03 November 2011
VVN Music
The news is not good for the Metallica/Lou Reed album Lulu. It is looking like the album will only sell around 12,000 to 15,000 copies in the U.S. during its first week of release, far short of any other Metallica album. Their last album, Death Magnetic, sold 490,000 copies in its first three days of release.
Rob Halford's longtime manager John Baxter has filed a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the members of Judas Priest and their management charging fraud, breach of contract and interference with contractual relations.
Baxter was fired in August after 29 years of working with Halford through a letter from a lawyer supposedly associated with the Priest management team. Baxter's attorney told Rolling Stone that it is obvious that they had ulterior motives. "Baxter has been managing [Halford] for decades. Judas Priest was coming to an end and the Judas Priest people wanted to engage Halford in his solo endeavor and to continue to have a relationship with him which was not possible with Baxter in the middle."
Keep an eye out for Neil Diamond who will be performing on one of the floats in the 85th Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York. Other's who will sing include Rodney Atkins, Mary J. Blige, Cobra Starship, Cee Lo Green, Avril Lavigne, Shelby Lynne, Mannheim Steamroller, Scotty McCreery and Ingrid Michaelson.
Kenny Loggins has been added to the list of performers at the CMA Awards on November 9. He will be opening the show with Blake Shelton as they duet on Footloose.
The U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals sided with CBS on Wednesday, saying they did not owe $550,000 for the fleeting nudity by Janet Jackson at the 2004 Super Bowl. In their ruling, the cited thirty years of FCC rulings, concluding that their was no precedent for the fine and that "An agency may not apply a policy to penalize conduct that occurred before the policy was announced."
Singer-songwriter Liz Anderson, mother of Lynn Anderson, passed away on Monday from heart and lung disease at the age of 81.
She had eight top 40 country hits including The Game of Triangles (1966/#5) with Bobby Bare and Norma Jean and Mama Spank (1967/#5). She wrote Merle Haggard's first top ten hit, (My Friends Are Gonna Be Strangers), from which he took the name of his band, along with his first number 1, The Fugitive.
Anderson also wrote hits, most with her husband of 65-years, Casey, for Tammy Wynette, Ernest Tubb, George Jones, Waylon Jennings, Kitty Wells, Conway Twitty and many others.
Also passing away is George Roundtree who was the musical director for the Four Tops for over thirty years. Roundtree died in a Las Vegas hospital on Sunday at the age of 61. He had also performed with the Temptations, Frankie Valli, Bill Withers, Freeda Payne, Gladys Knight & the Pips, Mary Wilson, Martha Reeves and David Ruffin.
