Bjork, Radiohead, Garth and more According to w.a.s.t.e, Radiohead's fanclub, Thom Yorke et al. have the gears in motion for work on their new album. After a lengthy break on the heels of a year's worth of touring, Radiohead plan on entering the studio in early 1998. But first, the group is preparing their first European gig this year, which will be in support of Amnesty International's 50th Anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. The concert, the biggest human rights benefit of its kind in the past decade, is scheduled for Dec. 10 at Bercy Stadium in France. Other acts on the line-up include Asian Dub Foundation, Alanis Morissette, Peter Gabriel, Tracy Chapman and Yossou N'Dour ... If you just can't wait for Nov. 17 to hear Garth Brooks's double live album, um, Garth Brooks: Double Live, you can sneak a listen if you're willing to take a short seven-mile trip -- up, that is. United Airlines has signed a pact with Capitol Nashville for the rights to preview eight tracks from the album on its in-flight programming from Nov. 1-16. And once you touch ground again, you can pre-order the album from United's website, though you won't receive it until the actual release date ... Two years after a rabid fan mailed Bjork a mailbomb (defused after said psycho shot himself in the head), a new stalker has reportedly visited the Icelandic home of the singer's mother. On Oct. 24, Bjork told Swedish newspaper Expressen that the unnamed Spanish fan not only left menacing messages for Bjork in her mother's house, but also slept in her bed and ate her food before departing. "This is worse than the mailbomb," Bjork told Expressen. "That the people I love are subjected to threats because of me is horrible!" Although she has reportedly been working on new material in London, the singer has commented that she may never again release new music because her celebrity status is putting her loved ones, including her son, in harm's way ... After severing ties with their label, Alternative Tentacles, on Sept. 30, Dead Kennedys East Bay Ray, Klaus Flouride and D.H. Peligro have officially filed a seven-count suit against former bandmate Jello Biafra. Seems that even though the then-united group formed their label back in 1978 "as an alternative to the greedy tentacles of the large corporate labels," according to guitarist Ray, Biafra has sold out to the money-hungry tendencies of the heavies. The band contends that Biafra squandered royalties and cut the rest of the band out of Dead Kennedy earnings dating back to 1986 when Biafra legally acquired the label. No comment was available from Biafra at press time, but we'll keep you posted ... Chumbawamba have been chugging along for a decade now, but the anarchist octet was actually a Best New Artist nominee at this year's MTV Video Music Awards. So, to prove MTV has its head up its ass -- and that the group wasn't merely throwing Molotov cocktails for all those years -- they'll be releasing Uneasy Listening, a collection of pre-Tubthumper tracks from their first nine albums, plus live tracks and B-sides. Songs will include "Mouthful of S---," "Morality Play in Three Acts," "Big Mouth Strikes Again," "Give the Anarchist a Cigarette" and "We Don't Go to God's House Anymore." The collection will hit stores some time in late November or early December . . . Matthew Sweet will return to his Ming Tea roots when he provides the trailer music, "Psychedelic Scene Breaks," for the forthcoming Austin Powers: The Man Who Shagged Me, due in theaters next year. The trailer will begin airing this holiday season. It's not yet known if Sweet, who cameoed in the original Austin Powers film as the bassist for the fictional Ming Tea will get saucy again in the sequel . . . Playing Marilyn Monroe to his John F. Kennedy, former Spice Girl Geri Halliwell made her solo debut Wednesday night when she pursed her lips and sang a special rendition of "Happy Birthday" to Prince Charles at London's Lyceum Theater. Now, if the once Ginger Spice wanted to complete the nostalgic recreation, the two would have been knocking boots by the time Big Ben struck midnight . . . Kiss in the Nineties can get away with sounding like classic Seventies' Kiss, but when they start sounding like classic Seventies' Alice Cooper, you better believe the lawyers start putting on their own war makeup. According to Billboard Online, Six Palms Music Corp., publisher (as Bizarre Music) of Cooper's "I'm Eighteen," has filed a complaint against Paul Stanley and former Kiss member Bruce Kulick for copyright infringement. Apparently the Stanley/Kulick penned "Dreamin'," from the new Kiss album Psycho-Circus, bears what Six Palms feels to be an inexcusable likeness to the lurching Cooper classic. As of Thursday afternoon, however, Cooper's manager Toby Mamis claimed that the shock rocker had yet to hear the Kiss track himself, but planned on picking up a copy of the album to see what all the fuss was about. By the time his new album, It's a Beautiful Thing, hits stores in December, rapper Keith Murray will likely have a very different worldview -- one from behind bars. The artist turned himself in Monday to begin serving a three-year prison term for assaulting a teenage fan with a barstool in 1995. Murray had been on the lam since Sept. 24, when he failed to appear at New Britain, Conn.'s Superior Court to commence his sentence. That delay could end up costing Murray, as it amounts to a felony charge carrying a $5,000 fine and/or up to five years incarceration How do you get Isaac Hayes, Next, Montell Jordan, country star Steve Wariner and a pack of NFL stars huddled together in one room? Simple: throw a New York press conference celebrating their new theme song for the United Way, "We're All In This Together." The Wariner-penned track, which also features Faith Hill, Foxy Brown, Randy Travis and a host of others, appears on both NFL Jams and NFL Country, and will be used in a series of United Way public service announcements scheduled to air during the rest of the NFL season. The commercials will feature footage of the song's recording as well as NFL players performing various good Samaritan duties. Ten months on the road would turn anyone into a couch potato, so it's little surprise that when road warriors Portishead got home from supporting their self-titled sophomore release they promptly logged onto their computers. On Monday, keyboardist Geoff Barrow and guitarist Adrian Utley chatted with cyber-journalists about their upcoming live album, PNYC, which will be released Nov. 3 in the States. Among the revelations: No gigs planned, no studio album planned, no hint of new directions, no idea what they're going to do with their free time and no fave albums of '98. We did learn that Adrian's got Radiohead in his disc player and that Geoff's spinning Nirvana. At least we didn't pay for an overseas call... Speaking of Radiohead, if you're as tired as we are of cookie-cutter music videos (choreographed rows of scantily clad dancers, preening rockers and divas, lightning edits and the like), hold onto your remote for "Rabbit In Your Headlights," the Jonathan Glaser-directed clip for Thom Yorke's contribution to the U.N.K.L.E. compilation. This pint-size slice of cinema makes Glaser's video for "Karma Police" seem as comforting as a Hallmark card. Had the roof of Manhattan's Roseland Ballroom caved in Sunday night, there'd be some serious shoes to fill on the Who's Who List of Media Mongers. Madonna, Puff Daddy and Lenny Kravitz waved royally from the VIP balcony at common people in attendance to see little miss Queen of Angst Alanis Morissette. Five hundred of the attendees won tickets from New York's Z-100; the remaining two thousand picked up free wristbands for entrance earlier that day. The rest of the world will have to wait for Nov. 2, when the performance will be aired as MTV Presents Alanis Morissette . . . Speaking of Kravitz, it took considerably longer than a haircut, but the retro-rocker's latest album, 5 (released May 13), has finally been certified gold by the RIAA. This is Kravitz's fifth album to break the half-million mark; his best-seller to date remains '93's multiplatinum Are You Gonna Go My Way. Apparently most of the people that did back then have since taken a detour . . . You know you're the Boss when your home state throws up a slavish "shrine" to you on their website. At New Jersey Online's brand new "Bruce Springsteen -- New Jersey Local Hero Website" (www.nj.com/springsteen), you'll find a wealth of N.J. newspaper clippings on Bruuuce, as well as photos, interactive tours of old Boss haunts like the Stone Pony, and something called the "Fantasy Concert Builder," in which you compile your dream setlist, pick a bootleg CD cover, and email it to all your Bruce buddies to compare and contrast. All this and a little human touch courtesy of Real Audio interviews with "Boss experts" like original E-Street drummer Vini Lopez . . . Tuesday saw the release of Welcome to the Videos, a thirteen song compilation of Guns n' Roses clips ranging from "Sweet Child of Mine" to "Since I Don't Have You." Axl Rose, meanwhile, continues to whittle away at the mythical new GNR album, sifting through upwards of three-hundred tapes of material . . . Is it just us, or does the Eels' "Last Stop: This Town" off their latest effort, Electro-shock Blues, sound eerily reminiscent of a certain painfully popular Hanson tune? The RSN staff (update
October 30, 1998) Bjork readies two home videos in between albums Bjork readies two home videos in between albums Fans of Bjork's operatic trip-hop have a wee wait ahead of them for the follow-up to last year's Homogenic album, but they need not fear starving for want of new pixie product. The Icelandic chanteuse has not one, but two video collections set for impending release. Later this fall, the former Sugarcube plans to deliver Volumen, a home video compilation featuring fourteen music videos, including "Hunter," "Big Time Sensuality," "Army of Me" and "Human Behavior." Also on deck is Live at Shepherd's Bush Empire. The live video was captured from a fan-club-only gig Bjork did in February '97 in London. The set included songs like "Anchor Song," "Crying," "I Miss You," "Headphones" and "Enjoy." Both videos could hit the shelves on the same day, although Bjork's camp was unable to confirm release dates for either video. Meanwhile, Bjork will play the part of a dancer in the Lars Von Trier film Dancer in the Dark, set to begin shooting next spring. She will also continue work on her still untitled new album, which will be released in the late spring or early summer of next year. ARI BENDERSKY { October 8, 1998 } |