Michael Jackson tribute turning into poorly-executed shambles

When they said they were going to pay tribute to Michael Jackson, who knew they were going to focus on the 'quite often didn't turn up and when he did it was disappointing' aspects of his career.

Parts of the plan have been dropping off like arms falling from a Thriller Zombie. We've had Kiss quit after they remembered how they'd slagged Jackson off.

Yesterday, the Black Eyed Peas announced they won't be in Wales this weekend:

"Due to unavoidable circumstances, the Black Eyed Peas will be unable to perform at this Saturday's Michael Forever event," said Chris Hunt, head of Global Live Events which is staging the concert.

Hey - "unavoidable circumstances" is no way a sign that they couldn't even be arsed to come up with an excuse.

Today, domestically violent Chris Brown said he wouldn't be coming, either, as he couldn't get a visa. But just as the organisers of Michael Forever were absorbing this good news came another problem: the company which had promised to run the gig as a pay-per-view event through Facebook has said it won't be:

Due to legal challenges brought by the music labels that own the rights to Michael Jackson’s lyrics, we have been notified by concert promoters Global Live Events and Ridgeline Entertainment that the live Facebook broadcast of the Michael Forever tribute concert has been cancelled. As the technology provider behind the live Facebook broadcast, Milyoni will fully refund all customers who pre-purchased access to the concert using Facebook Credits or PayPal.

“While social media presents a new opportunity for artists and concert promoters to reach global audiences, it is still a new and disruptive frontier ripe with challenges. Milyoni will continue to work closely with our music and entertainment partners to pursue this new channel of distribution, beneficial to both artists and fans worldwide.”

That's literally several people being mildly disappointed.

Jackson concert organisers admit maybe hiring people who think he fiddled with kiddies "an oversight"

I don't know if they're actually planning to use the title "The Ill-Fated Michael Jackson Tribute Concert" formally, but, boy, it fits.

Latest nightmare for the organisers of the Cardiff concert is having to uninvite Kiss from the bill after being reminded of this:

Some of [Gene] Simmons' harshest comments came last year in an interview with Classic Rock magazine. "Well, you know, where there's smoke there's fire," Simmons said regarding accusations that Jackson abused young boys. "There's no question in my mind he molested those kids. Not a doubt."

You know, says Global Events CEO Chris Hunt, perhaps putting Kiss on the bill was a bad idea:

"Under the circumstances, we fully agree that even though Kiss is a band Michael admired, we have no choice but to rescind our invitation to them to appear in our tribute concert," Hunt wrote in a statement.

A slightly more interesting question is why Gene Simmons signed up to pay tribute to a man he believes molested kids.

Is that really much of a tribute?

How great will the sort-of official Michael Jackson tribute concert in Cardiff be, exactly?

They've pulled in Craig David for it:

The R&B singer said he was "honoured" to be booked for the gig, which is scheduled to take place at Cardiff's Millennium Stadium on October 8.

Writing on his official Facebook page, David said:

I am honoured to announce I will be performing alongside some of the world's greatest artists at the Michael Jackson tribute concert.

That suggests either they've worked a long way down the list of dream bookings, or else one of the ice cream concessions has got its staffing sorted.

The tribute gig in Cardiff will celebrate Michael Jackson's strong links with South Wales, remembering his three-year stint doing the HTV weather forecast and that one time he heard an off-colour joke about Shirley Bassey.

Cee-Lo: Um, thanks, I think...

Is it really a great tribute to New York firefighters for Cee-Lo to remake Fuck You as Thank You?

Katy Perry's tribute to Big Star

Well, not her tribute so much as her manager's, but a tribute nevertheless:

"My manager, Bradford, he's from Mississippi, and he's a huge Big Star fan," Perry told EW. "And with the death of one of their members, I had just written that song, and he's like, 'Katy, just for me, will you please title it 'California Gurls,' with a 'u'? People won't even know!' I don't know the whole catalog of Big Star, but I did it because Bradford is one of my best friends, and I thought it was cool, and you know, the kids like those variations."

It was all lovely until she got to "the kids like those variations."

His Sharona

Among those making tributes to Doug Fieger, there's Sharona. His Sharona, as was:

. “I spent the entire weekend with him, with his body [at the services],” she told EW today over the phone. “It was beautiful to see the people who paid him respect on his deathbed — the people who he was the biggest fan of. It was absolutely sinister.” Alperin, who had kept in touch with Fieger until recently, commented on the frontman’s undying zeal for his genre up to the present. “He was so devoted to rock and roll — a walking encyclopedia,” she said. “He would know the b-sides of every single in the day. Just a real fan.” Fieger, who died after battling cancer for several years, “was too young for sure,” said Alperin. “But I’m grateful that he’s out of pain."

Sharona Alperin is now a real estate agent; shrewdly, she sells her houses through mysharona.com.

Apparently, we were all still pretending the Jackson tribute concert was on

Nothing is more surprising than the revelation that people were still busily beavering away on that Michael Jackson tribute gig. Or at least were, as once against, something Jackson is connected to goes to slush. The promotion company, World Awards Media, has wound itself up.

I suspect hardly anyone is keeping the date clear now.

Boyzone plan a "tribute" to Stephen Gately

Apart from inviting Jan Moir to perform a rap on one of the tracks, it's hard to think of a worse idea than the Boyzone Stephen Gately cash-in album.

Sorry, I tried to type 'tribute' but the spell-check keeps correcting it to 'cash-in'.

Boyzone will incorporate a number of tracks which feature Gately's voice on the album, Ronan Keating told Sky News.

Luckily, what with Derek Acorah being busy doing the Michael Jackson seance, Boyzone have got some tapes with Gately's voice on them they can use. Like The Beatles did with John Lennon. Although probably not even as good as that.

Tribute to Swells

Roger Sargent has made this rather wonderful tribute to Steven Wells:

Steven Wells Tribute Film from Roger Sargent on Vimeo.

[Via NME Video blog]

LaToya: What more can I give?

Look, she's giving all the proceeds to charity, right, so there's no way that LaToya Jackson releasing a tribute single to her brother is in any way an attempt to try and bolster her own career, is it?

Even if it's just a track off her forthcoming album. Even then.

Hey! It's a Jay Yay Day

October 11th would have been Matthew Jay's 30th birthday; marking the day and mourning the loss is a special event at the Shepherd's Bush Empire, Further Than Tomorrow. Taking part are a load of Jay admirers and associates, including his backing band, Good Shoes, James 'Starsailor' Walsh and at least one half of Squeeze.

Tribute

Over now, on MySpace: Rare Victory, a musical tribute to Grant McLennan, featuring The Orchids, Trembling Blue Stars, Luke Haines and others; we've posted about this before, but it's worth mentioning again.

Today is the greatest... well, sort of

As part of the ongoing Smashing Pumpkins tribute, Ben Kweller is streaming his cover of Today off his MySpace into your ears.

We thought the idea of a tribute to the Pumpkins sounded really interesting at first, but then when we looked more closely at it, it turned out to be a lot of ill-considered bluster signifying nothing. Which made it a very, very apposite tribute to the Pumpkins.

[Thanks to You Aint No Picasso]

Art imitates... art?

Tribute albums to bands aren't unusual any more - indeed, for a couple of decades it's been hard to flip more than two CDs past the Various Artists divider without turning up "Portsmouth by Portsmouth: South Western Bands sing the music of Mike Oldfield" or "The Men In Black Eyeliner: Goth tribute to Johnny Cash." But, we would suggest, the forthcoming tribute album to Frozen Gold is a first, what with Frozen Gold never having made a record, much less a sound.

Frozen Gold were the band in Iain Banks' Espedair Street; as such, Banks is now having to create some music for the real bands to record.