CULTS drop a vintage-y video for  "High Road."

CULTS also advance stream Static.

THE DISMEMBERMENT PLAN advance streams Uncanney Valley.

CASS McCOMBS advance streams Big Wheel And Others.

ALBERT HAMMOND, JR (The Strokes) is streaming his AHJ EP.

BEST COAST drops "This Lonely Morning" ahead of their next LP.

YO LA TENGO drops "Super Kiwi" and will be turned into psychedelic Japanese dolls.

THE MEAT PUPPETS play "Up On The Sun" at The Stone in San Francisco, CA. March 1, 1985.

ROBERT POLLARD offers life lessons to the Utne Reader.

THE WATERBOYS: Mike Scott talks to the Monterey County Weekly about setting Yeats to music. (Thx, LHB.)

MAN MAN: Honus Honus talks to Stereogum about living out of a storage locker and On Oni Pond.

BOB GELDOF claims climate change may wipe out humans by 2030. Fairly sure that's not the IPCC consensus.

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: Gravity tops the chart with 55.6 million, the biggest October opening ever -- and the biggest openings for both George Clooney and Sandra Bullock. OTOH, Gravity had a 100 million production budget, so you'd probably still prefer the ROI of a Paranormal Activity movie.  Even so, the overseas markets are likely to be pure gravy for Gravity.  Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 places with 21.5 million on a 37 percent drop; it likely would have been leggier had Gravity not taken all those 3D screens.  Runner Runner shows with 7.6 millio; the studio is undoubtedly relieved it only spent 30 million to produce this.  Prisoners drops to the fourth slot with 5.7 million on a steep 48 percent drop -- likely a product of the subject matter and competition from Gravity for Oscar-bait seekers.  Rush rounds out the Top 5 with 4.4 million on a similarly steep 56 percent drop for similar reasons -- subject matter and Gravity.  Rush is at least doing better in overseas markets where people are more into F1 racing.  Below the fold, Don Jon comes in sixth with 4.2 million on a steep 52 percent drop; it has earned 16 million against a 6 million budget, but the advertising cost was reportedly around 20 million more.

HALLE BERRY & OLIVIER MARTINEZ welcomed a baby boy Saturday.

KHLOE KARDASHIAN had a nuclear confrontation with Lamar Odom that could be the last straw in their marriage. She reportedly has prepared divorce papers following secret talks with a lawyer,but hasn't pulled the trigger... yet.

ROB KARDASHIAN is not that interested in Keeping Up With the Kardashians.

MADONNA writes she was raped at knifepoint and burgled thrice during her first year in NYC.

ROSE McGOWAN burned down her L.A. mansion. Oops.

SUSAN BENNETT: She's the voice of Siri.

SYRIA: The eradication of Syria's chemical weapons arsenal has begun, with the destruction of missile warheads, aerial bombs, and mobile and static mixing and filling units; the OPCW said work will continue for the next few days.

LIBYA: Prime Minister Ali Zeidan has contacted US officials and asked them "to provide an explanation" for the capture of longtime al Qaeda leader Abu Anas al Libi on Libyan soil.

EGYPT: At least 28 people were killed in clashes between security forces and Muslim Brotherhood supporters. In several separate incidents, seven people were killed in clashes between security forces and terrorists in the Sinai. Authorities arrested 25 people purportedly tied to the Muslim Brotherhood who were accused of possessing explosives at a metro station.

IRAQ: Al Qaeda in Iraq killed at least 27 Iraqis in a series of suicide bombings in northern and central Iraq.

MARA JADE, a PITBULL, is saved from abuse via Craigslist.

A GIANT SQUID washed up on a Spanish beach.

A BEAR stopped by a home in Irkutsk for Borsht. Things got a little out of hand.  In Cali, another Bear shopped for apples at Vons.

THE SQUIRREL THREAT comes to pro golfing.

THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE:

...with THE GO-GOs!  They made history as the first all-female band that both wrote their own songs and played their own instruments to top the Billboard album charts. Kind of a hard band to place seasonally. Their debut, Beauty and the Beat, which yielded hits like "Our Lips Are Sealed" and "We Got the Beat," as well as great album cuts like "This Town," "Lust to Love," "Tonite" and "How Much More," came out in late Summer 1981, iirc, and "Lips" was climbing the charts that Fall, so I mentally place the band in this time of year. And it's still warm enough that the title track to the too-quick sophomore album, "Vacation," -- or their cover of the Capitols' "Cool Jerk" -- doesn't sound too out of place. "Get Up and Go" was also a single from that LP, but it didn't make the Top 40.  The band would chart twice more -- in 1984, with "Head Over Heels" and "Turn to You" -- before splitting and the near-inevitable reunion tours.

FOUR TET is advance streaming Beautiful Rewind.

LUCINDA WILLIAMS stopped by KUTX for a mini-set. 

DAVID BOWIE, Live at the Universal Amphitheater, Sept. 5, 1974.

HEM plays a Tiny Desk Concert at the offices of NPR.

MINOR ALPS: Juliana Hatfield and Nada Surf's Mattew Caws drop "Far From The Roses."

DUMPTRUCK: "Back Where I Belong."

MY BLOODY VALENTINE's Kevin Shields suggests Britpop was a government conspiracy.

PHOENIX is profiled by the Nashville Scene.

ST. VINCENT's TOP 10, according to Stereogum.

PUNK IS DEAD: BuzzFeed presents the evidence.

CUTOUT BIN: From Frank Sinatra to Echo & The Bunnymen, from Stevie Wonder to Thomas Dolby, from Bobby "Blue Bland" to They Might Be Giants, plus Marty Robbins, Chameleons UK, Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, The Kinks and more  -- this Friday's fortuitous finds are streaming from the Pate page at the ol' HM.

NOW SHOWING:This weekend's wide releases are Gravity, which is currently scoring 98 percent on the ol' Tomatometer; and Runner Runner, which is scoring 13 percent.

GRAVITY is decribed by a number of reviewers as a thriller.  And it has a number of suspenseful sequences, if you can suspend disbelief for the implausible event that sets it in motion.  It looks and sounds great (aside from some overdone musical moments, the sound design was top-notch in Atmos).  Yet Gravity never reached escape velocity for me on a popcorn movie level, because writer-director Alfonso Cuaron attempts a deeper exploration of the theme of facing death.  That's laudable, and to the extent it largely works, it does so on the strength of Sandra Bullock's performance. (George Clooney plays Clooney, though someone with his star power was probably necessary for the role.)  The film did not completely work for me to the extent that the characterizations are too economical, occasionally verging on ham-fisted.  As someone who often finds recent films longer than they really need to be, I would normally cite an 84 minute running time as a plus. But here I wonder whether another 10 min of exposition upfront wouldn't have made Gravity a better movie. It's a good attempt at two types of movie, good enough to be annoyed that it's not truly great at either.

MILEY CYRUS gets unsolicited advice from Sinead O'Connor.

BRITNEY SPEARS claims she's under a lot of pressure to make hyper-sexual music videos. Spears' dad/conservator and her manager deny pressuring her.

LAMAR ODOM says he's been sober for 5 days and believes he can maintain sobriety without going to rehab.

BARBARA SINATRA doesn't think Roma Farrow is Frank's kid.

TIM BURTON: Caught canoodling on camera with a mystery blonde.

PAUL GIAMATTI talks to Collider about The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (and more), Downton Abbey, merlot and more.

NORTH KOREA: The Yongbyon nuclear complex, which was shut down in 2007, appears to have started up again, according to a US research institute.

SYRIA: Russia backed a UN Security Council statement urging Syria to allow more humanitarian relief into the country.

IRAN: The head of Iran's Cyber Warfare command was found dead in a woods outside Karaj over the weekend. He had been assassinated at close range.

A CAT sits on a HEDGEHOG.

A MOUNTAIN LION moves into DC.

CHINESE DEATH HORNETS: The average one grows to 2.2 inches in length.

500 MINKS escaped their farm in rural Abbotsford. It's the upscale version of 101 Dalmatians.

PARMA VIOLETS dropped a video for "Rattlesnake Highway."

OF MONTREAL advance streams Lousy With Sylvianbriar.

COURTNEY BARNETT advance streams The Double EP: A Sea of Split Peas.

PARQUET COURTS advance stream the Tally All The Things That You Broke EP.

LISSIE advance streams Back To Forever.

THE DEAD WEATHER drop a snippet of “Open Up (That’s Enough)”, the A-side to an upcoming single.

PAVEMENT: "Cut Your Hair." NO BIG HAIR!

DAVID LOWERY's crusade for musicians in the internet age is chronicled by the New York Times.

WIRE is profiled at Drowned In Sound.

KINGS OF LEON talk to the Daily Herald about fighting, making up and more.

CHVRCHES' Lauren Mayberry talks to The Guardian about online misogyny.

MIA FARROW tells Vanity Fair her biological son with Woody Allen, Ronan Farrow, may actually be the son of Frank Sinatra.  Ronan sticks the landing.

KIM & KHLOE KARDASHIAN fighting over Lamar Odom?

CORY MONTEITH was shooting heroin and downing champagne in his hotel room on the night of his death.

TOM CLANCY, whose complex, adrenaline-fueled military novels spawned a new genre of thrillers and made him one of the world’s best-known and best-selling authors, died on Tuesday in Baltimore. He was 66.

CASEY CASEM's wife won't let his kids see him? Insert long-distance dedication joke here.

THE JACKSON FAMILY loses their case against Dr. Conrad Murray.

SYRIA: Sources say the recent formation of the Army of Islam, including some 50 Islamist rebel groups but not the al Qaeda-affiliated Al Nusrah Front and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, has come at the urging of Saudi Arabia. ISIL, whose ranks are swelling with non-Syrians, is seeking to consolidate control in the north. An analyst said jihadists have secured more territory in Syria than they did in Afghanistan or Iraq.

LIBYA: Gunmen attacked the Russian Embassy in Tripoli with RPGs and other weapons. The gunmen attempted to enter the compound, the Russian foreign ministry stated, claiming the attack had been repelled. Libyan media said the embassy was looted and burned, and blamed a crowd of attackers, some armed, who were angered by the killing of a senior revolutionary commander by his Russian girlfriend or wife.

EGYPT: The Muslim Brotherhood said it has no plans to backtrack on its call for the reinstatement of Mohammed Morsi as the country's president.

IRAQ: Al Qaeda in Iraq shot down an Iraqi Army helicopter as the military was conducting an operation in the desert near Bayji; four Iraqi soldiers and were killed.

A BABOON  get's "handsy" during a live news report.

JELLYFISH shut down a Swedish nuclear plant.

A PYTHON regurgitates two cats.

THE CRAB BITE was bad; the flesh-eating bacteria was worse.

THE KILLERS drop a video for the gleaming new M83-produced single “Shot At The Night.”

SLEIGH BELLS is advance streaming Bitter Rivals.

LEE RANALDO & THE DUST is advance streaming The Last Night On Earth.

FROG EYES is advance streaming Carey's Cold Spring.

NYPC: The fmr New York Pony Club is advance streaming their new acronym.

TENNIS drops "Mean Streets" from the Denver-based duo’s upcoming EP Small Sound.

DOT WIGGIN: The fmr lead singer of The Shaggs drops "Speed Limit" ahead of Ready! Get! Go! It's her first new material in... 44 years.

CREAM sync into "I Feel Free" on the Beat Club in 1967.

I KNOW WHAT GIRLS LIKE: The Waitresses and the Limits of the "Female-Fronted" Band.

DAVID BOWIE's 100 Favorite Books.

LITTLE RICHARD recenty survived a heart attack, the legend tells Cee-Lo Green.

U2's albums' ranked by Stereogum.

BRADGELINA unwittingly or not, provoked yet another round of secret wedding rumors.

LAMAR ODOM is drugged out of his head, but he's telling people he will sober up and play basketball again this coming season.

MICHAEL DOUGLAS & CATHERINE ZETA-JONES are understood to be living together again as they attempt to heal the rifts that prompted a temporary separation earlier this year.

JAY-Z is this month's Vanity Fair cover story.

MICHELLE RODRIGUEZ admits she goes both ways.

CAMERON DIAZ and... Benicio Del Toro?

ELTON JOHN goes off on the paparazzi, on video.

LIBYA: A UN report said torture has become widespread in Libyan jails since the Gaddafi regime was overthrown, and that 27 people have died from such torture; over 8,000 people are being held without trial in Libya. Unknown assailants killed three Benghazi security officials in separate incidents on Sept. 29.

EGYPT: An appeal of the decision to ban the Muslim Brotherhood and seize its assets will be heard on Oct. 22. Due to security concerns, Egypt has stopped supporting tourist visits to Iran.

PAKISTAN: An association of hard-line Islamic clerics running Sunni religious schools in Pakistan has called on the government and the Taliban to start peace talks.

IRAQ: Nearly 900 Iraqis were killed in terror attacks in September.

A PYTHON regurgitates a DOG.

A METER-LONG RAT was caught by Chinese farmers, who then tried to eat it.

10000 WALRUSES came ahore in Alaska. Goo goo goo joob.

SHEEP stop traffic on London Bridge.

HAPPY ROCKTOBER!

YUCK dropped a video for "Middle Sea."

BASIA BULAT is advance streaming Tall Tall Shadow.

HAIM is advance streaming Days Are Gone. (Not really my bag, but Pitchfork likes it.)

UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA stopped by Morning Becomes Eclectic for a session. 

4AD: Drowned In Sound offers a 70-song introduction to the label via Spotify.

FEIST staples "Mushaboom" and "1 2 3 4" are your Twofer Tuesday.

CAMERA OBSCURA: Tracyanne Campbell talks to PopMatters about the new LP, performing while pregnant, and the tour's "no cameras" policy.

NIRVANA: Read Steve Albini's letter to the band prior to producing In Utero.

PSYCHEDELIA: The Guardian surveys a new generation of trippy bands.

30 DISCO SONGS Every Millenial Should Know. There is no Bee Gees on the list.

AMANDA BYNES left the UCLA Medical Center, where she was getting treatment for a serious mental illness, and is now ensconced at a fancy Malibu rehab center that caters to celebs.

KALEY CUOCO's engagement started with a fight.

LAMAR ODOM stopped paying his father's rent.

KATE UPTON and former Dancing with the Stars pro Maksim Chmerkovskiy are "very serious."

LINDSAY LOHAN's parents are banned from Li-Lo's upcoming TV show.

BRIDGET JONES is a widow.

SYRIAN Foreign Minister Mouallem told the UN that Syrian "terrorists" are being supplied with chemical weapons, and claimed there are no moderate militants in Syria, where jihadists from 83 countries are allegedly fighting. He likened the terrorism suffered by Syria to the 9/11 attacks. Syria said it would not sit at peace talks with the Syrian National Coalition. Russia has offered to guard sites in Syria where chemical weapons will be destroyed, but will not allow Syria's chemical weapons to be transferred to Russia for disposal.

ISRAELI President Peres said Israel would consider joining the chemical weapons ban treaty. Prime Minister Netanyahu urged the US to keep up sanctions against Iran.

SAUDI ARABIA: Women who drive risk damaging their ovaries and producing children with clinical problems, according to a conservative Saudi cleric.

AFGHANISTAN: The government claimed it retook a district in Badakhshan from the Taliban; the Taliban claimed they are still in control of the district.

IRAQ: Al Qaeda in Iraq killed at least 55 Iraqis and wounded more than 150 in a series of coordinated bombings throughout Baghdad.

THIS CAT totally cheats at ping pong.

ROTTERDAM RATS are the newest recruits at a Dutch police department, giving new meaning to the term "rat squad."

A FOX frustrates Swiss golfers.

A FROG breaks up a shrimp fight.