Cabbage Patch Steven Tyler

When artists get their own dolls, it usually means they're having the honour of having Todd McFarlane making one of his hyper-realistic toys.

Not Steven Tyler.

He's going to be... a fucking Cabbage Patch Kid:

If, like me, you have trouble identifying him, he's the one... in the middle. The white-trash prostitute with the brown hair and blonde streaks dressed like Elvis-meets-cowboy. Wow.

The Ever-Quotable Lou Reed

Remember when Lou Reed said his album with Metallica was the best thing ever created? It turns out most people don't agree; some actually feel it's the worst thing ever made. My favourite quote is from a user named lainso:

It made me want to illegally download it, then not listen to it.

Some Metallica fans want to go even further: Reed was told a few of them wanted to kill him:

[They] are threatening to shoot me, and that’s only because I showed up,” Reed said. “They haven’t even heard the record yet, and they’re recommending various forms of torture and death.

Then again, while Rolling Stone gave the record 3/5 stars, their readers gave it a 1; NME went as far as giving it a 7/10; but most sites seem to agree with the line of thought displayed by Pitchfork: 1/10.

Daniel Snyder from The Atlantic even longs for the days when Metallica was at its best merely selling out. Ouch.

Looks like Reed made another Metal Machine Music - only this time, it wasn't intentionally unlistenable.

By the way, I give it a 3/10, myself. And I loved Metal Machine Music.

Diddley Squat

Seems a little messed up that Elias McDaniel - Bo Diddley's son - was arrested in the Gainesville, Florida plaza that bears his father's name, just for supporting his local Occupy Movement ''chapter''.

I Wonder How Lou Reed Feels About His Work With Metallica

Let's start from the start, as Loverboy would say.

Lou Reed, a legend in his own right - and perhaps an even larger one in his own mind - decided to take two German plays from the early 1900s and re-conceptualize them as a rock opera/musical of sorts called Lulu, and then enlisted Metallica as his backing band for the project.

Yes, the still-loved Reed (despite so-so albums based on the works of Edgar Allan Poe and live shows that piss off casual listeners and fans alike) has joined forces with the much-maligned/old-fans-hate-them Metallica for, essentially, an art project.

I for one, am confident it'll work, and not just because Reed's lyrics made both Kirk Hammet and James Hetfield cry. But I'm not as convinced as The Lou himself, who claims:

It’s maybe the best thing done by anyone, ever. It could create another planetary system. I’m not joking, and I’m not being egotistical.

Find out in November.

Jani Lane Tribute Concert

If you're in L.A. and were of fan of Warrant and Jani Lane (who died last week), you might want to check out the tribute concert held on the 29th at Hollywood's Key Club.

It'll feature performances by Great White, Quiet Riot, Enuff Z'nuff, Slammin Gladys and - in my opinion - the only band worth going to see, L.A. Guns, although I'm unaware which version (Tracii Guns' or Phil Lewis') will be playing.

Tom Morello Speaks Out

These past couple of years, one of the musical projects that have resonated in my heart as much as in my ears is The Nightwatchman, Tom Morello's solo project after years as lead guitarist of seminal band Rage Against The Machine and the Pearl Jam-sounding side project Audioslave with Chris Cornell.

If anything, The Nightwatchman makes up for Audioslave's lackluster last 2 records, including one which I hold responsible for the end of my purchasing CDs on a regular basis.

In an interview with Gibson Guitars' website, he talks about the origin of his Nightwatchman project, as well as the early 90s' then-emerging rock scene (with a few choice quotes about Pearl Jam's influence in later music) and the five records that influenced him the most - two of which would maybe make my own list, but I'd take Public Enemy's Fear Of A Black Planet over It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back.

Red Hot Chili Peppers: Back On Track?

After a decade of releasing albums with only two types of songs - Under The Bridge-like ballads or Give It Away-style semi-funkers - and the most boring double-album of all time, Stadium Arcadium, it seems the Red Hot Chili Peppers are back to doing what they do best: original, actually funky tracks reminiscent more of 70s-funk made today than L.A.-pop and stupid lyrics.

Listen to the first track here:

Then again, in an interview on Gibson Guitars' website, Flea mentioned they recorded 70 songs for their next release, and didn't necessarily put the ''best'' ones on it. And no other song sounds like The Adventures Of Rain Dance Maggie, so I wouldn't go out and recommend it quite yet.

Van Nailed 'Em!

Some stories deserve to be read elsewhere than just on music-specific websites...

Here's the deal: Irving Azoff has a day job: he manages rock band Van Halen. Now, I don't want to debate over the quality of the rock that Van Halen delivers - at least not today - but we can all agree that they've reached some level of success.

As their manager, Azoff has time and time again criticized scalpers and bootleggers as being the worst possible scum on earth.

When came the time to expand his horizons, however, he decided to found Front Line Management, a concert ticket 'brokering' company that profits from selling tickets at a higher price than face value.

Oh, but that wasn't enough. Front Line Management was co-owned by ticket giant Ticketmaster, a major ticket distributor if there is one... you can see it coming can't you?

Like every stupid idea, this one needed an obvious name, hence 'Project Showtime', which consisted of pulling (i.e. never putting on the actual market) the best tickets in the house and giving them to private sellers, who would sell them on Ticketmaster's affiliate, Front Line Management. At a 70% cut of all profits above face value (sometimes twenty times the actual cost), of course, for the band, its manager, and Ticketmaster.

And who came up with this scheme? Azoff, of course. But he also called it off, because none of the thieves who were part of it trusted each other enough to keep it going.

And what is Azoff's new side-job nowadays? Ticketmaster’s chief executive, of course.

And only Gibson Guitars' website has run this story so far, apart from the Wall Street Journal who did the investigating. Nice.

The 15 Stupidest Musician's Quotes of 2008

Leave it to a guitar manufacturer's website to come up with an original list of Top Tens (we,, fifteen, actually) for year's end: The 15 Stupidest Musician's Quotes of 2008. Some really are the dumbest fucking things, for sure, but others got me thinking ''wait, you mean to tell me Britney Spears didn't say anything dumber than that in all of 335 so far in the year''?

Then again, does she qualify as a musician? She doesn't have Mariah Carey's vocal chords, to say the least. Heck, she doesn't even have Chris Martin's. By the way, both Carey and Martin made the list. Sort of.