This week's chart is interesting because it shows the beginnings of a transition between the Old Guard and some New Blood.

Music downloads are about to start leading the charts.

Here is a song quote to go with the theme:

Fortune calls.
I stepped forth from the shadows, to the marketplace,
Merchants and thieves, hungry for power, my last deal gone down.
She's smelling sweet like the meadows where she was born,
On midsummer's eve, near the tower.

Gentlemen, he said,
I don't need your organization, I've shined your shoes,
I've moved your mountains and marked your cards
But Eden is burning, either brace yourself for elimination
Or else your hearts must have the courage for the changing of the guards.

Bd C Dd C C Bd Bd Ab Ab .. Bd C Dd C C Bd Bd Ab Ab .. Bd C Dd C C Bd Bd Ab Ab .. Ab Bd Ab F F Ab ...

Changing of the Guards

Matthew sez, "According to this BBC News story, Warner Chappell's legal threats against the creator of PearLyrics are just a preview of a campaign to be launched in 2006 by the Music Publishers Association. The MPA is seeking to take lyrics and tabs sites offline and-- get this-- 'Mr Keiser said he did not just want to shut websites and impose fines, saying if authorities can 'throw in some jail time I think we'll be a little more effective'.'"

This is ridiculous. I don't accept the argument about this cutting into the sales of sheet music. Not only is sheet music for most popular music not available, but when it is, it's way overpriced. You also can't buy by the song. If you want to learn one or two songs off an album, which is almost always the case, you have to pay for an entire collection.

I think the attitude taken by artists like Frank Black is the right way to approach it. He puts tablature of all his solo work and The Pixies on his website.

Don't artists want fans to play their songs? I certainly would...

And jail terms for lyric sites? That's just completely unreasonable. This will backfire.

Boing Boing: Music publishers: Jail for lyric-sites

Grammy-nominated music producer Christian Julian Irwin was found by police sitting naked in a creek after going missing several days ago.

The Sheriff's Department says Irwin told authorities he was afraid he was being chased by Nigerians who had contacted him in an Internet scam.

He was taken to a hospital for examination.

Now that's just damn funny. I think this guy had a little too much blow.

KESQ | Resident finds missing music producer in creek

The Beastie Boys have released vocal only versions of several tracks for remixing. There does not appear to be any information about licensing. It does not get any more specific than this:

These A Cappellas are for your own personal use to make your own remixes.

I'm happy to see this, but it would be nice if they included some specifics about the licensing of the tracks, similar to how Interscope did when they released the GarageBand version of "The Hand That Feeds" by Nine Inch Nails.

Its safe to assume that if you do anything beyond making a remix and posting it to their web board, you would need a license. It would probably not be a good idea to make a remix or use the samples in anything that finds its way into a commercial release. Given the Beastie Boys heavy usage of sampling, I'd expect reasonable licensing options.

Put your Root Down and open up GarageBand..

Beastie Boys Release Vocal Only Tracks

Picking the right corporate doo-dad is a tricky art. Years ago, Novell gave out Bowie knives at an analyst event, as a way to demonstrate they could cut through the competition. Most everyone who attended the one day meeting came with only carry on luggage and had to hand it over at the airport, said analyst Chris LeTocq.

Dan Hutcheson of VLSI Research recalls one company giving away binoculars to underscore how it was looking into the future. Unfortunately, they proved impossible to focus, he recalled. Intel once gave me a set of coasters that looked like something Buddy Hackett may have owned to herald the coming of the Pentium II for notebooks.

This week, AMD sent out a gift box set celebrating 64-bit embedded processors and the man in black himself, Johnny Cash. It includes a DVD of Cash, a CD of his greatest hits, a poster from one of his early shows, and a cassette tape of "Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison."

One might ask, what's the connection? AMD sells 64-bit processors. Did Johnny Cash spend 64 nights in the Memphis Memorial Rehabilitation Clinic? Did he kill 64 men in Reno just to watch them die? And who knew they still sold cassettes?

That is kind of strange. What are they thinking of? The Cash part perhaps...

Connection or no connection, I'd be happy as hell to receive Johnny Cash swag. Who wouldn't love that? ... Ok, who with musical taste wouldn't love that?

AMD and Johnny Cash: what's the connection? | News.blog | CNET News.com

"George Bush doesn't listen to us,'' Keith Richards said.

The cross-fire hurricane rages on. Its a gas. This time around, Jagger has decided to howl at Bush in the form of some of the most political songs the Stones have done to date. Here is a taste of some of the lyrics to "Sweet Neo Con", thanks to the linked news article:

You call yourself a Christian
I think that you're a hypocrite
You say you are a patriot
I think that you're a crock of (expletive)
. . . How come you're so wrong?
My sweet neo con.

It's liberty for all
Democracy's our style
Unless you are against us
Then it's prison without trial
But one thing that is certain
Life is good at Haliburton . . .

Here is a snip from another song, "Dangerous Beauty", which addresses Abu Ghraib:

Who you got there in that hood
You look so fancy in those photographs
With your rubber gloves on
But you're a favorite of the Chiefs of Staff . . .

So, Keith Richards continues to do the walking dead thing, while Jagger continues to do the androgynous rocker thing, and no one other than the boomers is likely to care. I'm not sure how much political cred the Rolling Stones can carry. I guess we are going to find out.

BostonHerald.com - The Rolling Stones get political

NEW YORK (AP) -- Recording industry titan Sony BMG Music Entertainment agreed Monday to pay $10 million and stop bribing radio stations to feature its artists in what a state official called a more sophisticated generation of the payola scandals of decades ago.

The agreement springs from an investigation by New York state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, who called the practice "pervasive" in the industry and suggested other music industry giants could face similar penalties.

Pay-for-play "is driving the industry, and it is wrong," Spitzer told reporters

This still goes on. The record labels just don't directly deal with the stations anymore. They hire agents to do it. They pay the agents, the agents pay the radio stations. That's still legal.

Sony Agrees to $10M 'Payola' Settlement

Numark, the leading name in the world of DJ products and accessories, proudly announces the iDJ Mixing Console for iPod portable music players. The iDJ enables mobile DJs and iPod enthusiasts to seamlessly integrate their portable music libraries with other music and sound reinforcement systems transforming the iPod from a personal music player into a source playback device.

This is no longer vapor. Neat!

Gearjunkies.com - Numark announces IDJ mixing console for Apple iPod

Rock the Casbah?

A Defense AT&L exclusive: the lyrics from Major Punks' not-to-be-released-anytime-soon underground hit: Transcendental Passion

Cashman got it right
and the Clash, man, they did too
Jack said stick it to the man
and he's talkin' about you
CHORUS:
Punk's transcendental passion
for genuine self expression
is pushin' back oppression
with more than just aggression
Punk's got a deep obsession
it's makin' no concession
for posers tryin' to make themselves
more 'portant than the mission
Ya gotta do it your way
and I gotta do it mine
ya got a brain so use it
don't just toe the comp'ny line
CHORUS
Linus Torvalds, Ghandi
And Martin Luther King
they led the masses, got it done
without an ounce of bling
CHORUS
Stiffen up your backbone
cut through all the clutter
wear some ink, grow your hair
watch the big man sputter
CHORUS
(Gratuitous drum solo)

Everything We Need to Know About Program Management, We Learned from Punk Rock

A camp site is flooded on the first day of the Glastonbury music festival in Somerset, southern England, June 24, 2005. As many as 150,000 people are expected to attend the three-day event which begins on Friday and will be headlined by White Stripes, Coldplay and Basement Jaxx.

... scenes from the music festival from hell.

Glastonbury Music Festival on Yahoo! News Photos