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Flush with the news of the highest Billboard 200 debut of its short career, animated U.K. act Gorillaz has confirmed details for an innovative virtual U.S. tour. Unique performances will be streamed via the Web sites of radio stations across the country, beginning June 6 at KNDD Seattle’s www.1077theend.com.

Through June 21, the Demon Detour will “visit” the sites of 39 U.S. radio stations, and two national broadcasts, one via radio host Mancow’s syndicated show and the other via Sirius Satellite Radio’s Alt-Nation channel.

The activity comes in support of Gorillaz’ sophomore album, “Demon Days,” which debuts this week at No. 6 on The Billboard 200 after selling 107,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The mark is a career best for the act, which is a creation of “Tank Girl” creator Jamie Hewlett (aka Murdoc) and Blur principal Damon Albarn (aka 2D), who co-produced the set with Danger Mouse.

“It’s not enough that we’ve just recorded and released the defining album of the century, now we’ve gotta go tell the world about it,” Murdoc says in a statement. “We’re gonna play some live songs, maybe talk a little about the album, crack some jokes.”

Last week Hewlett and Danger Mouse were found actively supporting the set with promotional appearances in New York, Boston and Atlanta. In the Big Apple, they answered questions for a lunchtime crowd at the Union Square Virgin Megastore. Later the same day, Hewlett signed copies of the limited-edition Gorillaz action figures he designed for Kid Robot.

The Demon Detour will be the most extensive U.S. “visit” by the group, which is rounded out by characters Noodle and Russel. In support of the band’s 2001 self-titled set, the real-life counterparts of band members played shows behind a screen, onto which were projected images of their virtual selves.

“You know, doing a tour like this is a little like running for office, campaigning for the listener’s vote. Although in this case I think it’s a little er… like bringing the mountain to Mohammed,” Murdoc says of the radio station trek. “I mean, we’ve just released a CD with 15 f***ing good reasons to vote Gorillaz, so if that ain’t enough you’re probably not the type of fan we should be after anyway.”

Here are the Demon Detour dates:

June 6: KNDD Seattle
June 7: Sirius Satellite Alt Nation (Channel 21)
June 7: KCNL San Jose
June 7: KNRK Portland, Ore.
June 7: KMBY Monterey, Calif.
June 7: KCXX Riverside, Calif.
June 8: KITS San Francisco
June 8: XTRA San Diego
June 8: KJEE Santa Barbara, Calif.
June 9: KRZQ Reno, Nev.
June 9: KEDJ Phoenix
June 9: KMYZ Tulsa, Okla.
June 10: WSUN Tampa, Fla.
June 10: WOCL Orlando, Fla.
June 10: WPBZ West Palm Beach, Fla.
June 13: WNNX Atlanta
June 13: WEND Charlotte, N.C.
June 13: WDYL Richmond, Va.
June 13: WROX Norfolk, Va.
June 13: WHFS Baltimore
June 13: Y100.com Philadelphia
June 13: WHTG Monmouth, N.J.
June 14: WXRK New York
June 14: WBRU Providence, R.I.
June 14: WFNX Boston
June 14: WCYY Portland, Maine
June 15: WBTZ Burlington, Vt.
June 15: WEQX Albany, N.Y.
June 15: WZNE Rochester, N.Y.
June 16: WXDX Pittsburgh
June 16: CIMX Detroit
June 17: WGRD Grand Rapids, Mich.
June 17: WWCD Columbus, Ohio
June 18: WBUZ Nashville
June 18: KPNT St. Louis
June 18: KRBZ Kansas City, Kan.
June 19: WLUM Milwaukee
June 20: Mancow (syndicated)
June 21: WKQX Chicago
June 21: WMAD Madison, Wis.

Source billboard.com.

The Strokes are nearing the finish line on their as-yet-untitled third studio album, due in late January via RCA. The group has recorded 14 songs for consideration, three of which were co-produced by longtime collaborator Gordon Raphael, while the rest were produced by David Kahne (Paul McCartney, Fiction Plane). Andy Wallace (Nirvana, Rage Against The Machine) will handle mixing.

Source billboard.com.

Jeff Tweedy of Wilco will be playing a solo show at the Calgary Folk Music Festival on July 21st. The festival held July 21-24, will also feature a number of acts from Blues, African roots, hip hop, country, bluegrass and swing. Artist to play include Arrested Development, Steve Earle, Mary Gauthier, Del McCoury, Allison Moorer, Buck 65, Christine Fellows, Bill Frisell, Thea Gilmore, Sarah Harmer, Ron Sexsmith and Tortoise.

For more information, please visit, the festival’s website.

Smog’s Bill Callahan will hit the road this summer, beginning with a lengthy tour of Europe that begins June 9 in London before heading back to North America. The artist will be supporting his new album, “A River Ain’t Too Much To Love,” released Tuesday via Drag City.

“People who come to a show like [mine] probably listen to a lot of music,” Callahan tells Billboard.com of playing for European audiences. “It helped when I put a lyric sheet with [1997’s] ‘The Doctor Came at Dawn.’ When I went to Europe people were so happy; it helps them so much to be able to read it.”

]i] To read more, visit billboard.com.

VH1 Classic and World Productions have created “Decades Rock Live,” a new live concert series featuring rock and soul artists who have influenced popular music over the past 50 years. The show will debut in September on VH1 Classic and will be taped at Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, N.J.

The first show will star the Doors of The 21st Century, featuring Robby Krieger, Ian Astbury and Ray Manzarek. Special guests will include Jane’s Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell, Macy Gray and the original Vanilla Fudge. The music performances will be augmented with special features and behind-the-scenes interview.

Source billboard.com.

If the music industry can’t beat the desktop DJs who are slicing and dicing songs into new hybrid forms, they might as well join them.

Some of the world’s most venerable record labels, including Motown, Atlantic and Verve, are opening up the vaults in the hopes that a new generation of listeners will be attracted to remixed versions of classic tunes.

Amid an explosion in remix culture, spurred by technology that enables anyone with a computer to splice together music in new ways, a quartet of albums have been released this year: “Motown Remixed,” “Verve Remixed 3,” “Atlantiquity” and “Mayfield: Remixed – The Curtis Mayfield Collection.”

They take on classic — some would say unimprovable — soul, jazz and R&B songs including “Heard It Through the Grapevine,” “We Are Family,” “Let’s Get It On” and “Superfly.”

Previous major-label efforts in a similar vein have included Jay-Z’s collaboration with Linkin Park, and several Blue Note remix albums. There will likely be more to come as music companies seek to extract maximum value from their libraries and to combat the unauthorized “mash-ups” that have become increasingly popular.

DJ Dangermouse’s “The Grey Album,” which mixed The Beatles’ “White Album” with rapper Jay-Z’s “Black Album,” is widely credited with bringing mashups to the forefront.

It was forced underground when EMI, the world’s third-largest music label, filed a slew of lawsuits, but not before Dangermouse and the “Grey Album” achieved worldwide fame.

EMI does not seem to be holding a grudge. DJ Dangermouse is a lead producer for the new album from animated rock band Gorillaz, one of the company’s most crucial releases of the year. He also turned in a track on “Verve Remixed 3,” a remix of Dinah Washington’s “Baby, Did You Hear?.”

The “Motown Remixed” album includes a version of The Temptations’ “Papa Was a Rolling Stone” that is revamped by DJ Jazzy Jeff, and The Jackson Five’s “I Want You Back,” which isgiven a heavy hip-hop breakbeat by DJ Z-Trip.

The “Mayfield: Remixed” and “Atlantiquity” albums were made by Warner Music Group’s Rhino Records. Motown and Verve are both part of Vivendi’s Universal Music Group.

Source yahoo.com.[

Oscar Brown Jr., a legendary rhythm & blues and jazz singer, died Sunday (May 29) at age 78 following a two-month illness, his son said.

The songwriter and playwright had been hospitalized in April and again in mid-May complaining of pain and paralysis in his legs. He had emergency surgery on May 16 to address an abscess on his lower spine, Napoleon Brown said.

Brown was known for such compositions “The Snake,” “Signifyin’ Monkey” and lyrics for Miles Davis’ “All Blues.” The son of a prosperous attorney and real estate broker, he began performing on radio as a teenager. His first album, Sin and Soul, came out in 1960. He appeared with such jazz greats as Dizzy Gillespie, John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderly.

Brown wrote more than a dozen plays and musicals. He was also active in the civil rights movement in the 1960s, running unsuccessfully twice for political office — first for the Illinois legislature and later for the U.S. Congress.

Source billboard.com.

Following through on a pledge to not tour North America until later this summer, the White Stripes have revealed an initial round of dates. The tour will begin Aug. 6 in George, Wash., and has shows on tap through an Aug. 29-31 stand at Chicago’s Auditorium Theater.

There are also multiple-night engagements lined up at Los Angeles’ Greek Theatre and the Orpheum Theatre in Minneapolis, as well as an Aug. 22 show at Red Rocks Amphitheatre outside Denver. More shows will be added.

As previously reported, the Stripes are in the midst of a 12-date tour of Central and South America ahead of the June 7 release of their new Third Man/V2 album, “Get Behind Me Satan.”

Before the North American run, the Stripes will spend three weeks in June and July playing in such far-flung European locales as Ljubljana, Slovenia, and Riga, Latvia.

Here are the White Stripes’ North American tour dates:

June 10: Atlanta (Music Midtown Festival)
July 29: San Diego (Street Scene Festival)
Aug. 6: George, Wash. (Gorge Amphitheatre)
Aug. 7-8: Vancouver (Orpheum Theatre)
Aug. 10: Portland, Ore. (Keller Auditorium)
Aug. 12: Berkeley, Calif. (Greek Theatre)
Aug. 15-18: Los Angeles (Greek Theatre)
Aug. 19: Phoenix (Dodge Theatre)
Aug. 22: Morrison, Colo. (Red Rocks)
Aug. 23: Kansas City, Mo. (Starlight Theatre)
Aug. 24: St. Louis (Fox Theatre)
Aug. 26-27: Minneapolis (Orpheum Theatre)
Aug. 29-31: Chicago (Auditorium Theatre)

Source billboard.com.

Circus Maximus in Rome, London’s Hyde Park and the Eiffel Tower in Paris are among the venues that will host Live 8, a series of concerts being organized by Bob Geldof, the driving force behind the Band Aid and Live Aid campaigns for African famine relief.

The July 2 concerts, which will be free, also will be held at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin and in Philadelphia, organizers said.

Performers include Coldplay, Madonna, Paul McCartney, R.E.M. and U2 in London; Will Smith, Bon Jovi, Dave Matthews Band, Stevie Wonder and P. Diddy in Philadelphia; Crosby, Stills and Nash, Lauren Hill and Brian Wilson in Berlin; Jamiroquai, Youssou N’Dour, Yannick Noah and Placebo in Paris; and Duran Duran in Rome.

The events are aimed at raising awareness of poverty in developing countries just days before G8 leaders meet in Britain. Organizers didn’t immediately announce the full lineup for the concerts or where the Philadelphia incarnation would take place.

They said there were plans for concerts in other cities in G8 countries, but didn’t give further details. Japan, Canada and Russia are the three other nations in the G8.

Source billboard.com.

Modern rock act 311 will release its next studio album, “Don’t Tread on Me,” July 26 via Volcano. According to a post from vocalist Nick Hexum on the band’s official Web site, songs tipped to make the final cut are “Solar Flair” (“a super slow and heavy rap rocker”) and “It’s Getting OK Now” (“a fast punk song”), as well as “a handful of reggae-influenced tracks.”

311 has begun lining up dates for a summer tour, which will run from July 27 to Sept. 18. A handful of shows will feature Papa Roach and/or Unwritten Law, and 311 is also confirmed to appear July 30 at San Diego’s Street Scene festival.

Here are 311’s tour dates:

July 30: San Diego (Street Scene Festival)
Aug, 2: Tucson, Ariz. (Anselmo Valencia Amphitheatre)
Aug. 5: Las Vegas (Skin Pool Lounge)
Aug. 6: Salt Lake City (USANA Amphitheatre
Aug. 7: Morrison, Colo. (Red Rocks)

Source billboard.com.