2005

Celebrate over 25 years of sports, music, and road rash in downtown Athens, Georgia April 29 – May 1, 2005. Founded in 1980 by Gene Dixon, the Athens Twilight Criterium was the first nighttime bicycle race in the United States in over 60 years.

Friday April 29th, Twilight Music features a free concert in Downtown Athens – 300 Block of College Avenue. Nate Nelson, The Weight (featuring Joseph Plunkett) and Cracker are scheduled to perform.

The main event of the Athens Twilight, the men’s and women’s criterium, features cyclists representing teams from all over the nation and the world. The men’s criterium is a 60-km race around historic downtown Athens. The course start-finish is on Clayton Street at College Avenue. The 1-kilometer course runs clockwise on Clayton, Lumpkin, Washington and Thomas. The high-speed action of nighttime criterium racing is unparalleled in the world of spectator appeal and action sports. With $20,000 in prize money on the line, the Athens Twilight Criterium is dubbed the most insane criterium in the world. Don’t miss a minute of the evening

Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks (with Matador labelmates Yo La Tengo and Laura Cantrell), Richard Thompson, M. Ward, the Band’s Garth Hudson, Calexico, John Hammond, the Wailers, Regina Carter, the Fiery Furnaces, Robert Earl Keen, McCoy Tyner and Little Anthony and the Imperials have signed on to play free concerts in and around Lower Manhattan this summer.

The majority of the shows are part of the Hudson River Festival, but a number are being separately organized via the Downtown Alliance Inc., as part of the Music at Castle Clinton series.

For more information, visit WorldFinancialCenter.com.

Source billboard.com.

The Pixies, Weezer, Widespread Panic, the Killers, the Arcade Fire, Liz Phair, the Black Keys and Death Cab For Cutie are among the acts that will play the reconfigured Lollapalooza festival, which, as previously reported, will be held July 23-24 in Chicago’s Grant Park.

Also on the bill are Cake, Dashboard Confessional, Dinosaur Jr., Kasabian, Kaiser Chiefs, Louis XIV, Tegan & Sara, M83, Los Amigos Invisibles, Blue Merle, the Redwalls, the Changes, Dandy Warhols, Digable Planets, Brian Jonestown Massacre, Billy Idol, the Bravery and Blonde Redhead.

Lollapalooza 2005 will be produced by Capital Sports & Entertainment and Charles Attal Presents — the brain trust behind the successful Austin City Limits festival — along with Lollapalooza owners the William Morris Agency and Perry Farrell.

“This lineup is a cross between ACL and Coachella,” Attal tells Billboard.com of the event, which will feature more than 70 acts on five stages. “It’s the ACL model that we’re bringing to Chicago.”

Source billboard.com.

Hydra, a new band featuring Particle and Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, made an appearance last night at the Walter Cronkite Stewardship Award event presented to Yo Yo Ma & the silk road project. The evening was sponsored by the World Foundation for Environment & Development. Hydra performed ‘Wavemaker’ as a tribute to the late Betsy Cronkite. The performance roused the audience and yielded a standing ovation from Walter Cronkite and Mr. Ma. The event was held at the Mayflower Hotel in the nations capital.

Hydra continues their tour this weekend with stops in Worcester, New
York, and Philly.

For more info see: hydra-music.com

Jack Black has signed on to star in a new film co-written with longtime collaborator Mike White and Jared Hess, the latter of whom wrote and directed the 2004 hit comedy “Napoleon Dynamite.” The as-yet-untitled movie will be co-produced by Black and White’s Black & White Productions in tandem with Nickelodeon Movies, with distribution by Paramount Pictures.

Inspired by a true story, the film will star Black as a Mexican priest who lives a double life as a masked wrestler to raise funds for an orphanage in financial need. “I can’t think of two people I’d rather party with than Mike White and Jared Hess,” Black says. “I can’t wait to get down to Mexico.”

Black and White previously have teamed behind the scenes and on-camera for “School of Rock” and “Orange County.” Black recently wrapped work on the Peter Jackson-directed remake of “King Kong,” and is expected to shortly begin shooting the highly anticipated film “Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny.”

In related news, Black & White will co-produce a film with Warner Bros. Pictures based on the upcoming memoir “Yes Man,” penned by British author Danny Wallace.

Source billboard.com.