Over at Eric Beall's Berkleemusic.com blog, there's some discussion ofHall and Oates' suit against their publishing company, Warner/Chappell Music, which they claim has failed to protect "Maneater" from emulation and copying by other artists. If that sounds like a strange charge to you, well, it is, and it's presumably directed at Nelly Furtado, whose song "Maneater" (hmmm) bears some similarities to a certain Hall and Oates track. What makes the whole thing interesting is why Daryl and John are getting litigious:
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Great news, residents of the West Coast: You have the opportunity to hear Chris Cornell emote his way through his collaboration with Timbaland live! East coast residents—including you, S/FJ—are doubly out of luck, since the duo will be hitting up local Verizon Wireless stores for autograph sessions as well.
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It's not even that New Yorker critic Sasha Frere-Jones dislikes the Chris Cornell/Timbaland collaboration Scream. He seems disappointed by it, vexed that someone he idolized let him down.
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I know, guys. I know. Also: Timbaland and Cornell are touring together. Also: Scream, the album from which "Scream" was taken, has apparently had its release date pushed back to next month. But think of it this way: At least this song isn't a remake of that Timbaland/Keri Hilson/Nicole Scherzinger "sexy bank robbery" track from a few months ago. This doesn't mean that it's all that good, mind you. But I'm trying to be a bit more optimistic lately, and this six-minute, sorta-limp song that has some kind of James Bond outro appended to its already-too-long length is bringing out the "well, it could be worse, right?" in me like you wouldn't believe. [YouTube]
Latest by Winning_Personality: oh...mah....gawd! Drum machine? Seriously?! I had a violent reaction by 1:29. more »
Popbitch has revealed the impetus for Timbaland and Chris Cornell's unholy alliance: "To get the gig, Timbaland got hold of Cornell's mobile number and called him up personally to ask him to let him produce the record. He rhapsodied about Soungarden's early albums on Sub Pop, before they signed to a major, to the extent that Cornell realised the producer was a genuine fan and the two bonded." I swear, if this results in the album featuring "Nothing To Say '09", complete with Timbaland doing his "ehh, ehhh, ehhh"s in the background, I quit. [Popbitch]
Was anyone out there really clamoring for a sequel to Timbaland's Shock Value? Well, too bad, there's one coming, and it's on track to have a leftover track from Hard Candy as well as a Jonas Brothers cameo. It was apparently in high demand because the first Shock Value went platinum in "London," which the producer asserts is "the hardest place to go platinum." Sigh. [MTV]
Following an intimate church ceremony that was so casual, the bride and groom wore sweatpants, Timbaland and Monique Idlett (who's also the mother of his infant daughter Reign) had a big-ass formal wedding in Aruba yesterday. Guests included Jimmy Iovine and collaborators past and present: Missy Elliott, Ginwuine, Keri Hilson, Danja, and... wait for it... Magoo! [Us Magazine]
It could be residual inspirational song ear-cheese from last week's American Idol finale, but on first listen I was pretty convinced that Dima Bilan's "Believe," which won the 2008 Eurovision song contest on Saturday night, was an amalgam of this country's Lite-FM staples of the past 12 years—the Enrique Iglesias opening, the bits of Lonestar's "Amazed" and Mariah Carey's various mid-'90s ballads that are strewn throughout. (Although the yoga-ish dancing is, uh, quite original.) Finding out that the recorded version of the track was produced by Timbaland was merely the icing on my "this song would not exist without the songs it is made up of" cake, and it should serve as an ominous sign that the iconic producer has moved on from simply ripping himself off to taking "inspiration" from the songs that his earliest productions provided a radio respite from.
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Latest by solanine: Wow, that first song/performance is so incredibly horrible in every way that it makes me warm inside that such a thing could actually get both played and lauded on TV. more »
Madonna, Justin Timberlake and "Verizon Mobile Producer In Residence" Timbaland have teamed up to make a remix of "4 Minutes" by... Madonna, Justin Timberlake and Timbaland. Evidently the trio went into Verizon Wireless' mobile recording studio after the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame induction ceremony and created this "Underground Remix" of their Top 10 hit for the mobile-phone company. If you take the effort to buy this remix, you'll also get footage of the trio holding hands and dancing around a mic while chanting "Can you hear me now?"
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Latest by ByeBye: @HONEYBFLY: Something about sex and grooving? I'm just guessing. more »
Things That Keeping Fuse On In The Background Taught Me
Not only is Madonna's new single reminiscent of the theme to The Price Is Right, its chorus is also pretty much a carbon copy of the sung hook for Flo Rida's "Elevator." And both songs feature Timbaland, who clearly is getting all of his ideas from hanging out in clubs that are playing nothing but his songs. I just sang the chorus to Madge's song while the video was playing in the background, and it was a perfect match. I encourage you to do the same. (Click the cover for an embed of the "Elevator" clip.)
Madonna's video for "Four Minutes"—featuring Justin Timberlake and Timbaland, and bearing a title that's been chopped down from "Four Minutes To Save The World," presumably for national-security reasons—debuted on the Internet this morning, and its extended JT-and-Madge mating dance not only squicked me out at a way-too-early hour, it had even more indications that Hard Candy will be Madonna's "I'm out of ideas because the whole idea of 'subculture' has bubbled away in the social-networking era" album. The video, and five conclusions to take away from it, after the jump.
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Latest by HomefrontRadio: Wow. I thought 'Die Another Day' was the hook-freeiest song i've ever heard. You'd think with three people writing a song one of them would stumble across something resembling a melody, even by accident. more »
No matter what you think of Timbo, if you want to get a good idea of what the new music industry model might look like, the following clip of Tim at work on his new bus is a good roadmap. It's also pretty awesome.
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Will the latest song from Flo Rida's forthcoming Mail On Sunday, the Timbaland-assisted "Elevator," be as unstoppable as the year's only No. 1 single, his track "Low"? It has hot-spring synths, more product placement capped by shoutouts to Nelly's clothing line, and an attempt to remind listeners of the fact that they enjoyed the "ella, ella" call a few months ago, although back then those syllables were coming from Rihanna and not Timbaland. I'll root for this track's success if only because then maybe the still-kicking "Low" will finally recede from the nation's consciousness, even though on this single—like on his last—the top-billed Flo kind of takes a back seat to his collaborators in every way save "exposed muscles" and "self-glorifying back tattoo." [OnSmash via Sit Down Stand Up]
Latest by jasonelias: I liked Timbaland's earlier work, "Work It" probably the end of the sound and production style I liked. Part of it is also I'm sick of hearing him in the songs and looking at him in the videos. more »
Timbaland is days from unveiling the first installment in a "mobile-only album" released in conjunction with the bastards who overcharge me every month, Verizon, where (slightly less disgruntled) customers can purchase one new track a month (made on a bus, like Keith Partridge with creepy ill-gotten bodybuilder musculature) for the next 11 months. Rumored collaborators include Taylor Swift, Chris Cornell, and OneRepublic. (Naturally.) It will be precisely as crummy as Shock Value except it will be trapped on people's phones, unless they work out a radio deal. In which case we might be looking at another "The Way I Are." (Cool.) Which also means we might be looking at another "Apologize." (No.) [Billboard]
Sure, British tabloids exist to exaggerate, but even accounting for a purple-tipped editing pen being used to punch up these rumors straight from the London set of Madonna's next video, we're already a little wary about the premiere of the final product. But maybe you've long harbored secret fantasies about engaging in S&M with bodybuilding pop superproducers?
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The latest single to emerge from Timbaland's Shock Value is "Scream," a Nicole Scherzinger/Keri Hilson track filled with bad sex metaphors (cake! pie! designated driving!) that Interscope, no doubt, has released in large part because the label's suits still holding on to hope that someone will eventually give a damn about the lead Pussycat Doll's singing/orgasmic moaning abilities.
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Idolator
Over at Eric Beall's Berkleemusic.com blog, there's some discussion of Hall and Oates' suit against their publishing company, Warner/Chappell Music, which they claim has failed to protect "Maneater" from emulation and copying by other artists. If that sounds like a strange charge to you, well, it is, and it's presumably directed at Nelly Furtado, whose song "Maneater" (hmmm) bears some similarities to a certain Hall and Oates track. What makes the whole thing interesting is why Daryl and John are getting litigious:
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Popbitch has revealed the impetus for Timbaland and Chris Cornell's 
