Two former members of the Special Air Service [UK Special Forces Regiment] are to act as “minders” so The Pirates of the Caribbean star can tour with British rockers Babybird. According to a report in The Sun newspaper, music-loving Depp had begged the Indie rockers to let him play guitar with them. But the band said no because of security fears, before the star hired the two muscle-bound hardmen. An insider told The Sun: “These guys are experts in restraint….

Joni Mitchell, the Canadian singer-songwriter, has lambasted Bob Dylan as a “plagiarist” and a “fake”. In a rare interview, Mitchell, 66, attacked her fellow folk musician after an interviewer for the Los Angeles Times casually noted that both had changed their names, in Dylan’s case from Bobby Zimmerman. “Bob is not authentic at all. He’s a plagiarist, and his name and voice are fake,” she said. “Everything about Bob is a deception. We are like night and day, he and…

Red Hot Chili Peppers star John Frusciante has been voted the greatest guitarist of the past 30 years. Runner-up in the list of post-punk axe heroes was British-born Slash of US rock giants Guns N’Roses. More than 30,000 listeners to threatened BBC radio station 6Music voted from a choice of 40 top strummers. 6Music DJ Shaun Keaveny said: “Frusciante’s range, from minimalist melody lines, through choppy Hendrixian chord voicings, all the way up to eleven with wailing metal-tinged blues, gives…

Blabbermouth.net “If you didn’t see them signed yourself, your METALLICA autographs probably aren’t real,” says Autograph publisher Steven Cyrkin. Already one of the most forged bands of all time, with their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, METALLICA forgeries have hit an all-time high. On eBay, on fan and dealer web sites, and in many of the fancy galleries in tourist spots, criminals are preying on METALLICA’s unsuspecting fans. “You can find out if your METALLICA autographs,…

Billboard.com April 07, 2009 07:03 AM ET Coldplay has denied in federal court that it copied parts of Joe Satriani’s music for its hit song, “Viva La Vida.” In a response filed in Los Angeles on Monday, attorneys for Coldplay’s band members also argued that any similarities between “Viva La Vida” and Satriani’s “If I Could Fly” weren’t enough to warrant damages. Satriani’s song “lacks originality,” Coldplay’s response claims, and shouldn’t receive copyright protection. Satriani sued Coldplay in December, claiming…

CNN.com 4:21 a.m. EDT, Fri April 10, 2009 LONDON, England (CNN) — Just because they named their new CD “Yes,” does not mean that British electro-pop duo, the Pet Shop Boys, will agree to just about anything. PETA has asked the Pet Shop Boys to change the band’s name to Rescue Shelter Boys. The band has turned down a request from an animal rights group to rename itself the Rescue Shelter Boys. The organization, the People for the Ethical Treatment…

Blabbermouth.net Apr. 10, 2009 Harmonix and MTV Games announced today that “Chinese Democracy”, the sixth and most recent album from GUNS N’ ROSES, will be released in its entirety to the Rock Band Music Store catalog of downloadable content on April 14.  Next week’s Rock Band Music Store lineup will feature 13 songs from “Chinese Democracy”.  The tracks will be available for purchase as an album or individual tracks for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 system. The tracks will be…

Rollingstone.com Courtney Love plans to file a lawsuit within the next month in an effort to recoup the millions of dollars “looted” from her late husband’ Kurt Cobain’s estate, E! reports. The suit will be filed on behalf of Courtney and Frances Bean Cobain, and targets the “former assistants, former managers, CPAs, lawyers and a couple of banks” who Love says bilked roughly $30 million in cash and another $500 million in false real estate ventures from Cobain’s fortune. Cobain’s…