to a conclusion that a young man had already ‘learned some lesson’. Surely, this decision is very mild and nice, seems to be extremely liberal, but fare because it’s still not forth of isolating someone for music. Even if it looks bad, jail sentence for stealing music should be replaced with some moral or ethical blame.

American pop singer LadyGaGa (her real name is Stefani Germanotta) has set up a new popularity limit in the Billboard’s chart - Mainstream Top 40. With her eccentric style this young lady seems to be quite special and slighly different from her collegues on the pop scene. Basically, all of them may look extravagant, but this one is way above them all. So far three singles from her debut album “The Fame” were able to get on top of the Mainstream Top 40. Previously this chart was headed by “Just Dance” for two weeks, and later by “Poker Face” for five weeks. The latest results show that her “Love Game” is going to be the first one this time. Lady GaGa’s achievements are standing on the third place after Ace of Base and Avril Lavigne. In 1993–1994 Ace of Base turned to be the best with their “All That She Wants”, “The Sign” and “Don’t Turn Around”. In 2002–2003 Avril Lavigne was able to be the winner with “Complicated”, “Sk8er Boi” and “I’m With You”. Lady’s debut album “The Fame” was released in August 2008 and was quickly accepted by many pop fans in around the world helping her to be on the first place according to the British national chart, and on the fourth if relating to it’s American counterpart.

Canadian musician Dave Carroll who had recently accused United Airlines of damaging his precious guitar, has recorded a song about this incident and placed it on YouTube, said Agence France-Presse. As Caroll says, in 2008 him and his band have departured from Halifax (Canada) to Nebraska (US), everything was allright, but during their short stay at the O’Hara airport in Chicago they’ve witnessed the way loaders were handling his instruments. When musician had received his guitar back it turned to be broken. Eventually he was trying to sue the company, but things just turned against him and he was left without money. Carroll’s guitar is worth of three thousand dollars and seems to be quite cool if he can’t forget that day. Actually, any musician would get angry, especially if that instrument means something special. No money for the damage make things lool twice as worse. The first song which is now available on YouTube is called “United Breaks Guitars”, which tells the whole story. Those who are getting under the fire are loaders and company representatives who keep on ignoring him. “I should have flown with someone else or gone by car,” sings Carroll. In his comments to this video Dave has noted that the second one is coming soon.

Producer and DJ Adam Freeland has started the legal procedure against Black Eyed Peas. Musician is sure of the fact that they’ve stolen his song “Mancry” and used it’s melody in their “Party All The Time”, which was released on the album “The E.N.D. (The Energy Never Dies)”, said ContactMusic. Freeland had placed both melodies on his Twitter micro-blog in order to give his fans a chance to compare it and give their own opinion. It’s a typical misunderstanding between bands and musicians, who stole what or why such and such melody sounds so similar. Usually these debates end up in mutual disagreement and finally cease to exist because often they do sound similar, but there is no act of plagiarism too. Proves are scarce in situations like this one. At the same time scandalous blogger Perez Hilton who had recently sued Black Eyed Peas manager Polo Molina, insists that the band could hear Freeland’s song during his personal private party, which took place in 2008, before “The E.N.D.” came out.  In other words, lawyers are already talking, but there is nothing on when they will take these talks to court. Currently, Black Eyed Peas are getting for the grand world tour in support of the album mentioned above.

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Abbey Road studio, which became legendary due to the fact that The Beatles used to rehearse and record over there, starts a new life. The whole idea behind their new project is to give young musicians a chance to co-operate with the Abbey Road’s experienced specialists. Sort of transferring an experience to those who wish to learn, or just stay in touch with the old rock n’ roll legends. Now their web site is saying that any band or musician can use studio’s online-mastering tricks. In order to get an access, one should register by filling out an application and send his demo to the Abbey Road specialists who will take a look at it. Pretty cool idea, but for some reason there is no clear information on whether it will be free or not. There is no doubt that many musicians would like to join this project, so money factor may play some role in this game. Abbey Road studio was founded in London in 1931 and in the beginning used to work exclusively with classic musicians, but later began to provide services to pop and rock n’ roll bands too. Particularly Abbey Road, which is now owned by the EMI records label had produced all twelve The Beatle’s albums. One of them was even called by it’s name - “Abbey Road”.

Paul McCartney has finished working with John Lennon’s extremely rare song “Now And Then”, and in the nearest time plans to make it public, said ContactMusic. This song was written by John Lennon in 1978, but for some reason he was not able to record it before his death in 1980, so it existed only in the demo version. In 1995 Lennon’s widow Yoko Ono had decided to give this practically unknown record, plus some others including “Free As A Bird” and “Real Love” to his former bandmates while they were working with The Beatle’s “Anthology”. Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr have finished their parts in “Free As A Bird” and “Real Love”, and later included them into “The Beatles” album, but “Now And Then” remained unfinished due to some internal factions. During the last two years McCartney had finally ended up working with this song, also incorporating what was made up by the rest of his collegues. If “Now And Then” will see the light then it should be the first song since 1996 basically created by The Beatles, and practically the last rarity that still remains unreleased. “Real Love” which was part of the “Anthology” (1996) seemed to be the end line, but let’s wait for “Now And Then”.

“Drum!” magazine had announced the list of those musicians who are going to get this year’s Drummie Awards. Their cool prize was founded by the magazine itself and is given out to the best drummers of the year. The lucky one who turned to be the best of the best is a Canadian drummer from Rush, Neil Peart. He just passed by everybody and according to “Drum!” has deserved to get the highest prize they can offer to him. Also, Peart had received the title “of the best progressive rock drummer”, and therefore repeated his 2008 and 2007 success, when he was awarded with “the best live performance” and “the best drummer of the year”. In other words, “Drum!” loves this guy, so they just can’t stop giving him one award after another. Well, Peart is trully one of the most influential drummers, extremely talented and surely deserves a lot of respect. In 2007 this magazine gave him five Drummie Awards, probably beating everyone else’s records. Besides that, “Drum!” granted him with one more “the coolest live performance” award and particularly his work with the album “Snakes & Arrows”, actually another Rush’s masterpiece. The whole list of the Drummie Awards 2009 nominations is going to be available in the magazine’s August issue.