That’s just music

American legendary band Alice in Chains had finally released a new video to their song “Check My Brain” from the upcoming album “Black Gives Way To Blue”, said Blabbermouth.net on September 14. The best part is that it’s their first video in ten years, so it was nervously awaited by fans and those who just like rock music in general. “Check My Brain” video is going to be the first in which their new vocalist William Duval was fully presented. The video itself is currently available on MtvU website on 24/7 basis. It was directed by the infamous Alex Cortes, who has gained a lot of fame through his works with U2 and The White Stripes. The last Alice in Chains video came out in 1999 with their previous vocalist Lain Staly, who has died due to the drugs overdose in 2002. Practically, the band was silent since then and many believed that they are not even planning to come back, but things began to change. “Black Gives Way To Blue”, which is going to be released on September 29 will be their first album in fourteen years. In 1995 they’ve released “Alice in Chains” album and since then just kept on re-releasing previous stuff in various compilations.

Genesis vocalist and drummer Phil Collins had damaged the upper part of his spinal chord, and therefore this nasty accident may put his career under the danger of being knocked out for an uncertain period of time. As The Daily Telegraph said, at least it may put him away from the stage for a few years, hence this kind of trauma takes a very long time to recover. Besides the fact that Collins went through a successful surgery, it’s still not known if a musician is going to be able to perform on drums because his hands are not functioning right. Hopefully, current medicine and good care will restore this guy as soon as possible. Collins personally noted that he received this trauma way back in 2007 during the Genesis tour “Turn It On Again: The Tour”, which was dedicated to his return (he left the band in 1996). “Somehow during the last Genesis tour I dislocated some vertebrae in my upper neck and that affected my hands”. He cannot play drums and keyboards right now, but at the same time Phil is trying to keep up with his spirits. “Maybe in a year or so it will change, but for now it is impossible for me to play drums or piano. I am not in any ‘distressed’ state – stuff happens in life.”

Tommorow London is going to see an exposition, which is about to include rare and previously unpublished pictures of now legendary British band Oasis, said New Musical Express. This art expo will open on September 11 in one of the London’s night clubs. Photograph lovers and Oasis fans will be able to look at some very interesting and rare photos made by Michael Spencer Jones, the band’s photographer who used to work with them almost since the beginning of their career. Surely, this guy knows a lot about them, and if he still works with them, then he is a trully good photographer and a true admirer of Oasis. Jones co-worked with the band during the release of their debut album Definitely Maybe (1994). Also, Jones had produced photos for the release of their fourth single “Cigarettes And Alcohol”; his photo had appeared on a single cover. To the viewer’s attention this expo will show Oasis photographs made my Jones during the band’s studio sessions, and tours. Moreover, many of these photos were already included in the recently released Oasis photo album. Practically, this gathering was designed particularly for those who like this band, and generally enjoys photography, so those who are in London don’t miss it.

Ex-The Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman had criticised music video games, said BBC News. In the recent time projects like Guitar Hero or Rock Band are possessing the great popularity among gamers. As Wyman believes they’re distracting children from playing for real on the real music instruments. Quite interesting remark from an old guy who grew up in a totally different time, and possibly cannot understand the fact that such games are actually driving kids into playing music on the real instruments. Meanwhile, the same opinion is shared by the Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason. He has noted that Guitar Hero or Rock Band are interesting games, but it annoys him that children are spending so much time playing them. Mason had also unterlined that if children were spending the same amount of enthusiasm learning how to perform on the real instruments then by now they would become good guitar players. Of course both musicians get to the point, but seriously can these games trully distract from the real music? After all many of these kids will actually start the real music careers with the help of these games, so it’s hard to tell whether they’re getting distracted. It’s not the first time when promiment musicians have decided to criticise video music games. In June, Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page and the leader of The White Stripes Jack White have shared the same point of view.

German scientist Peter Jager had discovered a new type of spiders and decided to name it after the infamous British musician David Bowie. This cool news was spread out by The Daily Telegraph on September 7. This unique type of spiders, which is now called Heteropoda davidbowie was discovered by Jager in Malasya; special quality is in it’s deep yellow hair. So far there is no clear information if the “guy” is dangerous to human beings. The Daily Telegraph supposes that Jager named this spider after Bowie because a musician had popularised this sort of species in his songs. The whole deal is in the fact that spiders were mentioned in Bowie’s legendary album “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars”, which was released in 1972. Peter Jager said that by giving famous names to rare species, scientists are able to bring some attention to the problem of their extinction. Pretty good idea, especially if David Bowie will notice his old friends from Mars. So to speak, Bowie is not the first musician to ‘give out’ names to spiders; in 2008 American biologist Jason Bond has named another rare type of spiders Myrmekiaphila neilyoungi after Neil Young.

Musicians from The Rolling Stones have denied any rumours regarding their drummer Charlie Watts. The problem was based on some information that Charlie is planning to leave the band. However, recently Reuters said that the band’s official representative called all of these rumours to be “a fabricated story”. This strange rumour had appeared on September 2 with the help of the Australian website Undercover relating this news to some circles that surround the band. It was noted that a 68 years old musician just got tired from his work in the band (since 1968) and wished to leave it. Undercover was also underlining that “rollings” are planning to invite Charlie Drayton who is constantly recording together with Keith Richards. Previously, Mick Jagger and Richards kept on saying that without Watts the band cannot stay together no matter who may replace him. Possibly that without anyone of them the band may not stay together; their unchanging lineup is simply the one and only solid lineup. As Rirchards had told the press, in 2010 The Rolling Stones are planning to record a new album, which is going to be produced by Jack White (The White Stripes, The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather). It’s already known that Richards had already recorded something new with him.

American scientists have noted that monkeys are practically not accepting/perceiving human musical sounds. The only song which was able to create some sort of a reaction in them was Metallica’s “Of Wolf And Man”. Scientific article about this strange effect had appeared in the Current Biology magazine, and it’s short version may be seen on the Madison University’s website. Within the frames of this study scientists were learning about the behaviour of monkeys called Cottontop Tamarin (Saguinus oedipus). Scientists were making videos of fourteen different monkeys during five minutes, later they’ve played music for thirty seconds and compared their behaviour. This project had included a professional violencellist David Teie who had chosen various music tracks that may influence monkeys. Among played tracks are “Grudge” by Tool, “Fragile” by Nine Inch Nails, and “Adagio for Strings” by Michael Barber. Also, Teie had produced some music of his own, which presumably had to influence monkeys – or monkey music. Eventually, those tracks which were ‘happy’ made them behave in the calm way, ‘sad’ or ‘noisy’ music made them look more disturbed. On the other hand human music did not influence them at all except Metallica. While listening to the “Of Wolf and Man” monkeys look calm and happy, so Metallica with it’s lound music made a huge and positive effect on these creatures.

The White Stripes video “Fell in Love With a Girl” made by Michel Gondry had taken the first spot within the best videos chart, which includes all sorts of videos created since the year 2000, said Pitchfork. Their video was set up in the unique lego style (or brickfilm); everything what was shown in the video was designed with the help of Lego toy building bricks. “Fell in Love With a Girl” was released as a single from the album “White Blood Cells” in 2002. The White Stripes is in many ways the unique band, hence it constantly trying to reinvent something what had already existed before, but makes it look new and cool. Such lego styled video could be made up way back in the 80’s, or early 90’s. However, it still looks original. Totally, Pitchfork had chosen 50 videos, which now may be seen on their official website. Here is the best ten of those: 1. The White Stripes – “Fell in Love With a Girl”, 2. R. Kelly – “Trapped in the Closet”, 3. Weezer – “Pork and Beans”, 4. The Avalanches – “Since I Left You”, 5. Feist – “12345”, 6. Pulp – “Bad Cover Version”, 7. Bat for Lashes – “What’s a Girl to Do”, 8. Justice – “D.A.N.C.E.”, 9. “Fatboy Slim” -“Weapon of Choice”, 10. OK Go – “Here It Goes Again”.

American ska-punk group Sublime had announced the fact that they’re planning to reunite in the near future. As the Billboard said, their first concert in thirteen years is about to be given within the frames of the Smokeout festival, which is going to take place in California’s San Bernardino on 23–24 of October this year. Besides bassist Eric Wilson and drummer Bud Gough the band will now include vocalist and guitarist Rome, who will therefore replace Brad Nowell. At the same time there is no clear information on whether they will start recording something new or not; hopefully they will do it because for thirteen years there is nothing, so let’s wish them some good luck. Sublime was formed in 1986 and during it’s career had released only three studio albums, which sold seventeen million copies worldwide. The biggest popularity belongs to their third one called “Sublime” (1996) that reached number 14 on the American hits chart. In May 1996 Nowell had died over the drugs overdose, and the band fell apart. Why they did not want to reunite for so long is not known, maybe they just thought that nobody is able to replace Nowell. For a certain period of time Wilson and Gough used to participate in the Long Beach Dub All Stars project.