"Shame": Ryan wrote this song with a great friend of ours (and uber talented artist) Chuck Carrier. It has a great straight ahead rock groove with a splash of southern jam.

I love Ryan's guitar break and the soulful melody that I get to play with. It's the lead track on our CD "Absolutely" and it turned out to be a blast on the new acoustic CD "Before the Amplifiers."

Sam Leeson killed himself in his bedroom after suffering months of "sickening" abuse from cruel youngsters who bombarded his home page with offensive emails.

Unweighted first-day sales of "Tha Carter III" at nine leading accounts through the close of business yesterday (June 10), stood at 423,000. Sources close to the album project "Carter" could shift between 850,000-950,000 in its first full week. That would easily give Wayne the biggest sales week of the year, and the best since Kanye West's "Graduation" started with 957,000 last year.

In the lawsuit, filed today in LA County Superior Court, band members say manager Burt Stein and his management companies were supposed to watch their back -- but instead took money and made backroom deals without their permission in order to cash in on the band's popularity.

According to The Sun, Fielder-Civil was convinced that his wife was cheating on him with the singer/guitarist, so attempted to enlist Richard Lyttle, a former doorman who was serving time with him in jail, to harm him.

Robert Plant & Alison Krauss CD "Raising Sand" has earned three of the most prestigious nominations for the seventh annual Americana Awards. Besides being nominated for "Album of the Year", Krauss and Plant are also among those tabbed for "Duo/Group of the Year", and a tune from the CD earned a "Song of the Year" bid more

Speaking of Zeppelin, we have some news about the Zep tribute band that played the DVD release we put on a few years back that Axl Rose showed up at. That band Spirit of Zeppelin (featuring Frank Simes who has played with artists ranging from Mick Jagger to Stevie Nicks and Don Henley) will be performing at Di Piazzas in Long Beach, California on Friday, June 13, from 11:30 PM till 2:00 AM. If you mention "Spirit of Zeppelin" at the door the admission is free. There is no age limit. Di Piazzas is located at 5205 E. Pacific Coast Highway, Long Beach, CA 90804. The cross street is Anaheim. Also of note, Mark Romans actually plays John Bonham's "Green Sparkle" drum kit at most SOZ gigs. more about Spirit of Zeppelin

The fourth installation in the Guitar Hero series has been announced as "Guitar Hero: World Tour." The new game is planned for a fall 2008 release for Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, and PS2 and is to support a drum kit with cymbals, a new guitar controller, and a microphone. more

Maroon 5 are jumping on the "let have our fans buy our album twice bandwagon. Billboard reports that their 2007 album "It Won't Be Soon Before Long," will be reissued in expanded form July 8 via A&M/Octone. The package will include a bonus DVD with four music videos and a full concert shot last year in Montreal. more

Carrie Underwood has extended her maiden headlining tour, dubbed Carnival Ride, through mid-December. The new leg begins Sept. 23 in Cleveland. more

Industry speculation that Michael Cohl is out as chairman of the board for Live Nation is premature, but it's apparent that there is plenty of discord atop the world's largest concert promotion company. Even if he remains in place for now, some sources indicate that Cohl's departure from Live Nation is imminent. more

Founder and former Editor-in-Chief of Harp Magazine Scott Crawford today announced the launch of BLURT, a new music digital-magazine. He will be joined by Managing Editor Fred Mills, Senior Editor Randy Harward, Associate Editor Andy Tennille and Contributing Editor A.D. Amorosi. www.BLURT-online.com

The RIAA has voluntarily dropped the case of Warner Vs. Cassin, one of several suits that revolved around the question of whether making MP3s available for download qualified as copyright infringement. It's noteworthy that the RIAA dismissed the case itself, rather than waiting for the court to follow recent precedent more

So, M.I.A., why are you canceling your European tour? Are you hesitant to spend July hopping around Europe due to your visa issues? "I'm canceling because I feel like physically I just have to stop for a second," she told New York. more

"I'm working on it pretty aggressively right now while I have the time cause as soon as Velvet finds its singer, then it's going to be off the races with that," he tells Spinner. "I'm using this little period to be able to do as much on my solo record as possible. I'm not sure exactly when it will come out, but hopefully it will come out before the Velvet record."

The star has labeled the dates at Earl's Court in August "The Final Two". It is a nod to his sell-out Wembley Stadium show, The Final, with Andrew Ridgeley in 1986 - when he brought the curtain down on Wham!

Get this -- turns out Solomon actually has a permit to pack heat, but she still can't have one in an airport. Cops took her gun away and sent her packing with a court date.

DeLonge: "The same sort of thing happened to me with Blink, so I can understand what it's like to be a part of something like that. We had a victim of the Columbine shootings take his life with our song on repeat. You kinda go through these situations where you blame yourself �but you can't. You have no idea who these people are.

While Palm claims his testimony was based on the original, high-quality tape, defense attorneys claim the jury may believe they were acting in "poor faith" when they used the prosecution's cheap copy during Palm's testimony.

This third installment of what has been hailed as "the heaviest, darkest tour of the year," the "Unholy Alliance Tour, Chapter III" will feature Slayer, the undisputed kings of extreme speed/thrash metal, and two true princes of the genre, Trivium and Mastodon.

Blabbermouth has the details: Metallica has posted an updated version of the image that originally appeared on the band's official web site yesterday (Tuesday, June 10) under the headline "???."

The pop icon has called off the European leg of her heavily hyped Rock Witchu tour, blaming the promotional efforts�or lack thereof�of Island Def Jam Records.