Well that was expectantly fast.

Thom Yorke's last-minute show tonight at the Echoplex went on sale today via Ticketweb, and the site reported the gig was sold out by the time Pop & Hiss was even able to access the show listing.

For those keeping score at home, it took about seven minutes to crack through to the site, with every regular concertgoer's worst nightmare -- the dreaded "processing" page instructing users not to touch their Web browsers -- creating a virtual moat between us and the opportunity to see Radiohead's frontman in cramped quarters.

Worse, some of our office comrades who actually fought their way through Internet traffic jams and found an on-sale screen were still waiting for Ticketweb to process their requests at 12:28 p.m. -- almost 30 minutes after the on-sale time (we're good at math, to boot). Of course, with a capacity of well under 1,000, we expected as much. 

Tickets soon hit Craigslist and eBay. As of the time of this posting, Craigslist seemed to be the better bargain, with tickets selling for around $750. On auction site eBay, expect to shell out a couple months' rent for a pair, as tickets are listed for about $3,500 -- buyer beware, of course.Yorke will also appear at downtown's Orpheum Theatre Sunday and Monday, and those tix are more of a bargain -- a seat looks like it can be snagged for about $150 on Craigslist.

Anyone who had success getting tickets, we invite your stories of ticket-purchasing heroism in the comments section below. Those who failed, we want your horror stories as well.

--Todd Martens

Screenshot: Ticketweb

Emmylou Harris, Dwight Yoakam and other singer-songwriters nimbly display music's varied forms in a casual fundraiser for the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum.

Great as he was, the late singer-songwriter Townes Van Zandt was wrong when he said that there are only two kinds of music, "the blues and zip-a-dee-doo-dah." Emmylou Harris quoted that line Thursday at Club Nokia, and the singer-songwriters gathered around her nodded agreement. Yet their own songs and others they offered during this show to benefit Nashville's worthy Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum demonstrated the limits of Van Zandt's assessment.

Any visitor to the museum  realizes that music also can take the form of a joke, a nursery rhyme, a prayer, a come-on or a campfire tale. In an evening that began as a history lesson (including a brief talk by the museum's director, Kyle Young) and expanded to include a few song debuts, a duet or two and plenty of barbs about Dwight Yoakam's tight jeans, Harris, Yoakam, Melissa Etheridge and Vince Gill touched upon all those forms, showing the flexibility of "country" as they did so.

They started, fittingly, with something by Gram Parsons, a Southern-born artist whose California-based career typified how country has progressed by applying its torch and twang to many styles and sources. Gill sang "Sin City," a traditional lament infused with the energy of 1960s rock. Harris, Parson's artistic foil during his short life, sang her famous harmonies.

Less than 24 hours after the sudden but not entirely unexpected cancellation of her co-headlining trek with Kanye West, pop-star-meets-fashion-oddity Lady Gaga has stated that she will stage a solo tour this winter. The singer unveiled on her Twitter account that an announcement will be coming next week.

"Still leaving on solo TOUR this nov.," the artist wrote, making creative use of her caps lock key.

Lady Gaga also appeared at an industry conference held by trade Billboard Magazine today in New York, and briefly addressed the tour. "It was a mutual decision," Gaga was quoted as saying. "Kanye's going to take some time off. But the good news is that I'm going on tour in a few weeks."

In other Lady Gaga news, a leaked single of hers, "Bad Romance" made its way online today. Music blog Idolator wrote that the song "is pretty much a calculated step back into 'Poker Face' territory," although the artist stressed on Twitter that the version online is "making my ears bleed." Lady Gaga will appear on NBC's "Saturday Night Live" this weekend.

Meanwhile, it's all quiet on the Kanye front. Fans will find zero mention of the canceled tour on the artist's blog. Instead, the blog today has posted some designer lamps. 

Lady Gaga's co-headlining tour with West, "Fame Kills," was to begin in November.

-- Todd Martens

Photo credit: Getty Images

While three of members of country music royalty -- Emmylou Harris, Vince Gill and Dwight Yoakam -- gathered Thursday night at the shiny new 2,000-seat Club Nokia for a tony dinner and concert fundraiser benefiting the Country Music Hall of Fame, one of country’s under-sung heroes, Texas singer and songwriter Billy Joe Shaver, held court a few blocks away in decidedly rootsier surroundings.

Shaver, one of the kingpins of of the Texas outlaw movement that took off in the ‘70s, stopped in on his way to Saturday’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in San Francisco for a bristlingly energetic set at the tiny Redwood Bar & Grill downtown, which is developing a lively roots and alternative music scene. 

A few dozen alt-country aficionados jammed the Redwood to check in on the man who wrote “Georgia on a Fast Train,” "Old Chunk of Coal" and two numbers that became unofficial theme songs of the Waylon Jennings-Willie Nelson-led outlaw camp, “Honky Tonk Heroes” and “Old Five and Dimers (Like Me).”

Shaver’s a true original, writing songs that cut straight to the heart of whatever subject he tackles. He figures he’s written more than 500 songs, although never got the acclaim or commercial success that fellow Lone Star State musicians Nelson, Jennings and Kris Kristofferson found. One of Jennings’ most highly regarded albums, “Honky Tonk Heroes” from 1973, consisted of nothing but Shaver songs.

“It’s like a game of cards,” Shaver told me in a backroom at the Redwood about an hour before his performance. “You get dealt a hand, and sometimes all the right cards aren’t there.”

He was circumspect rather than bitter, jealous or sad about how his career has unfolded.

“There are lots of reasons I could be depressed,” he said. “I’ve broken my neck three times, I had a heart attack, I’ve broken my shoulder.” He also lost two fingers on his right hand when he was in his early 20s, and earlier this decade suffered the loss of his son, guitarist and songwriter Eddy, to a heroin overdose, his wife to cancer, his mother and mother-in-law within the space of about a year.

“But depression is a nasty thing,” he said. “When it gets you, you don’t even want to get out of bed. So I just stay happy.” He’s gone through his bouts, and said there were times he had to stop writing songs because he didn’t like the place that depression took him to. “I don’t want to hurt anybody, so I just had to take a break.”

He looks at the ups and downs of his life with a wry sense of humor: “I’ve been down the road, but the road’s been down me too.”

 
While I may or may not be of a minority opinion, I’ll stand firm in my conviction: The cancellation of the Kanye West/Lady Gaga “Fame Kills” tour, quite frankly, stinks. It’s also a sad commentary on the state of modern pop music, which could have benefited from something so inspired.

At its best, pop music is thrilling, sexy and occasionally brilliant, but quite almost always controversial. When it works, it elevates beyond music to a larger pop cultural stage, and provokes more than just a conversation. Between the two of them, Lady Gaga and Kanye West have done all of the above and more. They’ve affected the cultural zeitgeist and are walking among the biggest pop stars in the world because of it.

The aptly titled "Fame Kills" tour was an intuitive juxtaposition of the new pop power structure. West’s panoramic hip-hop appeal with Gaga’s even broader reach -- one that includes the gay/lesbian community -- was sure to draw a mind-bogglingly cross-cultural crowd.

The few leaked details on the actual show made it sound like a truly ambitious undertaking, with both artists on stage at the same time:

Kanye West's duo-headlining tour with Lady Gaga has been canceled, concert promoter Live Nation announced Thursday afternoon. The "Fame Kills" trek was to have hit Anaheim on Nov. 15 and Los Angeles on Nov. 16. There was no reason given for the cancellation, and zero indication that the tour dates would be rescheduled.

A Live Nation press release offered few details. "Live Nation announced today that the Kanye West and Lady Gaga 'Fame Kills' tour has been cancelled. Refunds are available at the point of purchase.  Tickets purchased online and via phone will be refunded automatically."

Rumors of the tour's demise hit the gossip sites last night. Representatives for West and Lady Gaga did not respond to requests for comment. Representatives from Live Nation had no further information.

The tour seemed ill-fated from the start. Pop & Hiss first reported that the tour might be doomed on Sept. 15, as reps for the artists refused to discuss the trek and dates were swiped from the Ticketmaster system. Pre-sales initially announced for Sept.16 were removed from Ticketmaster without any explanation, and prior to the tour going on sale, West had announced on national television that he planned to disappear from the public spotlight.

Yet an R-rated teaser was ultimately released for the tour on West's site; the trek was to have begun Nov. 10 in Phoenix. It was to have been a high-profile pairing of two of the nation's biggest pop stars.

This Sunday's Calendar features a profile of many of the artists around the Low End Theory club night at the Airliner in Lincoln Heights.

It's Los Angeles' foremost destination for cutting edge hip-hop and electronica,  where its artists use progressive instrument technologies and online-savvy business models to make dazzling (and profitable) records that combine elements of avant-garde jazz, heavy rap, techno and a variety of U.K. beat-making cultures.

The story is available now, and clips of many of the artists discussed are streaming below.

-- August Brown

Boreta (Glitch Mob) -- "Bubblin in the Cut"

Daddy Kev -- "Little Doggy"

Daedelus -- "Admit Defeat"

edIT (Glitch Mob) -- "Artsy Remix"

Nosaj Thing -- "IOIO"

Ooah (Glitch Mob) -- "Tubstomper"

Reefer -- "Let It Go (Flying Lotus Remix)"

Photo by Stefano Paltera / For The Times

There's been plenty of Bruce Springsteen envy on Pop & Hiss of late.

The artist, who recently turned 60, has been hopping on the latest trend in live music by exploring a number of his classic albums from start to finish. Chicago was recently treated to "Born to Run," and Springsteen's home state of New Jersey is getting the reverential treatment from now through Oct. 9.

Last night, the artist launched a five-night stand at Giants Stadium, a rock 'n' roll farewell to the East Rutherford, N.J. stadium, which will be torn down in 2010. The song, dubbed "Wrecking Ball," plays out as part tribute to the football, and part statement of rebellious survival.

There's working-class tailgating images of dirt and beer, and a sturdy lead-in to a reliant chorus. There's references to Boeing-sized mosquitoes and shout-outs to the Giants. Beginning with a feisty acoustic build, the song stands on protective ground, and is ready for a fight. Growls the Boss, "So if you got the guts, mister / If you’ve got the balls / If you think it’s your time, then step to the line and bring on your wrecking ball."

New Jersey's Star Ledger has a clip of the concert's opening moments leading up to the initial verses of the song. Full versions can be found on YouTube, and are embedded below. Springsteen said the song was "something I wrote for tonight." A spokesman had no further information on the cut. 

Despite some skeptical public reaction to news that Bob Dylan has made a Christmas album -- “Another sign that the end times are near,” a friend wrote in an e-mail linking to the Amazon Web page -- it’s no joke. And judging from half a dozen songs I was able to preview at a listening session Wednesday evening, it is a ton of fun.

“Christmas in the Heart” is due Oct. 13, and Dylan was still finalizing the song selection and sequencing this week, which is one reason a handful of music journalists weren’t able to hear the whole thing. 

But the Currier and Ives-ish cover image is a good clue as to what Dylan is after on this set of traditional carols and recent vintage Christmas chestnuts -- beyond the charity aspect. (All of Dylan’s royalties -- in perpetuity -- will be divvied up among three organizations that help feed the hungry: Feeding America, U.K.-based Crisis and the United Nations’ World Food Program, which made a snarky Reuters story earlier this week about an early-download arrangement between Sony Music and Citibank seem especially misguided.)

Rather than simply a tossed-off session for his kids and grandkids, Dylan seems to be offering up an astute exploration of the roots of holiday music -- Christmas records in particular -- in the same way he has returned in various albums over the years to mine pop music’s foundation in blues, folk, country and gospel.

His version of “Must Be Santa,” with David Hidalgo squeezing reindeer-quick accordion, is directly inspired by the arrangement that Texas rock-polka group Brave Combo created on its 1991 gem of a seasonal album, “It’s Christmas, Man!” Better yet, there's a video on the way, shot here in L.A. Dylan's treatment of “Here Comes Santa Claus” goes straight back to Gene Autry’s 1947 version, with a guitar solo that mirrors the original, melodically and tonally.

So there's a hot rumor that Thom Yorke and his new assembled band will be performing a clandestine show at the Echoplex Friday night before their two-night stand at the Orpheum this weekend. We reached Yorke's publicist by phone just now, and this is the current official line on the show's factual existence.

"We cannot confirm nor deny it, but we will confirm or deny it by tomorrow morning."

So coy. So cryptic. So Thom Yorke. We're not saying to get your camping gear out just yet, but there is a very conspicuous empty slot on the Echoplex's show calendar for Friday night. Maybe you should keep your Sterno in an easily reachable place, if, say, you need to grab it before claiming a spot on a Glendale Boulevard sidewalk in the next 24 hours.

[Update @ 9:49 p.m.] According to the official Radiohead website, the show will happen Friday at the Echoplex:

so yes that band thats doesnt really have a name that im working with at the moment??????
have decided to do a warm-up show on Friday Oct 2nd around 9pm at the Echoplex in Los Angeles
Its not that big, it'll be total chaos and its kind of a rehearsal but .. if you are near by..
below is a link to get tickets.
hope you get lucky with it.

Tickets will go on sale tomorrow at noon via Ticketweb.

-- August Brown

Photo by Herbert P. Oczeret / European Pressphoto Agency

The band rode wave after wave of its music, surfing steadily through its songs' curls and switch ups. The sound was excellent and the size of the venue let fans and band connect.

Four songs into Pearl Jam's Wednesdaynight performance at the Gibson Amphitheatre, Eddie Vedder shifted his weight from one foot to the other, as if to maintain his balance atop something moving fast. Lead guitarist Mike McCready leaned back hard; Stone Gossard, on rhythm, hunched forward. Bassist Jeff Ament kept his head down as if holding on to an invisible mooring line. Matt Cameron cast himself as the storm's eye -- back straight, face calm as he beat out a spray of drum notes.

After nearly two decades and hundreds of shows, the most resilient group in alternative rock has become something simple at its core: a surf band.

It's not so much that Vedder can't resist aquatic metaphors, though the lifelong beach bum acknowledged that predilection Wednesday, quipping, "There are a lot of ocean references [tonight] because we're close to the shore, and it's healing." Nor is Pearl Jam's sound anything like the treble-heavy instrumentals of Dick Dale or the Surfaris.

Pearl Jam makes surf music in the philosophical sense. Its sets build in arcs. Some songs peak quickly and crash, while others take shape gradually. To negotiate their tricky changes, each player employs serious muscle control. If he stops to pose, he'll topple.

Paramore's fantastic new album of evocative modern punk may be called "Brand New Eyes," but what frontwoman Hayley Williams might really be in the market for right now is some brand new throat lozenges.

Vocal woes have forced the band to postpone their much anticipated show tonight at the Hollywood Palladium. A representative for the group confirmed that the postponement had resulted from vocal difficulties Williams began showing toward the end of their Tuesday night show at Pomona's Fox Theater, which came after a morning set at the Troubadour.

Mariah Carey is on track for a top-10 debut next week with her "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel." That's not necessarily news, as any release with the Mariah Carey name will certainly land at the top of the chart, especially in an era when 30,000 first-week sales will get an artist within reach of the pole position.

Today, Billboard -- the keeper of the U.S. pop chart -- unveiled early prognosis for next week's tally. Unexpectedly, Carey will vie for the top spot with Paramore, who are still riding a post-"Twilight" wave into superstardom. The early numbers posted are a bit eye-catching, even in this depressed sales climate.

Billboard has Carey and Paramore on track to sell somewhere between 160,000 and 170,000 copies in their first week. That's quite the achievement for the latter -- Paramore's 2007 effort "Riot!" topped out at No. 15 -- but a bit of a drop for Carey.

Let's say Carey beats those expectations and comes in with 200,000 first-week sales. That's still a fraction of the first-week sales of her recent albums. Is that an indicator that audiences are not-yet sold on "Angel," an album that received a favorable review in this publication, or just the fallout from multiple delays and a successful, if not smashing, first single?

A list of upcoming shows across the Southland, with on-sale dates in parentheses.

Pauley Pavilion

Jay-Z, Nov. 8 (Sat.)

Hollywood Palladium

Weezer, Oct. 24; Blasphemous Rumours and The Cured, Nov. 21 (Sat.)

Wiltern

X, Dec. 19 (Sat.)

El Rey Theatre

Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine, Oct. 25; Big D & the Kids Table, Dec. 13 (now); Cage the Elephant, Nov. 5; Julian Plenti, Nov. 19; Little Dragon, Dec. 4; Son Volt, Dec. 11; Dave Davies, Feb. 5 (Sat.)

Kodak Theatre

John Fogerty, Nov. 12 (Mon.)

The Mayan

Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros, Dec. 4 (Sat.)

Fox Theater Pomona

La Quinta Estacion, Oct. 30 (Fri.)

Club Nokia

Band of Horses, Nov. 9 (Fri.)

House of Blues

Julian Marley, Nov. 13 (Sat.)

House of Blues Anaheim

Revolution Mother, Oct. 17; The Vandals Christmas Formal, Dec. 19 (Sat.)

Grove of Anaheim

Rob Zombie, Nov. 1 (now); Third Eye Blind, Nov. 15; The Devil Wears Prada, Oct. 3 (Sat.)

Spaceland

Miles Benjamin Anthony Robinson, Nov. 4; Dum Dum Girls, Nov. 28 (now)

Bootleg Theatre

Spleen UTD, Oct. 16; Matt Costa, Nov. 8; Grand Archives, Nov. 13; A Tribute to Neil Young, Nov. 20; Horse Feathers, Nov. 17 (now)

Silverlake Lounge

Tape Deck Mountain; Elle Macho, Nov. 24 (now)

The Roxy

Hypercrush, Oct. 10; Dead by Sunrise, Oct. 19; Switchfoot, Nov. 11; Saul Williams, Nov. 13; Fat Freddy's Drop, Nov. 20 (now)

Key Club

Everlast, Oct. 17; Cam'ron, Nov. 6; Too $hort, Nov. 12; Nitzer Ebb, Nov. 17; Digable Planets, Dec. 3; Marduk, Dec. 4 (now)

Xololanxinxo, Oct. 8 (now)

Photo credit: Matt Sayles / AP

Rhino's latest Nuggets set offers a comprehensive look at the mid-'60s music scene. Yes, the marquee names are here -- many performing rarities -- but so too are the long-forgotten acts.

The mid-'60s was a remarkably dynamic time in pop music, so it's no surprise that Rhino Records' latest edition of the Nuggets series, this one focusing on L.A., has a breathtaking range of recordings from the city's heavy hitters.

The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, the Doors, the Beach Boys, Randy Newman, the Mamas & the Papas, Arthur Lee & Love and, yes, the Monkees are all featured among the collection's 101 tracks, as are dozens of colorful acts that largely have been forgotten by just about everyone but the producers of this four-CD set, released last week.

It presents a comprehensive record of a period when the Brill Building pop of the early '60s was giving way to the British invasion, when folk had just become engaged to rock, when musicians who were experimenting with mind-altering substances started channeling those experiences into their music.

The tracks from the marquee acts included here tend toward rarities rather than greatest hits. But it's far more illuminating to hear the Byrds in an embryonic late-'64 recording of Gene Clark's "You Movin' " or the Turtles in '66 singing "Grim Reaper of Love" than to listen to "Mr. Tambourine Man" or "Happy Together" one more time.

Return to form: With "Backspacer," Pearl Jam scores its first No. 1 album in 13 years, Billboard reports. The set sold 190,000 copies in its first week in stores, according to Nielsen SoundScan. It's Pearl Jam's first release outside the major label system, but the band wasn't exactly going the DIY-route. In a move that surprised fans, Pearl Jam lined up with big box retailer Target for the exclusive release.

Long associated with an anti-corporate stance, Pearl Jam avoided major fan criticism by still allowing the album to be sold at indie shops and Apple's iTunes store. While "Backspacer" failed to land on the chart with the same impact of 2006's self-titled effort, which opened with 279,000 copies, it is on par with Target's other recent exclusive. Earlier this year, Prince went with the retailer, and ended up with the album "LotusFlow3r" landing at No. 2 after selling 168,000 copies.

Diva tales: It's another solid week for Whitney Houston. Her "I Look to You" is at No. 4 this week, selling 66,000 copies. That's a dip from last week, when she sold 156,000 copies -- a post-"Oprah" sales bump -- but brings her total to 620,000 copies sold to date. That's good news for Houston as the industry heads into the holiday season. With depressed sales making it relatively easy for a brand-name artist to stay in the top 20, Houston should be on target to rack up a bevy of Grammy nominations if she can maintain a consistent sales base.

Expect her to be joined on the chart next week by another diva -- Mariah Carey. Digital downloads of Carey's "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" are expected to be solid, as the album is currently retailing at Amazon.com for a budget price of $5.99. But album sales may not be a real indicator for the success of "Angel," as it's a truly ad-supported release, coming complete with sponsored liner notes.

For the Avett Brothers, bluegrass is hard-core, and country is emo. This North Carolina band plows a familiar field by blending folk idioms with punk, playing against the surface incongruities of the two forms while unearthing the deeper connections. Punk and folk are both heartfelt and showily handmade, and share a central yearning for that tricky grounding element -- authenticity. With soaring harmonies, Southern twang and lyrics that evoke both Walt Whitman and Will Oldham, the Avetts fit right in to this particular syncretic tradition.

What's distinctive about the Avetts -- singing, multi-instrumentalist siblings Seth and Scott and artistically adopted stand-up bassist Bob Crawford, plus a step-member, cellist Joe Kwon -- is a dedication to exploring a specific dynamic: the intense expression of soft emotions. This focus is refined and made beautifully accessible on the band's Rick Rubin-shepherded major label debut, which follows a busy near-decade of independent releases and constant touring.

"I and Love and You" is so earnest that more skeptical listeners might laugh out loud at its wider-eyed pronouncements. These are not college sophomores, and yet they make their girlfriends look at the stars, fret about whether they're making art and intone about how tough it is to say those three words in the title track.

What makes this cultivated innocence bearable, besides the band's sprightly playing and ravishing sense of melody, is the diligence with which the Avett brothers, who write the material, and their bandmates explore the subject of sentimentality. Each cliché is honed and nurtured, making these songs both the expression of feelings that startle and a meditation on how and why feelings can be so disordering.

Rubin, who's known for helping artists get down to the bare essentials, reins in the raucousness that often led to sloppiness on previous releases and encourages the Avetts to experiment, but carefully. The New Wave-y "Kick Drum Heart" and the almost Springsteen-esque "Slight Figure of Speech" vary the flavors here; so does "January Wedding," a straight-up bluegrass tune that Pete Seeger might have sung 50 years ago.

Seeger, of course, has been both a preserver of tradition and a rabble-rouser. Too much reverence turns folk music dull, but the genre always presents new ways to affect its own renewal. The Avett Brothers have hit upon a winning approach, and this album is another step in their taking it beyond the obvious.

-- Ann Powers

The Avett Brothers
"I and Love and You"
(American Recordings)
Three stars (Out of four)

Earlier this year, on the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ terrific “It’s Blitz!,” frontwoman Karen O demonstrated that she's as effective weaving her voice into a wall of synth-heavy alt-rock as she ever was wailing over the band's stripped-down garage punk. Now, with this soundtrack to her ex-boyfriend Spike Jonze's big-screen adaptation of "Where the Wild Things Are," Karen O proves she's capable of still more, floating her ethereal vocals over charmingly ramshackle folk-pop arrangements long on the kind of acoustic instruments you might find in a children's music class.

Karen O is actually co-billed here with the Kids, a sprawling group of indie-rock all-stars that includes Deerhunter singer Bradford Cox, Greg Kurstin of the Bird and the Bee, a pair of Raconteurs and her fellow Yeah Yeah Yeahs. An actual kids' choir lends the ensemble's name some credibility on several tracks.

Yet it's Karen O's unique singing -- imagine a post-punk take on a '40s-era jazz chanteuse -- that defines this music, even when it blows up to Arcade Fire-style proportions, as in "All Is Love" and "Rumpus," both of which culminate in tiny-army shout-alongs. In "Hideaway," the album's prettiest cut, she sounds even more vulnerable than she did on the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' hit ballad "Maps."

Not surprisingly, given its origin, not everything here works as well on record as it does in the movie, where a meandering tune-fragment like "Cliffs" adds emotional flesh to the minimalist bones of Jonze's story. Even then, though, there's that voice.

-- Mikael Wood

Karen O and the Kids
"Where the Wild Things Are"
(DGC/Interscope)
Three stars (Out of four)

The boys of AFI are goth lifers -- though it's not the makeup (well, not entirely) but their message. The dozen tracks on the band's latest, "Crash Love," once again mourn decay and romance gone wrong over sweeping, layered post-punk guitars. To singer-lyricist Davey Havok, love is an endlessly tragic and anxious state: "I'd tear out my eyes for you, my dear / anything to see everything that you do."

Produced by Joe McGrath and Jacknife Lee with the band, "Crash Love" is AFI's most confident, enjoyable album yet. Though there remain echoes of the Cure, the Smiths and many other morose pop heroes from the 1980s, the result feels more organic now, rooted in the genuinely bleak and hopeless rather than the simply theatrical sounds of My Chemical Romance.

Within the collection's tightly crafted 43 minutes is music of gloom, force and energy. The band finds hope and something approaching joy in the rousing, anthemic "Beautiful Thieves," and Jade Puget's guitars sound bright enough for endless radio rotation on "Veronica Sawyer Smokes." Hard-core riffs lurk beneath the pleading vocals on "Sacrilege."

The music of AFI wasn't always as daring as its fashion sense, but the NoCal band has grown with accelerating sophistication, stepping further beyond easy pop-punk thrashings to something grander, with music to match the mopey melodrama of Havok's words.

-- Steve Appleford

AFI
"Crash Love"
(Interscope)
Three and a half stars (Out of four)

Michael Jackson’s estate filed a suit in federal court against Heal the World Foundation Tuesday accusing the organization of cybersquatting, trademark infringement and using the superstar’s name and likeness without permission in a bid to trick fans into thinking they are making donations to a Jackson-sanctioned cause. 

According to the suit filed in Los Angeles by special administrators for the Jackson estate John McClain and John Branca, the defendants have registered for six trademarks and applied for 41additional ones. Those applications, the suit alleges, “uniquely and unmistakably point to Mr. Jackson and his persona” and are intended “to cause confusion, mistake and to deceive.”

Jackson established his own Heal the World Foundation in 1992, naming it after his iconic hit song “Heal the World.” But that charitable organization has no relation to the defendants and ceased to function before the entertainer’s death. The suit alleges that Heal the World cybersquatted by establishing such deliberately misleading domain names as “mjaid.net,” “mjquotes.net” and “healtheworldfoundation.net.”

-- Chris Lee

Photo credit: Associated Press