Hot Music Beat

Coffee shop chain Starbucks Corp. said on Monday its new Hear Music record label will release a live album by singer-songwriter James Taylor this holiday season.

Taylor’s “One Man Band” will be the third album released by Hear Music, which was formed by Starbucks and Concord Music Group earlier this year. An album by folk singer Joni Mitchell will hit stores in September.

The label’s first release, Paul McCartney’s “Memory Almost Full,” had sold 496,000 copies in the United States as of August 5, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Sales at Starbucks stores account for 46 percent of those sales.

Starbucks’ influence as a music retail outlet has grown in recent years. Before forming its own record label, it posted a big success with the Ray Charles album, “Genius Loves Company,” which won eight Grammy awards.

Hear Music releases are available at U.S. Starbucks and traditional music retailers.

“One Man Band” will be an “intimate retrospective of 40 years worth of songs,” Taylor said in a statement, and will include live recordings of “Something in the Way,” “Carolina in my Mind,” and “Fire and Rain.”

Here’s the remix of “Tambourine”, the song from the upcoming album of rapper Eve, “Here I Am” due out on September 18th.

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Country star Billy Currington has penned a vicious new tune about his alcoholic step dad after realizing how his childhood was tainted by the bully in therapy. Hang in there Billy your wonderful, you can overcome this obstacle, you’re a wonderful talented singer and I’ll be praying for you! This is what happens when you have abusive parents who just do not know how to raise a child; you can hit them and scream at them when they are young. Once they grow someday they will vent their anger in no small terms and the relationship will die its natural death. On the contrary nothing can be changed about the past how much ever we’d like to forget about it they come back to haunt us. Currington, who duetted with Shania Twain on her hit Party For Two, tells he lived with Larry Currington for the first seven years of his life and suffered regular alcohol-fueled beatings.

Kanye is pulling a publicity stunt using the word bling, as if he invented it, to say he won’t use it any more. His album is coming out the same day as 50 cent, the guys using situations or each other to pick fights with to get attention. It’s call ‘beef” what beef he has with anyone else using the word bling as much as people of my race uses the “n” word publicly and privately. And this time he’s using something totally farce and off bases to get public attention. Wont work, I am not buying the comment or his album, or 50 at that rate. It seems to me these days that the African Americans are more racist towards whites than any other race. I am DEFINITELY NOT racist! But why is it okay for African Americans to say something like that about whites, but not vice versa??! Can you imagine a white singer saying something like that about an African American?? Hell NO! What KANYE WEST said is uncalled for. I love his music, but I definitely don’t like his racist remarks.

Here’s the live music video of R&B singer Kelly Rowland confirmed that her new single off “Ms. Kelly” will be “Ghetto”

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Courtney Love strips down to her birthday suit for the new issue of Harper’s Bazaar. The only thing that made the photos not x rated are strategically placed large pieces of jewelry.

The rock chick’s photo shoot was done in Paris on Coco Chanel’s couch. She was photographed by none other than Uncle Karl himself. The two have kissed and made up since earlier in this year when Courtney inadvertently wore a fake Chanel dress.

The interview that accompanies the spread is pretty hilarious. If anything, this could become a collector’s item for the sheer humor that went on.

And by the way, she is still hot!

A new 50 Cent video has recently leaked out on youtube. The song is titled “Follow My Lead” featuring Robin Thicke and is confirmed to be 50’s next single. Apparently, this wasn’t supposed to come out until October but someone in 50’s crew leaked it. His new album “Curtis” is due for release on September 11th.
Unfortunately this video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Universal Music Group.

Justin Timberlake should change his middle name to ‘collaboration’. He is the king of it, so it seems. He just added another artist to his collaboration notch and it’s not just some puny artist. It’s none other than country music royalty Reba McEntire.

Justin is one of the artists featured on Reba’s new album ‘Reba Duets’ which would be out on September 18th. The two crooners sing ‘The Only Promise That Remains’ together.

Other singers featured on the album include LeAnn Rimes, Kelly Clarkson, Rascal Flatts, Trisha Yearwood, Carol King, Kenny Chesney, Vince Gill, Faith Hill and Don Henley. What a list!

Here’s a remix of the latest single of rapper Fabolous titled “Make Me Better”.

This is one of those stories that is probably true but still sounds like it isn’t. On Monday night Britney Spears reportedly hit a station wagon that was parked in a Los Angeles parking lot while trying to park her Mercedes-Benz. Her new pet dog was sitting on her lap and she was not wearing her seatbelt. It’s reported that paparazzi cameras caught the whole thing, which means if it’s true it will end up on YouTube. Britney hit the same car again with her door when getting out to survey the damage. She looked at the cameramen and said, “It’s not that bad.” There is no word yet whether or not the owner of the parked car is seeking damages from Spears but I mean come on, of course they will. She clearly has a great neglect for other people and their property. As a mother she should be setting a better example whether or not her children are with her. The no seatbelt thing is a huge no-no. She should know better. Things really are not looking good for her.

R&B singer Ciara brought on stage 50 Cent for her performance of “Can’t Leave ‘Em Alone” in Houston
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Gwen Stefani’s solo successes have caused tension between her and her No Doubt bandmates, because nobody expected it to go on as long as it has. The Don’t Speak hitmakers have been on hiatus since 2003, although they recently announced plans to record a sixth studio album together. We all strive for a successful career, be it Paris Hilton seeking success in destroying herself which she has achieved according to me as well as Lindsay Lohan or be it the likes to Gwen who is tasting success in her solo career as well as fashion line that she is pursuing. She can now take time out to fulfill her commitments with the band and create another smashing No Doubt album; we surely will be waiting holding our breath for the next album. Success make others insecure and that is natural, once they start recording for the proposed album their will be ‘No Doubt’ among the members of the band about her commitment.

Singer Pete Doherty, the on-off boyfriend of supermodel Kate Moss, was told he faced a jail sentence next month if he failed to demonstrate he was trying to kick his drugs habit.

At a London court hearing, district Judge Davinder Lachlar told Doherty she was adjourning sentencing for a series of drugs offences until another hearing in four weeks’ time.

“What I have in mind is a community order or prison,” Lachlar said at West London Magistrates’ Court.

“If he does not show the motivation in four weeks’, it will be prison — it’s as simple as that.”

She told Doherty’s lawyer Sean Curran that a financial penalty was a “totally unrealistic suggestion.”

The Baby shambles singer, dressed in a black jacket and white shirt, told the judge he understood her instructions.

Lachlar had ordered Doherty, 28, to undergo detox treatment at a hearing last month.

On Tuesday, she gave credit to Doherty for attending rehab, but said it was “early days” as he had only been receiving treatment for about a week.

The court heard that Doherty, who fanned himself with his trademark trilby hat during the hearing, still showed signs of drugs in his system.

Lachlar granted Doherty bail until September 4.

Doherty pleaded guilty in July to possessing quantities of crack cocaine, heroin, cannabis and ketamine. He had also pleaded guilty to two driving offences.

Alert the masses and the media. Amy Winehouse actually showed up for a show. The ‘too drunk to perform most of the time’ Brit made her scheduled appearance at the Virgin Festival in Baltimore on Saturday. More likely than not, she will make it to Chicago for her Sunday appearance for Lollapalooza.

She may have arrived five minutes late which got the crowd restless but it was smooth sailing right after she stepped up to the mic. She sounded clear and seemed sober. And her hubby was on stage the whole time filming her.

A show that was well worth it just because she actually did something right.

Bruce Hornsby refuses to be counted among the pop stars trying on jazz for size.

“I can see why someone may want to make an album that goes down easy and why a record company would want to put it out because it’s a quick way to make a sale,” said Hornsby, who makes his all-instrumental jazz debut with “Camp Meeting,” due August 7 via Legacy.

“But my record is just the opposite. I have two of the most in-demand jazz artists, Christian McBride on bass and Jack DeJohnette on drums, playing with me, and we go into plenty of dissonant, stark, angular sonic places,” he said. “This is not casual jazz playing; it’s been something I’ve been wanting to do for years.”

The genesis of “Camp Meeting” stretches back to Hornsby’s jazz studies at the Berklee College of Music in Boston and the University of Miami. But after graduation he gravitated to the songwriter camp as a pianist/vocalist, even though his earliest pop hits, among them “The Way It Is” and “The Valley Road,” featured jazz-informed piano breaks. He has also worked through the years with such top-tier jazz artists as Pat Metheny, Branford Marsalis and Wayne Shorter.

After encounters in recent years with Metheny and DeJohnette, who each encouraged him to take the jazz plunge, Hornsby embraced the harmonic jazz language that he “hadn’t spoken for years,” he said. “I was no longer fluent. I knew I had to go into the woodshed.”

The refresher course paid off. Hornsby not only demonstrates his jazz prowess on “Camp Meeting,” but also conjures up that rare alchemy with his rhythm team as they contemporize tunes by Miles Davis, Keith Jarrett, Thelonious Monk (a reharmonized, rumba-flavored “Straight, No Chaser”) and Bud Powell (including a hip-hop-spiced take on “Celia”). There’s also a never-released Ornette Coleman track, “Questions and Answers,” that the iconoclastic saxophonist played for Hornsby years ago.

The CD was recorded in April 2006. Given their hectic schedules, the threesome’s next meeting was May 26 at the B.B. King club in New York, to perform a benefit show for the jazz-in-schools organization Jazz Reach.

Backstage at the show, DeJohnette said, “Bruce doesn’t lose himself. He approaches jazz with his own sensibility.” McBride was likewise impressed and joked, “But I worry about him. I hope he doesn’t get too good and make jazz his thing.”

Hornsby laughed when told of these remarks. “Rest assured,” he said, “I love writing songs and it’s great fun to sing.”

There’s still some red tape standing in the way of Madonna’s mother-of-three status.
Due to Malawi’s timeworn adoption laws and the lack of resources to oversee the case, officials are not much closer to signing off on the pop icon’s adoption of David Banda, who was 14 months old when the Material Girl took custody of him in October, than they were last year. I feel that the whole might get delayed but in the end she will have custody of the child and will be able to overcome all the current hiccups. Malawi’s Child Welfare Services, which is supposed to evaluate the family’s suitability, has already missed its first scheduled visit, in May, to the Ritchies’ London abode, citing various logistical problems. If there are too many delays then the officials in Malawi can sit there in their office and let the family enjoy time with the child.

Man, they must go through hell on stage with the fans. I mean, I love Tim McGraw – especially in tight blue jeans – but I dont’ want to grab his manhood or his jewelry. One of the things I love about him most is his marriage! Hopefully – fans like that won’t tarnish what he and Faith have. Maybe I’m blind too, but I just love them. Deplorable! I suppose they want more than singer and song for what they have to pay for front row tickets. Most of these people come to the concert empty handed and think that by the end of the day while getting back home they have to have some goodies in their pockets. Who else to steal from but that guy on stage, just act like he is your favorite singer and you are his biggest die hard fan, just get onto the stage and mob him and then rob him, for the rest who cares? Lets see if he can get back his prized possession and that ring too.

Rap’s critics have been complaining for years, only to watch the music become even more profane – and more popular. But now it seems as if Don Imus may be accomplishing what a generation of detractors could not. Four months after outrage over Imus’ sexist and racial comments led to intense scrutiny of rap’s negative imagery, and as the genre’s sales continue to plummet, some artists are publicly abandoning offensive language. This where I think that some Muslim country’s that ban use of foul language in the lyrics of music videos do the right thing when they ban stuff that’s obscene. If we allow the seeds to grow then one day we will be fighting to cut the bad crop we sowed.
Thank god that I am not a big fan of these guys and I do not have hear these guys scream all that shit into my ears every morning I leave for work. More so the drop in sales of the CD’s of these artist have been the most driving force for them to realize that we do not except them in this form. The platinum-seller Chamillionaire recently announced that his new album, ”Ultimate Victory,” would be cuss- and N-word free.

Michelle Branch and Jessica Harp, a.k.a. the Wreckers, will put their work as a country duo on hold later this year to pursue solo projects.

In 2004, Branch took a break from her successful solo career to team with friend and touring backup singer Harp to form the Wreckers. Prior to the Branch collaboration, Harp had been working as a singer/songwriter in Nashville. The duo debuted in autumn 2004, performing “Good Kind” on the WB teen drama “One Tree Hill.”

Their album, “Stand Still, Look Pretty,” (Warner Bros.) has sold more than 780,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The duo released three singles, the first of which, “Leave The Pieces,” spent two weeks at No. 1 on Hot Country Songs. They are touring with Keith Urban for the rest of the year.

Branch and Harp’s solo records will be released via Warner Bros., according to a spokesperson.

Harp told the Adrian, Mich., Daily Telegram it was too early to say whether more Wreckers albums were in store. Their next step would be to work on the individual projects, she said, but after that, they would fly by the seat of their pants.

“This whole project just sort of happened on a whim,” Harp told the paper, adding that she had already written some songs for her next album. “As soon as I possibly can, I’ll be getting into the studio,” she told the paper.

Gwen Stefani apparently isn’t everyone’s favorite girl in Malaysia. A Muslim students group that objects to the pop star’s sexy style and come-hither lyrics is pushing to have Stefani’s first-ever concert in Kuala Lumpur scrapped before the spotlights have a chance to shine. “Her video clips promoting the event are too obscene,” Mohamad Hilmi Ramli, president of the National Union of Malaysian Muslim Students has said. “We want the organizers to cancel the concert, failing which we will ask the authorities to intervene.” Well most Muslims are very strict about what they like and what they do not want to allow happening in their country, despite Malaysia being a rapidly developing economy and being a leading tourist destination in Asia, perhaps it’s not yet willing to open up so much to international performance by western artist. She is currently playing in Australia and will have to complete the Asian leg of tour without a performance in Kuala Lumpur.