Having heard them play some of these songs live last week, I can personally attest to the quality of Phantom Planet’s forthcoming record, Raise the Dead, their debut for new label Fueled By Ramen. But you can check it out for yourself, for free, on the band’s Myspace where the record is streaming in its entirety. You can also check out an interview with the band about their newest record over at the Synthesis.net music archive. Who needs Jason Schwartzman when the pissed dude from Donnie Darko is writing straight up hits?

A Florida teenager was ambushed at a residence by her high school classmates in an assault that apparently stems from the victim posting nasty messages on MySpace. For posterity, the attack was videotaped for a future posting online as sweet sweet revenge.

The victim was repeatedly beaten for around 30 minutes by six different girls, and was eventually taken to the hospital by ambulance and treated for concussion, damage to her left eye, left ear and numerous bruises.

One of my shitty bands got the chance to share the stage yesterday with a couple slightly less shitty bands, the surprisingly badass Phantom Planet and a band I’d never really heard of called Takota. I don’t think anyone else had really heard of them either, but I get the feeling that’s about to change: they’re second disc, Just Before Morning is set to come out on Island Records later this year and if it’s anything like their live set, its gonna be filled with epic vocal hooks ( ala Dredg ) set atop guitar-driven midtempo pop rock, with a little synth grandeur added in for good measure. Someone told me they sounded like the Scorpions gone modern emo, which might sound like a dig, but if you know shit about epic ’80s ballads you know the Scorpions are on point. Anyways, since they’re on some major label bullshit they only have brief clips of some songs on their Myspace but you can get a pretty good gauge of what the band is all about regardless. If you’re on the east coast you can also check them out on tour with Third Eye Blind next month. Oh and if yourre wondering who the sore thumb dude is in the above picture (for those too obtuse for old adages, sore thumb as in sticking out) he’s not just some random old dude who slapped on an H&M sweater to try to look more croosh, he’s Justin, one of the old drummers from Reel Big Fish. That’s cred.

Actually, it’s kinda funny. This skit features Tim & Eric as well. Good for an uncomfortable laugh.

Good luck Tom:

MySpace, the world’s largest social network Web site, said it has formed an online music venture with three major recording companies in a challenge to Apple Inc’s dominant iTunes Music Store. Vivendi’s Universal Music Group, Sony BMG Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group have minority stakes in the new MySpace Music venture announced on Thursday. Financial terms were not disclosed.
MySpace Music will offer free music and video streaming supported by advertising, paid-for MP3 downloads, ringtones for cell phones, concert ticket sales and merchandise. Chris De Wolfe, chief executive of MySpace, said the launch date of the new service was “fluid” with commercial features being added to the site over the next three to four months. He said MySpace is in talks with more music industry partners to offer their services on MySpace Music.

In the meantime, Apple’s iTunes recently supplanted Wal-Mart as being America’s #1 music retailer, with 19% of the music sold in January.

Dear MySpace (Tom),

I think it’s cute / retarded how you put spaces in between the links that we send in messages. You win at most Poetic (mySPACE) / Pathetic Attempt at Censorship of 200Hate. www.My[space]lame[space].com/[space]censorshipthatiswack!!!!!!111

Damn the man. You all are getting too crazy with it.