Joe Kavanagh's Music News

He may be a living legend to some, and a bone fide national treasure in Ireland, but recent reports in the media suggest that Shane MacGowan did not fit the bill when Simon Cowell went looking for musicians to participate in his star-studded remake of REM's Everybody Hurts; a single aimed at raising funs for the ongoing relief effort in Haiti. In an interview with UK tabloid, The Star last week, retro-chic UK singer Paloma Faith, was discussing her current collaboration with the renowned Pogues singer when she claimed: "Simon Cowell didn't want Shane in his perfectly created thing and we wanted to help." Further accounts reveal that in addition to Faith, Shane has also enlisted the assistance of such stars as Nick Cave, Chrissie Hynde, Primal Scream's Bobby Gillespie, The Clash's Mick Jones and Hollywood heart-throb Johnny Depp, for a remake of Screamin' Jay Hawkins' 1956 classic, I Put A Spell On You. The single will be released at the end of February, with all proceeds going to Dublin-based charity, Concern Worldwide, which currently has over 100 staff members working in Haiti and has purportedly distributed 135,000 liters of fresh water every day since the earthquake struck...

While we are on the subject of Irish singers and their charitable endeavors, Bono has participated in no less than two charitable singles at last count, both of which are also aimed at assisting the Haitian relief effort. First up was his turn with band mate The Edge, along with Jay Z and Rhianna on the laudable, if rather twee single, Stranded, while he is also allegedly among the vast pool of talent assembled for the remake of We Are The World. Written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Ritchie, the track was originally released in 1985 to raise funds for African famine and featured a plethora of stars such as Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen, along with a veritable who's who of 80s musical talent. The array of luminaries accrued for the updated version is almost as impressive with Snoop Dogg, Usher, Pink, Tony Bennett and dozens of other singers slated to appear on the track. They even managed to get Kanye West to pull his head out of his a**e for long enough to blurt out a few lines. The track will debut on February 12, as part of NBC's coverage of this year's Winter Olympics opening ceremony...

While many people - including some of the participants themselves - are quick to praise the celebrities for offering up their time to contribute to this clutch of charitable releases, don't count AC/DC's Brian Johnson among them. The singer launched a broadside at preachy popstars like Bono, claiming that they would be better served putting their money where their mouth is when it comes to saving the world. Johnson told the Melbourne Sun: "I do it myself, I don't tell everybody I'm doing it. I don't tell everybody they should give money - they can't afford it. When I was a working man I didn't want to go to a concert for some bastard to talk down to me that I should be thinking of some kid in Africa. I'm sorry mate, do it yourself, spend some of your own money and get it done. It just makes me angry." Not usually known for being the most outspoken of stars, Johnson was also in the news last week when he blasted AC/DC fans for launching an online petition, urging the band to change their set list each night during their current Black Ice tour. An exasperated Johnson told news.com.au: "They may cheer at the concerts, they may go home happy... but they only came to hear Thunderstruck. They don't eat, sleep and s*** AC/DC like we do. F*** them! What about the fans who haven't heard (those songs)? There are a few cocky fans. A lot of people now with the computers, they sit on their fat a**es in their house somewhere going 'Oh they played that song last night, they should change it'. Well, b******s to you. I don't think they realize changing a song in a set now is not the same as it used to be. When you include all the lighting guys, the stagehands, the technicians - there are 85 guys who have to know what's happening if you change a song. We're still doing some of the really old stuff. We're not daft. We realize the fans like the old songs." Maybe AC/DC should think about getting someone a little more amenable to deal with such fan concerns...

Speaking of people who aren't the most sympathetic when it comes to dealing with their fans, Ringo Starr was in the news last week, when he became the 2,401st person to be issued with a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame. While the Beatles were issued with a collective star on the famed walkway, Paul McCartney remains the only member of the band yet to be awarded the honor in his own right, but quite how Ringo Starr got one before him is beyond me. It's kind of the equivalent of Ed McMahon getting one ahead of Johnny Carson. Starr also made news last week when he told an interviewer of his newfound faith in God, telling a reporter at the Grammy Museum: "I feel the older I get, the more I'm learning to handle life. Being on this quest for a long time, it's all about finding yourself. For me, God is in my life. I don't hide from that. I think the search has been on since the 1960s. I stepped off the path there for many years and found my way back onto it, thank God." Ringo turns 70-years-old this July and isn't it funny how none of these rock stars find religion during their hedonistic heydays? As Loud Reed sang on the song Strawman: Does anybody need another self-righteous rock singer / whose nose he says has led him straight to God?...

In other ex-Beatles related news, Paul McCartney's crazy ex-wife Heather Mills claims that their acrimonious divorce has left her reputation as a spokesperson for charities in tatters. Speaking to OK magazine last week, Mills blasted: "It (the divorce) destroyed a lot of my charity work - which was hugely upsetting. We had the biggest (land) mine-clearing charity in the world. A certain quarter of the press destroyed that to nothing. Because I didn't get my divorce settlement for a few years I couldn't fund it because I didn't have any money. People didn't want to be associated with it because of all my bad press." Oh right, so the fact that most of the charities whom she claimed to represent in the past had no record of her participation didn't have anything to do with her reputation - such as it was - being further denigrated? With the way she played Paul McCartney and the pay-off she received, I would suggest that Heather Mills is a charity. This woman is battier than Batman acting as batboy for the Baton Rouge Solons...

Speaking of women on the edge, Amy Winehouse is allegedly on her way back to the Caribbean island of St Lucia in the coming weeks, in order to begin work on her long-awaited third album. Maybe I'm mistaken but I could have sworn that that was the reason she was taken from St Lucia back to the UK some months back. And maybe I'm wrong but I also seem to recall that the entire reason for moving her out to St Lucia in the first place was to clean her up and get her away from all of the distractions at home, in order for her to begin work on her third album. Mercy me, this girl is being shuttled around like Howard Hughes trying to use up the last of his frequent flyer miles, but at least it's nice to be writing a music related story about her for a change...

While the sunshine and idyllic surrounds of the Caribbean may seem irresistible to Amy Winehouse, acclaimed soul singer Sade is more at home under the cold gray skies of the UK. Despite several attempts to lure her away from her adoptive home, the Smooth Operator singer claims that she will never leave Britain, telling a reporter: "It can be very hostile, England. Not just to me, to everybody. England's like a sour old auntie. You go and stay with her although she criticizes you all the time and doesn't treat you right, even when you're doing your best. But you keep on loving her, in a certain way. And then you die. Those b**ches always outlive you!" While her love may be true, it's certainly not obvious and I don't think the British Board of Tourism will be calling on her as a spokesperson any time soon. I don't think there's too much future in a slogan like: "Come to the UK. It's more intimidating than the Colosseum circa 90AD, but at least the weather is shite!" ...

Last week saw quirky pop star Mika reveal the torment he went through as a child, when his father was taken hostage in Kuwait, during the hostilities which resulted in the fist Gulf War. Speaking to The Scotsman, the singer claimed that when his father was finally released, he found it difficult to reconnect with him when he arrived home, saying: "He had a big beard and was very skinny and gaunt and none of us wanted to hang out with him because he looked too different." Sounds like an exact description of Christian Bale after he finished shooting The Machinist...

Spice Girl Melanie Brown has entered the studio to begin work on her latest solo album which she hopes will fare somewhat more successfully than her last effort, which sold approximately ten copies upon release - okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit, it was twelve copies. The lady formerly known as Scary Spice says that she intends to take her time working on this album in order to get everything exactly right. I suggest that she should spend at least 1,000 years on it, just to be sure...

Last week saw the Chicago Sun-Times report that Brazilian toyboy Jesus Luz had given Madonna the Spanish archer ( El Bow), only for more stories to appear over the weekend suggesting that the two were still an item. While the state of their relationship remained in doubt as we went to print, friends of Madonna were quoted in several gossip pages as saying that the two had simply run out of things to talk about. Assuming that's true, I'm sure Madonna could have just read him a few fairytales - as long as she avoids Snow White. For the life of me - and for all her money - I can't understand how young Jesus finds a woman with a body like Joe Calzaghe's attractive and if they did break up, at least we've found an answer to what Jesus wouldn't do...

While Madonna's attempts to cross over into the world of film have been nothing short of ludicrously appalling, her ex-husband's move in the opposite direction is meeting with more success. Aware of his limitations, Guy Ritchie has yet to grab a microphone himself, but has occasionally sat in for a jamming session with an Irish traditional act that regularly play at his London pub, The Punch Bowl. So impressed was the Snatch director that he recently set up a record label with the sole intention of breaking the four man act, who now play under the moniker, The Punchbowl Band. Others apparently agree with Ritchie's assessment, as Justin Timberlake, Stella McCartney and Robert Downey Jr. have all given the band glowing reviews in recent times and Universal are now set to release their debut album, Journey, on March 1. I still can't forgive him for Swept Away.