"WE ARE PLEASED TO PUT THE MATTER BEHIND US": Clear Channel have settled a lawsuit it was facing in Colorado, although, oddly, it is refusing to admit any wrongdoing. The entertainment conglomerate had been facing legal action from a promoter in Denver who claimed that Clear Channel's radio stations wouldn't play music by bands playing at Denver venues not owned by Clear Channel. A federal judge had ruled the promoter, Nobody in Particular, had enough of a case to allow a full trial. Strangely, Clear Channel - who accept no wrongdoing - decided it would make more sense to settle the matter out of court, rather than go to trial and demonstrate that it wasn't doing anything wrong. We've said it before, but we do find it incredibly generous of these big companies that - although, of course, they're doing nothing wrong - they'd rather pay cash sums to rival companies than go to the trouble of showing how good and ethical they are under oath. Still, Clear Channel's executive vice president and chief legal officer says that he's happy: "We are pleased to put the matter behind us." Let's just hope there aren't promoters in, say, San Diego, or New York, or Tuscon who have a similar problem with them.

GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN US?: Oh shit, no sooner had we (and, it seems, the entire electronic world) raided the champagne closet to celebrate the end of Creed that Creed have reunited: the non-Scott Stapp members have formed a new band which they insist isn't just Creed without Scott Stapp, despite being, erm, Creed without Scott Stapp. The name to avoid is Alter Bridge. Write that down somewhere prominent, so you don't end up going to their gigs by accident.

Worse, Stapp is hooking up with The Tea Party to record a solo album. (Yes, we know that that doesn't quite make any sense). It's like when you cut an earthworm in half and get two worms, only without the possibility of being saved by a hungry blackbird.

THEY'LL BE LUCKY, SURELY?: Interesting little appendage on yesterday's Radio One entertainment news mail out:

Are you a female aged 25 or over who listens to Radio 1 and lives in the Greater London area? We're looking for someone who would be happy to talk about their lifestyle and interests at a radio event next week. It will take place between 6pm and 8pm on Thursday 10 June

Surely, with the onward march of the Colin Murrays, Chris Moyleses and Vernon Kays, grown-up women who listen to Radio One must be in pretty short supply? Perhaps they're trying to track one down so they can just parade her onstage - "see, we do have listeners over the age of ten..."

COWBOYS PICK WINDY 'UNS: No, no, no, Cowboy Junkies - while there's much to applaud in your top ten british punk songs ever selections, how on earth could you put Anarchy in the UK first? Higher than I Found That Essence Rare? You've got to be kidding - it's like doing a top ten restaurants and putting McDonalds ahead of Villa Romana on Wood Street, Liverpool.

TELL THE BNP TO FUCK OFF FROM THE BACK OF A LORRY: The Love Music Hate Racism team have come up with a replacement for the festival which collapsed when Pete Doherty wandered off to try some cheeses in France - they're having a rolling, lorry back festival around London on Sunday 6th. The bands involved will be Art Brut, The Fades, Skeme & Big P, Navigator, Demolition Man, MCs Foxy & Eksman and - of course - many more, and the festival-on-a-low-loader can be caught at the following locations:

11-1 Finsbury Park
1.30-2.00 Wood Green
2.45-3.30 Camden Town
4.15-4.45 Brixton
5.30-6.00 Brick Lane/Shoreditch

There's surely nothing more fitting for the 60th anniversary of D-Day than helping ensure Europe remains free from fascism for another sixty years.

JET OFF: Glastonbury looking slightly more attractive now, then, with the news that Jet have quit the bill for reasons of family illness. Now all we need is for Oasis to come up with a prior appointment.

WHO SAID GOD DOESN'T ANSWER YOUR PRAYERS?: Creed have split. What a way to go into the weekend.

PROBABLY NOT GOING TO BE A MANICS FILM NOW: It was all looking good for a movie with the Manic Street Preachers in it. Karl Francis, the Cardiff movie maker, was on board, and an application for funding had gone into the Welsh film board, Sgr n. Then Karl Francis decided to call the board of Sgr n all the names under the sun, including people incapable of selling faggots and peas in Cardiff market. We're guessing the application might not get quite the rosy reception it was expecting. Hint to Karl: Best to wait until you've got the cash before slagging off the guy holding the wallet.

"I HAVE A MALE LOVER" LINE OF DEFENCE ABANDONED: It seems that any hope of Nathan Moore of avoiding a fine for kerbcrawling by using the "I'm in a gay relationship" gambit to make it seem impossible that he'd have been trying to buy sex with a lady were abandoned when his legal team realised that maybe magistrates might not be unfamiliar with the concept of bisexuality. Oddly, despite having pleaded guilty, as is the way with pop stars, Nathan emerged from court still claiming to be innocent. Apparently he pleaded guilty to "stop the intrusion." Because nothing stops people looking at you like a kerbcrawler like saying "I am a kerbcrawler."

He was fined GBP250, or three times up the arse, twice without a condom, once over the tits and a standard with no kissing.

CROSSING IN THE MIDDLE: Reuters report that Heavy metal bands get softer (i.e. Kittie have recorded a song in a slightly quieter version), while Broadway gets darker (i.e. someone playing a kiddie sex fiend has been nominated for a Tony). This suggests that all music will eventually become Fred Durst by 2017.

HANG ON LASSES, AMERICA'S CALLING: The Sugababes must have been delighted to discover that, just as they thought they'd never have to see each other's pouty faces ever again, their management have decided to capitalise on their "success" in America - Hole in my Head has entered the Hot 100 at, erm, 98. So the leaky Sugababes boat is being forced to punt across the water. Yep, shutting Mutya and Heidi up in airplane together. That'll work.

Mis-Teeq are apparently doing "well" (comparatively well, compared to say, Robbie or Kylie) with a top 60 hit. Oddly, Busted are also having a crack at the US, but they've elected to start in the same way as in the UK, with the two-year old That's What I Go To School For. Blimey, and they think the Harry Potter cast are getting too old to play schoolkids... the Americans are going to think it's a revival of Please Sir.

PING PONG: Amongst the babies being thrown out with the Warner bathwater: Stereolab, dropped by Elektra, a label they've been with for over ten years. (Actually, the label has also gone, merged out of existence). The Breeders could also be for the chop. But don't the RIAA keep telling us CD prices are high so that record labels can support bands with less stellar sales?

THANKS, THE DARKNESS: Great. Just when we were on the point of being shot of the Wildhearts forever, the Darkness go and invite them to be tour buddies and keep the blood band alive. Why not go the whole hog and get Therapy? to make a new album, Justin?

HOOKERCLOTHES FOR TWO YEAR OLDS: It's in The Sun, so approach with caution, but Madonna's planning on launching a range of clothes for twos-to-teens featuring miniskirts and see-through tops. Is anyone else reminded of the Fry & Laurie sketch where Laurie's businessman is asked by Fry's banker if it's entirely ethical to be selling heroin, and Laurie looks confused and starts going through his paperwork saying "I think Sophie did me a graph on that somewhere..."?

YOUNG WOMAN THINKS ABOUT SEX; "THIS CHALLENGES ALL OUR PRECONCEPTIONS" SAY SCIENTISTS: This might shock you, but apparently Janet Jackson had sexual thoughts even before the Superbowl.
"As I've gotten older, I've come to realize that I had a very active sexual mind at a very young age. I hope that doesn't sound bad."

("I hope that doesn't sound bad" = "Is that okay for your strapline, or do you want me to throw something lesbian as well?") Shouldn't CBS have screened her to discover this before they let her appear on television? Her first crush was Barry Manilow - now, that does sound bad - before she moved on to Teddy Pendergrass when she was 12. Currently, Janet has an - ahem - "alterego" called Strawberry, who is the "most sexual" of all her alteregos.

HE'S COMING FOR AMERICA: "Cullum Is Different Kind of Jazz Star" warns Associated Press. Yes, a demonic one. Don't look in his eyes:

"For me, jazz is the widest platform possible to do everything I want to do. I can pull from so many camps when I'm playing jazz ... from rock 'n' roll, pop, hip-hop, dance and classical. When I was playing rock 'n' roll, it was much more rigid. ... In jazz, I can be different every night."

Can be; chooses not to be, apparently.

Although AP seems to be just doing a welcoming puff piece, we suspect they did sneak in this coded message:

Cullum's CD hardly captures the excitement of his live performances. He is no "scooby-doo" style crooner, but more like "Scrappy Doo"

Now, comparing Cullum to the most irritating, ill-conceived cartoon character - remembered only for turning up and spoiling everything - has to be a signal, doesn't it?

HOW MACCA AND LENNON GOT TO BE RICH: They only paid Peter Blake two hundred quid for making the Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band sleeve. Blake's still smarting over this, nearly forty years later - he told Apple to go slice themselves when they asked him to do some work during that flurry of anthology stuff a while back - but while he might not have got paid much, he's not done badly out of the Sgt Peppers job: certainly, whenever he pops up in the media, it seems to be to bang on about how "Shirley Temple's on the front three times, you know." Two hundred quid and several thousand good lunches, then.

I HAVE ALWAYS RELIED ON THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS: Who's to know? Maybe when Croatian pop star Severina Vuckovic stood up and said "look, there's some pictures of me shagging that have been posted on the internet, so if you come across them, just delete them, will you? Oh, and let the police know", perhaps people will say "fair enough, then" and destroy them. And, to be fair, when www.index.hr first ran the photos, they were careful to preserve as much of Vuckovic's dignity as you can while running pics of her getting it in both ends. Editor Matija Babic says "We did not want to show her breasts, let alone anything more." That's restraint for you right there.

DID WE SAY IT WAS DOWNLOADING THAT WAS KILLING MUSIC? HANG ABOUT A MINUTE...: With the number of illegal downloads on the way back up again, it looks like the music industry is going to turn its attention back to people making copies of their own CDs, by introducing new technology that will, somehow, stop people copying CDs more than once, or something. We're not quite sure how it's meant to work, but it's delicious to think after all this time, they're resurrecting 'home taping is killing music' as a battle cry.

HOW MANY MUSIC INDUSTRY FAT CATS WILL WIND UP INSIDE?: Poor music biz execs; as if having Camden Council wanting to throw them in jail isn't bad enough, the Sarbanes-Oxley act - an American measure introduced after the Enron clusterfuckage to try and ensure good corporate governance - could allow artists to finally hold their paymasters to account: just by buying a single share of stock in their company, they could accuse the board of failing to comply with the act and demand a full, independent audit of the company's finances. Richard Menta explains it all in loving detail, concluding "the rules have changed."

[via blogcritics, who've been having an upheaval of their own over the last day as they shift from one hosting company to another - apparently Bloghosts just pulled the plug without warning]

WHAT HAVE WE DONE TO DESERVE THIS?: Come on, a joke's a joke but does the World really deserve to be hit by a second Kelly Osbourne album? It's not like anyone actually got round to buying the first one, is it?

"MOVING ON SIR, IT APPEARS YOUR FATHER WAS A BANK ROBBER...": You'd actually have thought that a singer in a Clash tribute band would have been all over the lyrics to Clash songs anyway, so it's probably doubly unfortunate that London Calling's bassist Mike Devine had to text a chunk of Tommy Gun to singer Reg Shaw. Because he screwed up the number, and the text went astray to someone else, who didn't recognise "How about this for Tommy Gun? OK - so let's agree about the price and make it one jet airliner for 10 prisoners" as being a Clash reference, and told the police. Mike Devine wound up being interviewed by police - although he's probably lucky; if Blunkett had got there first he'd be dangling from his gonads in a secret camp in the Isle of Wight by now. Or, at the very least, breaking rocks in the hot sun.

Reg, for god's sake, if you need help with White Riot, use the telephone.

CHILDREN'S BOOKS - THE NEW MUST-HAVE FOR A CELEB: God, we prefered it when it was all fitness videos or books of out-of-focus polaroids. Now, the celeb with too much time on their hand seems to think that they can best serve the cause of humanity by churning out children's books. LeAnn Rimes is about to unleash three on us, Madonna - of course - has got her scary English Roses sideline; Stan Cullimore from the Housemartins writes books about hippos. We guess the thinking is "they're kids, they'll eat anything, won't they?"

Although actually, Stan's books are quite good.

HEY, YOU DIDN'T BLOG THIS, FRED: Apparently, having sniffed about Britney Spears, Fred Durst has tried to move on to Avril Lavigne. Probably heard her going on about how much she has in common with Marilyn Manson and thought "Hey, I'm also a middle-aged man pretending to be angry and scary, so I must be in with a chance, too." Gossip says that Fred got fixated on Avril after she'd asked him for an In-n-out burger. You can seem why a simple man might have got the wrong idea from that.

LIBERTINES CRISIS LEADS TO CANNING OF ANTI-RACISM FESTIVAL: Oh, bugger - the Love Music Hate Racism gig has been axed for Sunday as The Libertines can't go on. It seems that the band had been hoping Pete would have been back in the fold in time for Sunday, but now reckon he'll still be lost in France, and so pulled out. Without a headline act, the organisers decided to call it a day and axed the gig, although we'd have thought the message was more important than the running order. It's a bit of a shame that one bloke's personal demons has cancelled out an attempt to get out the anti-Nazi vote. The BNP must be pissing themselves.

MORE AND MORE COMPLICATED: Dear Avril, Yesterday you were quoted in an interview saying how if you were going to swap images with someone, it would be Jessica Simpson, right? And so, Jessica Simpson must be square with you. Britney, we know, isn't, because she dresses like you "should only dress for your boyfriend."

So, Avril, how come Jessica is an acceptable role model while Britney isn't? Why is dressing like this:



for an awards show okay with you, when dressing like this:



for a stage show isn't? We're very confused.

JACKSON CLEARED. A LITTLE: One of the nasty hanging nails on Jacko's back, the bloke who popped up claiming he'd just remembered being abused by Michael Jackson back in the 80s, has been pulled from Michael's paw; LA Police couldn't find anything to make further investigation of the claims worthwhile. It's unclear if, on being told the news, the accuser said "no... wait... maybe it was Paul Reubens... or that Portuegese TV presenter guy...", or if we just dreamed that bit. That leaves Jackson with the slightly more solid charges facing him but, hey, every step forward, eh?

BROTHER BEYOND THE PALE: What surprises us most about Nathan Moore being caught kerb crawling is this: how on earth can someone from Brother Beyond have the money for hookers?



Apparently, Nathan had the bad luck to be sniffing round while Camden was having a crackdown on prostitution (prostitution, flyposting - they're really having a crack at gentrification, aren't they?)

Moore - who went on for a stint with Worlds Apart and now manages James Fox and Phixx (still no clearer where he's getting the cash from, then)- has been charged with "being a man soliciting a woman for the purposes of prostitution from a motor vehicle while it was in a street or public place, persistently or in such circumstances as to be likely to cause annoyance to the woman solicited or nuisance to other persons in the neighbourhood." If only he hadn't kept playing Phixx on his car stereo, he might have gotten away with it.

KABBALAH NOT AS KEEN ON MADONNA AS SHE IS ON IT: Rabbi Shmuley Boteach isn't very impressed by Madonna's "embracing" of Kabblah, railing that no good will come of it all in an article "Perverted priorities", no less, for somethingjewish.co.uk:

You know your religion is up a creek when [...] the most famous representative of your mystical tradition is simulating lesbian sex with scantily clad pregnant dancers.
Earth to Phillip Berg: Do us all a favor and dump Madonna as your principal spokesperson. Sorry to be so crass, but Madonna is a slut. Yes, she may sing, and she may dance. But she is famous for being a slut. And no religion dare have a slut as its principal representative [...] I realize that Madonna has brought the Kabbalah Center great notoriety and is, according to reports, a contributor to the tune of millions of dollars. But is the Kabbalah Center really so desperate that it is prepared to promote itself through a vulgarian whose main contribution to the culture is porn rock?

Added to which, you know, she's not done a decent album for over half a decade...

Then, her PR steps in, issuing a counter-statement:

"I find Rabbi Boteach’s comments regarding Madonna frightening. His vile attacks on her character and as an artist are staggering for someone who professes to be a religious person. . . . I suggest this man take a look at his own character and what problems he may have that would make him feel that he should make statements about a truly beautiful human being that he does not know in the slightest. . . . Madonna’s relationship with the Kabbalah and her commitment to (their) teachings has been a beautiful experience for her and the fact that Madonna wants to share her lessons . . . is yet another example of her truly generous and loving spirit."

Which, is all nice and everything, but sort of misses the point of what the Rabbi was getting at - which seemed to be "What sort of religion associates itself with a woman whose image is one of a shaggarama on legs?", which would mean that Madonna being a lovely lady he doesn't know in real life would be kind of beside the point. We're just astonished that someone working in PR is suggesting that a Rabbi might have some character flaws.

The Rabbi, of course, strikes back:

"For Madonna to put herself forward as a spiritual spokesperson while continuing to degrade women by simulating sex acts at music concerts, portray full nudity in her movies, and to ridicule lesbians by performing same-sex kisses merely for TV ratings, is a mockery of her claims to a life of spiritual renewal based on the teachings of the Kabbalah. Women like Liz Rosenberg especially, who heave [sic] greatly distinguished themselves professionally through their brains rather than their busts, should be at the forefront of criticizing Madonna’s assault on feminine dignity."

Yeah, wouldn't be holding my breath for Madonna's PR woman to launch an attack on Madonna's behaviour. Now, let's just leave them to it...

THE SWEAR BOX: Madonna has introduced a swear box on her current tour, to stop the cast and crew befouling the air with cusswords. Quite right too, nobody going to see eroticised images of warfare, people singing from electric chairs and simulated lesbian sex are going to want to have their enjoyment ruined by someone using rude words, are they?