the fyrehaus

• Radiohead will play a free gig to be aired on BBC Radio 2. [NME]
• Stream the new albums of We Are Scientists and The Teenagers at NME.com [NME]
• REM will stream ITS new album a week early via iLike, the social networking widget you can use on Facebook and iTunes, etc. [Guardian]
• Brit School gals Amy Winehouse, Adele, Kate Nash, and Katie Melua want to form a supergroup. It’s like the anti-Girls Aloud. [NME]
• Muse wants to launch UFOs at the audience at the V Festival. Apparenly, V pays well enough that they want to spend the money on something really crazy. [DS]

• Ringo Starr doesn’t want you to ask him about his time in the Beatles [DS]
• Clive Davis things that singers shouldn’t insist on writing their own songs [DS]
• Liam Gallagher waxes his chest and eyebrows [DS]
• The Flaming Lips, Goldfrapp, and Jack Penante to headline Lovebox Weekender along with The Human League and Groove Armada in London on July 19-20. [DS]
• Noel Gallagher has taken up shooting and bought some guns. Also Kenicke pulled a knife on him. [DS]
• Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails to headline Lollapalooza in Chicago’s Grant Park, August 1-3 [Brooklyn Vegan]
• Kate Nash, The Hoosiers, and One Night Only added to T in the Park lineup. [NME]
• The Sex Pistols, Paul Weller, and The Hives are playing the EXIT Festival in Serbia, July 12,-16. [NME]
• Kasabian will headline the Creamfields Festival in Cheshire, August 23-24. [NME]
• Franz Ferdinand, Damon Albarn, Reverend and the Makers, and Hard-Fi played the Africa Exprez gig on March 6. I could go for a boot of that. [NME]
• Amy Winehouse, The Pogues, and The Charlatans have been added to the lineup of the Oxegen Festival in Ireland. [NME]
• NOFX will air tour documentary on Fuse. [Punknews]

• Blur drummer Dave Rowntree to stand for election to Parliament for Labour, for the Cities of London and Westminster seat. [DS]
• Prince needs hip replacement surgery. [DS]
• The Prodigy, Panic at the Disco, and Stereophonics have all been added to the Oxegen festival this summer, July 11-13 in County Kildare. [NME]
• Winehouse to get her own lines of fashion and makeup. Hell, I’d buy her eyeliner, that stuff lasts for DAYS. [NME]
• Spiritualized and Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. lined up for Dot to Dot Festival in Nottingham, May 24 - 25. The 1990s and Caribou are the only other bands on that list I recognize, and I will refrain from making a crass, American joke about Robin Hood. [NME]
• The Von Bondies have completed their 3rd album, ‘Love Hate and then There’s You’ set for summer release. They also completed a 4-track EP entitled ‘We Are Kamikazes Aimed Straight For Your Heart’ which is available from their MySpace now. [NME]

Billy Joel to play last show in Shea Stadium
White Stripes release Spanish language single
Sergio Leone directs new Arcade Fire video
The Teenagers enjoyed North America and made a video about it.
Johnny Marr and Ryan Jarman jamming backstage
Amy Winehouse could write new James Bond theme if she says clean
Idolator asks: 16 years after it was invented, why can’t we ringtone (w)rap it up with a musical condom?

Mark Ronson has told Rolling Stone that he and Amy Winehouse are thinking about doing a Christmas/Hannukkah album for next year. I’m kvelling.

“We’re talking about making a holiday record, with Christmas songs on one side and Hanukkah songs on the other. She’s got songs called ‘Kosher Kisses’ and ‘Alone Under The Mistletoe’. She was kind of messing around, but I was like, ‘You have all these amazing records to play for Christmas, like Motown and Carla Thomas and the Charlie Brown Christmas, and unfortunately, us Jews have nothing that cool to listen to. So we should do something.’”

Quote shamelessly stolen from The Music Slut

Pete Doherty has apparently hired himself a personal trainer and has been seen jogging around London.

Pete, at the end of last year (known by the soubriquet 2007), had been spotted running on the streets of London. This seemed to contradict his reputation as a self-destructive junkie, but also conform to his image as a contrarian sort who would never do anything you’d expect him to.

This conundrum is only put into greater relief by today’s news, as reported by the estimable The Goss column in the Daily Star, that Pete has hired himself a personal trainer in the way of, say, an investment banker who’s reached the age of 30 and realises that they may have money and the perfect house in Fulham but their body is the equivalent of the slops from a fishmonger’s floor.

Reports the Goss: “Pete is so serious about getting fit - with plans that include running the London Marathon - he sees a personal trainer called Jess six days a week.

“Our mole said: ‘Peter works out with Jess every day [Pete observes the Zoroastrian six-day week]. They run together, do weights and three times a week work out with Pilates moves.’”

With all that exercise going on, how will he fit in the smack?

You know, if he can kick smack and get in shape, can’t we all?

Click over to see further updates about Amy Winehouse and her tan, and Lily Allen who fucking hates text speak.

Embracing the people is really in over at the Guardian this year, with all their online content, which is totally awesome. They ran their first ever end of the year readers’ poll, and there are very few surprises: Radiohead has the best album and is the best band, LCD Soundsystem’s “All My Friends” is the best single, Amy Winehouse the best solo artist. (No, I’m not reprinting all the lists.)

The best one is this, though: The Top Ten Most Likely To Go Missing in a Canoe and Resurface in Panama.

1) Amy Winehouse
2) Pete Doherty
3) Morrissey
4) Britney
5) James Blunt
6) Klaxons
7) Lily Allen
Spice Girls
9) Richie Manic
10) Mr Winehouse

Radiohead was glad to be voted best band instead of this one, as “We’d be rubbish in a canoe because Ed’s so much bigger than the rest of us, it’d be like the end of Titanic.”

The comments are hilarious as always, complete with complaining about how sucky the list is. The readers’ poll. The people have spoken, and I’m sorry you’re SO indie and awesome, but the people who voted like Radiohead for some reason.

And it was good.

A “pal “of Amy Winehouse’s has tipped Smart off as to her management’s plans to send the singer to rehab in Israel, not just because she’s Jewish but because they’ve found a rehab centre that runs a one-week course and think they can convince the singer to go because of its brevity.

Seriously folks, I can’t make this shit up.

If you like British rock, schedenfreude, or drugs, you should be reading the Guardian music section online. Then you’d see many gems like this one: Housewarming with Amy and Pete

“Your husband’s in prison, tour’s been cancelled and you’re crippled by drug addiction. What’s the last thing you need?”

Um, a poke in the eye with a big stick?

“A 4am visit from Pete Doherty”.

Oh yes, apparently Crackhead Pete (a moniker we say with love) showed up at Amy Winehouse’s new flat with dirty fingernails and left at 9 AM. Everything else is just speculation.

You can also play a game that I used to play at my old office, called “Guess who got arrested today?” I’m sure you can figure out the answer, all my interns always did.