The Strokes played SNL. Videos below...

Continue reading "The Strokes played Saturday Night Live (videos)"

From: Bob Lefsetz
To: Nathan Hubbard

Is this true? That buyers of DMB and Phish tickets at livenation.com were redirected to coasttocoast.com?

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From: Nathan Hubbard

Sorry, been traveling.

No it's not to my knowledge. Have not had fan complaints about this and we monitor issues in the email and call center hourly. We DID find out that a couple of these broker sites including gotthetix.com were using the Live Nation name in their Google ads and displaying the ads when someone searched "Live Nation." This happened in late June. We filed a trademark complaint with Google soon after. But no redirect from the buy button.

We do of course know that many brokers get their tickets using bots that vault them to the front of the line. It sucks for us (we have to build a costly infrastructure that can essentially handle an attack), and more importantly it sucks for the fan (lack of available inventory). We continue to work on technologies that thwart these efforts, and dynamic pricing to address the underlying economic reasons why the secondary market exists.

Thanks for highlighting the great stuff NIN does via Musictoday (part of Live Nation Ticketing). These really are the two options to address the issue; restrict transferability and ask the fan to jump through a few hoops to prove their identity, or price the tickets at what the market is willing to pay. They aren't mutually exclusive

"A week after Miley Cyrus shared with the world her plans to 'ruin' Radiohead after they snubbed the young starlet at the Grammy Awards, the band has responded to the singer's threat... The band wasn't amused by her story. 'When Miley grows up, she'll learn not to have such a sense of entitlement,' the band told the new issue of Us Weekly in a statement." [MTV]

"Dozens of investors who came to federal court in New York to hear Bernard Madoff's admission that he ran a $65 billion Ponzi scheme in which he lied and stole for decades applauded his jailing." [Bloomberg]

"Yet Miley is not the only star that has a beef with the band. Kanye West is another temperamental superstar who was also snubbed by the band. West told audiences at his VH1 Storytellers taping that he too was dissed by the band at the Grammy Awards" [andPOP]

"wish us all a safe journey if you still like us and you're not one of those people i have managed to offend by doing nothing xx" [Thom Yorke]

"We are working on new material" [Ed O'Brien]

"U2 celebrated the number one debut of its new album 'No Line on the Horizon' with an intimate gathering for a few friends Wednesday night." [Boston Globe]

"It's not U2, but 'The Tonight Show With Jay Leno' will get its own multiple dose of pop royalty this month. Prince will perform on three consecutive nights on the NBC program as he girds for the release of a pair of new albums. The mini-residency will run March 25-27; he also plans to hit the 'Tonight' stage May 28 for Leno's next-to-last night as host of the venerable talk show." [Reuters]

"Five new shows have been added to Michael Jackson's London run, bringing the total to 50, according to Randy Phillips, CEO of AEG Live, promoter of the shows." [Billboard]

"Hundreds of fans have queued through the night to buy the first tickets to Michael Jackson's 'final curtain call' of concerts in London." [CNN]

Continue reading "Radiohead, Miley Cyrus, U2, Prince, Leno & Michael Jackson"

AC/DC @ The Izod Center (more by Ryan Muir)

If anyone had any doubt that touring is where the money is in the music business, a quick look at the top Moneymakers for 2008 should hammer the point home.

Regardless of genre, retail sales or radio play, each of the 20 acts on Billboard's Moneymakers list toured in 2008. (Taylor Swift mostly opened for Brad Paisley but doesn't get credit for that revenue). For almost all of them, touring generated the most revenue. And in a year when recorded-music sales declined yet again, many earned more at the box office than ever before. [Billboard]

Continue reading "the list of musicians who made the most money in 2008"

I just saw the animated Disney movie Bolt. Like the critics said, it was really great, and not just because it's completely in 3-D.

I won't post any spoilers, but the film is about a dog named Bolt (John Travolta) and his human Penny (Miley Cyrus). In additon to the score, there are basically two full songs in the movie. One is actually sung by John and Miley. That comes at the end. The other, by Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis, is during a (what I think was a) major scene of the movie. It completely surprised me. I wasn't 100% sure it was her, but the credits confirmed it, and then the credits confirmed that the child actress is also assistant director which had me leaving the movie thinking she had that job, though IMDB points out that she is the voice of a character called "assistant director" (which makes more sense I think).

The Jenny and Miley songs are both on the soundtrack which is otherwise all John Powell's score. Not on the soundtrack: Motorhead's "Dog Face Boy" which has a quick cameo in the movie (no spoilers). The Jenny Lewis (new) and Motorhead (old) songs, and another video that ties them together nicely, below...

Continue reading "Jenny Lewis barking at the moon in Bolt, Motorhead too"

Feist @ Hammerstein Ballroom, NYC (more by Bao Nguyen)

Continue reading "Feist & other Good Morning America show this summer"

Tom Araya of Slayer arrives w/ family @ The Grammys - Feb 10, 2008