Karl Bade THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE:
THOMAS DOLBY threatened legal action against Britney's hubby Spenderline, for using Dolby's 1983 smash, “She Blinded Me With Science,” in his latest rap song. And he got the song removed from MySpace.
FRIDAY TIMEWASTER: Curveball. It's like 3-D Pong, plus you can put English on the ball.
BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE: Jason Collett, promoting his second album, “Idols of Exile,” tells the Kansas City Star that BSS leader Kevin Drew sets a high standard: “Kevin would say, 'There’s no sense in just making a good record. There are a lot of good records out there. Let’s make a great record.' I didn’t want to just make a good, linear singer/songwriter record. The genre is full of records like that. I wanted to transcend it.” Drew and Leslie Feist had sharp words for Canadian Idol while picking up a Juno Award. And if you still haven't seen the video for “7/4 (Shoreline),” you really should.
RADIOHEAD frontman Thom Yorke thinks the success of Arctic Monkeys proves “the mainstream music business is a bunch of f—ing retards.”
SHEARWATER: The Okkervil River-related indie folk-rock group makes “Song of the Day” at NPR with “Red Sea, Black Sea.” You can stream four more at MySpace.
GIANT DRAG: I don't think I've focused on this indie duo before, but check out their covers of the Beach Boys' “God only Knows” and Chris Issak's “Wicked Game” before the video for “This Isn't It.”
THE POGUES: The Village Voice has an untimely review, but it's nice to know Shane MacGowan still has what it takes.
ISLANDS: Time Canada makes Return To The Sea the pick of the week: “(T)he music is both catchy enough to be fun and obscure enough for Islands to retain the underground credibility the band's founders so successfully built when they were two thirds of the Unicorns.” See them prepare for the first lunar concert in “Rough Gem.” And there's more to hear at MySpace.
SEVEN MISTAKEN SONGS, courtesy of the A.V. Club.
THE POLYPHONIC SPREE plans to get topical on the next album. You can hear the Spree's latest on the Thumbsucker soundtrack.
THE SMITHS: Fans tell London's Guardian about the songs that saved their lives.
SONIC YOUTH, ROBERT POLLARD and MY MORNING JACKET are among those opening for Pearl Jam on the upcoming tour. Plus, Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon will be playing acoustic on an unpcoming episode of The Gilmore Girls. No, really.
PETE DOHERTY-KATE MOSS UPDATE: The troubled singer announced in an Austrian porn club that he's marrying the supposedly sober supermodel, who just inked a big deal with Calvin Klein. Doubt that marriage is going to happen, even if he gets his teeth fixed.
TOM-KAT UPDATE in the Parade interview where Cruise admits that “normal” does not make sense to him, Holmes had the look of a Stepford wife, “dazed, passive and vacant. She never stopped smiling.” Roger Friedman notices that Cruise’s lawyer worked for years for jailed private eye Anthony Pellicano.
NOW SHOWING: This weekend's wide releases are the all-star noir of Lucky Number Slevin (67 percent Fresh on the Tomatometer, though a 55 percent Rotten with the “cream of the crop”), Antonio Banderas dancing through Take the Lead (44 percent Rotten) and two movies not shown to critics — The Benchwarmers and Phat Girlz. Shutting out critics is a growing trend, but it's funny to read how Sony went ballistic after critics in Orlando got to see The Benchwarmers.
GEORGE CLOONEY has a big wiener in his mouth at the Gallery of the Absurd.
ALEC BALDWIN and ANN COULTER won't be hooking up in the near future.
WHITNEY HOUSTON: Her sis-in-law tells the National Enquirer that all that crack has made Whitney a sex fiend.
SOUTH PARK, THE SHIELD and BATTLESTAR GALACTICA pick up Peabody Awards. Hurricane Katrina coverage also a big winner.
BRITNEY SPEARS: Remember this pro-life monument to the pop tart? Dare you see the reverse angle?
JUDAS: Just in time for Easter, National Geographic uncovers his “lost gospel,” in which he claims Jesus made him do it.
JESSICA SIMPSON: Star is set to claim the pneumatic blonde is crank calling Kristin Cavallari, even though she's not seeing Nick Lachey.
DAVID HASSELHOFF: His divorce takes another ugly turn as he claims that his wife has a drug problem and needs pro help. I thought she was just hooked on a feeling for the Hoff.
RACHEL WEISZ may get bent over a table and lashed with a cat-o'-nine-tails.
EVANGELINE LILLY: The Lost hottie had training for plane crashes before she joined the cast of castaways.
EVA LONGORIA: Maxim blows her up to a size visible by satellite.
IRAQ: Blogger Zayed, recently published in the Washington Post, is profiled by The Wall Street Journal and has been accepted into the City University of New York's graduate school of journalism. Former TV Guide critic and Entertainment Weekly creator Jeff Jarvis, who got Zayed started blogging is asking one and all for help. Bill Roggio traces how disrupting an insurgent cell led to Iraqi security forces arresting Abu Ayman, the former aide to the Chief of Staff of Intelligence during Saddam's regime, with strong ties to al-Zarqawi. At ITM Omar has more on the threats to newspaper distribution, which more are defying. Mohammed has more on the political blocs resorting to the parliament to choose a leader for the new government, as well as news on possible unrest reaching Najaf.
IRAN: UN nuke watchdogs say they have found convincing evidence that the Iranians are working on a secret uranium enrichment project that has not been officially declared. I'm surprised… they found it.
DOGS are getting fashionable in NYC.
BROKEBACK DUCK POND: “I wish I knew how to quack you!”
ELK passes away after mouth-to-nose resuscitation fails.
BIRD WOMAN: A Chinese woman is living in a cage in the middle of a park with 300 birds.
NICE BEAVER! Bailey is nursed to health after losing her teeth in a car accident. The punchline writes itself.
