Billy Morrison Week: Day 3 "Swandive"

The CD is out now digitally on iTunes and limited edition hard copy CD is available exclusively from - www.billymorrison.net

Sambora Plea Deal

TMZ reports: TMZ has learned Richie Sambora just plea bargained his DUI case. He pled no contest to driving with a blood alcohol level of .08 or higher. The driving under the influence charge was dismissed. And, prosecutors did NOT file child endangerment charges.

Sambora was popped for DUI last month. His 10-year-old daughter Ava was in the car at the time. We're told Sambora had a .13 blood alcohol level. Although the brass at the Laguna Beach Police Dept. recommended that prosecutors file child endangerment charges, we're told the rank and file cops felt the evidence didn't support the charge. Prosecutors agreed.

Sambora will pay a $390 file plus penalties -- total damage is around $1,600. He'll be placed on three years informal probation and must attend an alcohol education course. - more on this story

AC/DC Finish CD

Blabbermouth reports: AC/DC has finished recording its new album and is currently mixing the effort for a late 2008 release, the group's vocalist Brian Johnson revealed this morning (Tuesday, April 22) during an interview with Washigton D.C.'s DC 101 radio station.

Johnson has apparently left the studio in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada where AC/DC guitarists Angus and Malcolm Young have remained with producers Mike Fraser and Brendan O'Brien in order to complete work on the CD.

Brian also stated that the band will next work on getting the artwork done and take care of the promotional activities in connection with the release, to be followed by a tour. - more on this story

Yoko Fighting Rare Lennon Footage

Reuters reports: Footage of John Lennon smoking pot, writing songs and discussing putting the hallucinogenic drug LSD in President Richard Nixon's tea is the focus of a court case starting in Boston next week over whether the video should be made public.

The case pits Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, against Lawrence, Massachusetts-based World Wide Video, which claims ownership of nine hours of raw footage of the former Beatle and Ono that was filmed just weeks before the "Fab Four" broke up in 1970.

World Wide, a New England consortium of Beatles collectors, wants to release the black-and-white footage as a two-hour film titled "3 days in the life" about Lennon during a pivotal and turbulent time for the most celebrated band of the 1960s. - more on this story

Al Wilson RIP

AP reports: Al Wilson, the soul singer and songwriter who had a number of 1970s hits including "Show and Tell," has died. He was 68.

Wilson died Monday of kidney failure at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Fontana, according to his son, Tony Wilson of Yucaipa.

"He was always singing," his son said. "He would call me in the middle of the night with a new song that he had written." - more on this story

Just How Bad Is The Scarlett Johansson CD? Hear For Yourself

antiMusic reports: Actresses are getting record deals while real musicians can't get arrested by the major labels. And they want to blame their drop in sales on downloaders. The following is the case in point. We received the following PR today with a link to a listening party: Scarlett Johansson will release her debut album, Anywhere I Lay My Head, on Atco Records, an imprint of Warner Music Group's Rhino Entertainment, on May 20.

The inspired album features 10 Tom Waits songs and includes one original track. Collaborating with TV on the Radio producer David Sitek, Johansson is also joined by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zimmer, Sean Antanaitis from Celebration, as well as others.

You can preview the following six songs to see if you think Scarlett can sing or if she's another Paris Lohan (or worse!): 1. Fawn 2. Town with No Cheer 3. Falling Down 4. Anywhere I Lay My Head 5. Fannin Street 6. Song for Jo. Gave it a listen but all I heard was organ music for three and half minutes followed by her talking with a bunch of echo on her voice (which was really buried in the mix). Two minutes of that and couldn't take any more. Didn't sound inspired at all, actually sounded pretty mundane but if you have more patience, - grab a listen here and decide from yourself.

Metallica Now Love The Internet

BW&BK reports: Rolling Stone caught up with Metallica at their Record Store Day signing event in northern California late last week. Drummer Lars Ulrich chatted about recording with Rick Rubin, bonding with his kids over Guitar Hero and learning to love the Web.

Rolling Stone: How would you feel on the day the last record store in America closed? * Ulrich: "I'd do my best to try and be there playing 'Fade To Black' as the last song, but I don't think it'll come to that. iTunes? I'm there as much as everyone else, I'm not against that. If you look at vinyl, fifteen years ago CDs came out and yet it continues to make more of a comeback. I don't think you'll be able to kill the record store, at least not in major cities. I'm worried about the smaller cities. I'm against these soulless megastores."

Rolling Stone: And as far as the next record goes ... * Ulrich: "You know, this is our last record under contract with Warner, so we're looking at how we can embrace everything."

Rolling Stone: Like a 360 deal with Live Nation? ** Ulrich: "Mmm, we've never sold ourselves that way. No disrespect. We want to be as free a players as possible. We've been observing RADIOHEAD and TRENT REZNOR and in twenty-seven years or however long it takes for the next record, we'll be looking forward to everything in terms of possibilities with the internet." - more on this story

Shinedown Return with CD and Tour

PR reports: Shinedown has announced early details of their much-anticipated third album, entitled "THE SOUND OF MADNESS." The collection -- produced by multiple Grammy Award-winner Rob Cavallo (Kid Rock, Green Day, My Chemical Romance) will arrive in stores and at online retailers on June 24th.

"THE SOUND OF MADNESS" will be heralded by the lead single, "Devour." The track will land online and at multi-format rock radio outlets nationwide on May 5th. In addition, "Devour" will serve as the theme song to World Wrestling Entertainment's June pay-per-view event, Night of Champions, slated for June 29th. The single will also be featured on ESPN throughout the current major league baseball season, and will be included on the soundtrack to EA Sports' "Madden NFL 09" video game.

The Jacksonville, Florida-based rock outfit has lined up a number of upcoming live dates, including headline shows and festival performances. - more on this story

Oberst Bright Eyes Solo Deal

Filter reports: Conor Oberst is saying goodbye to Saddle Creek and hello to Merge for his forthcoming solo record marking the first from the Bright Eyes frontman in over a decade.

The self-produced, eponymous LP was recorded earlier this year in Mexico with help from the Mystic Valley Band and longtime collaborator Andy LeMaster.

Oberst and friends will be playing a couple European festivals, as well as, ACL this Fall. - more on this story

Quicks: Play Games With Underoath- Newton Faulkner Adds Dates- Filter Venue Change

antiMusic reports: During short breaks from recording the as-yet-untitled album through mid-May UNDEROATH are going online to play "Halo 3" or "Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare" with fans. The band is online Thursdays from 6:00pm-8:00pm ET/3:00pm-5:00pm PT for their "Game with Fame" session

Newton Faulkner's debut album, Hand Built By Robots, is in stores this week. Newton just expanded his current U.S. tour with new dates have been added in Denver, Los Angeles and San Francisco. check newtonfaulknermusic.com for all the dates.

Just received word there's been a venue change for the kick off of the Filter Tour. The show will now be at EMO's in Austin on Thursday. This is their first tour in nearly six years and it's in support of their new CD "Anthems For The Damned" which hits stores on May 13. - Grab the latest dates here

Coachella Set Times

Filter reports: For everyone who is packing their sun-tan lotion, short shorts and bottles of water in preparation for Coachella this weekend, the festival has just released the full list of set times for each day of the festival:

[here are the mainstage times, see full story link for the side stages]

Friday, April 25
Coachella Stage:
Rogue Wave, 1:30-2:15 p.m.
John Butler Trio, 2:30-3:20 p.m.
Slightly Stoopid, 3:45-4:35 p.m.
The Breeders, 5-5:50 p.m.
Tegan and Sara, 6:15-7:05 p.m.
The Raconteurs, 7:30-8:30 p.m.
The Verve, 9-10 p.m.
Jack Johnson, 10:45-midnight

Saturday, April 26
Coachella Stage
VHS or Beta, 1:35-2:20 p.m.
Minus the Bear, 2:45-3:35 p.m.
Cold War Kids, 4-4:50 p.m.
Cafe Tacuba, 5:15-6:05 p.m.
Death Cab for Cutie, 6:30-7:20 p.m.
Kraftwerk, 7:50-8:50 p.m.
Portishead, 9:15-10:15 p.m.
Prince, 10:45 p.m.

Sunday, April 27
Coachella Stage
Austin TV, 1-1:45 p.m.
The Cool Kids, 2-2:40 p.m.
Shout Out Louds, 3-3:50 p.m.
Stars, 4:15-5:05 p.m.
Gogol Bordello, 5:30-6:20 p.m.
My Morning Jacket, 7-8 p.m.
Roger Waters, 8:30-11 p.m.
- side stage times

All Reunite

punknews.org reports: Riot Fest has just confirmed that legendary punk band ALL will be reuniting for Riot Fest 2008, Oct. 10-12 in Chicago, Illinois. The band will be reuniting with the Allroy's Revenge., Allroy Saves, Percolater and Trailblazer lineup which includes Scott Reynolds (vocals), Bill Stevenson (drums), Karl Alvarez (guitar) and Stephen Egerton (bass). This ALL lineup has not performed together in 20 years.

Frontman Scott Reynolds commented: Stephen is going to jump a motorcycle over 10 flaming school buses, then save all the children inside them before they burn up! Bill is going to levitate, then disappear, then reappear on Karl's shoulders who will be riding a unicycle on a tightrope made from dental floss suspended 100 ft. above the stage.

And I'm going to give one lucky audience member a makeover that will take 10 years off his/her appearance! So we better start practicing!! Everybody should come because it's going to rock sooo hard - more on this story

My Bloody Curators

Billboard reports: The reunited My Bloody Valentine will headline and curate a new upstate New York branch of the All Tomorrow's Parties festival on Sept. 19-21. According to the Daily Swarm, MBV will also perform in six to eight additional U.S. cities.

The ATP event will be held at Kutshers Country Club in Monticello, N.Y., about 100 miles away from Manhattan. The stellar lineup will feature four acts performing classic albums in their entirety:

Built To Spill ("Perfect From Now On"), Tortoise ("Millions Now Living Will Never Die"), the Meat Puppets ("Meat Puppets II") and Thurston Moore ("Psychic Hearts"). - more on this story

New Order DVD

Gigwise reports: New Order are to release a DVD of footage from their two night residency at the Glasgow Carling Academy in 2006.

'New Order: Live In Glasgow' features performances of classic New Order hits including, 'Crystal' and 'Blue Monday'.

The DVD, which is released on June 2nd, will also feature four Joy Division songs. - more on this story

Aaron Lewis Plots Solo CD

Blabbermouth reports: According to Billboard.com, STAIND frontman Aaron Lewis is making plans to record a solo album in the near future.

"As soon as this (new STAIND) record is done and while we're out on tour I'll be writing and getting everything ready to go," Lewis tells Billboard.com. "It'll probably come out right on the tail end of this new STAIND record."

Lewis says that at the moment he's planning to produce and play most of the instruments on the album himself but notes that, "We'll see how far I get with that adventure." - Wonder if he'll call it something along the lines of "Poor Me"? Click here for more metal news than you can bang your head to.

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