Modern Rock

April 28, 2004

Here come the Chicks With Attitude
 
A new all-girl-headliners tour, dubbed The Chicks With Attitude Tour, will kick off in August and will visit over a dozen U.S. cities over several weeks.  Top headliner is slated to be Liz Phair, with Katy Rose, Charlotte Martin, and The Cardigans‘ singer Nina Persson all scheduled to appear.  Dates have yet to be publicly confirmed, but the tour, which will be sponsored, appropriately, by Maybelline Cosmetics, is expected to make stops in Chicago, Detroit, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, and Toronto, with a special preview show set to take place on May 3rd in New York City...
 
Meanwhile, fellow chick rocker Sheryl Crow will play an unusual show on May 4th, when she takes the... uh... stage (aisle?) on a United Airlines flight to mark the launch of United‘s partnership with Sony‘s new Connect Online Music Service.  Crow will perform a 40-minute set with an accompanying acoustic guitarist during the flight, while the Sony/United program will allow United frequent fliers to earn miles when purchasing downloaded music from Sony...
 
Canadian singer-songwriter Ron Sexsmith - a favorite of Elvis Costello, Coldplay‘s Chris Martin, and Paul McCartney - has released his latest album, *Retriever,* to much critical acclaim.  *Retriever,* which includes the new Sexsmith tunes “From Now On,“ “Happiness,“ “Tomorrow In Her Eyes,“ and the album‘s first single, “Whatever It Takes,“ was recorded in just 12 days in London with producer Martin Terefe.  Sexsmith now has plans to hit the road in May for a U.S. tour, and he is also expected to tour Canada in the fall;  tour dates confirmed so far include stops in Los Angeles (5/15), Ferndale MI (5/16), Chicago (5/17), Minneapolis (5/19), Denver (5/23), and Seattle (5/27)...
 
Miami has been tapped to play host to the 21st Annual MTV Video Music Awards this year on August 29th, enabling MTV and crew to avoid the venue limitations and congestion of the Republican National Convention, which will take place August 30th to September 2nd in MTV‘s hometown (and one of two traditional Video Music Awards venues) of New York City...
 
And Blender Magazine is publishing their list of “The 50 Worst Songs Of All Time“ in their latest (May) issue - included in the dubious honor roll are tunes from Starship (“We Built This City“), Billy Ray Cyrus (“Achy Breaky Heart“), Wang Chung (“Everybody Have Fun Tonight“), and Eddie Murphy (“Party All The Time“)...
 
MINI BUZZ:
PJ Harvey and Le Tigre have been added to the roster for this year‘s Lollapalooza tour...
Kurt Cobain‘s Mark IV guitar sold for a whopping $117,500 at a music memorabilia auction last weekend...
Former Lemonheads lead singer Evan Dando is set to play a string of solo shows in the U.S. this month; rumors are also flying about a possible Lemonheads reunion tour...
A new charity download site is set to launch in mid-June - www.warchildmusic.com will offer inexpensive downloads from the likes of Badly Drawn Boy, Travis, and Spiritualized, with proceeds going to the War Child charity...
Ex-Black Crowes frontman Chris Robinson‘s new solo album, *This Magnificent Distance,* is now set for a June release date...
Jewel has been alternating tour dates with work on her upcoming new album, her sixth, which she plans to release next year and which she says will be much more “lo-fi“ than her previous dance album, *0304*...
 
And here are the albums and DVDs that are being released this week...  ON CD:  Radiohead drops *Com Lag*... IMA Robot releases *IMA Robot*... Ben Jelen is ready to *Give It All Away*... Alanis Morissette releases the anticipated *So Called Chaos*... Morrissey drops *You Are The Quarry*... and Sugarcult presents *Palm Trees and Power Lines*... ON DVD:  Alanis Morissette doubles her releases this week with *Music In High Places: Alanis Morissette Live in the Navajo Nation*... Collective Soul presents another *Music In High Places* release with *Collective Soul Live From Morocco*... Duran Duran drops *Sing Blue Silver*... and U2 releases *Rattle and Hum* on DVD... and that‘s the buzz for this week‘s Modern Rock.
 
*Questions, comments, rants, raves, about your fave artists or this column?  Send ‘em to Kristi at expressmodernrock@hotmail.com!*
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