Pop Quiz: Ashley Parker Angel

Pop Quiz: Ashley Parker Angel

Aidin Vaziri | As a member of O-Town, the boy band manufactured on the MTV reality show "Making the Band," Ashley Parker Angel sold nearly 2 million records in the United States, scored radio hits and became a great pinup talent. But when the cameras stopped rolling, it all fell apart. The band split, the debt piled high and the 24-year-old Northern California native got his actor-model girlfriend, Tiffany Lynn, pregnant. Six years after first hitting it big, Angel is attempting to resuscitate his career on the heels of another reality show, "There & Back," the brutally candid MTV series that tracked the making of his solo debut, "Soundtrack to Your Life."

Ashley Parker Angel
Q: You were born on the same day as MTV. That's weird, huh?
A: Exactly to the day and the year. August 1, 1981, is the day they launched as a network and that's the day I was born. So I feel this weird connection with MTV.
Q: Is that why you let them film you while you were broke, working minimum-wage jobs and living with your pregnant girlfriend at her mom's apartment?
A: You know, I really didn't pursue the television show. MTV heard my demo as a solo artist and they were like, "What's going on in your life?" I was living off credit. I was going on job interviews. Basically, I was being evicted from my apartment, which is why I ended up living with Tiffany's mom. They were like, "This sounds like a great story. We would love to follow you!"
Q: I don't know. I think you should have held out for "Cribs."
A: I've always tried to be a real person, so even though some of the things I was dealing with in my personal life were kind of embarrassing, I just laid all my cards on the table and I said, "Look, I'm like every other American."

Pop Quiz: Mark E Smith of The Fall

Pop Quiz: Mark E Smith of The Fall

Aidin Vaziri | The woman answering the phone says Mark E Smith will call back from a land line in just a minute. A good hour later, the Fall singer, 48, is on the line, cackling uncontrollably and thinking he's speaking to someone from Colorado. So it is with the always charming and always unpredictable Smith, who since 1976 has released more than 80 albums and gone through more than 40 different band members. On the way, the Fall's askew post-punk music has made more than a conspicuous impression on everyone from Pavement to Franz Ferdinand, whom Smith has threatened to sue.

Mark E Smith
Q: Last time you were in America, the tour ended abruptly when you and two of your band members came to blows in the middle of a song.
A: Yeah. You read that?
Q: No, I remember it. And then you got arrested.
A: Right. Two nights in the cell.
Q: Before that, you broke your hip and had to sing from a wheelchair.
A: Yeah, I was a cripple. I had no escape.
Q: Should people be worried about seeing you this time?
A: No, no, no. The group is very on form, actually. You'll be surprised. They're all 10 years younger than me.
Q: What do you think of all these new bands that sound like the Fall?
A: It disturbs me a lot, actually.
Q: You're not honored?
A: No. I don't like being used like a trademark.
Q: How much would it take to get you to listen to a Franz Ferdinand album?
A: Me? All the way through? About $100,000.

Pop Quiz: Chris Isaak

Pop Quiz: Chris Isaak

Aidin Vaziri | He may be famous for cavorting on the beach with a near- naked supermodel in the video for his hit "Wicked Game," but as the new "Best of Chris Isaak" CD/DVD package proves, there's a lot more to the pompadour-sporting Bay Area rocker than saucy broken-heart ballads. Made up of 14 remastered hits, three new songs and an acoustic rendition of "Forever Blue," plus a DVD that includes 18 music videos, the set showcases both Isaak's classic songwriting and his handsome silhouette. But anyone who remembers the sublime comedic talent displayed on Showtime's "The Chris Isaak Show" will know to skip straight to the commentary.


Chris Isaak
Q: Did you realize you liked the color blue so much?
A: Why, is blue mentioned in a lot of the song titles?
Q: "Blue Spanish Sky." "Blue Hotel." "Forever Blue." Do you want me to go on?
A: You know, one time I read that the most popular word in Elvis' song titles was "blue."
Q: Well, it is easy to rhyme it with stuff.
Q: You wrote "Blue Hotel" about a friend who committed suicide. Does it still mean the same to you now?
A: Yeah. One time, someone asked the Everly Brothers, "While you're singing onstage what do you think of?" They said, "Hitting the notes." There's some of that. When you're up there, you actually have to hit the notes and play it in time and everything. But I don't think you forget what the songs are about.
Q: Is that why your pants shrink two sizes every time you sing "Wicked Game"?

Reviews: Tool, Gnarls Barkley

Reviews: Tool, Gnarls Barkley

Tool "10,000 Days": Aidin Vaziri | Some Tool fans were so distraught when a leaked version of "10,000 Days" hit the Internet a few weeks ago that they were resolutely convinced the whole thing was a fake, going so far as to look for hidden messages in the album artwork, skewing it just right to read "April Fool's Day." Well, the joke is on them, because this sucker is the real thing, and for those who have heard it all before from Tool, it's real boring. Coming five years after the double-platinum "Lateralus," the Los Angeles metal band's fourth studio album seems strangely subdued, tilting heavily toward moody experiments that take longer to unfold than the album's title suggests. Not that the whole thing is a wash -- there are still some head-banging thrills to be found in tracks like "Vicarious" and "Jambi." It's just going to take a patient person to find them.

Gnarls Barkley "St. Elsewhere": Aidin Vaziri | Getting tired of waiting for OutKast to come up with a worthy successor to its visionary 2003 album, "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below"? Try this instead, a studio concoction by Danger Mouse (the Grammy-nominated producer behind Gorillaz' multi-platinum "Demon Days" and the illicit "Grey Album") and vocalist Cee-Lo Green (oversize member of Goodie Mob and songwriter to the stars like Pussycat Dolls and Ludacris) that effectively turns everything on its head. "I remember when I lost my mind/ There was something so pleasant about that place," goes the blues-infused first single, "Crazy." Sure enough, over the course of the next hour, the duo delivers a lush, soulful album that manages to pay tribute to the Violent Femmes, bad '80s medical dramas and, in a more unsavory moment, necrophilia without sounding like a joke. The bar has officially been raised.