Monday Morning Newsletter (2-23-09)

Next week the three-day Harvest Of Hope festival will take place in St. Augustine at the St. John's County Fairgrounds. It’s proceed benefit Harvest of Hope, a non-profit bringing aid to migrant workers. Bands on the bill include Paint It Black, Against Me!, The National, Deerhunter, Propagandhi, Bad Brains, and over 100 others.

R&B singer Solange Knowles managed to overdose in Nyquil this week. The singer popped a number of Nyquil flu tablets while on an air flight. She blacked out and woke up in the baggage claim then was taken to the hospital. …But isn’t that what Nyquil is supposed to do?

The Michigan Brewing Company is working with the Bull-god himself, Kid Rock on a new line of beer, which should be in stores this spring. The Michigan Economic Growth Authority has wisely granted them a $700k tax break towards the booze-project. Christian rocker Gavin DeGraw will be releasing a new record Free, on March 31. It was produced by Camus Celli. To promote the 10-song release, DeGraw will be doing a stretch of small-venue dates across the U.S. called the bore-us-to-death tour.

In an unnatural use of the term “super group” band Tinted Windows is composed of Ex-Smashing Pumpkin guitarist James Iha, Fountains of Wayne bassist Adam Schlesinger, Taylor Hanson of Hanson and Cheap Trick drummer Bun E. Carlos. It’s kind of a celebrity B-list definition of “super.” Their debut album is set for a spring release and their debut performance at Billboard’s South by Southwest showcase on March 20.

Henry Rollins lost his gig at KDLD in L.A. when the station flipped formats last month. KCRW took the opportunity to snatch up the aging punk icon. His program there will run Saturday nights from 6-8 p.m., starting March 7. Welcome back Henry.

ELO Bassist Kelly Groucutt died this week. He performed on most of ELOs hits throughout the 1970s including “Mr. Blue Sky” and “Livin' Thing.” He left over a royalty payment disagreement in the early 1980s but remained active enough to cut a solo album that same decade. He died Thursday of a heart attack. He was 63.

Somebody hacked the twitter account of Miley Cyrus this week. Apart from being hysterically funny on its own, the hacker twittered such Shakespearean quips as “IM NOT A FUCKIN ROLE MODEL I HATE LITTLE KIDS I ONLY DO HANNAH MONTANNA FOR DA $$$$$$$$” and my favorite “ME AND MANDY HAD SEX IN HANNAH MONTANNA WIGS.”