THE STOOGES: Guitarist Ron Asheton is dead at 60, sometime over the past few days, apparently of natural causes. Here are two remembrances from Greg Kot, the Detroit Free Press and the Guardian. Iggy Pop and the surviving Stooges issue their statement.  NPR has two classic Tube links, but it's "No Fun" for me.

MONTT MARDIE: Frank Yang nominates this singer-songwriter as the new face of Swedish pop for 2009, with A/V links a-plenty: "Musical cribs from The Cure nestle alongside classic Brill Building song structures and quotes from Meatloaf. Lyrics reference Breakfast At Tiffany's and Star Wars - Introducing is a glorious open house pop culture party, where everything is fair game and welcomed with love..."

AMAZON is selling its bestselling 2008 MP3 albums for just five bucks each.

CULT of the iPod: Apple said Tuesday that it would remove anticopying restrictions on all of the songs in its popular iTunes Store and allow record companies to set a range of prices for them.

THE RETURN OF THE 7" 45: Don't call it a comeback.

XTC is blogging about their songs.  Most recently about "Generals & Majors," but just keep scolling. (Thx, Chromewaves.)

ROBBERT BOBBLE & the BUBBLE MACHINE, the alter ego of Apples In Stereo frontman Robert Schneider, performs the kind of garage-y, surf-tinged psychedelia you'd expect, but with an all-ages twist.  Stream a few. For the children.

DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE: Ben Gibbard talks to The A.V. Club, presumably before news of his engagement to Zooey Deschanel leaked out.

ANIMAL COLLECTIVE is profiled at Billboard.

OXFORD AMERICAN's 10th Anniversary Music Issue is out. The CDs aren't on line, but the liner notes are, plus Grant Alden on the demise of No Depression, the legendary alt-country magazine that he co-founded and edited, and on the (dreary, at best?) future of music criticism.

ALYSSA MILANO is getting hitched to CAA agent David Bugliari.

JENNIFER GARNER & BEN AFFLECK are the proud parents of a new baby girl.

JOSH BROLIN & JEFFREY WRIGHT, charged with interfering with a cop during a bar brawl last July, settled their criminal case in Shreveport, LA.  Maybe the arrest video did the trick.

RIP TORN pleaded not guilty to two counts stemming from a Dec. 14 drunken driving arrest.

MADONNA's rumored boytoy, Yankee slugger Alex Rodriguez, is reportedly "still hung up" on Madge and refused Donna Karan's advances over the New Year.

WATCHMEN has a new video journal online; this one covers The Minutemen.

CRAIG FERGUSON made a surprise announcement on his CBS Late Late Show Monday night: He got married over the holidays. Video at the link.

PATRICK SWAYZE talks to Barbara Walters about "going through hell" in his yearlong battle with pancreatic cancer, and taking on a leading role in a new television series.

IRAN: More than 70K students have volunteered to carry out suicide bombings against Israel, according to Iran's state news agency.  But President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has not responded to their request for permission, which suggests that the campaigns are mostly propaganda.

IRAQ: An Iraqi battalion shifts from Baghdad to the northern city of Mosul to conduct counterinsurgency operations.

MILLIE the SPANIEL needs to get her blankie out of the dryer.

BEES: Cocaine alters their judgment, stimulates their behavior and makes them exaggeratedly enthusiastic about things that might not otherwise excite them.

SERIAL SNAKE THIEVES BUSTED: One in fact had a rainbow boa in his pocket.

PITBULL ATTACK thwarted by a 9-year-old jiu-jitsu master.

A PAIR OF DEER drop in on a class at Faith Baptist School in Hamilton, NJ.