CD celebrates 25th anniversary
EINDHOVEN, Netherlands (AP) - It was Aug. 17, 1982, and row upon row of palm-sized plates with a rainbow sheen began rolling off an assembly line near Hanover, Germany.
An engineering marvel at the time, today they are instantly recognizable as Compact Discs, a product that turns 25 years old on Friday - and whose future is increasingly in doubt in an age of iPods and digital downloads.
Those first CDs contained Richard Strauss' Alpine Symphony and would sound equally sharp if played today, says Holland's Royal Philips Electronics NV, which jointly developed the CD with Sony Corp. of Japan.
The recording industry thrived in the 1990s as music fans replaced their aging cassettes and vinyl LPs with compact discs, eventually making CDs the most popular album format.
The CD still accounts for the majority of the music industry's recording revenues, but its sales have been in a freefall since peaking early this decade, in part due to the rise of online file-sharing, but also as consumers spend more of their leisure dollars on other entertainment purchases, such as DVDs and video games.
As the music labels slash wholesale prices and experiment with extras to revive the now-aging format, it's hard to imagine there was ever a day without CDs.
Yet it had been a risky technical endeavour to attempt to bring digital audio to the masses, said Pieter Kramer, the head of the optical research group at Philips' labs in the Netherlands in the 1970s.
"When we started there was nothing in place," he said in an interview at Philips' corporate museum in Eindhoven.
The proposed semiconductor chips needed for CD players were to be the most advanced ever used in a consumer product. And the lasers were still on the drawing board when the companies teamed up in 1979.
In 1980, researchers published what became known as the "Red Book" containing the original CD standards, as well as specifying which patents were held by Philips and which by Sony.
Philips had developed the bulk of the disc and laser technology, while Sony contributed the digital encoding that allowed for smooth, error-free playback. Philips still licenses out the Red Book and its later incarnations, notably for the CD-ROM for storing computer software and other data.
The CD's design drew inspiration from vinyl records: Like the grooves on a record, CDs are engraved with a spiral of tiny pits that are scanned by a laser - the equivalent of a record player's needle. The reflected light is encoded into millions of 0s and 1s: a digital file.
Because the pits are covered with plastic and the laser's light doesn't wear them down, the CD never loses sound quality.
Legends abound about how the size of the CD was chosen: Some said it matched a Dutch beer coaster; others believe a famous conductor or Sony executive wanted it just long enough for Beethoven's 9th Symphony.
Kramer said the decision evolved from "long conversations around the table" about which play length made the most sense.
The jump into mass production in Germany was a milestone for the CD, and by 1982 the companies announced their product was ready for market. Both began selling players that fall, though the machines only hit U.S. markets the following spring.
Sony sold the first player in Japan on Oct. 1, with the CBS label supplying Billy Joel's "52nd Street" as its first album.
The CD was a massive hit. Sony sold more players, especially once its "Discman" series was introduced in 1984. But Philips benefited from CD sales, too, thanks to its ownership of Polygram, now part of Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group.
The CD player helped Philips maintain its position as Europe's largest maker of consumer electronics until it was eclipsed by Nokia Corp. in the late 1990s. Licensing royalties sustained the company through bad times.
"The CD was in itself an easy product to market," said Philips' current marketing chief for consumer electronics, Lucas Covers. It wasn't just the sound quality - discs looked like jewelry in comparison to LPs.
By 1986, CD players were outselling record players, and by 1988 CDs outsold records.
"It was a massive turnaround for the whole market," Covers said.
Now, the CD may be seeing the end of its days.
CD sales have fallen sharply to 553 million sold in the United States last year, a 22 per cent drop from its 2001 peak of 712 million, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
Napster and later Kazaa and BitTorrent allowed music fans to easily share songs over the Internet, often illegally. More recently, Apple Inc. and other companies began selling legal music downloads, turning the MP3 and other digital audio formats into the medium of choice for many owners of Apple's iPods and other digital players.
"The MP3 and all the little things that the boys and girls have in their pockets ... can replace it, absolutely," said Kramer, the retired engineer.
CDs won't disappear overnight, but its years may be numbered.
Record labels seeking to revive the format have experimented with hybrid CD-DVD combos and packages of traditional CDs with separate DVDs that carry video and multimedia offerings playable on computers.
The efforts have been mixed at best, with some attempts, such as the DualDisc that debuted in 2004, not finding lasting success in the marketplace.
Kramer said it has been satisfying to witness the CD's long run at the top and know he had a small hand in its creation.
"You never know how long a standard will last," he said. "But it was a solid, good standard and still is."
Warner to reprise Enter the Dragon
Warner Bros. has asked The Shield producer Kurt Sutter to write and direct a remake of the 1973 Bruce Lee classic Enter the Dragon.
Sutter has been writer, producer and even actor in the Golden Globe-winner TV series The Shield, which follows life inside a Los Angeles police precinct.
The new film, to be called Awaken the Dragon, will tell the story of an agent investigating a Shaolin monk and underground kung fu clubs, according to Warner Bros. publicist Laura Kim, who announced the movie Thursday in Hong Kong.
There was no news on casting choices or the shooting schedule.
The original Enter the Dragon, the first U.S.-produced martial arts film, starred Lee as an agent infiltrating a crime syndicate by taking part in an invitational martial arts competition.
The crime lord is a renegade Shaolin monk and, like Lee, trained in the famed Chinese martial arts tradition.
The non-stop action of Enter the Dragon awakened a taste for martial arts in North America and made the Hong Kong-raised Lee an international star.
He died in 1973 at age 32 from swelling of the brain.
China recently announced plans to make a 40-part television series on his life and a Hong Kong studio is planning a biopic.
"Superbad" vies for box office honors
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Does the summer box office have room for just one more break-out hit? As an overheated season draws to a close in North America, Sony Pictures is betting that it can eke out yet one more chart topper with the teen-sex comedy "Superbad," which opens Friday.
By contrast, the weekend's other new wide arrivals -- Warner Bros. Pictures' sci-fi remake "The Invasion" and the Weinstein Co.'s fall-of-the-Roman-Empire actioner "The Last Legion" -- are shaping up more like traditional, late-summer entries, which aren't expected to burn up the box office.
"Superbad," which stars relative unknowns Jonah Hill and Michael Cera as high school buddies bent on sampling that good ol' American Pie, appears headed for an opening in the mid-$20 million range.
The only thing that could stand in its way is the second weekend of Rush Hour 3." New Line's buddy cop flick debuted last weekend to a chart-topping $49.1 million. If it holds to a typical 55% drop, it will pick up $22 million or so, but a steeper fall would see it fall below the $20 million level.
"The Invasion," starring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig, is the weekend's starriest offering. But this latest adaptation of the Jack Finney novel about body snatchers from outer space -- its fourth film adaptation -- has been through four directors, credited filmmaker Oliver Hirschbiegel, the Wachowski brothers and James McTeigue. The film will probably find itself stuck in the teen-million-dollar range.
"The Last Legion" stars Colin Firth and Ben Kinglsey in a tale that weaves the final days of the Roman empire with the rise of the Arthurian legend. It should arrive at one side or the other of the $5 million mark.
Other titles entering the race include MGM's "Death at a Funeral," a Frank Oz-directed comedy of dark British manners; Picturehouse's documentary about die-hard gamers "The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters"; and Warner Independent Pictures' environmentally minded documentary "The 11th Hour," with Leonardo DiCaprio narrating.
Shrek the Third Comes To Disc
Paramount Home Entertainment will cover the distribution of the latest Shrek DVD which will be arriving later this fall. Shrek the Third is coming.
The new DVD will include several deleted scenes, a behind the scenes featurettes as well as the featurette Tech of Shrek, a Donkey Dance video, a gag reel, kid's games, and two interactive features Worcestershire Academy Yearbook and Shrek's Guide to Parenthood.
The DVD is on the way on November 13th for $29.99.
Eagles Unveil New Single, Album Release Date
The Eagles have unveiled "How Long," the first single from "Long Road Out of Eden," their first new studio album in 28 years.
The cut was delivered today (Aug. 16) to U.S. radio outlets and will be available exclusively via walmart.com, samsclub.com and eaglesband.com starting Monday. A video for the track, shot recently in Los Angeles, premieres the same day on CMT.
"Long Road Out of Eden," which will also only be available at Wal-Mart, Sam's Club and via the band's Web site, is due in October. Guitarist Joe Walsh recently told Billboard.com the Eagles will tour extensively next year in support of the project.
"I didn't want us to be too ballad-y" on the album, Walsh said. "We need some stuff we can play live, so I made sure there was that element in the record."
The Eagles will be back on stage in October during a six-night stand with the Dixie Chicks as part of the opening of the new Nokia Theatre L.A. Live in downtown Los Angeles.
Springsteen Finds 'Magic' With E Street Band
Bruce Springsteen is ready to rock again with the E Street Band. The artist will on Oct. 2 release "Magic," his first Columbia album with his longtime backing group since 2002's "The Rising." A North American arena tour is expected follow, but dates have yet to be announced.
The 11-track "Magic" was produced by Brendan O'Brien and includes such tracks as "Gypsy Biker," "Last To Die," "Devil's Arcade" and "Long Walk Home," which is the only song to have previously been played live. Springsteen manager Jon Landau describes the project as a "high energy rock CD."
After "The Rising," which has sold 2.1 million copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan, Springsteen went solo with 2005's "Devils and Dust" and last year rounded up a host of new musicians for his "Seeger Sessions" album and tour.
His return to the road with the E Street Band should provide a big boost to the industry's fourth quarter bottom line. Springsteen's 2003 tour with E Street was the most financially successful of his stellar touring career, selling out stadiums in both Europe and the U.S., and dozens of arenas across North America.
Springsteen's $182 million gross from 82 shows, on one of the most conservative ticket prices among all superstar acts at $75 in most markets, was second only to the Rolling Stones in 2003. The Boss' remarkable 10 sellouts at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford New Jersey that summer, with a gross of $38.7 million and attendance of 566,650, remains the top Boxscore ever reported to Billboard.
Prior to the release of "Magic," Springsteen will unveil some new recordings with Pete Seeger on two separate compilation albums due next month from Appleseed Recordings. He also guests on his wife Patti Scialfa's new Columbia album, "Play It As It Lays," due Sept. 4.
Here is the track list for "Magic":
"Radio Nowhere"
"You'll Be Comin' Down"
"Livin' in the Future"
"Your Own Worst Enemy"
"Gypsy Biker"
"Girls in Their Summer Clothes"
"I'll Work for Your Love"
"Magic"
"Last To Die"
"Long Walk Home"
"Devil's Arcade"
Jim Carrey Deal -- Unmasked
Jim Carrey, the first movie star ever to command a salary of $20 million per picture, has signed a deal with Warner Bros. in which he will receive no upfront cash and no percentage of the gross for the upcoming film Yes Man.
Instead, he will receive a so-called cash-break deal on 36.2 percent of the back end -- that is, the amount the studio holds onto after it recovers its production, prints and advertising costs.
In her Deadline Hollywood blog, writer Nikki Finke remarks that this "could just turn out to be the worst talent deal ever" for a major star.
"The conventional wisdom in Hollywood is always to get as much fixed compensation as you can upfront because you're never going to see the back end thanks to the studios' creative accounting," Finke wrote.
She quoted one unnamed talent manager as saying, "Let me put it this way: if his reps were a hospital, they would be shut down for malpractice. This is a new kind of Hollywood stupid."
Jazz master Max Roach dies at 83
NEW YORK - By his 30th birthday, Max Roach was already considered the greatest jazz drummer ever by his peers. By the time he died this week, the 83-year-old master percussionist was known worldwide as much more: innovator, activist, teacher, genius.
Roach, whose rhythmic innovations and improvisations defined bebop jazz during a career marked by expectations defied and musical boundaries ignored, died late Wednesday in a Manhattan hospital after a long illness.
No additional details were available, said Cem Kurosman, spokesman for Blue Note Records, where Roach played on seminal recordings with Thelonius Monk, Duke Ellington and Miles Davis. Roach was elected to the Downbeat magazine Hall of Fame in 1980, and the Grammy Hall of Fame 15 years later.
"Max was one of the founders and original members of the A-Team of bebop," said fellow music legend Quincy Jones. "Outside of losing a giant and an innovator, I've lost a great, great friend. Thank God he left a piece of his soul on his recordings so that we'll always have a part of him with us."
In 1988, he became the first jazz musician ever honored with a MacArthur Fellowship — receiving a $372,000 "genius grant."
The creatively restless Roach, who debuted with Ellington's band as a self-taught 16-year-old drummer in 1940, challenged his listeners and himself by making music that connected the jazz of the pre-World War II era with the beats of the hip-hop generation.
His place in the pantheon of jazz greats long since secured, Roach collaborated with drummers from around the world, with a string quartet that featured daughter Maxine, and with rapper Fab Five Freddy.
"I try to show my students the correlation between hip-hop and Louis Armstrong," he once said. "That's how well-rooted hip-hop is, coming out of an environment where people were denied any kind of cultural enrichment."
The North Carolina native was born on Jan. 10, 1924, and moved to Brooklyn with his family four years later. A player piano left by the previous tenants gave Roach his musical introduction.
But he was looking for another instrument while singing with the children's choir at the Concord Baptist Church. Roach found a snare drum, and was quickly hooked. His father gave the eighth-grader his first set of drums, and Roach was drumming professionally while still in high school.
He would take often the nickel train ride from Brooklyn to Harlem, listening to the music spilling out of the Apollo Theater or the Savoy Ballroom. While there, he befriended saxophonist Charlie Parker and trumpeter Dizzie Gillespie as the burgeoning bop movement took flight. By 1942, he was playing behind Parker in a Harlem after-hours club; two years later, Roach joined Gillespie and Coleman Hawkins in one of the first bebop recording sessions.
What distinguished Roach from other drummers were his fast hands and ability to simultaneously maintain several rhythms. By layering different beats and varying the meter, Roach pushed jazz beyond the boundaries of standard 4/4 time. His dislocated beats helped define bebop.
Roach's innovative use of cymbals for melodic lines, and tom-toms and bass drums for accents, helped elevate the percussionist from mere timekeeper to featured performer — on a par with the trumpeter and saxophonist.
"One of the grand masters of our music," Gillespie once said.
Through the jazz upheaval of the 1940s and '50s, Roach played bebop with the Charlie Parker Quintet and cool bop with the Miles Davis Capitol Orchestra. He joined trumpeter Clifford Brown in playing hard bop, a jazz form that maintained bebop's rhythmic drive while incorporating the blues and gospel.
In 1952, Roach and bassist-composer Charles Mingus founded Debut Records. Among the short-lived label's releases was a famed 1953 Toronto performance in Massey Hall, featuring Roach, Mingus, Parker, Gillespie and pianist Bud Powell.
Around this time, a panel of 100 jazz musicians voted Roach the greatest jazz drummer ever.
But bad times were lurking. Roach watched several friends — including Parker — die from heroin addiction. He was further devastated when Brown and Powell died in a 1956 car accident, slipping into his own battle with drugs and alcohol.
Roach rebounded with the help of his first wife and frequent collaborator, singer Abbey Lincoln. The couple, married in 1962, split after eight years.
Roach re-emerged in the free jazz era with a new political consciousness, becoming one of jazz's loudest voices for civil rights. Albums like "We Insist! Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite," released in 1960 to celebrate the upcoming centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, reflected his support of black activism.
Roach eventually expanded his repertoire and explored new challenges. He taught at the University of Massachusetts, traveled to Ghana in search of new music, and performed with groups from Japan and Cuba.
He also formed an all-percussion ensemble known as M'Boom, an ensemble of eight pecussionists; a quartet that performed with a 22-member gospel choir; and a double quartet — his band, plus a string quartet — that included Roach's daughter Maxine Roach on viola. Ignoring critics, Roach insisted rap had a place on music's "boundless palette."
He was survived by five children: sons Daryl and Raoul, and daughters Maxine, Ayo and Dara.
Everlasting Elvis: Fans, tribute artists gather to honour icon
Thousands of Elvis Presley fans have descended on Memphis, Tenn. this week to celebrate the life of the iconic singer and, on Thursday, to mark the 30th anniversary of his death.
Each year, fans queue for a candlelight vigil at his former home Graceland and partake in a solemn procession past the singer's grave in a small garden on the sprawling estate.
Officials from Elvis Presley Enterprises, which manages Graceland, anticipate a particularly large crowd for this year's vigil Wednesday night, despite the serious heat wave that has enveloped the region. In 2002, the 25th anniversary of Presley's death, organizers estimated that more than 30,000 fans gathered for the vigil.
Presley, who died at Graceland on Aug. 16, 1977, has remained a musical icon, with many giving credit to the efforts of his ex-wife Priscilla Presley, who helped open Graceland to the public as a sort of museum and pushed to license the pioneering rock and roller's name and image.
For instance, the world renowned Cirque du Soleil has been working on an Elvis-themed permanent show to join its many others in Las Vegas.
As well, Presley was recently edged out of the top spot in Forbes's top-earning dead celebrity list, with grunge icon Kurt Cobain pushing the King, who earned $42 million US in 2006, down to second place. Presley had topped the list since its inception.
Special concert planned
Memphis has spent the past week hosting Presley-related events. Aside from an Elvis conference, highlights on the schedule include a special concert featuring his former backup singers and band who will perform alongside video footage of the King and a massive competition of international Elvis tribute artists.
After years of resistance to the "Elvis impersonator" phenomenon, Graceland will also host the finale of the Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Contest on Friday. Jay Zanier of Guelph, Ont., is among the top 10 finalists vying for the title of Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist 2007.
Lisa Marie Presley, who has since followed in her father's footsteps as a singer, and the AOL website Spinner.com have also announced the release of a duet featuring father and daughter singing his famous song In the Ghetto.
Timed for release during the 30th anniversary celebrations, the song's music video will be posted online Friday along with an interview with the Presley, 39, about the project.
"We had two hours to lay down my vocals," she said about the remixed track.
Presley admitted she cried when a rough version of their combined voices was first played back for her the following morning.
"I've never cried when I've done anything," she said, "but I just lost it when I heard it."
Proceeds from the new song and video will be earmarked to groups helping build temporary housing for the homeless in New Orleans, Presley said.