• Ticketmaster Apologies to Springsteen
• The Cramps’ Lux Interior Dead at 60
• M.I.A., Stevie Wonder Added to Grammys

Top stories from the last three days:

• Springsteen “Furious” With Ticketmaster
• Beyond Bruce: Who’s Next for Super Bowl?
• Van Halen to Rock on With Roth
• The New Issue: Sean Penn
• Live Nation, Ticketmaster Close to Merger
• Springsteen’s Dream Hits Number One
• Patti Smith Rocks Tibet Benefit
• RS‘ New Critic: Patrick Stump
• American Idol Kicks Off Hollywood Week
• Breaking: Bishop Allen
• New Music Report: Lily Allen, Peter Tosh
• Joaquin Phoenix Stands By Rap Career
• Oasis’s Royal Scandal: “Falling Down” Clip
• Phish, Bruce to Headline Bonnaroo 2009
• Yeah Yeah Yeahs Talk April’s It’s Blitz
• Spinal Tap Plot New Material in ‘09
• What Happens When Rappers Rock?
• Beastie Boys Celebrate Paul’s With New Site
• Langerado Fest Canceled Due to Poor Sales
• The Hold Steady Ready Live LP, Doc
• Bruce Delivers on Super Bowl Party Promise
• Prince Launches New Website With Private Gig
• Phish Fans Angry at Live Nation Ticketing
• Inside RS’ Afternoon With Seeger and Baez
• T.I. Counts Down Days Until Jail on MTV
• McCartney, Killers Top Coachella Lineup
• Not Fade Away: Remembering Buddy Holly

Scroll down for full news stories, commentary and much more in Rock Daily.

Photo: Paul Kane/Getty Images

The Grammys have added yet another batch of new performers for this Sunday’s ceremony, recruiting M.I.A., Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson, MusiCares Person of the Year Neil Diamond, Terence Blanchard, Robin Thicke and Allen Toussaint. Plus, there will be an all-star tribute to Bo Diddley featuring B.B. King, Buddy Guy, John Mayer and Keith Urban. The announcement was made via the Grammys’ Twitter. Since the ceremony will air live February 8th, the Grammys only have three more days to announce additional performers.

In case you haven’t been keeping track, this is the jaw-dropping list of artists that will be performing at the Staples Center this year: Radiohead, Coldplay, U2, Paul McCartney with Dave Grohl, Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Lil Wayne, Kanye West, T.I., Jay-Z, Justin Timberlake, Kid Rock, Jonas Brothers, Carrie Underwood, Jennifer Hudson, Katy Perry, Kenny Chesney, Rihanna, Estelle, Taylor Swift, Chris Brown, Adele, Sugarland and a Four Tops tribute with Ne-Yo, Jamie Foxx and Duke Fakir. Phew. Our cable box says this ceremony is only supposed to run three-and-a-half hours, but if this thing goes eight-plus hours, that’s fine by us. After all, they are supposed to be also handing out awards at some point. (more…)

Lux Interior, the frontman for iconic punk band the Cramps, died today, February 4th, at the Glendale Memorial Hospital in Glendale, California. Interior, born Erick Lee Purkhiser, was 60 and is survived by his wife of 37 years, Cramps guitarist Kristy “Poison Ivy Rorschach” Wallace. In a statement released by the band’s publicist, a preexisting heart condition is named as the cause of death.

The Cramps first made their mark in the mid-1970s, when Interior, Poison Ivy and a revolving door rhythm section frequented the stages at famed New York punk clubs like CBGB and Max’s Kansas City alongside artists like Television, the Ramones, Blondie and Patti Smith. The band eventually recruited drummer Nick Knox in 1977, who remained with the group until 1991. During those years, the Cramps were credited with creating both the term and musical style “psychobilly,” a synthesis of punk rock and rockabilly that was gloriously raw and over the top. Their lyrics examined American culture at its most campy, often citing bad jokes, science fiction films and sexual fetishes. (more…)

Just hours after Bruce Springsteen issued an open letter to his fans on his Website, railing against Ticketmaster for mishandling the onsale of his Working on a Dream tour tickets earlier this week, the company has issued a statement apologizing to the Jersey legend and his colleagues.

In what’s addressed as “An Open Letter of Apology to Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau and the entire Springsteen Tour Team,” Ticketmaster Entertainment CEO Irving Azoff says that the company decided to send some buyers to the company’s secondary-ticketing company TicketsNow in an attempt to put more tickets into the hands of Bruce Springsteen fans. “While we were genuinely trying to do the right thing for fans in providing more choices when the tickets they requested from the primary on-sale were not available, we clearly missed the mark,” Azoff writes. (more…)

Photo: Chavez/WireImage

Fall Out Boy frontman Patrick Stump has been in Rolling Stone before — he’s even been on our cover. But the Sean Penn issue hitting newsstands today marks the first time the singer-guitarist has written for the magazine: Yes, Stump reviewed the forthcoming CD/DVD The Ultimate Peter Tosh Experience under the byline P.V. Stump for Issue 1072.

“It’s insane to say, but I never planned on being a singer,” Stump tells Rolling Stone. “The thing I really wanted to do was write about music; it’s what I planned on doing when I went to college.” Stump says he grew up with a subscription to Rolling Stone and spent hours listening to radio shows hosted by Chicago critics Greg Kot and Jim DeRogatis.

When Stump visited our offices late last year, he confessed he’d always wanted to review albums for RS — so we put him to work. (more…)

In the week’s rock and reviews recap known as the New Music Report, Rolling Stone’s Christian Hoard tackles everything from Bruce Springsteen’s rollicking, slide-filled performance at the Super Bowl halftime show to this year’s Coachella lineup, which features headliners Paul McCartney, the Killers and the Cure. Hoard also talks the 50th anniversary of the Day the Music Died and digs into Fatboy Slim’s BPA project.

As for reviews, Hoard spotlights Lily Allen’s It’s Not Me, It’s You. Jody Rosen gave the British pop queen’s second album a three-star review, noting “any of the album’s dozen tracks could be a single.” The problem lies in Allen’s subject matter: “No longer content to be a quirky confessional songwriter, Allen has decided that she is a social critic, a job she doesn’t have the maturity or the insight to pull off.” (more…)

Photo: Mazur/WireImage

Bruce Springsteen has responded to his fans’ outcry following Ticketmaster’s problem-laden sale of his Working on a Dream tour tickets earlier this week. Countless fans reported technical malfunctions during the onsale, while others complained that Ticketmaster forwarded them to the company’s secondary ticket site, TicketsNow, even though seats were still available through Ticketmaster. The New Jersey Attorney General has also announced an investigation into the sale. Ticketmaster has since issued an apology to Springsteen, and vowed to make amends to confused fans.

“Last Monday, we were informed that Ticketmaster was redirecting your log-in requests for tickets at face value, to their secondary site TicketsNow, which specializes in up-selling tickets at above face value. They did this even when other seats remained available at face value. We condemn this practice,” Springsteen and his tour team said in a letter posted on Bruce’s official site. “We have asked this redirection from Ticketmaster to TicketsNow cease and desist immediately and Ticketmaster has agreed to do so in the future and has removed its unwanted material from their and our site.” (more…)

Who: A Brooklyn-based indie pop band fronted by two Harvard alums — singer-keyboardist Justin Rice and multi-instrumentalist Christian Rudder. The pair met in a mandatory English class in the mid-Nineties and formed a punk band called the Pissed Officers before starting up Bishop Allen, which they named after a Cambridge street. In 2006, the group put out an EP per month, and their third full-length, Grrr … is due in March.

Sounds Like: A blend of Los Campesinos! and Yo La Tengo with a twee-folk vibe. The band’s literary influences, like Jorge Luis Borges and G.K. Chesterton, is evident on songs like Grrr …’s “The Ancient Common Sense of Things.” “There’s something cool about writing songs. You think, ‘Yesterday, this song didn’t exist but now it does,’ ” Rice says of the songwriting process. “But there’s something gratifying about playing shows because that you think ‘That thing I made in my room, these people appreciate it and they’ll give me a high-five.’ ” (more…)

Oasis are back with a new video, this time for “Falling Down,” the latest single of the band’s Dig Out Your Soul. Directed by Wiz, the video’s plot seems pretty clear, as we follow a bright-eyed, luxurious young woman from random people’s beds to random drug dens. Later on, we see the woman putting on a crown, meaning that she’s regal or something, and at a red carpet event Oasis’ Gallagher brothers both snub the woman, hinting that one or both of them got it on with a member of the Royal Family. How do we know she’s a member of the British monarchy? The final shot is a Gump-esque composite featuring the woman and Prince Charles side-by-side. So while Oasis’ spokesperson says the plot is of Wiz’s own creation, the real question is “Which real-life Princess had relations with one or both of the Gallagher boys?” Watch the video above.

Related Stories:

• Oasis’ Noel Gallagher Has One Christmas Wish
• Oasis’ Noel Gallagher: “I Am Brilliant Every Night”
• Liam Gallagher on the Beatles and the Death of the Rock Star

Photograph by Sam Jones

The Oscar-nominated star of Milk isn’t punching out photographers anymore, but he’s hardly mellowed. Hollywood’s most daring actor names names and talks straight about his 30-year career in film, his critics and his beef with Obama in the new issue of Rolling Stone (on newsstands today!).

Grab the issue to read the Rolling Stone interview by Mark Binelli, and click over to Peter Travers’ blog right now to watch our film critic discuss Penn’s defining roles, from Fast Times at Ridgemont High to Dead Man Walking.

• The Essential Sean Penn: The Roles That Defined the “Milk” Star

Plus, take a look back at Penn’s past features in the magazine: 1983’s Bad Boy. Slab Boy. Everyboy., when the 22-year-old actor was being hailed the greatest of his generation, and 1996’s Cool Jerk, where Penn tries to reconcile his rep as a menace to society.

Slaraffenklang is a Danish big band made up of two great art-pop, etc. groups, Slaraffenland and Efterklang. After sharing bills in the U.S. last year as the Danish Dynamite Tour, they delivered the real thing in a one-time supercombo performance at home last fall. Four songs from that show are available as a free-download EP at the Leaf Label’s MySpace page. I’ve been entranced by both bands separately. Together, they’re like an entangled Animal Collective and Arcade Fire, with much more fire in the engine room.

Photo: Gerard/Getty

On February 3rd, 1959, China invaded Tibet, sending the Dalai Lama into exile in India. That same day, halfway across the world, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson were killed in a plane crash in Iowa.

Both anniversaries were saluted at last night’s Tibet House benefit at New York’s Carnegie Hall, where Patti Smith, Vampire Weekend, the National, Steve Earle and others gathered to pay homage. “Fifty years ago, the day the music died, I was a kid living in Brooklyn,” said Patti Smith Group guitarist Lenny Kaye, before launching into an energetic medley of of the Big Bopper’s “Chantilly Lace,” Holly’s “Words of Love” and Valens’ “Come On, Let’s Go.” “Now we’re here to celebrate that music.”

The tribute — which was topped off by Smith whipping out a harmonica solo on a jubilant cover of Holly’s “Not Fade Away” — capped a night of musical cross-pollination: Vampire Weekend jammed on “M79″ with Afro-funk orchestra Antibalas; African singer Angelique Kidjo, backed by an ecstatic horn section, tackled the Rolling Stones’ “Gimme Shelter.” Steve Earle even covered himself: “I never sang this song before — I wrote it for Joan Baez to sing,” he said of the folk tune “God Is God.” “How cool is my job?” (more…)

Photo: Mazur/WireImage

After decades of sugar-coated pop debacles, the NFL has served up a parade of legends during halftime of the big game. In recent years, the Super Bowl has delivered Paul McCartney, the Rolling Stones, U2, Tom Petty, Aerosmith and now Bruce Springsteen. But where does the NFL go from here?

It’s a tall order to fill: applicants must be legendary but still active, rocking but not raucous, and as big as the game itself. So who’s left? Oddsmakers are already lining up favorites for next year’s Lombardi Trophy (The Patriots? Really? No love for your new champs, the Pittsburgh Steelers? Your loss, Vegas.), so we thought we’d set the odds for next year’s halftime show. The NFL could go country (Tim McGraw? Taylor Swift?) or pop (Kelly Clarkson will soon return to us), but you have to presume they’ll stick with what works — big rock from big names. We have, of course, completely pulled these names and numbers out of thin air, plus gambling’s illegal just about everywhere, so keep your money in your wallet.

The Who
Pros: Legendary band with a sound louder than the game itself.
Cons: None. They’re the Who.
Odds: 3/2 (more…)

Photo: Winter/Getty

Though we’ve all enjoyed a chuckle at Joaquin Phoenix’s mic skills, the actor continues to assert that his detour into the hip-hop world is for real. Phoenix recently spoke to several journalists, including NYmag.com’s Vulture bloggers, to confirm that this whole rapping thing is not a “hoax” as has been reported. Asked how his career has been going so far, Phoenix responded honestly, saying, “Uh, terrible. … I did a lot of free-styling around the studio and I’ve gone to small places, and I guess some people there filmed it and shit, and put it out there. But it’s been really nerve-wracking, because there’s literally people there heckling you.”

As for Phoenix’s infamous fall from the stage during his Las Vegas gig, “I didn’t fucking fall,” Phoenix maintained. “You’re up on this little platform, there’s fucking lights everywhere, right in your eyes, flashing at you like that, and everything is dark, and I literally just went to step off the thing and misjudged and slipped down. I wasn’t fucked up.” Phoenix also addressed rumors that Diddy would produce his first album: “I’ll just say that we are going to work together shortly. As to whether that will be a complete album or not, I don’t know, but I’m doing a lot of the music and production.” (more…)

Photo:FOX

American Idol got a little more serious last night as 147 hopefuls arrived at Los Angeles’ famed Kodak Theatre (did they mention it’s famous? Really? Six times, you say?) for Hollywood Week. The judges’ goal was simple — “All we’re looking for is a star,” explained Simon Cowell — and in the interest of sparing us from the sight of gawky, ungroomed singers like a pre-makeover Clay Aiken, producers let their teams of stylists and makeup artists loose … as well as Barry Manilow, who showed up to mentor. Eliminations were swift and relatively painless: singers took the stage in batches of eight to sing whatever they chose a cappella (time to start whining about song choice), and anyone who passed moved to the next round. Insert tears, whoops of joy and Ryan Seacrest hugs here.

At the end of the first two days of Hollywood Week, 104 singers were still standing. Here’s a quick rundown:

Ones to Watch:

• We love Lil Rounds because her name sounds like an appetizer at the Cheesecake Factory and she managed to sing Whitney without getting destroyed by the judges.

• Smooth Anoop Desai may have undone the damage Sanjaya Malakar inflicted upon South Asian singers with only 14 seconds of screen time. (more…)