2004

Stewart Copeland is big in Italy. He’s also big as a TV and film composer, and he was in a really big rock band called the Police. In May, Copeland took part in the Taranta Ensemble concert in Rome and wailed on his drums in front of 500,000 people. The free concert, showcasing the regional southern Italian music called puglia — a mixture of ethnic Mediterranean sounds and percussion — was broadcast live throughout Italy.

Copeland began a tour with the 20-piece Taranta band this week that will take them throughout Italy and Greece. He also recently released his “Orchestralli” album and DVD in Europe, which was recorded live during the course of four concerts in Italy and features music from his extensive soundtracks, ballets and operas. A North American distribution deal is in the works.

Of his orchestral compositions, Copeland notes: “I went through a period, as a drummer, trying to prove that I am actually a musician by writing a lot of orchestral music. I wrote three operas, three ballets for the Seattle symphony, and I wrote some orchestra work. I actually have quite a lot of orchestral music.”

On the TV side, Copeland has been working diligently on scoring the second season of Showtime’s hit series “Dead Like Me,” which stars Mandy Patinkin, Ellen Muth and Rebecca Gayheart. The new season premieres July 25.

Copeland says he came to “Dead Like Me” because series creator Bryan Fuller was a fan of his work. “[Bryan] laid a lot of very stringent parameters around me: no electric guitar or keyboard,” Copeland says. “So I couldn’t use any guitar or any rock ‘n’ roll instruments for a youth-oriented show, which actually forced me to think of something else. I ended up with this kind of diabolical quartet, with strings and baroque trumpet. I had to find other ways of telling the story that don’t involve the [rock] cliche.”

Copeland says that after almost a decade of writing with the Police, he loved making the transition to film and TV music during the 1980s because the parameters of writing for a particular mood and scene are both challenging and liberating. His scoring work includes “Rumble Fish,” “Wall Street,” “Highlander II,” “She’s All That” and “Gridlock’d.”

Copeland also says he is hoping to regroup with his Oysterhead bandmates Les Claypool (Primus) and Trey Anastasio (Phish) to work on new material later this year.

Source billboard.com.

Musician David Bowie underwent an emergency angioplasty to open a blocked heart artery in Germany and is recuperating, his spokesman said Friday.

Doctors discovered the blockage after the 57-year-old Bowie sought treatment after performing in the German town of Scheesel on June 25, according to the spokesman, Julian Stockton.

A pinched nerve was initially cited as the cause of shoulder pain that forced Bowie to shorten a June 23 performance in Prague and eventually to cancel the remainder of a European tour.

Stockton did not specify the date of the procedure but said it was after the June 25 show. Bowie left the clinic in Hamburg, Germany early this week and is now with his family in New York.

Stockton quoted Bowie as saying, “Can’t wait to be fully recovered and get back to work again. I tell you what, though, I won’t be writing a song about this one.”

Source yahoo.com.

While taking some time off from the road this summer, the Strokes have begun pre-production on a handful of new songs with longtime producer Gordon Raphael. And while manager Ryan Gentles tells Billboard.com a new album isn’t likely to be ready until spring 2005 at the earliest, the sessions are set to unfold in an entirely new way.

“The recording of this record will be much different from the last two,” he says. “They’re not working on any deadline whatsoever and have built a recording studio into their rehearsal space so that they can just record everything that they do over the next 8 to 10 months, and shape the new songs for the next record out of that.”

The quintet will return to the live stage Saturday (July 10) at Ireland’s Oxegen Festival, to be followed the next day by the U.K.’s T in the Park Festival. Also on tap is an Aug. 14 performance at Little Steven’s International Underground Garage event on New York’s Randall’s Island an Aug. 21-22 appearances at the U.K.’s V2004 Festival.

Afterward, studio time will dominate the schedule. “They might bow out once or twice to do a show here and there just around New York for the band to try out new material,” Gentles says, “and we’re entertaining the idea of doing a brief stint in South America before the end of the year since we’ve never toured there yet.”

Source billboard.com.

Apple Computer will make its iPod mini digital-music player available internationally starting July 24. A spokesperson for the computer giant says prices will vary for each territory. The mini portable player will be available for

Modern rock act Cake has just wrapped recording of a new album. Due Oct. 5 via Columbia, the 11-track “Pressure Chief” will be the band’s second studio album for the Sony-affiliated label and fifth to date.

The Sacramento, Calif.-based group recorded the set in a converted house in its hometown, marking its first foray outside of the confines of a conventional commercial studio. “It’s representative of the place we’re from,” trumpeter Vince DiFiore says. “A dry and dusty place.”

Among the songs that have made the cut are opening track “Wheels” and the electronic influenced “No Phone.” Of the folk-ish “The End of the Movie” and “She’ll Hang the Baskets,” wry and often-cryptic frontman John McCrea says, “There’s something funny about disillusionment and something subversive about joy.”

At deadline, Cake had a handful of dates on its itinerary, starting with a July 18 appearance at Boulder, Colo., radio station KBCO’s World Class Rockfest, alongside the Finn Brothers, Mindy Smith and Keller Williams, among others. Also on tap is a Sept. 19 performance at the Austin (Texas) City Limits Music Festival. A full tour in support of “Pressure Chief” is expected.

Source billboard.com.

The Flaming Lips have hit the studio with producer Dave Fridmann to record material for their next Warner Bros. album. According to the group’s official Web site, the songs “Space Bible” and “Mr. Ambulance Driver” have already been completed. The Lips plan to return to Fridmann’s Tarbox Road studio at least once more before a previously planned September session.

Other tracks that have been put to tape in recent visits include a contribution for the “Spongebob Squarepants” movie soundtrack, due in November; a cover of Daniel Johnston’s “Go” with Sparklehorse for a Johnston tribute album; and “Vaginal Holocaust,” earmarked for the Lips’ long-incubating holiday movie “Christmas on Mars.” That film may finally see the light of day by the end of the year.

Source billboard.com.

In an article published in Tuesday’s Burlington Free Press, ticketless Phish fans may have to dig deep to catch the band’s final two shows in Coventry, VT.

JEFFERSONVILLE — Adriane Whitfield and Ryan McDonald are going to Vermont jam-band Phish’s last show in Coventry next month.

But because the Lamoille County couple is unwilling to spend $450 a ticket — the going price on eBay for the tickets originally sold for $150 each — the question remains whether they are going to get into the two-day concert.

“I didn’t think it was going to sell out at first,” said McDonald, who works restoring homes and painting. “It seemed like there were tickets everywhere. Then it became the last show, but even then I figured, how could they turn you away?”

Like all but the 70,000 people who have tickets to the show, he just might find out.

Phish fans seeking concert tickets are encountering mind-blowing prices now that the band has announced it will split up after the August show. The 200 percent increase on eBay might even be a bargain. Brokers are selling tickets to the show for as high as $915 apiece. That’s 510 percent higher than the $150 face value.

Sky-high prices

Veronica Lusk, sales representative for the Internet broker eSeats.com, has only about 40 tickets left. That’s not many for a show this size that’s over a month away, she said.

Because eSeats.com resells tickets for clients who name their own prices, eSeats lists tickets from $515 to $915. Lusk said the demand for even the $915 tickets is there.

“At this price, they are going really fast,” she said. “We can sell them for this much. People are buying them. I’ve never really seen general admission tickets for this much.”

Whitfield and McDonald were planning to buy their tickets on the Internet at face value. They waited until after they moved into a new home to sign up for online service. Credit card in hand, McDonald logged on to buy tickets.

“I stared at the screen,” he said. “Sold out.”

Whitfield, 30, has been following the band for 14 years. McDonald, 25, has been to 120 shows since he began following them at age 15. The couple met at a Phish show.

Their love for the band is on display throughout their hilltop house — a bootleg DVD alongside their movies, old Phish newsletters on their bookshelf, Phish photos on their walls, the shirt on McDonald’s back, posters in his room, signed memorabilia tucked away in hiding spots, the Phish pint glass McDonald sips his beer from.

Whitfield and McDonald have looked for tickets on eBay. They’ve called ticket brokers they’ve used in the past. They called friends. They’ve yet to find anything affordable.

But they refuse to miss the last show.

“I’m very nervous about going,” said Whitfield, a seamstress and designer. “Yes, I’m going with or without tickets, but I’ll never be a gate-crasher. I want to respect the band and the town. I’m praying.”

She and thousands of others.

Ticketless in Chicago

Brad Feldman, a 23-year-old Chicago business analyst, hopes to score a ticket. He’s been a Phish fan for 10 years, and is pretty sure he’s showing up with or without the right enter the Newport airport, where the concert is being held.

“I’d rather have a ticket and not have to worry, but if it comes down to going without a ticket, I’m going to go to the show,” he said.

He refuses to pay much more than the cost listed on the stub. He said he’s sold extra Phish tickets before, and he’s always sold them at face value.

“Phish is different,” he said. “When people need a ticket and you have some, you sell it at face. Hopefully good karma comes back.”

Internet message boards are full of Phish-hungry fans willing to spice up offers with money, tickets to other shows and even more personal enticements.

As a member of the Jambands.com message board found out, it’s a seller’s market.

“i offered making clothes, sex and cookies/brownies for a coventry (ticket) plus the cost of the ticket……,” wrote a user with the moniker Gabby23. “im still searching.”
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/bfpnews/news/2000h.htm