concerts (191 posts)

NBC Photo: Dana Edelson

Sarah Killen isn't the only person able to say Conan O'Brien made her day.

All of Team CoCo is rejoicing, as the former Tonight Show host just confirmed his much-buzzed about tour!

Despite all the inevitable hype about such an outing, Conan's hoping to keep expectations for the "Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television Tour" low.

"Hey Internet: I'm headed to your town on a half-assed comedy & music tour," the funnyman tweeted. "Go to http://www.teamcoco.com/ for tix. I repeat: It's half-assed."

On the site, he describes the outing as "a night of music, comedy, hugging, and the occasional awkward silence."

Sign us up!

The 30-city theater crawl kicks off on April 12 in Eugene, Ore., and makes a stop at Bonnaroo Music Festival in Manchester, Tenn., before winding down on June 14 in Atlanta. That leaves him a little less than 12 weeks before that television gag order instituted by NBC is officially lifted.

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What else to do when you're out of work? Why, take a road trip. And that's just what Conan O'Brien is planning to do.

A source close to the former Tonight Show host tells E! News that O'Brien will officially announce live-performance dates next week on his new Twitter page. O'Brien will perform a live theatrical revue in major cities across the country beginning in April.

Guess that Home Depot gig didn't pan out, huh?

One potential date was leaked earlier today, when Ticketmaster accidentally posted a notice that Big Red would be at Phoenix's Dodge Theater on April 30 with tickets going on sale Monday. The message has since been removed and O'Brien's rep said the listing was premature and they were still "firming up dates." San Diego is reportedly one of the other cities to make the cut.

No word whether the rest of Team CoCo like Andy Richter and Triumph the Insult Comic Dog will be along for the ride. But the show will combine music and comedy, hearkening back to what O'Brien did back in 2004 when he transplanted NBC's Late Night to Toronto for a string of shows.

We'll be anxiously monitoring Conan's tweets. (Sarah Killen, you're life's about to change!)

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What's rock 'n' roll without a little drama? Devoid of sweet emotion, that's for sure!

After a few months of squabbles and threats that Aerosmith would be moving forward without frontman Steven Tyler, the group has announced a reunion and a European summer tour.

Last August, Tyler toppled off the stage during a performance. In addition to hurting himself, the band had to cancel the rest of its concert lineup. Guitarist Joe Perry drew the line, telling him shape up before he could get back in the saddle, and buzz hit the Net that the group was auditioning replacements.

Toward the end of the year, the group said they were still together just before the singer headed to rehab for an addiction to pain killers.

"I auditioned and I got the gig," Tyler jokes in the group's announcement video.

In other words, while our lousy puns just keep on comin', the group is getting back to its same old song and dance.

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Tired of always being the last one to know? Resolve to stay informed this year with our breaking news alerts.

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Don't call it a comeback. No, seriously, don't—because with all due respect, we won't really believe it until we see it.

According to Spin, current covergirl Courtney Love, along with Hole, will be playing their first U.S. show in more than a decade at the magazine's annual South by Southwest event March 19.

Love, who managed to wrangle free of her legal battles long enough to record Nobody's Daughter—the first new Hole album in nearly 12 years—for an April release, is currently touring England with her band (and throwing the odd insult at Lily Allen), to overwhelmingly positive acclaim.

That is, when she actually makes the gigs. Last week, Love was unable to make it to a London show after a "squat riot" broke out between her hotel and the venue, leaving 1,000 fans out cold. At least if that happens in Austin, they'll be out a little warmer.

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Courtney Love's a given for our Most Dysfunctional Celeb Couples gallery. Check out who else made the cut!

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Things aren't all frowns for Céline Dion. She's taking over Las Vegas yet again!

The Canadian songbird is returning to the Colosseum at Caesars Palace for another three-year residency. She'll be bringing a full orchestra and band and a classic Hollywood movie romance theme to the stint scheduled to kick off March 15, 2011.

"I'm coming back home...and I'm very excited about it," the 41-year-old said in a statement. "The repertoire is going to be extraordinary…a mix of timeless Hollywood classics, along with the favorites that my fans like to hear me sing. It's going to be a very beautiful show, and I think we'll be raising the bar higher than we've ever done before."

Tickets for the first 54 performances go on sale on Ticketmaster Friday at 10 a.m.

Between rehearsals, continuing in vitro fertilization treatments and talking about both—as she already has with Oprah Winfrey and People—Céline is one busy mama!

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Céline is one of the gazillions of stars participating in the "We Are the World" remake. Did you hear about that?!

Dove Shore/Getty Images; Theo Wargo/Getty Images; Paul Natkin/Getty Images; Dave M. Benett/MTV via Getty Images

Where else can you see Kings of Leon, Dave Matthews Band, Steve Martin and Jay-Z on the same stage?

OK, yeah, maybe it could happen if the stars aligned and the musicians did some killer movie tracks and Martin was hosting an award show, but, when you toss in The Flaming Lips performing Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon, the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival is the only possible place to see them all in one fell swoop.

The ninth annual music and camping fest, returning to the 700-acre farm in Manchester, Tenn., from June 10-13, has announced a lineup of more than 125 bands and 20 comedians set to take one of 13 stages over the course of four days.

For Kings of Leon, the appearance is historical—they're the first act to have started on a small tent stage (in 2004) and work their way up to headliner status.

Here's the full list of acts traveling 60 miles south of Nashville this summer:

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Frank Micelotta/Getty Images; Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images; John Shearer/ Getty Images; Kevin Mazur/ Getty Images

Another year, another desert blowout. And this one's actually for the kids.

After leaning heavily on some relative geezers for the last few go-rounds, organizers of the 2010 edition of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival are going back to the future, tapping a host of modern acts for an eclectic slate that includes Jay-Z, Muse, Thom Yorke, Gorillaz, LCD Soundsystem, a reunited Pavement and still manages a few blasts from the past, Sly and the Family Stone, Devo and Echo and the Bunnymen, among them.

The biggest musical gathering west of the Mississippi, Coachella is set to take place April 16-18 at its usual haunt, the Empire Polo Club in Indio, Calif.

But with the inclusion in the lineup of such youth-oriented acts as Hot Chip, Spoon, Vampire Weekend, MGMT, Dirty Projectors, Orbital and Jack White's latest side project, Dead Weather, the annual music bash is back to its roots as a promoter of cutting-edge indie rock and electronica.  

While there's no Paul McCartney, Roger Waters or Prince, this year's roster still has a few oldies worth listening to...

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Jeffrey R. Staab/CBS

That little band from Dublin posted another stellar year of ticket sales, with U2's box-office take totaling $123 million, according to the concert-sales gurus at Pollstar. Taking the top spot wasn't even much of a competion, with Bono and the boys besting the Boss by around $30 million. Rounding out the top 10 after Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band were Elton John/Billy Joel, Britney Spears, AC/DC, Kenny Chesney, Jonas Brothers, Dave Matthews Band, Fleetwood Mac & Metallica. And despite the down economy, grosses for 2009 were reportedly up over the previous year. Rock on.

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Toby Keith better start working on that apology statement about now.

Asian watchdog groups are blasting the country crooner over an allegedly racist gesture made during an impromptu performance with Will Smith and Wyclef Jean at the Nobel Peace Prize concerts in Norway last week.

Let's go to the YouTube video...

When Big Willie raps the word "yellow" about 26 seconds into the song, Keith is seen briefly pulling back his eyes in a slant-eyed expression that only Miley apologists might find amusing. And while the gesture went unremarked at the time, several Asian organizations have since called out the "Courtesy of the Red, White & Blue" singer.

"Tobey Keith embarrassed himself and his country, denigrated the Nobel Peace Prize and offended Asians and Asian Americans by using a crude, racist hand gesture," says a spokesman for the Asian American Justice Center.

"By doing this, he is telling his Asian fans, 'You don't matter, you're not on my radar,' " adds a rep from the Media Action Network for Asians.

Keith's camp could not immediately be reached for comment but previously told TMZ that "nobody at the party thought Toby was out of line."

So that makes it OK?

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Get the low-down on Miley's misfire with the Asian community here.

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ABC: The Adam-Banning Channel?

Just over a week after Adam Lambert's sexually expressive American Music Awards performance got him booted from Good Morning America, the Disney-owned network—out of hypocrisy, fear of the FCC or general old fogeyness, it's not yet clear—has widened its ban on the singer.

Lambert is now persona non grata at the Alphabet net's annual New Year's Rockin' Eve countdown and, rather surprisingly, on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, where he was due to appear on Dec. 17.

Apparently, harboring the sentiment that you want to f--- Matt Damon is only acceptable if you don't really mean it.

"Yes, sadly friends, ABC has cancelled my appearances on Kimmel and NYE. :( don't blame them," he tweeted yesterday. "It's the FCC heat."

The thing is, it's not.

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Rihanna almost brought a little too much to her TV concert comeback on Good Morning America.

Two day after performing solo at the American Music Awards, Rihanna made her much-anticipated way to the morning show's outdoor stage in NYC this morning to sing a whopping three tunes: "Wait Your Turn," "Russian Roulette," and fan (and remix) favorite "Umbrella."

But what about that slight lag between new besties Diane Sawyer and Robin Roberts announcing Rihanna and the singer's appearance on the stage?

Two words: wardrobe malfunction.

"I'm a little too fat right now, my dress…the zip busted in the back," the svelte-as-always Rihanna explained. "They're like, 'A minute to live,' I'm like, oh my god! They wanted to stitch it up, but I couldn't."

But it wasn't all body talk. After performing her new single, "Wait Your Turn," the superstar paid her now usual lip service to the oh-so-perfect timing of her new album, Rated R.

"It came very natural, only because it was my place of peace, being in the studio, just venting," she said of the post-Chris Brown attack process of recording the album.

"It was the one place where I didn't feel judged or criticized, I just wanted to sit and make great music. Every emotion that I was going through at the time throughout making the record went into that album and you can hear it in the songs."

The album, a surefire No. 1 if ever there was one, was released yesterday.

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Rihanna looked good at the AMAs. Check out who didn't (hint: everyone else) with our Fashion Police roundup.

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At age 15, Justin Bieber is so young his mom probably still kisses his boo-boos to make them feel better.

She might need to get to work—the pop star-in-training broke his foot yesterday.

The Usher protégé had the distinguished honor of opening for Taylor Swift at England's Wembley Arena, but something went awry as he finished up his set with his hit single, "One Time."

No, Kanye West didn't interrupt. Justin stumbled. And, like any good celebrity on the rise, he Twittered about the whole thing.

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