Blog Posts by Daniel Kreps

WaleWale is the biggest name in Rick Ross' Maybach Music Group, a collective that also features rappers Meek Mill and Pill. However, on Wale's current Ambition tour, he's not recruiting his label mates to open the gigs and boost their own status. Instead, he's letting the crowd pick the music. Wired reports that the social music site Turntable.fm, which allows users to switch off playing handpicked tunes by using an avatar DJ, will be utilized to set the mood at venues prior to Wale taking the stage. And in our concert-going experience, a hip-hop show has never, ever started at the advertised time, so helping to DJ the concert should help kill precious minutes off the wait.

Born This Way: The CollectionLooking for an alternative to Nickelback this Thanksgiving? Lady Gaga will be the subject of her own 90-minute special this November 24th when A Very Gaga Thanksgiving airs on ABC. The Fame Monster will perform eight tracks during the special -- including a "The Lady Is a Tramp" duet with Tony Bennett and a rendition of "White Christmas -- as well as prepare a turkey feast with Oprah's former personal chef Art Smith. The singer will also return to Manhattan's Sacred Heart Catholic School, where Stefani Germanotta actually attended classes in her youth, for a Q&A with Katie Couric.

Kevin Winter/NBCUniversal/Getty ImagesJustin Bieber appeared on NBC's Today show this morning to talk about his new Christmas album, but his visit was really just to confront the allegations that his brief romance with an older fan after a Los Angeles concert resulted in a baby boy. The incident has turned "Mariah Yeater" into a household name overnight, and while Bieber and his reps immediately denied the rumors, chatting with Today about the situation has more resonance than a tweet. Al Roker and Ann Curry loosened the Bieb up with some innocent questions about his Under the Mistletoe, the charities that album is raising money for, and his moneymaker ("My voice is evolving and changing for the better"). Thankfully, Matt Lauer swooped in to ask the question on everyone's mind this morning: Is it your baby?

"I'd just like to say, basically, that none of those allegations are true, and I know that I'm gonna be a target, but I'm never going to be a victim. I think it's crazy, because every night after the show, I'm gone

Paul Warner/Getty ImagesCory Smoot, the fifth guitarist to don the Flattus Maximus costume in the carnival metal band GWAR, died mysteriously today while the band was on tour. Smoot joined GWAR as their lead guitarist in 2002 and became the longest-serving member to wear the Flattus mask in the group's 27-year history. According to Metal Sucks, the band found Smoot dead -- presumably on the tour bus -- as they prepared to cross the Canadian border. No cause of death has yet been revealed.

"It is with a sense of profound loss and tragedy that the members of GWAR must announce the passing of their long time guitarist and beloved friend Cory Smoot, also known to thousands of metal fans worldwide as Flattus Maximus," GWAR frontman  Dave Crockie (or Oderus Urungus) said in a statement. "Cory was found deceased this morning as the band prepared for a border crossing. At this point we are just dealing with the loss of our dear friend and brother, one of the most talented guitar players in metal today."

Crockie and

One by one, prog-rockers Coheed and Cambria keep losing band members. They're like the cast of The Walking Dead. The latest to depart the group is drummer Chris Pennie, who had been a member of C&C Prog Music Factory since 2007. On the bright side, Pennie wasn't kicked out of the band because he was arrested for robbing a Massachusetts pharmacy hours before they were scheduled to open for Soundgarden, or for anything crime-related. Instead, he's leaving Coheed to work on other projects. The split was amicable, but "creative differences" did play a role.

Although Metallica and Megadeth toured together this past year, there's always been a rivalry between the two groups (and their fans) ever since Megadeth's Dave Mustaine was fired from Metallica in 1983. Both bands are heavy metal gods, but only Metallica is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. They both sell out arenas, but only James Hetfield's crew rake in the platinum records. Megadeth has long been the Joe Frazier to Metallica's Muhammad Ali, the Boston Red Sox to their New York Yankees. Except this week, as Megadeth's new album TH1RT3EN is crushing Metallica and Lou Reed's reviled Lulu on the Billboard 200 chart.

Gustavo Caballero/Getty ImagesDetroit Rock City is not too happy about the NFL's decision to hand halftime of the annual Thanksgiving Day game to Nickelback. Just hours after it was announced that the much-loathed band would perform midway through the Lions' battle with the Packers, Motor City denizens have already drawn up a petition protesting Nickelback's presence. Detroit is the town that's responsible for Kid Rock -- and a lot of good music, like Motown, Eminem, and White Stripes -- and even they recognize how terrible Nickelback is. At press time, the petition has collected over 4,000 "signatures," and that number is quickly ballooning.

Hollywood, like the book publishing industry, can't get enough music. Jeff Buckley, Keith Richards, Dennis Wilson, and N.W.A. are all getting the biopic treatment, and now Wu-Tang Clan rapper Ol' Dirty Bastard is the latest to draw big screen interest. The script for the film was penned by ODB's cousin Raeshawn (not to be confused with Raekwon, who also has a biopic in the works), and while it appears like the movie is nowhere near being greenlit, there's already a race between comedians Eddie Griffin and Tracy Morgan to portray the rapper.

"Eddie Griffin is down," Wu-Tang Clan's RZA told XXL. "Me and Eddie talked about it, laughed about it. Tracy Morgan, he wanna do it [too]. I said 'Ya'll both kinda can do it... [but] Eddie spent time with Dirty, they knew each other well." Griffin could easily imitate ODB's mannerisms, and Morgan's 30 Rock character Tracy Jordan is the closest thing primetime has to the rapper with his penchant for unpredictable behavior and spouting hilarious