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<p>Blondie recalled their close call with a gun-toting Phil Spector in 1977, reflecting that they were fortunate to avoid working with the notorious producer.</p><p>The rising stars were still a year away from the big time, which arrived with the launch of third album Parallel Lines. On the other hand, Spector – who died in 2021 – had been a celebrated name for nearly two decades. Once known as the “first tycoon of teen” after forming a record label at the age of 21 and developing the “wall of sound” production technique, he’d soon enter semi-retirement and spend the last years of his life in jail for shooting actress Lana Clarkson dead in 2003.</p>

Ronnie Spector, the trail-blazing lead singer of the 1960s all-girl group the Ronettes, has died. The rock and roll star rose to fame with hits such as Be My Baby, Baby I Love You and Walking in the Rain. A statement from her family said she passed at age 78 "after a brief battle with cancer". "Ronnie lived her life with a twinkle in her eye, a spunky attitude, a wicked sense of humour and a smile on her face," the statement said.

Fear or "armed protest" at state capitols across the country did not materialize in any significant numbers... "Be wise as serpent and innocent as a dove...Sorry FBI we're not going to be your crisis actors today" That message sent out by People's Rights Washington early this morning via Telegram with the belief that the FBI was ultimately behind today's call for "armed protests"... "Far-right extremists" said to be upset with President Trump over his calls for peace following the January 6th incident at the US Capitol... The Federal Communications Commission out today with an "enforcement advisory" about the use of...

I think I finally beat Wikipedia on this one.

Drummer Hal Blaine, who propelled dozens of major hit records during the ‘60s and ‘70s as a member of the “Wrecking Crew,” Hollywood’s elite, ubiquitous cadre of first-call studio musicians, died Monday, according to a statement from family members on his official Facebook page. He was 90. “May he rest forever on 2 and 4,” read the statement. “The family appreciates your outpouring of support and prayers that have been extended to Hal from around the world, and respectfully request privacy in this time of great mourning. No further details will be released at this time.” According to a 2017...

While rock 'n' roll is necessarily classified as a form of pop music, it is actually an idiom whose radical, destructive primitivism established a new type of socio-cultural disorder. It's about rejection of the status quo and celebration of the dis-imprisonment it instills. Always exploited for profit, rock's unmanageable aspects have been steadily diluted by a sinister, commercially driven course of revisionist myth-making. There is no acceptable role in the marketplace for radicals like Charlie Feathers, Poly Styrene, Lux Interior or Roky Erickson, but there's always room for the homogeneous, money-hungry, play-it-safe phonies on this list. These douchebags all have...

The New York Times is very good at what it does — which nowadays involves a lot of lying in service to a leftist agenda. There are the outright lies (such as the paper’s recent distortion of a police bias trial to make the NYPD appear racist), the lies of omission (such as its lack of full reporting on the Obama administration’s fatal acts of malfeasance and dishonesty in, say, the Benghazi and Fast and Furious scandals), and the atmospheric lies (such as its rose-colored reporting on the disastrous economy in bluer-than-blue California). Altogether, these lies combine to make the...

According to BBC news, the legal team behind Phil Spector is appealing his murder conviction, citing judicial error and prosecutorial misconduct. The 148-page appeal claims Spector — who pleaded not guilty to the murder of actress Lana Clarkson in 2003 — did not receive a fair trial, since prosecutors used testimony from five acquaintances to damage the producer’s image. (The women claimed Spector held them at gunpoint in different incidents dating back to the 1970s.) The brief also claims the trial’s judge allowed lawyers to insist that Spector “had a history and propensity of violence against women and thus should...

Spector: I’m scared in this snake pit prison By JAMES CLENCH Published: Today rigTeaserImage JAILED music legend Phil Spector has told of his terror at being held in a "snake pit" prison with crazed killers. The record producer, 69, is banged up in the same nick as cult massacre maniac Charles Manson.

Darlene Love is a genuine American musical icon. With her powerful singing leads, she began her career in 1959 during the glory days of rock & roll girl groups. She caught the attention of Phil Specter and almost immediately began recording the most popular records of that 1962-1963, era including enormous hits like “He’s A Rebel”, written by Gene Pitney,” Wait Til My Bobby Gets Home”, “ Today I Met The Boy I’m Going To Marry”,” The Da Doo Ron Ron”, “ He’s Sure The Boy I Love”, “Why do Lovers Break Each Others Hearts?”, “Not To Young To Get...

Music producer Phil Spector has been assigned to a ‘sensitive needs’ area of a California jail to serve his life sentence for murder.

California corrections officials released a startling new prison mug shot of Grammy-winning music legend Phil Spector, convicted last month of second-degree murder and serving 19 years to life in prison. Phil Spector's prison mug shot, taken June 5, shows him without a hairpiece. Spector, 69, is being held at North Kern State Prison, where he is being evaluated before receiving a permanent prison assignment, corrections spokesman Gordon Hinkle said. The process could take up to 70 days. The mug shot, which shows a bald-pated Spector, was taken on June 5 as part of the routine intake process. California prison inmates...

JUNE 10--Now that he is a ward of the California state prison system, wig-loving murderer Phil Spector has been forced to return to his au naturel state. As seen in the below mug shot, the 69-year-old Spector's dome is no longer covered by one of the fright wigs he wore during his criminal trials (the most recent of which ended in the music producer's conviction for killing actress Lana Clarkson in February 2003). Spector, who was sentenced last month to 19 years in prison, was photographed after arriving last week at the North Kern State Prison Reception Center in Delano.

Rachelle Spector, 28, scoffs at the notion that she's a gold digger, saying she's devoted to her role as the spokeswoman for the producer's cause and chief financial officer of his music empire.Rachelle Spector arrived for lunch at the Beverly Hills Hotel with one French-manicured hand gripping a hot pink BlackBerry. "I never know when he is going to be allowed to call," she said as she laid the mobile device carefully on a velvety banquette. "Whenever he calls, I answer." SNIP "He's locked in a 5-by-9 cell, 23 1/2 hours a day," Rachelle Spector said. "They treat people worse...

JAILED music legend Phil Spector has posted a string of astonishing internet blogs before and after being sentenced to 19 years for murder. The producer, who has been allowed to keep a laptop computer and iPod in his cell at Los Angeles County Jail, has been rattling off revealing messages via the chat site Twitter. In them, Spector, 69, who was convicted by a retrial jury last month for the murder of actress Lana Clarkson, tells how: The authorities took his wig; He has befriended a cockroach – “I’m naming him Wilson” – and is playing air chess with him;...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Eccentric music producer Phil Spector was given a sentence of 19 years to life in prison on Friday for the murder of a Hollywood actress in 2003. Spector, 69, who revolutionized pop music in the 1960s with his layered "Wall of Sound" production technique, was convicted in April of second-degree murder by a Los Angeles jury after a second trial. The first trial ended in a deadlock in 2007. Lana Clarkson, 40, a B-movie actress, died of a shot to the mouth, fired from Spector's gun in the foyer of his mock castle home outside Los...

Reclusive record producer Phil Spector's murder conviction has seen him travel a long way from his glory days producing The Righteous Brothers and John Lennon.One thing in particular sticks in my mind from the interview that I conducted with Phil Spector in his Los Angeles mansion, six weeks before he murdered Lana Clarkson. We had been talking about success, the extraordinary run of hits that had made Spector - at one time - the most important producer in pop music. "People tell me they idolise me", he said, "want to be like me, but I tell them, trust me, you...

From The Times April 15, 2009 Phil Spector: murder, madness and shocking hair Chris Ayres, Los Angeles During the 11 months that he spent on trial for murder, Phil Spector said nothing. Not a word. Not a peep. Not a single da-doo-ron-ron, da-doo-ron-ron. His wigs, however, told you pretty much everything you needed to know: at times they were so implausibly massive that the man's head appeared to be encircled by its very own weather system. And then, of course, there was the cake-icing foundation that he chose to shovel atop those ghoulish, sunken features, not to mention the long-tailed...

Legendary music producer Phil Spector was convicted Monday of second-degree murder in the fatal shooting of actress Lana Clarkson in his Alhambra mansion six years ago. The verdict means Spector, famed his work with Tina Turner, the Beatles, the Righteous Brothers and others, faces 15 years for murder and at least three for gun enhancement when he is sentenced May 29.

This time the jury did not ignore the habit Phil Spector had of playing Russian roulette with women. After so many times of "playing" the game, Lana Clarkson was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time with Phil Spector who's luck had run out. With a chance to find Phil Spector innocent, guilty of 2nd degree murder or involuntary manslaughter, the jury found Spector guilty of 2nd degree murder.