The Record Store Day site has uploaded a PDF of all of the upcoming releases for this year.

The new Steve Earle album (I'll Never Get Out Of This World Alive due out April 26th), produced by T Bone Burnett, includes a song called "Heaven or Hell" that was originally intended to be included on the follow up to Raising Sand but as we all know, the sessions for that album didn't work out. Evidently Earle has cut it as a duet with his wife Allison Moorer for his new record.

I know that Elton John recently called Billy Joel out in a Rolling Stone interview for his alcoholism but according to Elton it was an effort on his part to help Joel by making his problems with alcohol abuse (more) public. Whatever the case, other than one outburst (which was later retracted), he's remained calm about it and has said, "it's just Elton being Elton". Perhaps Sammy feels the same way about Edward, who knows? I've never really had a problem with Hagar but in all honesty it smacks of a way to sell books even though apparently only one chapter of the book is devoted to Edward's drug abuse issues.

You didn't quote the second part of the sentence which reads, "then we started going towards trying to make music portable and lost sound quality" which I'm guessing is a reference to 8-tracks, cassettes and CDs. These days, vinyl is played at 45 rpm. At least that's true of most of the records I've purchased. Records that would normally would have fit on a platter meant to last 40 minutes or more (the traditional length for most vinyl) is now split into 2 LPs. Mp3's aren't going to suddenly disappear from the landscape but some artists are making uncompressed FLAC files available to fans that want them. The Black Crowes and Gregg Allman are two that I can think of just off the top of my head but there are many others.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXHuf5Oo3PY Haven't seen these guys in years but they're still out there touring. Their most recent date in NC was canceled but hopefully they'll be back here again soon.

This explains a lot: "Red" rocker Sammy Hagar says abducted by aliens

Funny how so many people complain about Rolling Stone but when asked to name their favorite music magazines only something like three people have been able to provide an answer. Thing is, people may bitch about someone like Justin Bieber being on the cover recently but what they neglect to mention is the outstanding piece that ran in that very same issue on The Clash. That's how it works, people that don't normally buy Rolling Stone might pick it up just because of the cover but then they end up getting educated on The Clash or whatever other artists are featured in a particular issue. Print is a dying medium so it doesn't bother me in the least that they put a teen idol on the cover (it isn't the first time), it's about the great music writing within that keeps me coming back. I've been a subscriber off and on since the 70s and will most likely continue to be. However, it's not the only music magazine I read. There's also Mojo, Uncut and several others that I pick up on occasion, depending upon the content. Paste went under a year or so ago but they've recently been acquired by Wolfgang's Vault. I'm not sure if they plan to revive the print edition or not but I frequently read their website as well as several other music blogs/ezines. There has been talk of bringing Creem back as well (I also used to read it religiously back in the 70s) but that's yet to happen. In the meantime, they've archived many of their best articles online.

There was definitely an element of "Pop" to the Beatles, that goes without saying. However, there's two sides to the Pop thing, one is that it's a shortened version of the word "Popular". The other is a kind of music known as "Pop" or more specifically, "Power Pop" that applies to everyone from the Beatles to Big Star. I think the argument grew out of someone saying the Beatles were not a "Rock n' Roll" band. That they were and then some.

There's also a new four part video with Mike Mills that you can watch here. The interview covers a lot of the same ground as other interviews surrounding the release of Collapse Into Now have but there's a few different questions asked as well. Of course, the future of R.E.M. beyond Collapse Into Now is covered, part of Mills' answer is: "We'll always make music, will we make it together? I don't know, we'll have to find out". If they do decide to go out with this record, it's a very good one to go out on.

Or buy vinyl that comes with a download card. This hasn't caught on in a huge way yet (for instance, the new R.E.M. doesn't come with a download card) but I sure hope it does. Some artists even include the CD (and download card) with vinyl editions of their albums. I still purchase both CDs and vinyl but have never made a mp3 only purchase and I hope the day never arrives where I have to.

Rock n' roll isn't a competition.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wok2QU3r098 Loved this. One of my favorite scenes is when Danny Kortchmar talks about a piece Lester Bangs wrote called James Taylor Marked for Death in which Bangs fantasizes about disemboweling Taylor with a broken Ripple bottle. Kortchmar says that James could "kick his ass" and that "Lester Bangs isn't remembered". Even though the second part (and maybe even the first) is wrong, I still found it to be funny as hell. Though Taylor has never read the piece, this is what he had to say about it: "If you think [my music] is sentimental and self-absorbed, I agree with you. If you like that kind of thing, then listen to it. If you don't, you don't have to remove it from the face of the earth. It's not for everybody. But to me, there's still something compelling about doing it. Regardless of what the guy with the bottle of Ripple feels." If you missed this when it first aired on PBS' American Masters series earlier this month you can still watch the entire episode online here.

From NPR.org: The MP3: A History Of Innovation And Betrayal by JACOB GANZ and JOEL ROSE iStockphoto.com "I don't like the title 'The Father of MP3,'" says Karlheinz Brandenburg. But he kinda is. "Certainly I was involved all the time from basic research [to] getting it into the market." Brandenburg was part of the group that gave the MP3 its name. The Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) lent its name to the process of digital encoding by which audio and video is compressed into a file small enough to be transferred easily. That process — MPEG Audio Layer III — and the resulting file — the MP3 — is ubiquitous today. But the development wasn't simple, and its outcome wasn't inevitable. The story of the MP3 is the story of how intellectual property became the commodity over which the Internet's greatest wars would be fought, and also how the work that goes into innovating can be forgotten in the face of a technology's rapid spread. Google "history of the MP3" today, and you'll find two options, neither satisfying: brief timelines that privilege the user experience over the process of invention and relentlessly technical, acronym-studded descriptions of the differences between various algorithms. To read the rest of the article click here.

More new Cars, I believe this song is the actual single: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxqxNzlEFM4

That's more of a music magazine that specializes in one thing; more specifically what magazines featuring music journalism does everyone like?

I see a lot of hate here for Rolling Stone but I seldom see praise for any other music magazines. So, what is everyone's favorite music publication?

It's alive and well in 2011.

To a degree. So, if you were able to discover those artists what was keeping you from getting into many of the ones I mentioned? You seem so dead set against music from the 80s yet you were apparently aware of artists beyond what the mainstream had to offer. I just don't understand the outright hatred you have for that decade of music.

Which has exactly what to do with Sammy Hagar working with Jimmy Page? FYI, I joined this board (in it's original incarnation) sometime in 2003 before it became the "official" Zeppelin board in 2007. Anything you have said beyond that is a product of your overactive imagination and apparently intense case of paranoia.

The 70s didn't have this:

He also "dreams" of working with Edward Van Halen again, then proceeds to refer to him as a "fruitcake" in his new tell all book. What he has to say about Edward may very well true but I seriously doubt it endears him to him any.

Really. So what exactly were you listening to in the 80s?

A fine example of a band that's been around since the 80s and is still turning out great, kick ass music. On top of that, it's a great video to boot with lots of images sure to induce a flashback.