Entertainment on Parade

It always amazes me when new music from a very old band is discovered. I mean, who is sitting on this stuff? Did someone just throw the tape in a box and then one day, while doing housecleaning, just happened to find it and go “Oh my God, this is The Beatles! I totally forgot! We are rich!”

Anyhow, it appears that has happened. Some guy in England was cleaning his dad’s attic when he stumbled across a reel-to-reel tape of The Beatles talking and laughing during an early recording session in 1964. In addition, the tape also has the Fab Five singing “I Feel Fine,” “I’m a Loser” and “Don’t Put Me Down Like This,” plus John Lennon and Paul McCartney laughing while flubbing the song “I’ll Follow the Sun.”

The tape will be sold by Cameo Auctioneers today and it is expected to bring in between 8,000 to 12,000 pound ($16,000 to $24,000). Hum, given that half of The Beatles are dead, I would have thought it might have fetched a bit more.

Stoners everywhere – rejoice! The long feud between comedians Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong appears to be over. The two recently announced that they are planning their first comedy tour (titled “Hey, What’s That Smell?) in 25 years.

What prompted the reunion? It seems the two simply decided if they were ever going to reunite, now was the time. Marin just 62 and Chong just turned 70 this year and as Marin put it, “We’ve gotten to the age where we don’t feel like fighting anymore because the end is a lot closer than the beginning.”

The two began their dope brand of humor in the early 70’s. They released nine comedy albums, one of which won a Grammy. They also starred together in eight feature films including “Nice Dreams” and “Up in Smoke.”

However, the good times ended when the two broke up in 1985 due to creative differences. Since then, Marin has worked on a more mainstream acting career while Chong occasionally took acting roles while running his Chong Glass/Nice Dreams bong business until it was busted by the federal government.

Details of the tour are supposed to be released today in a press conference, but it appears they will hit the road later this year.

Those Australian mad men of rock are “back in black” as AC/DC has announced the will take off on their first world tour in 8 years this October. The announcement was made yesterday at the International Association of Assembly Managers’ conference and trade show.

The tour is no doubt in response to the release of the band’s newest album, which will only be available at Wal-Mart. Well, that isn’t very rock n’ roll, is it? A new single from the upcoming album will be released next month.

AC/DC has been a staple of the rock world since the late Seventies. The band has sold over 150 million albums worldwide, despite the death of lead singer Bon Scott in 1980 as they were just about to reach their pinnacle of fame. Scott was replaced by Brian Johnson, who remains the lead singer of the band 28 years later.

Well, I guess you go where your peeps are. Singer Chris De Burgh (call me sappy, but I have always loved the song “Lady in Red”) is scheduled to hold a concert in Tehran, Iran in late November. Now this might not normally make the news, but this is the first such “western” concert to be held in Iran in 30 years, since the 1979 revolution.

Although Chris is Irish, the Iranians love him. Hey, it is better than the Germans fondness for David Hasselhoff’s singing. Chris will perform with the Iranian band Arian and the concert will be held at the Azadi Indoor Stadium, which holds about 12,000 people.

There has been such a gap for a “western” type concerts in Iran because the authorities there have banned western pop songs. However, pirated versions of pop albums are available on the black market.

Well, I don’t want to say I told them so, but I did! I wanted to scream “No” at the television when Matt Grant, the latest “Bachelor,” choose blond bimbette Shayne Lamas (daughter of Lorenzo) as his mate. When he got down on one knee to propose, it all just seemed wrong. The whole “monkey” thing just made me nauseous.

And as it turns out, I was right. The “actress” and the British bachelor have called off their engagement. They issued a statement that read, “We tried hard to make it work but we realized that we were both heading in different directions. We truly care about each other and will remain close friends.” Ugh, please. I wonder if Shayne returned the huge diamond bling that the block put on her finger in May?

So, what was the deal? Did Matt really not know any better or did he just have stars in his eyes? He certainly was charming and I wouldn’t have a problem with seeing him on television again. Did he think Shayne could help with this?

The two were the hot cute couple of the moment for a while, but now it appears as if the Drew Barrymore/Justin Long break up may have been less than amicable. The couple ended their nine month relationship, which began when the couple met on the set of He’s Just Not That Into You, in early July.

Now, Justin is also breaking working ties with Drew. He was scheduled to appear in Whip It!, which will be Drew’s feature directorial debut. But, sources are now saying that Justin has backed out because he is too upset. The source told E! News “She dumped him. She was hot and cold. One minute she was in love with him and the next she wanted to break up with him. He is so distraught over the split that he dropped out of the movie.”

Flower Films rep Chris Miller couldn’t even confirm that Justin had been attached to the project, saying that “we never comment on cast.”

Could it be that Drew is still in love with Fabrizio Moretti, her boyfriend of five years that she broke up with not long before beginning her relationship with Justin?

In case you haven’t heard, actor Christian Bale managed to make a bigger ruckus this week than his latest film The Dark Knight, which grossed a record-breaking $158.4 million on its opening weekend. Bale was accused Tuesday of assaulting his mother Jenny and his sister Sharon in a London hotel. He was released on bail, but not charged.

Since then, Bale has only said that the event was “deeply personal” and he would ask that the media “respect my privacy in the matter.” Through his lawyers, he said the allegations were false.

See Christian and all other celebrities who request privacy, here’s the deal – you are a celebrity. You are paid God-awful amounts of money to do what you do. On one film, you probably make more than most of us will see in our lifetime. Then, we turn around and pay to see you on the big screen and so really, you are just the employee of the audience. After all, if you aren’t popular, you aren’t making huge bucks.

That means when you do something off camera – whether it be have a baby or beat up your sister – we want to know about it. This is not necessarily a new phenomenon – ask Liz Taylor about the media brouhaha that occurred when she left Eddie Fisher for Richard Burton.

You can ask for privacy, but guess what dude? Ain’t gonna happen. If you want privacy, get out of the limelight and go work for McDonald’s. If you want to keep making the big bucks, try to keep yourself out of trouble because if you don’t, it’s gonna hit the press. End of story.

Giving hope to the Madonna/Alex Rodriguez or Sienna Miller/Balthazar Getty relationships, Chris Evert has admitted that her relationship with Greg Norman started out as an affair. She told Vogue in an interview that she and the golf pro started a romantic relationship before either left their respective spouses.

Evert was on her second marriage – to Olympic skier Andy Mill, and Norman was married to his wife of 26 years, Laura Andrassy, when the two met. Both admitted to trying to fight off their desire for each other and went to counseling with their spouses, but when that didn’t work, they both sought divorces.

Chris described her attraction to Norman as an “irresistible force.” The two married in April in the Bahamas. The wedding cost approximately $2 million and it was attended by 140 of Evert and Norman’s friends and family. I am assuming that Mill and Andrassy were not there.

Hum, something weird is going on. Yesterday, I blogged about Richard Roeper leaving “At the Movies with Ebert & Roeper” because a contract could not be reached with Disney-ABC Domestic Television. Right after that, Roger Ebert, who has been on the show for 33 years barring the last few, announced that he too is leaving the show. Of course, as you probably know, Ebert has been off the show since his bout with thyroid cancer in 2006.

This makes me question why Ebert announced he is departing the show. I mean, no disrespect to Roger – I love him dearly, but he hasn’t been on the showin two years. So it seems some symbolic form of solidarity against Disney for the two to both make this announcement on the same day.

Ebert’s statement read, “After 33 years on the air, 23 of them with Disney, the studio has decided to take the program named ‘Siskel & Ebert’ and then ‘Ebert & Roeper’ in a new direction. I will no longer be associated with it.”

The film critic for the Dallas Observer, Robert Wilonsky, said that the show brought “thoughtful conversation” about film and that the arguments “were always spirited, and I hope Disney can find some way to keep that spirit alive without allowing the series to roll its end credits.”

Hum, sounds like Wilonsky is bucking for a job.

Wow, is it the end of an era? “At the Movies,” the show in which two critics review some of the newest movies, has been around in some form since 1975. For the longest, the critics were newspaper rivals Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel. After Siskel’s death in 1999, Richard Roeper, who writes for Ebert’s Chicago Sun-Times, joined as the permanent co-host.

As you probably know, Ebert was sidelined in 2006 with complications due to thyroid cancer, which left him unable to speak. Roeper carried on the helm since then with guest critics, but now, it seems that he too is gone from the show. He and Disney-ABC Domestic Television could not reach a contract settlement, so he is leaving the show after 8 seasons. His last show will air on August 16-17.

However, could there be more to this than money? In his statement, Roeper said his plans are to “proceed elsewhere … as the co-host of a movie review show that honors the standards established by Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert more than 30 years ago.” That doesn’t sound like man who was just wanting more money and didn’t get it.

Well, I hope the show survives, but even if it does, I doubt it will be the same.