2011 - This Time In The Other Direction, Meet The Staff At 360 Degrees, Live Green Day, And More!

Welcome to 2011... again! In the last blog, I highlighted a few stories on how 2011, barely a week old, got off to an interesting start. We also looked back at 2010 for a bit. Moving forward, we'll look at more upcoming stuff and who knows what else.

The big buzz over the past few days has been about the live Green Day album that's coming out in March. This may be old news for some of you, but the band is releasing a 2 disc CD on March 15th called "Awesome as F**k". All material was recorded on their latest tour. No other details are available at this time, except Amazon.com states that a DVD will also be included with the bundle that contains footage of the band performing live. The trailer has been all over the net, so what the heck - let's throw our hat into the ring!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZcCJBr_Nh4

In some other "tag line" news bits, we look at some polar opposites;
- We mentioned a while back that Coldplay is working on a new album. There's still no release date yet, but they'll be working two producers - Brian Eno and Markus Dravs. Rating = Cool!
- After a two year hiatus, Britney Spears "couldn't wait" to leak her new single, "Don't Hold It Against Me" through iTunes over the weekend. As a good friend of mine said about the song, "Sometimes the jokes just write themselves". 'Nuff said. Rating = Not Cool!

Trent Reznor, the front-man for Nine Inch Nails, is doing another movie soundtrack. You may remember he did the music for David Fincher's movie The Social Network. Trent's latest project will be the score for the American film adaptation of Stieg Larsson's bestselling book The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, which is also being directed by Fincher and slated to hit theaters around Christmas 2011. According to Reznor, the upcoming soundtrack will be more performance oriented and less programmed.

Here's your chance to shape the future of rock n' roll! Converse in association with Rolling Stone magazine is hosting a contest called "Get Out Of The Garage". Kind of like an on-line "American Idol", you get to vote for one of the top 10 finalists. The winning band will be the opening act on the Get Out Of The Garage tour that kicks off in March down in Austin Texas for a 6 city tour including stops in NYC and LA. Click here to cast your vote.

Speaking of "shaping the future of rock n' roll", I was looking through some history that happened during this week:

- Back in 1977, The Clash sign a world-wide deal with CBS Records with an initial signing bonus worth over 100,000 pounds. Their are rumblings in the underground that The Clash, being the last bastion of the political left, have "sold out". The band plans to release their debut single in less than eight weeks.

- Back in 1978, The Sex Pistols implode in San Francisco, less than 3 months after the release of their debut record on Warner Brothers. The band, at this point, is an absolute train wreck. The bands manager, Malcolm McLaren, is trying to stop the chaos. After their performance at Winterland in the bay city, Johny Rotten says he is through with the Sex Pistols and takes off to San Jose. Bassist Sid Vicious is depressed, suicidal, and constantly wasted. He almost OD's on heroin 2 days after the show. No one in the band wants anything to do with him. Guitarist Steve Jones & drummer Paul Cook actually plan to go on with the tour without Vicious and Rotten. The final nail in the coffin, is after expenses are subtracted for the show (and everything else) from the bands money, they are left with only $67 to split between the four of them. A day later, Johnny Rotten is in New York & makes a statement to the The New York Post stating that The Sex Pistols are finished... no more... done. He stays with various New York bands, attends some gigs, goes to some clubs, and then disappears into the city.

Finally, I received an email on Saturday asking an unusual question. The sender (also a fan of the station) wanted to know how come there are no pictures of the staff at 360 Degrees of Alternative on the website, on the Facebook page, etc. I had to admit, I never really thought about it. But, without further ado, here is the staff -


1). Gunther; IT specialist - Gunther is our "go to" guy when we experience any technical glitches, which thankfully, are very few. It's amazing what this guy did with all this equipment in a space the size of a small closet. He's working on some cool upgrades that we hope to have on-line in the very near future. He also keeps me in line when we experience "hiccups" and gives me those puppy dog eyes...


2). Yogi; Human Resources Manager - Yogi comes to us from overseas with a wealth of knowledge and life experience. He keeps the station flowing and keeps everyone on track (including me) when things get a bit hectic. I must admit, he is one of the more relaxed characters I've ever met and that's one of the main reasons why is is so key to this operation.

3). Baxter; Assistant Program Director & "Party Animal" - Believe it or not, Baxter is not all fun and games. He has quite the pulse on the alternative rock scene, especially on what's new and up & coming. He helps me keep on top of the latest news, trends and groups. Ironically, he and Gunter get along great!





That's about it for now. Until next time, keep listening and thanks!
Peace out,
Dave