Celebs Sing for Katrina Disaster

Hurricane Katrina has brought out the best in many musicians and celebs over the past week or so, with two U.S. charity concerts being the first of probably many that will try and make a dent in the huge human catastrophe that has occurred in New Orleans.  Last Friday, “Shelter From the Storm - A Concert for the Gulf Coast” was held nationwide, with a variety of musicians gathering in different cities across the U.S. for the event, which was broadcast simultaneously on over a half-dozen different networks; performers included U2, Madonna, and Neil Young.  And last Saturday, MTV presented “ReACT now: Music and Relief,” with performances from Beck, Coldplay, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Green Day, and many more happening over a four-hour period for, of course, the same cause.  As Mick Jagger so deftly put it according to MTV news, “Some great music has come out of New Orleans.  All we can do is give a little back”...

On a related note, organizers of the 2005 Voodoo Music Experience - a primarily rock festival that usually takes place at New Orleans’ City Park - are currently working on relocating the event as planned for this year, with funds now earmarked to “aid in the rebuiliding and preservation of the culture and heritage of New Orleans,” which has served as home to the fest for the past six years.  Expected to take place on October 29-30, if all goes well, the original lineup (much of which is expected to remain intact) was set to include Foo Fighters, Flaming Lips, Louis XIV, Cake, New York Dolls, Handsome Boy Modeling School, The Decemberists, The Secret Machines, My Chemical Romance, Digable Planets, Billy Idol, QOTSA, 30 Seconds to Mars, Dan the Automator, Neville Brothers, Dr. John, Prince Paul, and Brotherhood of Groove, among others.  Updates can be checked out on the festival’s official website, www.voodoomusicfest.com
Celebs Sing for Katrina Disaster

Multi-platinum funky modern rockers Jamiroquai have announced dates for their first stateside tour in over six years, an event that will serve to promote the release of their much-anticipated new album, Dynamite.  The band is getting ready to climb onto the tour bus on October 21, with their first show happening at the House of Blues in Atlantic City, and they’ll serve up a groovin’ mix of both new tunes and past hits, according to lead singer Jay Kay.  Live dates will include stops in Toronto (10/28), Chicago (10/30), and Los Angeles (11/9), and if you can’t see ‘em live and in person, they’ll also make a couple of TV stops, namely Jay Leno’s Tonight Show on November 7, and Jimmy Kimmel Live on November 11... 

And Chris Cornell’s band Audioslave are also prepping for their fall tour, having added several new stops, including one at NYC’s Madison Square Garden and one in Las Vegas.  The setlist for their tour will include plenty of Audioslave originals - of course from their sophomore album, Out of Exile, which debuted at No. 1 last May - plus, this time around, tunes from both the Rage Against the Machine and Soundgarden archives, which the band chose not to do on their first tour outing.  Fellow modern rockers Seether and Kasabian have been tapped as opening acts for the tour, which will play shows in Toronto (10/7), Columbus, OH (10/12), Orlando, FL (10/19), Detroit (11/6), Chicago (11/7), and Grand Rapids, MI (11/9), among plenty of other cities...

MINI BUZZ:
The Live 8 historical concert is set to hit stores as a snazzy four-disc DVD on November 7; we’ll keep you updated as soon as we get more info on the DVD itself...
Gorillaz are making plans to “break new technological ground” by embarking on a worldwide tour in which they’ll appear onstage in 3D holographic format;  be patient, though, because that tour likely won’t take place until 2007, mostly because of needing extra time to figure out all of the creative logistics...
Legendary NYC punk club CBGB is still fighting for the rock n’ roll cause - they were served with an eviction notice this week, but owner Hilly Kristal still isn’t giving up, and says he’ll “cut the locks” if CB’s is ever officially shut down...
Kanye West is in the midst of lining up a fall tour, with only one date confirmed so far - namely, October 24 at Detroit’s Fox Theater...
Louis XIV, Bloc Party, The Hives, OK Go, Pennywise, and Hot Hot Heat will be among the artists appearing on SSX On Tour, the latest installment of Electronic Arts’ stunt-happy snowboarding video game, due out this fall...
And the new lead singer of INXS will be revealed on national television on September 20, during the finale of the CBS-TV show Rock Star: INXS - once chosen, the new singer will enter the studio with the band to work on the new INXS album, which has been titled Switch...

Speaking of new albums (and DVDs, too), here’s what you can expect to see in stores this week... ON CD:  Damian Marley’s Welcome to Jamrock... Smash Mouth’s All Star Smash Hits... Casting Crowns’ Lifesong... Switchfoot’s Nothing is Sound... Genesis’ Platinum Collection... and The Dandy Warhols’ Odditorium or Warlords of Mars... ON DVD: Right Spectacle - The Very Best of Elvis Costello... Britney and Kevin - Chaotic The DVD... Olivia Newton-John’s Video Gold 1... and Green Day’s Suburbia Bomb... and that’s the buzz for this week’s Modern Rock.

Questions, comments, rants, raves about this column or your fave musicians?  Send’ em to Kristi at modernrocker@gmail.com!


View On Our Website