Guitar Hero with Van Halen to be released

Guitar Hero: Van Halen to be released later this year.
Guitar Hero: Van Halen is being developed as we speak, according to gaming blog Joystiq. Game publisher Activision Blizzard has confirmed to them that Van Halen fans will have the game in their hands by the latter part of this year.

The site reports that Activision said the game will contain Van Halen's "greatest hits," as well as guest acts like Queen, Weezer, Blink-182, The Offspring, and Queens of the Stone Age.

The game will also feature Van Halen's original lineup with David Lee Roth. Activision's Senior Vice President of Global Brand Management told Joystiq, "Oh this is definitely Van Halen, not Van Hagar."

The Van Halen game will be the third version of Guitar Hero to be based around a single rock artist/band, following succesful Aerosmith and Metallica games.

Steven Tyler autobiography: "I can't retire"

Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler's long-awaited autobiography, titled Does The Noise In My Head Bother You?, will be published on October 27th, according to a press release. The book follows Tyler's childhood in the Bronx, his early musical career, his now-historic partnership with guitarist Joe Perry and the rise, fall and rebirth of Aerosmith. The book will also trace Tyler's romantic liaisons, his relationship with his four children, and his dealings with the sex-and-drug-filled life of a rock star. Tyler commented, "This is not just my take -- this is the unbridled truth, the in-your-face, up-close and prodigious tale of Steven Tyler straight from the horse's lips."

Publishing house Ecco, a division of Harper Collins, reportedly paid more than $2 million for Tyler's memoir, according to Blabbermouth.net.

A band memoir, called Walk This Way: The Autobiography of Aerosmith, was published in 2003.

Tyler, who has been singing for more than 40 years, told us that even a recent string of injuries and illnesses wouldn't make him think of retiring: "No, I don't know if I know how to do that. I know that Joe and I, we questioned it a couple of times about whether, you know, whether we would go out again. We took a year off. I remember I had hep-C (hepatitis-C) and decided to take a year off, and I literally got rid of it. I mean, it's one of the few miracles known to man. I kicked its ass."

Tyler will promote the book at BookExpo America in New York City on May 28th, where he and E Street Band saxophonist Clarence Clemons, who has also written a book, will be interviewed by author Chuck Klosterman.

Aerosmith will hit the road next month with ZZ Top for a two-month North American trek, before returning to the studio later in the year to continue work on a new album.
source the rockradio.com

donation to titanic last survivor

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - "Titanic" stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet and the film's director James Cameron have responded to a challenge and donated $30,000 to support the last survivor of the Titanic in her last years, a representative for DiCaprio said Monday.

The survivor, 97-year-old Millvina Dean, has reportedly resorted to selling her autograph to pay her nursing home bills in Southampton, the English city from which "Titanic" began its fateful maiden voyage in 1912.

Dean was only 9 weeks old when her family traveled on Titanic in hopes of beginning a new life in the United States. Her father was one of the 1,517 casualties after the supposedly unsinkable ship hit an iceberg in the Atlantic.

DiCaprio, Winslet and Cameron made their combined $30,000 donation after Irish author and photographer Don Mullan publicly challenged them to match his donation, said Ken Sunshine, a spokesman for DiCaprio. Mullan, who photographed Dean for an exhibition, made his appeal last month in the Irish Independent newspaper.

The 1997 drama "Titanic" made more than $1.8 billion at the worldwide box office, making it the highest-grossing film of all time in figures not adjusted for inflation. It went on to win 11 Oscars, including best picture.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Dean Goodman and Bill Trott)