Hot Music Beat

After only including releases from the previous 18 months to calculate the best selling albums on the Billboard chart, Billboard will now be incorporating catalog releases due to the massive sales of both Michael Jackson and The Beatles. The sales chart on November 25 will be the first tally of the comprehensive chart. In digital music news, 4 artists have already broken Rihanna’s track sales record of 9.9 million digital songs in 2008, including the late King of Pop, Lady Gaga, the Black Eyed Peas and Taylor Swift. The biggest news is probably that the country singer is the only artist that outsold Michael’s album this year in sales. Congratulations!

The craze over ‘Glee’ doesn’t seem to be dying down anytime soon. Billboard has revealed some very interesting stuff regarding the musical TV show. There are reports that the cast members of the show could potentially get their own record deals with Columbia. The cast is also going to be recording a special version of Wham’s ‘Last Christmas’ to be released as a single next month but it won’t be used for the show. There’s also talk for an episode of all original songs as songwriters have been contacting the show’s creator to feature their songs. One of those writers is Diane Warren, who will be writing two ballads for the show. Wow!

Pop-rockers Honor Society debuted at #18 on the Billboard Top 200 this week, moving over 22,000 units of their debut album, Fashionably Late. The band kicked off their second headlining tour on Monday, September 21 in Minneapolis, MN and will continue a run of nearly 40 dates with shows across the United States and Canada including an appearance on The Today Show on Friday, September 25.

The release of Fashionably Late caps off a busy summer for Honor Society as they joined the Jonas Brothers on their World Tour 2009 performing to nearly 1 million fans throughout North America. Honor Society simultaneously headlined their own club tour called The Full Moon Crazy Tour where they brought their high-energy live shows to sold out venues including the Blender Theater in New York City and over 1,500 fans at Club Nokia in Los Angeles.

See below for what the press is saying about Honor Society and Fashionably Late and visit HonorSocietyMusic.com for more info and a full list of tour dates.

Rolling Stone

“Over You” (3 stars) — delivers “shiny heartbreak that splits the difference between *NSYNC and Maroon 5 – all riffing synths… and tunefulness.”

Entertainment Weekly

Honor Society are “crafty pop rock dudes” with songs that “shimmer with freeze-dried funk licks…”

People Magazine

“…fans will likely swoon over …” whose “strongest tracks include the power ballads ‘Where Are You Now’ and ‘Goodnight My Love’ both showcasing Bruno’s emotive tenor. ‘My Own Way’ is an infectious pop-rocker.”

Dallas Morning News

Honor Society are “purveyors of that frenetic catchy-crunchy pop sound of the day…”

“CHECK MY BRAIN” VIDEO PREMIERES ON MTV2′S “UNLEASHED” – PLAYING EVERY HOUR ON THE HOUR

BAND ANNOUNCES EUROPEAN TOUR DATES

Hailed by Spin as “one of the catchiest songs of Alice In Chains’ history,” lead single “Check My Brain” has blanketed rock and alternative radio and rocketed straight to No. 1 on Billboard’s Rock Songs Chart and No. 1 on the R&R Rock Chart.

The riff-driven track appears on the band’s highly anticipated new album, Black Gives Way To Blue (Virgin/EMI), available September 29th. Playboy gave the disc four stars, calling it “Alice In Chains’ Back In Black,” Revolver praised the record for its “dense tapestry of heavy guitars and soaring melodies” and Reuters wrote “the heavy guitars, submerged vocals and thunderous rhythm section assures fans that the band has lost none of its menace.”

The “Check My Brain” video premiered yesterday on MTV2’s “Unleashed,” airing every hour on the hour. It also debuted on MTVu, as well as on MTVMusic.com, MTV2.com and MTVu.com. The clip was directed by Alex Courtes, whose credits include U2’s “Vertigo,” Wolfmother’s “Woman” and the White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army.”

The band (guitarist/vocalist Jerry Cantrell, guitarist/vocalist William DuVall, drummer Sean Kinney, bassist Mike Inez) has been previewing songs from the album during their current sold-out buzz tour, which wraps September 30th at the Avalon in Los Angeles. Alice In Chains will celebrate the release of Black Gives Way To Blue with a special two-night performance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” on September 29th and 30th. Next up is a headlining tour of Europe, set to kick off November 12th in Glasgow.

Tour dates are as follows:

Sept. 15 Toronto, ON The Opera House – SOLD OUT

Sept. 16 Cleveland, OH House of Blues – SOLD OUT

Sept. 17 Detroit, MI St. Andrew’s Hall – SOLD OUT

Sept. 19 Chicago, IL House of Blues – SOLD OUT

Sept. 20 Milwaukee, WI The Rave – SOLD OUT

Sept. 21 Minneapolis, MN First Ave – SOLD OUT

Sept. 24 Seattle, WA Moore Theater – SOLD OUT

Sept. 26 Portland, OR Roseland Grill – SOLD OUT

Sept. 28 San Francisco, CA The Fillmore – SOLD OUT

Sept. 30 Los Angeles, CA The Avalon – SOLD OUT

Nov. 12 Glasgow, Scotland Barrowland

Nov. 13 Birmingham, UK Birmingham Academy

Nov. 14 Manchester, UK Manchester Academy

Nov. 16 London, UK The Forum

Nov. 17 London, UK The Forum

Nov. 19 Tilburg, Holland 013

Nov. 20 Antwerp, Belgium Trix Zaal

Nov. 21 Weisbaden, Germany Schlachthof

Nov. 23 Dortmund, Germany FZW

Nov. 24 Prague, Czech Rep. Lucerna

Nov. 25 Warsaw, Poland Stodola

Nov. 27 Budapest, Hungary Petofi Csarnok

Nov. 29 Vienna, Austria Gasometer

Nov. 30 Munich, Germany Thearterfabrick

Dec. 2 Milan, Italy Alcatraz

Dec. 3 Fribourg, Switzerland Fri-Son

Dec. 4 Paris, France Bataclan

CHECK MY BRAIN VIDEO:

Jason Mraz just carved himself into the foundations of history as his song ‘I’m Yours’ is now the longest0running song on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in its 51-year history. The singer has officially beaten the likes of LeAnn Rimes and Carrie Underwood. The song is also the only track to reach number 1 on each of the following four radio-based charts, namely Mainstream Top 40/Pop Songs, Adult Contemporary, Adult Top 40 and Triple A. And it still doesn’t seem like his song will be going anywhere soon and Jason still has the chance to edge out a lead that might prove to be unbeatable. Congratulations!

Lady Gaga is making a big solid mark in music history as the singer is officially the third artist in history to have three number 1 songs from a debut album on the Billboard Mainstream Top 40. The only other artists to have accomplished this feat have been Ace of Base and Avril Lavigne. I think it would be great if Lady Gaga could surpass those artists and get four number 1 songs on the chart. And with her career going mighty nicely, I don’t think that’s a feat that’s too far off from getting achieved. I hope she does it.

After Michael Jackson’s sudden death last week, his greatest hits and even some of his lesser known songs have earned nonstop radio airplay to honor his memory. According to Billboard, the late King of Pop’s airplay increased by 1735% from last week. Prior to his death, the singer’s hit ‘Rock with You’ was heard around 500 times in a week. But in the past week, 22 of Michael’s song were played over 1000 times! Leading in the airplay is ‘Billie Jean’ which places the track at number 51 among the titles for the past week. That’s not bad for a song that was released back in 1983.

The Jonas Brothers know how to keep their fans happy and the fans know how to return the favor. For the second time in less than a year, the trio of singing brothers debuted at #1 last week’s Billboard albums chart with their latest release ‘Lines, Vines and Trying Times’. The guys from New Jersey sold over 247,000 copies of the record this week and they are on point to keep this good thing going for a few weeks more. It looks like their fame isn’t fading after all. Congratulations for scoring another top spot! With a tour going on, they’re sure to stay there.

The right wingers at the Parents Television Council are fussing about Britney Spears’ song ‘If U Seek
Amy’, which, as you know, spells out some dirty words when said quickly aloud. The PTC is warning radio stations to quit giving the song airplay as it “violates the broadcast indecency law” if played between 6AM and 10PM. PTC president Tim Winter said “There is no misinterpreting the lyrics to this song, and it’s certainly not about a girl named Amy.” However, the song has already hit the airwaves and is at the number 92 spot on the Billboard Pop 100 with a cleaner version that replaces the word ‘seek’ with ‘see’.