RE: GNR: 

As the 2012 class of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame gets closer to induction, original members of late 80s thrashers GNR – Axl, Slash, Dizzy Reed, Izzy Stradlin, Duff McKagen and Steven Adler – are assembling to receive their respects. Which means, if Axl and Slash can put a stop to their fussin’ and a fuedin’, there may be an on-stage reunion of sorts. I.e. not the hired-gun head-swell that took over a decade to drop Chinese Democracy, but rather the kind that fed the monster arenas of Appetite For Destruction. Although keyboardist Dizzy Reed revealed to Billboard that he and Axl and the rest of the band haven’t discussed it, he doesn’t “know exactly what’s going to go down.” “It’s one of those things I’m sure will all come together and be really cool. I’m just going to go in with a good attitude and a clear head and a grateful heart,” said Reed. For fans’ sake, hopefully it will be easy to get back to “It’s So Easy.”

Technologic:

Techno ground zero is readying another Detroit Electronic Music Festival (DEMF; Memorial Day weekend), just announcing this year’s lineup yesterday. Teasing headlining talent from Public Enemy to Jeff Mills and Lil Louis, Motor City’s fabled electronic foreground has branched out a bit from its 2000 inception, when a million audio nerds showed up over the three-day affair for relatively niche DJ talent. Hence this year’s Public Enemy addition. Though the DEMF camp is trumpeting Public Enemy as a group that “continues to blaze musical and technological trails,” in which the formidable hip-hop pioneers will focus on their latest record Revolverlution, “a combination of new songs, live performances recorded around the world and several classics reworked by fans via the internet.” In other words: plenty of chick-chicka-wicka-wicka vinyl fun.

F**k Time:

Punk-pop’s favorite Dookie-cum-Broadway crew, Green Day, started recording the follow-up to their eighth effort 21st Century Breakdown on Valentine’s Day, as told to the world via frontman Billie Joe Armstrong’s tweet, “Happy Valantine’s day! Officially started recording the new record today. It’s FUCK TIME!!!!” Four exclamation points and a misspelled holiday later, we don’t have a working title yet. But that’s what future tweets are for. Otherwise we can speculate that some of the 15 new tracks debuted within a secret show back in 2011 may be of speculative value here.

Doin’ Dylan Proud:

Though it makes our brain hurt to type the former Hannah Montana star Miley Cyrus and Bob Dylan in the same sentence, the budding pop-starlet did a Dylan proud with her rendition of “You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go,” from the recently dropped Amnesty International four-disc cover benefit opus of all things Dylan, Chimes of Freedom, channeling a lineage of Baez-esque folk Cyrus usually doesn’t circle. And it wasn’t a studio trick either, as performed on Jimmy Kimmel Live last night, dueting with guitarist Johnzo West. Dig on the intimate open-mic vibes on Cyrus’s YouTube channel.

Lyricapsule:

Tutankhamen, a.k.a. King Tut, was exhumed from his circa 1400 B.C. resting place in Thebes Egypt by archaeologist Howard Carter on this day in 1923. Story goes that Tut wasn’t such a popular dude when he died as a mere teenage pharaoh. But since he was preserved so well, the world was collectively re-enamored with ancient Egypt, a sentiment that would endure across a few decades through the 70s, when a young Steve Martin parodied the Tut-ster on SNL with backing band the Toot Uncommons, remembering Tut’s “dancing by the Nile” and how “ladies loved the style” while “rocking for a mile.”