Excellent Online

Carl Crack, founding member of ATARI TEENAGE RIOT, has been found dead in his Berlin apartment. The 30-year-old, who had a history of mental illness, was said to have been in declining health due to alcohol and drug abuse. The band were in a one-year hiatus to allow Crack to seek psychiatric help. No official word yet on the cause of death.

Though at press time no official word had been made on the band's web site, NME is reporting as fact today that CATATONIA have split, following the sudden departure of vocalist Cerys Matthews. The band had recently cancelled a UK tour, with Matthews citing "exhaustion and a recurring athsmatic condition" as the sidelining ailment. NME, however, is reporting today that Matthews has been a guest at a London rehab clinic, and checked out just last week to travel to Wales and inform the band of her decision.

If you listen to the UK press then the Stokes are the greatest band since.. umm... the last mediocre band that were hyped beyond belief. I'm trying to listen to the album and ignoring all that crap in the press but it's hard. Even the Stone Roses debut album wouldn't be able to live up to the hype that 'Is This It' is getting.

Excellent Online's own Roberto Nache (himself a veteran midwest radio jock) forwarded to us a VERY interesting bit of news. Ever heard of Clear Channel Communications? They're the world's largest radio network, and they've got their hand in the pot of nearly every radio market in the U.S. Anyhow, in the wake of last week's tragedy in New York, a program director at Clear Channel has sent all of their stations a list of songs considered "questionable" to play while the nation's in shell-shock.

PJ Harvey takes the Mercury Music Prize for her album, "Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea". She beat out several great artist including Elbow, Basement Jaxx and Radiohead.

Tania notified us that the Charlatans have cancelled several dates on their upcoming east coast US tour "due to todays events in New York and Washington".

Four planes were hijacked this morning, two of them crashed into the World Trade Center, one hit the Pentagon in Washington DC, and the last one crashed in a rural area in Pennsylvania. The World Trade Center has been flattened and a section of the Pentagon is also damaged.

Jeff informed us that Ocean Colour Scene had to postpone their US tour. According to their official site, Damon Minchella has had a "reaccurence of tendonitis in his wrist". They are looking to reschedule later this year.

I actually got spam that was worth reading the other day and here it is:

Sigur Ros have a beautiful (and potentially controversial) new video for «Vidrar vel til loftarasa». You can see it along with the video for «Svefn-G-Englar», live footage, and an interview throughout September on MTV2. Tune in at the following days & times.

Click Read More for the dates and times.
Thu 9/13/01 12:30-1:00am
Sun 9/16/01 midnight-12:30am
Sat 9/22/01 midnight-12:30am
Fri 9/28/01 midnight-12:30am

Morrissey isn't the only one missing a record label these days... more from Paul Kelly of Birdie on their latest release, "Triple Echo":  "The record will be released in the U.K. on October 22nd, this version differs slightly from the Japanese version, a couple of changed songs and alternative cover etc. but we don't have a U.S. version planned. Kindercore didn't want to release it and Minty Fresh who had expressed an interest in putting out the album in the end decided to turn it down also! You could try amazon.com or pennyblackmusic.com or even perhaps Apricot Records in Germany who are also issuing a version. We are going to revamp the site in time for 22nd Oct and so by then we should have far more buying information. "