Summer Tours Preview 2006

Summer Tours Preview 2006

Slap on the sunscreen, tank up the car -- Bruce, Shakira and a pack of 'Idols' are headed your way: Aidin Vaziri | If you stick together the biggest tours this season -- Red Hot Chili Peppers, Radiohead, Pearl Jam, Sonic Youth, the Black Crowes, Counting Crows, the Flaming Lips and Nine Inch Nails -- the whole thing starts to resemble a Lollapalooza bill from 1993. All that's missing are a couple Smashing Pumpkins and Holes. But let's not tempt fate. We've already got the Def Leppard/Journey doubleheader to contend with.

AMERICAN IDOLS LIVE
Katharine McPhee, Taylor Hicks and eight other aspiring singers whose names you've already forgotten from the past season do big-time karaoke.

RADIOHEAD
"Spooks." "Bodysnatchers." "House of Cards." No, it's not a B-movie horror film festival. Those are the "enigmatic" titles of the new songs Radiohead is airing during this tour preceding its next release.

COUNTING CROWS/GOO GOO DOLLS
There are people who might expect this concert to sound like one long soft-drink commercial. These people most likely have ESP.

FIONA APPLE/DAMIEN RICE
Two socially awkward, emotionally bruised singer-songwriters sharing the stage? This could be the most disastrous pairing since Courtney Love and Marilyn Manson.

EMMYLOU HARRIS and MARK KNOPFLER
When the former Dire Straits front man and the Nashville duet queen come together, it's kind of like Dolly and Kenny without the boobs and beards.

NINE INCH NAILS/BAUHAUS
Break out the top hats and rainbow suspenders! Oh, wait. Actually, it's break out the black mascara and rusty razor blades as two of the world's biggest gloom merchants join forces.

PEARL JAM/SONIC YOUTH
Currently experiencing a late career comeback thanks to Clive Davis (the man behind recent successes by Barry Manilow and Rod Stewart), the Seattle rockers carry the grunge flame through yet another year with the help of fellow New York stalwarts Sonic Youth.

RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS
Celebrating their first No. 1 album in a 22-year career punctuated by death, tragedy and lack of clothes, the Chili Peppers confusingly bring "Stadium Arcadium" to an arena.

CROSBY, STILLS, NASH & YOUNG
The grizzled hippie quartet's first outing together since 2002 is called Freedom of Speech '06. As in, "CSNY is touring again? S -- ! F -- ! C -- !"

SHAKIRA
We need about 70,000 more bilingual belly dancing pop stars. In the meantime, we'll have to make do with the bottle-blond Colombian star behind "Hips Don't Lie."

DEF LEPPARD/JOURNEY
Whatever profits California's smoking restrictions took away from the lighter industry, this tour will single-handedly restore them tenfold.