BISHOP ALLEN premiered the video for "Click Click Click Click" at the 'Gum; it's currently in a Sony camera ad, so you can be the one who impresses friends and family by saying "Hey, that's Bishop Allen" when it comes on.

THE HOLD STEADY:  Craig Finn tells Crawdaddy that he "always wondered whether Springsteen sees himself as the first real songwriter who was strongly influenced by film."  I can't answer that question, but if Finn reads Dave Marsh's Born to Run, he'll find that cinematic influence comes mostly from critic-turned-manager Jon Landau.  At the WaPo music blog (yes, there is such a thing) David Malitz provides an A-Z glossary for the band.

JOE JACKSON is getting good buzz for his upcoming album, Rain.  MOKB is streaming "Citizen Sane," while Some Velvet Blog has posted "Too Tough" (streaming via the ol' HM).  I previously pointed y'all to "King Pleasure Time" also.

ROCK BAND:  At Slate, fmr Sleater-Kinney guitarist Carrie Brownstein reviews the videogame: "Rock Band is Guitar Hero for people with more than one friend. It's a theater group set to music, and just as nerdy."  Even so, it has been "haunting (her) like a bad ring tone."

RYAN ADAMS has stuck three short tracks from his metal alter-ego, Sleazy Handshake, among those streaming from RySpace.

M WARD and CONOR OBERST of Bright Eyes reportedly have formed a band.  Representatives from neither Oberst's nor Ward's camps could confirm the collaboration, however.

THE THERMALS have dropped a new video for "Returning to the Fold," from their current LP, The Body, The Blood, The Machine.

BALLAD OF A DEAD MAN:  Bob Dylan's "Mr. Jones" -- Jeffrey Owen Jones, a film professor at the Rochester Institute Of Technology -- has died of lung cancer at 63.  There have been other candidates for the protagonist, including a British journalist named Max Jones, who Dylan has mentioned himself.

RUBY, DON'T TAKE YOUR LOVE TO TOWN:  The Mel Tillis chestnut is covered at least eight times at MOKB, including by Leonard Nimoy.

NEIL YOUNG: The Detroit Free Press marks five milestones -- or left turns -- in his chameleonic career.

DINOSAUR, JR.:  Lou Barlow tells the Cape Cod Times the secret of the band's reunion: "J (Mascis) is less evil." After momentarily laughing, he pauses and adds, "I'm serious. J is a bit easier to communicate with and deal with. A bit."

THE BRIT BOX:  At the Riverfront Times blog, Annie Zaleski posts a two-disc set of songs she believes were wrongly left out of the Britpop collection, including tracks from The Housemartins, The Lightning Seeds, Paul Weller, and more.

SPARKS will play every one of the 20 albums they've released dating to 1972 over the course of a month next spring in London, leading to the premiere their brand new 21st album.

BRITNEY SPEARS:  The ever-reliable Star magazine is running rumors of a secret sex room, feces-smeared couches and another pregnancy.  The preganancy rumor is also the cover of the latest InTouch magazine, though I think they are suggesting a different dad, and pal Sam Lutfi denied the pregnancy story to Ryan Secrest.  The stories of the pop tart showing up 12 hours late to her own video shoot and being dumped by her new driver as a "liability" seem tame by comparison, though the one about Spears pulling off her panties in the middle of West Hollywood's Hustler Store and stealing a wig is still pretty rich.

LINDSAY LOHAN "has been drinking a little bit," a pal tells the New york Daily News.

HEATH LEDGER has been linked to Helena Christensen and Kate Hudson since his split from Brooklyn baby mama Michelle Williams, but he now reportedly has set his sights on Heather Graham and Gemma Ward.

DREW BARRYMORE was... wait for it... caught canoodling her He's Just Not That Into You costar (and human Macintosh) Justin Long over the Thanksgiving weekend, which she spent meeting Long's parents.

DOO WAH DADDY:  Mike d'Abo - the former lead singer of chart-topping Sixties band Manfred Mann - is celebrating becoming a father of twins at the age of 63.

JESSICA SIMPSON, as you might have guessed, was set up with Dallas Cowboys QB Tony Romo by her creepy dad-manager Joe.  However, "There are definitely parts of her that regret breaking up with Nick now," a Simpson friend tells Us Weekly in its new cover story, but I guess you have to buy the mag to discover which parts.

MADONNA is in the middle of a sheep controversy.  No, not that.  The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is angry that Madge dyed her pet sheep different colors for a Vogue photo shoot.

MARIE OSMOND faked her fainting spell on Dancing With the Stars?  RELATED:  Two-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves beat out Spice Girl Mel B and Osmond for the prized mirror ball trophy Tuesday, but business executive Aliette Vazquez has broken off her engagement to the "Dancing" winner.

KIM KARDASHIAN had her laptop, digital camera and $50,000 worth of diamond jewelry, including a Cartier watch, stolen out of her bags, sources close to Kardashian told E! News.

ANGELA KINSEY from The Office is knocked up.  In the video version of the story, Kristin Veitch says there's a good chance her pregnancy will be written into the show.  After all, she will be due for May sweeps.

OWEN WILSON is reportedly dating "Bionic Woman" star Michelle Ryan.  Which one makes this sound?

TEDDY BEAR JIHAD:  A British teacher arrested in Sudan after allowing her class to name a teddy bear "Mohammed" has been charged by authorities with offending religion -- an offense punishable with 40 lashes, a jail term of up to a year or a fine.  A seven-year-old Sudanese boy defended the teacher, saying he had chosen to call a teddy bear Mohammad because it was his own name.  But extreme Islamic groups said Mrs Gibbons "must die" and urged Muslims to hold street protests after prayers tomorrow.

FRANCE:  The violence in the Paris suburbs ebbed Tuesday night after police were deployed in force and quickly rounded up youths lobbing Molotov cocktails and setting cars ablaze.  Buried at the end of the piece: "There have long been tensions between France's largely white police force and ethnic minorities in poor neighborhoods. Despite decades of problems and heavy state investments to improve housing and create jobs, the depressed projects that ring Paris are a world apart from the tourist attractions of the French capital. Police speak of no-go zones where they and firefighters fear to patrol."

VENEZUELA:  Pres. Hugo Chavez said CNN may have been instigating his murder when the US TV network showed a photograph of him with a label underneath that read "Who killed him?"  The caption appeared to be a production mistake -- confusing a Chavez news item with one on the death of a football star. The anchor said "take the image down" when he realized.

PAKISTAN:  At Foreign Policy, Daniel Markey and Husain Haqqani debate whether the US should abandon Pervez Musharraf.  FWIW, iirc, Haqqani is in Benazir Bhutto's camp.

IRAN said on Tuesday that it had invited Palestinian "militant" factions to a meeting in Tehran aimed at countering a US-hosted Middle East peace conference seeking to kickstart the peace process.

IRAQ:  A top Iraqi Sunni cleric on Wednesday called for the tens of thousands of Sunni Arab militants allied to US forces in the fight against Al Qaeda to be integrated into the regular security forces.  The WaPo reports that cabbies are once again crisscrossing nearly all of Baghdad.  Reuters reports on reconstruction in Fallujah, where blogger Michael J. Totten reports that an edgy calm prevails.  AQI is attempting to reestablish its propaganda presence in Iraq, while Multinational Forces Iraq is seeking to dismantle the network.  One of northern Iraq's longest-serving army brigade commanders was reassigned Tuesday, prompting concern among US military advisers that progress they've made in training Iraqi forces here would suffer.  Some of the refugees returning from Syria intend to fight the militants who drove them from their homes

IRAQ and the MEDIA:  When an Iraqi "journalist" said on Monday that gunmen went on a killing spree in his Baghdad home, murdering seven children and four adult relatives -- and blamed the "occupier or those who came with the occupier" -- the story was picked up widely in the media.  Just one problem -- the alleged victims have appeared on Iraqi television, apparently safe and well.  The "journalist's" sisters denounced his actions, saying there had never been any sort of threat against them. One of his brothers-in-law suggested that he had made the story up for political reasons.  ALSO:  During the press conference about the US and Iraq entering talks for a long-term bilateral security agreement, a member of the White House press corps revealed he or she did not know that we have one with South Korea.

BUZZWINKLE got drunk on fermented crab apples, draped himself in Christmas lights and ended up standing glassy-eyed and dizzy in the front yard of a downtown bar in Anchorage.  Not too different from most office parties.

RAT ISLAND:  Our second story from Anchorage.  State and federal wildlife biologists are gearing up for an assault on Rat Island, where the decendents of Japanese rats have virtually extermianted songbirds, seabirds and certain plants.

BABY FLAMINGOS born in Des Moines, IA.  Pics and video at the link.

PETS are more comforting to people recently bereaved than priests or spiritual advisers.

A FRENCH COOK has prepared the world's largest barbecue - spit-roasting a 550kg camel for 15 hours at a seaside Moroccan town south of Rabat.