Blog Posts by Chris Willman

Tim & Faith on stage at the VenetianSuperstar couple Tim McGraw and Faith Hill met the press in Las Vegas this morning, announcing the details of their long-rumored Las Vegas residency. Core message: If you liked their joint Soul2Soul tours (the last of which ended in 2007), you're going to love it in a room that's about one-tenth the size, and without all that extraneous solo stuff.

Over the course of a half-hour press conference, exact details about the content of the show were nebulous, partly because the run doesn't start till December and is still in the planning stages. But when I finally asked whether each of them would be disappearing from the stage for a good portion of the show while the other sings his or her individual hits, McGraw couldn't have been clearer: "I would say that the chances of us not being on stage together for any length of time, maybe other than a song or two, are small," he emphasized.

We're still not getting a duets album any time soon, but a full-on duets show may be the next best thing...

Lollapalooza logo, 2012You can argue how great an impact Lollapalooza has ultimately had on rock 'n' roll since the festival began in 1991. One thing that's inarguable: its effect on the English language.

Probably no suffix has gained traction in the last quarter-century quite like "-palooza." Tracking the origins of the word and its outgrowth and myriad variations since Perry Farrell popularized it in 1991 makes for a real...etymology-palooza. (Sorry.)

Lollapalooza takes place this weekend in Chicago, having been reborn in 2009 as a geographically sedentary three-day festival, as opposed to its original traveling circus format. One thing that hasn't changed over the last 21 years is the delight with which people let the L-word trip off their tongues...or mash other words into it.

But the name didn't seem like a great idea to everyone at the time. Marc Geiger, Farrell's business partner in the festival, recalled his reaction upon first hearing it. In December 1990, Farrell "called my house at 1 in the

Bon JoviWhat makes you sing along to a popular song in a bar? Science can explain! (And no, the answer is not "Jello shots.")

According to a research presentation at the International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition last weekend in Greece, there exists a set of criteria that separates "Livin' On A Prayer" from the billions of tunes that aspire and fail to be "Livin' On A Prayer."

[VIDEO: Celebrity karaoke disasters]

Musicologist Alisun Pawley spent 30 nights "undercover" hanging out at English pubs in order to observe and determine the common characteristics of the songs that produce a nearly involuntary group-sing. Of course, that's what we all say. But Pauley actually produced a scientific paper at the end of her long, lost weekend. Some determinations reached by Pawley and fellow researcher Daniel Mullensiefen, who spent six years on the project:

Mick Jagger, pre-fatherhoodMick Jagger is turning 69, and chances are he won't be getting nearly as many ties from his kids as most men of his age. Whatever his children get him (maybe something from the Skinny Jeans for Seniors department at Dolce & Gabbana?), there will be a lot of boxes to open.

TJ JacksonMove aside, Joe. There's a new paterfamilias in town, and his name is TJ Jackson —the 34-year-old who's just been appointed by an L.A. judge to be temporary guardian of his uncle Michael's three kids.

His initials stand for Tito Joseph, since this Jackson was named for both his father Tito and grandfather Joe. But they might as well stand for "Tough Job," given the seemingly insurmountable odds that TJ faces in helping restore any peace or sanity to the suddenly deeply riven Jackson clan.

[Related: Paris Jackson Takes The Offensive, Lashes Out In Shocking Jackson Family Feud]

TJ had already emerged as 14-year-old Paris Jackson's most visible family ally. Some have said he was more directly involved in her care than her previous guardian, Katharine, 82, who has suddenly become the human football of the Jackson family. TJ tweeted Paris with his support on July 23, publicly telling her, "I know it's completely unfair for them to do this to you and your brothers (Prince and Blanket). We

Spice Girls, 2012If you've been hoping to hear a lot of "Fanfare For The Common Man," boy, did you come to the wrong Olympics.

On the other hand, sporting's greatest historic event has brought Sporty Spice back from the dead.

The Games of the XXX Olympiad have long promised to be the grooviest Olympics ever — for better (for Underworld fans) or worse (for Aaron Copland groupies). With the opening ceremony approaching Friday in London, the enormity of the British music connection is coming ever clearer: With a host of English acts from Paul McCartney to Underworld in the docket, these might be the first Olympics to get more coverage in NME than Sports Illustrated.

[VIDEO: Memorable Olympic moments]

Chances are you've heard the official theme for the summer Olympics, Muse's "Survival"...and heard it only once, if you're like most people with an intolerance for hook-avoidant Brit-pomp bombast. "Survival" answered the never-asked musical question "What if Queen were bad?" and may have singlehandedly made

Maybe Bruce Springsteen was much more affected by that "Wreck on the Highway" than we realized.

Opening up more than ever before, Springsteen reveals battles with depression throughout his life in a 16,000-word New Yorker profile hitting the stands this week. It turns out he wasn't just dancing in the dark; he was doing his fair share of brooding there, and even contemplating suicidal thoughts.

Bruce SpringsteenAt the height of his stardom in the early '80s, "he was feeling suicidal," Dave Marsh, Springsteen's first biographer as well as longtime confidante, told the New Yorker. "The depression wasn't shocking, per se. He was on a rocket ride, from nothing to something, and now you are getting your ass kissed day and night. You might start to have some inner conflicts about your real self-worth."

That isn't just an acquaintance exaggerating. Even Springsteen's wife, Patti Scialfa, opened up to writer David Remnick about her husband's bouts with the blues — and admitted she shared them. She says Bruce's

photo: Samir Hussein / Getty ImagesBefore she died last July at the tender age of 27, Amy Winehouse was well on her way to being The Illustrated Woman, with a series of provocative tattoos that were usually highly visible to the public, thanks to her preference for tank tops, bras, and low-cut shorts. She never got a chance to write a memoir, but a lot of her life story is right there in ink—the romantic obsessions, the familial sweetness, the aspirations, the sauciness.

"It's a way of suffering for the things that mean a lot to you," she said about her penchant for going under the pen. "Actually I like the pain. To me, it relieves you."
Here's a look back at what Winehouse had to tell us through her body art: