The Weight of Her: The last song written for the record and recorded. It was all done in my little bedroom. Flew Darren out and he cut the drums and I finished the track without all the words. Finished the words the next day and boom bang bing... Done.

I thought it was the right song to set the tone of my record, without being a forced, sappy, "my house burned down" kickoff of a song. There's plenty of those on the record. This one is just the truth about girls.

His bandmates made the announcement: "We're very sorry to announce that founding member of The Descendents, and close friend Frank Navetta passed away on October 31, 2008 after becoming ill over the course of a few days.

Kennedy has rehearsed with Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist John Paul Jones and drummer Jason Bonham on several occasions, according to sources in the know. In a recent BBC interview, Jones confirmed the band was planning to tour but didn't refer to Kennedy by name.

Now, if that wasn't scary enough, in a double whammy, the article goes on to say that if Kennedy leaves Alter Bridge, it would clear the way for a Creed reunion with Scott Stapp, which would be an unintended consequence the music world simply must not tolerate.

"Mike, 45 years old, suffered a heart attack, Wednesday afternoon, October 29th, 2008. Mike was a founding member of Shadow Gallery and for the past 16 years helped shape the sound of the band with his magical voice. Additionally, he made many appearances on rock records around the world.

The head of rap label Def Jam Recordings died suddenly on Saturday, the company said. Shakir Stewart, who was named executive VP of the iconic label in June, committed suicide, according to reports. But no other details were immediately available. more

Mindy McCready has been released from jail after serving about 30 days for violating probation on a 2004 drug charge. more

A British couple who sold video footage of singer Amy Winehouse apparently smoking crack to a newspaper have pleaded guilty to drug charges.more

Billboard has taken a listen to Guns N' Roses' "Chinese Democracy" single and found in part "The opening track is a hard-rocking cyberpunk drama, complete with an action-movie intro, neurotic multitrack vocals and plenty of spaced-out guitar solos (Buckethead?) designed to make up for Slash's absence." Read the rest of the review here

The AC/DC Black Ice dominance of the music charts was shirt lived. After one week, the AC/DC album has been bumped by Pink in Australia and Snow Patrol in Ireland.more. Pink?

Britney Spears is reportedly set to hold a two week residency at London's 02 Arena next summer. The gigs are due to take place in June 2009 in support of her new LP 'Circus', which is due out on December 1. more

In Flames have released a limited edition EP featuring the roll out single "The Mirror's Truth" off the quintet's critically-acclaimed full length release, A Sense of Purpose. Also included on the EP are the previously unreleased tracks "Eraser," "Tilt" and "Abnegation."

Neil Young's Sugar Mountain Live At Canterbury House 1968 has been moved from November 25th to December 2nd.

Amy Winehouse has been discharged from hospital after she was taken in last weekend to be treated for a chest infection. Despite the media claiming Amy had checked into The London Clinic for a course of rehab, a spokesman confirmed she was actually getting treatment for her infection. more

MySpace Music is proud to announce the worldwide exclusive premiere of the new video from Seal titled "I've Been Loving You Too Long" from Seal's upcoming album "Soul", hitting stores on 11/11, featuring covers of classic tracks from James Brown, Sam Cooke, Al Green and more!
The video can be viewed here.

Saliva has completed its fifth album, Cinco Diablo, which is set to arrive in the physical and digital marketplace on December 16th.

The Quireboys "would like to welcome a new member... Phil Martini, formerly the drummer of Tokyo Dragons. Previous drummer Pip Mailing was unable to fully commit to the band's hectic touring schedule. more

Cattle Decapitation comments: "We're finally done with all the finishing touches of our new album and we feel we've finally done it! Sonically, the band has managed to finally capture and accentuate its live intensity that we've become known for and has created one hell of an album from start to epic finish" more

Death By Stereo has finished their next full-length, their first since 2005. According to a new interview with RebelTheory.com, the band is currently "sorting out the label stuff," apparently meaning that they are no longer under contract with Epitaph Records. more

The album features 15 of the hottest tracks from guitarists including Johnny A., Johnny Winter, Journey's Neal Schon, Eric Johnson, Tinsley Ellis, Billy Burnette, Arlen Roth with Sonny Landreth and Muddy Water's son Big Bill Morganfield, among others.

The Dublin Docklands Development Authority said it remains committed to building the long-planned U2 Tower, but a souring economy at home and abroad means the project must be shelved. It expressed hope of reopening negotiations with potential developers within 12 months.

Interest in Farrell's song has led to plans for a vampire inspired video in keeping with the movie's theme (details to be announced).

The history of Simmons Records dates back to Bob Buziak former head of RCA Records. I signed House Of Lords ( a name I trademarked and let Greg Giuffria use for his band), Silent Rage, a California rock band and Gypsy Rose a Canadian rock band RCA wanted to release through my label.

The seven-song strong, 50 minute tour de force entitled Crack The Skye, was recorded at Southern Track Studios in Atlanta and produced/mixed by Brendan O'Brien (Rage Against The Machine, Springsteen, Pearl Jam, AC/DC, etc.).

Singer Dan Grattan: The story behind "Summer Fires" is about a transition period, where you know the future is inevitable but a certain part of you wants to hang onto the moment that you're in. The elongated title "Summer fires are autumn's ashes" is representative of something that burns so bright and feverishly but eventually burns out and becomes nothing more than a memory. The idea for the melody came pretty easily. I usually try to counter what Mike Rathfon's guitar is doing so that the two parts come out side by side to tell the story. I knew from the start that there had to be two vocal parts. We tried other members of the band but something was missing from the sound. Luckily for us, Mike isn't the only musically inclined member of the Rathfon clan. His sister, Michelle, stepped up to the challenge of recording with us and her sweet, yet haunting, vocal part that really adds to the eclectic nature of the song. We knew we were onto something with "Summer Fires" and it has turned out to be one of the most popular tracks from the album.

Bassist Cody Moyer: As I remember it: I had the idea for the drum part first, then came up with the keyboard part, which is, to me, really the heart and soul of the song. Next, Mike added the guitar part and then we followed that with the simple bass riffs because there was so much going on in the verses. Because the verses were so busy, we decided to make the chorus simple and kind of let the one guitar lick stick out. The original idea was for the song to be a long song with the general idea of building a ton of texture and sounds.

Guitarist Mike Rathfon: We wanted to change it up and do something really fresh. We laid it down with some simple electronic drums which Cody wrote up and ended up liking the simple drum part so much that it stuck through much of the song. The big idea for the second part of the song, was intensity. By the time the song ends, it's going through a huge, intense ride with a good deal of extra instrumentation (organ, piano, many guitars, lots of bass layers, female vocals), which is something we like to do because it can make a song a lot more powerful and moving.