March 18, 2024

Charting Acts Find Common Ground

June 16, 2004
July 5 - 11 are the dates that have been set for the upcoming Common Ground Festival along the waterfront in downtown Lansing, Michigan.  In addition to tons of food vendors and interactive exhibits - including the GameRiot Exhibition/Party, where you‘ll be able to play (and compete in) over three dozen new and unreleased games on plasma and LCD screens, there are, of course, going to be tons of great performers as well - on the schedule so far for this year‘s event are:
Crosby Stills and Nash, Liz Phair, Five For Fighting, Blues Traveler, and Saliva.  Tix for the event can be snagged at www.commongroundfest.com ...

Jeff Buckley‘s only studio album is set for reissue in a deluxe, remastered edition (as remastered by George Marino) that is expected to be out in stores on August 23. Buckley‘s Grace: Legacy Edition will include the original 1994 album in its original sequence, plus a disc of rare tracks and a special DVD. The second disc will include five solo tunes recorded by Buckley during his sessions for Grace at Bearsville Studios in New York; DVD content as of press time is set to include music videos for “Grace,“ “So Real,“ “Last Goodbye“ and “Eternal Life,“ footage of Buckley working with a string section, interviews with Buckley‘s bandmates, and footage from the EPK that was sent out to promote the original album.

Brothers Neil and Tim Finn - former frontmen for Crowded House and Split Enz - have wrapped work on a new album with producer Mitchell Froom and mixer Bob Clearmountain, and are planning to drop the disc, the first disc to see the brothers work together in over eight years, this summer. Also playing on the Finns‘ latest effort are drummer Matt Chamberlain (Fiona Apple, Garbage, The Corrs, SNL), bass players Sebastian Steinberg and Davey Faragher, and multi-instrumentalist Jon Brion. Neil and Tim Finn‘s Everyone Is Here hits stores on August 24, and the brothers also begin a North American tour in July that will start on July 9 in Vancouver and will make stops in Chicago (7/22 and 7/23), Detroit (7/24), and Boston (7/31)...

Bombastic rock band Creed have announced that they are disbanding after nearly 10 years as a group - and after selling nearly 30 million albums worldwide, complete with such hits as “With Arms Wide Open,“ “Higher,“ and “My Sacrifice.“  The breakup is, of course, significant news for Creed fans - but even more significant may be the fact that several of Creed‘s members - namely guitarist Mark Tremonti, drummer Scott Phillips, and original Creed bassist Brian Marshall - are already working on a new project with singer/songwriter Myles Kennedy. The new “band,“ reportedly called Alter Bridge, effectively reunites all of Creed‘s members - with the exception of frontman/singer Scott Stapp. So, is it really a Creed breakup, or just a Creed restructuring that leaves Stapp out of the picture?  Time will tell - we‘ll keep you updated...

Green Day are back in the game with their next album, which is due out on September 19 on Reprise Records, and which has been dubbed American Idiot. The disc is rumored to contain a mini rock opera called Suburban Jesus that will combine song segments called “I Don‘t Care,“ “City of the Damned,“ and “Dearly Beloved“...

MINI BUZZ:
Detroit‘s Madonna is prepping for the release of her third children‘s book, Yakov and the Seven Thieves, due out later this month...
With the band walking out on and/or cancelling various performances, rumors are rampant that The Vines are in the midst of a band breakup... Dick Clark, the long-running host of pop music show American Bandstand, is said to be teaming up with the creators of American Idol in the hopes of bringing an updated Bandstand show back to television in summer 2005...
The Calling, whose first album, Calmino Palmero, went gold in the U.S., are set to release their second disc, Two, later this year... London‘s Somerset House has lined up a five-night stand of live shows for this August; dubbed The Grolsch Summer Set, the event will feature performances from Air, Turin Brakes, Basement Jaxx, Beverley Knight, and Snow Patrol...
Hot Cleveland band Sw1tched have revamped their official website, which can
now be seen at www.sw1tched.net ...

ON CD: PJ Harvey sez Uh Huh Her... Cowboy Junkies sing of One Soul Now... Sonic Youth releases Sonic Nurse... Killswitch Engage says it‘s the End of Heartache... The Streets drop A Grand Don‘t Come For Free... and Phish present Undermind... ON DVD:  Triumph: A Night of Live Triumph... and Music in High Places - Boys II Men Live From Seoul... and that‘s the buzz for this week‘s Modern Rock.

Questions, comments, rants, raves about this column or your fave artists? Send ‘em to Kristi at expressmodernrock@hotmail.com!

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