May 31, 2005
Matthew Sweet Covers American Girl

NEW YORK (ALR) - AMERICAN LAUNDROMAT RECORDS (ALR) and FACE DOWN RECORDS (FDR) are proud to announce Indie Pop Superstar – Matthew Sweet will cover Tom Petty's 'American Girl' for their upcoming tribute CD, HIGH SCHOOL REUNION (a tribute to those great 80's films!). The tribute will features John Strohm (Blake Babies, Antenna, Lemonheads), Kristin Hersh (Throwing Muses, 50 Foot Wave), Vic Chesnutt, The Atomic Hep Cats, The Caulfield Sisters, and many more covering songs from some of the 80's most popular teen films.

Release date is scheduled for October 15, 2005. A page devoted to the tribute record can be found at http://www.americanlaundromatrecords.com.

AMERICAN GIRL appeared in the quintessential high school film FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH which was written by Cameron Crowe (Almost Famous, Singles, Say Anything), and directed by Amy Heckerling (Clueless). Sweet will record the track in his home studio.

'Matthew was one of the first artists I contacted when conceiving this tribute last October. He's a phenomenal singer-songwriter and a huge film buff like myself, so I had a feeling he'd like this record. HIGH SCHOOL REUNION is a labor of love for everyone involved, and Matthew's participation is once again an indication of his generosity and commitment to the independent community.' Joe Spadaro, ALR founder & president.

MATTHEW SWEET emerged in 1991 as the leading figure of the American power pop revival. Like his British counterparts Teenage Fanclub, Sweet adhered to traditional songcraft, yet subverted the form by adding noisy post-punk guitar and flourishes of country-rock, resulting in an amalgam of the Beatles, Big Star, R.E.M., and Neil Young. Sweet enjoyed commercial success for several years and then went underground only to reemerge with the critically acclaimed record (Japanese released) Kimi Ga Suki* Raifu, which he called a love letter to his loyal Japanese fans. Matthew appeared in 'Austin Powers – Goldmember' as Sid Belvedere (the drummer in 'Ming Tea'; Austin Powers band), and part of supergroup 'The Thorns' with fellow singer-songwriters Shawn Mullins and Pete Droge. Last year Matthew released Kimi Ga Suki* Raifu and Living Things in the USA, on Superdeformed, the label he formed with his longtime manager, Atlanta-based Russell Carter; these were his first albums of new mateterial since 1999's In Reverse.

HIGH SCHOOL REUNION is scheduled for October 2005 release with an exclusive pre-sale offered in September to ALR newsletter subscribers. More information can be found at http://www.americanlaundromatrecords.com.

Tom Petty "Conversations With"

Press Release

Book Release Precedes the 30th Anniversary of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers' First Album

Tom Petty - long seen as one of the great songwriters of American rock and roll, as well as one of the key standard bearers of integrity in the music business - will see the book "Conversations with Tom Petty" released this Fall by Omnibus Press. The book will precede the 30th anniversary of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers' first album and will be the first chronicle to focus solely on the life and work of the man responsible for some of the most memorable rock anthems of our generation, including: "American Girl," "Breakdown," "Refugee," "The Waiting," "Don't Come Around Here No More," "I Won't Back Down," "Free Fallin'," "Runnin' Down a Dream," "You Don't Know How It Feels," "Mary Jane's Last Dance," and many others.

"Conversations with Tom Petty" was written by Paul Zollo who conducted a series of in-depth discussions over a six month period with Petty about his career, with special focus on his songwriting. The book will feature rare photographs and the conversations will be a Q-and-A-type format, essentially Petty "in his own words," representing a personal and unique perspective on his entire career.

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers are headlining one of this summer's hottest tours which kicks off June 7 in Fort Myers, FL. This is the band's first major North American tour in nearly three years and will see them playing some 40 dates through to early September. With many of the dates already sold out, the band, who has not released a new album since "The Last DJ" in 2002, are well on their way to selling some half-million concert tickets over the summer.

Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers have sold more than 50-million records world-wide, and were inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002. Petty's work with the Heartbreakers, as well as his solo albums and those with the Traveling Wilburys, have been critically acclaimed the world over, earning him numerous Platinum-status awards as well as Grammys and other major awards.

May 7, 2005
Concertgoers can't win

By Tony Hicks

CONTRA COSTA TIMES

Jon Mealley exhaled and mouthed a quiet obscenity.

It was 10:10 a.m. Sunday morning at Concord's Tower Records. Mealley had been a much happier man at 10, strolling toward the Ticketmaster counter, the first in line for what he hoped would be great seats at two Tom Petty concerts.

Ten minutes later, here's what he had: Last-row seats for one show, lawn seats for the other.

"(Expletive) lawn seats," muttered the Concord resident. "I was the first guy in line. At 10:02 they said there were no more (reserved) seats. At 10:07 a guy walked up and said, 'We're sold out.' Out of, what, 30 people here, probably only 10 got tickets."

Concertgoers' No. 1 beef used to be ticket prices. These days, they're happy if they can get tickets at all.

Concert promoters and entertainment industry officials point to reasons for this. There's the proliferation of ticket brokers, companies that often use high-powered technology and special software allowing them to buy large quantities of tickets in a short time. Add to this the tickets committed to "pre-sales" offered to fan club members and to radio promotions, and the general public gets fewer and fewer chances to get out of nosebleed seats.

"You can't even be the first guy in line and get good seats," said Mealley.

Ticket-selling outlets like Ticketmaster, Tickets.com and TicketWeb have sought to make buying tickets more convenient in the past decade, with increased outlets, Internet service and phone access. But these improvements have proved a boon to ticket brokers, which can snatch up tickets and then sell them for hefty profits, despite Ticketmaster's best attempts. Days after Mealley stood in line for two hours and paid $41-$59 each for seats to a Tom Petty concert, online ticket broker sites like ShowMeTickets.com offered front-row seats for the same concert. For $715.

"It's a cat-and-mouse game to stay ahead of them," said Bonnie Poindexter, a Ticketmaster spokeswoman.

Back when physical presence was required to buy tickets, brokers paid people to line up early. The 21st century version is getting employees on computers every Sunday morning. It's perfectly legal in California.

It's called capitalism in any other business, noted Paul Cobbe, the co-owner of Walnut Creek-based Bay Tickets. He realizes music fans who can't pay $700 to sit in the first row take it very personally. "The ticket business is easy to pick on," said Cobbe, who defends his business as a way for fans to avoid hassle. "People love their music. It's the only area I know of in the free-market system that people complain about."

Cobbe's agency doesn't use software to get around Ticketmaster's security devices, which include an optical password system supposedly impervious to computer intrusion. (Tickets.com has a similar system using sequences of numbers.) But there is expensive software out there that can do it, allowing users to rapidly and repeatedly enter a site to buy as many tickets as possible.

"I tried every application out there," Cobbe said. "By and large, they're garbage. It's a waste of time and money."

Still, ticket brokers are finding ways to frustrate fans, ticket agencies and, as a result, performers. And some of those performers are kicking back. Bruce Springsteen played the relatively small Paramount Theatre in Oakland on Thursday, and tried to make it as tough as possible for scalpers. Buyers could only purchase two tickets at a time and had to pick them up at the theater's box office. After standing in long lines, they were ushered directly into the theater, cutting off scalping opportunities.

"We'll see more of that, various artists caring more about getting that ticket into the fans' hands," said Ticketmaster's Poindexter.

But that creates even more inconvenience, forcing people to arrive early and stand in long will-call lines.

"That's the only method that's been proven to (keep tickets from scalpers)," said Gary Bongiovanni, editor of the concert trade magazine Pollstar. "It's Draconian, though, and it could never work in an arena."

Some states crack down on brokers by outlawing selling tickets for more than twice face value. "California law isn't terribly comprehensive in this area," said Nathan Brankin, a spokesman for Attorney General Bill Lockyer's office. He said the only state laws applying to scalpers involves scalping on a venue's property. Brokers also must work from a "brick and mortar" facility if selling more than six tickets at a time.

But while brokers may help elevate prices, they are by no means the only reason tickets are so hard to get for big shows. Artists and concert promoters control the ticket inventory, and usually the venue determines which agency will sell the tickets. Ticketmaster gets most of the big shows in the Bay Area.

Various radio stations get blocks of tickets, either to give away or pre-sell to listeners. For example, for the Petty shows, KFOG-FM 104.5 gets two seats in the first five rows to give away. Fan clubs are making a bigger impact, as more artists offer up to 10 percent of a venue's tickets to club members before they go on sale. It's a way for artists to reward fans and bypass ticket agencies altogether.

But there's no way to prevent scalpers from joining fan clubs, nor are there any guarantees. U2, which charges members $40 annual membership fees, had problems earlier this year getting tickets to some of those very fans who joined to avoid dealing with Ticketmaster.

"I went to close the transaction and got kicked out, so I had to start over and my pre-sale code said it was already used," said Jim Cordoba, of San Ramon. "I had to call Ticketmaster. They gave me a new code, which still did not work."

Cordoba eventually got his tickets six hours later and, eventually, an e-mail of apology from U2.

Even with all these factors in play, technology, ironically, seems to be the biggest culprit. In the late '70s and early '80s, Concord's Jeff Nelson bought from the venues when it was still first-come, first served. He camped out for Springsteen tickets at San Francisco's Winterland in 1978.

In contrast, getting Springsteen tickets in 2005 meant Nelson had to start punching a computer with one hand at 9:58 on a Sunday morning, while dialing a cell phone with the other. He struck out, missing Thursday's show.

"Now you just know that's the way it is," Nelson said. "I don't go to many big-name shows anymore, and that's part of it."

May 2, 2005
Live CD & Greatest Hits II Too
From Live Update

With just over a month to go before they launch their summer tour with the Black Crowes, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers continue adding dates to the run.

New stops extend the trek into early September, and include a late-July return to the Boston-area Tweeter Center--which the tour first hits in mid-June--and a two-night, late-August engagement at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley, CA. Details are shown below.

The itinerary has also been tweaked to move up one day to June 7 the previously announced kick-off in Estero, FL.

The Black Crowes are slated to open most of the currently confirmed shows; exceptions are noted in the itinerary below.

Dates for a number of shows are on sale now, and Petty's website has been rolling out tickets via online pre-sales for fans who register at the site for free.

The most recent release from Petty & The Heartbreakers--Mike Campbell (guitar), Benmont Tench (keys), Ron Blair (bass), Scott Thurston (guitar/harmonica/backing vocals) and Steve Ferrone (drums)--is 2002's "The Last DJ." Last year, Petty said that he was sorting through live material for use in a planned two-disc release, and also said a "Greatest Hits, Part II"--featuring some new material--was in the works. No word on the status of either project was available at press time.

Before hooking up with Petty, the recently reunited Black Crowes will complete their current stretch of headlining and festival shows (dates shown below). Led by brothers Chris and Rich Robinson--the only original members still in the group--the band's lineup also features guitarist Marc Ford (who was fired from the band in 1997) and keyboardist Eddie Hawysch (a.k.a. Eddie Harsch), both of whom joined the group after its debut album and tour in 1990; bassist Sven Pipien, who departed the group in 2000; and drummer Bill Dobrow--Rich Robinson's bandmate in Hookah Brown--who takes over for Steve Gorman.