THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE:

...with THE LEMONHEADS!  Evan Dando's songbook has always struck me as autmnal, though not all of it really is.  For example, a very young Dando released his take on Suzanne Vega's hit "Luka" in May '89.  He dissolved the band after releasing the Lovey LP, but returned with a new lineup on "It's A Shame About Ray" in July '92. Despite Johnny Depp's appearance in that video, the Ray album lingered in the lower reaches of the charts, despite being filled with grunge-pop goodness like "Rockin' Stroll" and "Confetti."  But that November, Atlantic released the band's take on Simon & Garfunkel's "Mrs. Robinson," which shot to No. 19 on the UK charts and landed Dando unlikely US gigs like "Live with Regis and Kathie Lee."  The flip side of that single was the goofy "Being Around," which becomes a singalong live.  The followup LP, C'mon, Feel the Lemonheads, hit the Top 5 in the UK, but only No. 56 in the US, with the single "Into Your Arms," which would later turn up on the soundtrack to Before Sunrise and in an FTD commercial.  The other two videos from the LP, like "Ray," sport celeb cameos -- Angelina Jolie turns up in "It's About Time" and a young Chloë Sevigny can be seen in "Big Gay Heart".  Unfortunately, Dando would soon slide into heavy drugs and the next album, Car Button Cloth was not nearly as successful -- commercially or artistically.  An unremarkable solo album and sporadic gigs would follow, until Dando got his personal life together and revived The Lemonheads brand with a self-titled LP in 2005, from which "Black Gown" was the lead track.  BONUS:  Dando and Mudhoney's Mark Arm fromted the DKT-MC5 on a ripping version (is there any other kind) of the classic "Kick Out the Jams" on The Late Late Show.

ROBERT PLANT advance streams Carry Fire.

STARS advance streams There Is No Love in Fluorescent Light.

WILLIAM PATRICK CORGAN advance streams Ogilala.

NORAH JANE STRUTHERS advance streams Champion.

THE RENTALS share “Elon Musk Is Making Me Sad.”

THE KINKS: The truly classic "You Really Got Me."

TOM PETTY: A special, 107-minute rush edition of Political Beats with Dan McLaughlin.  Also, LHB still has your Petty covers.

RILO KILEY's More Adventurous gets some belated love from NPR.

THE HORRORS talk to Stereogum about V and 10 years together.

SPOTIFY Killed the Long Song Intro.

NOW SHOWING: This weekend's wide releases include Blade Runner 2049, which is currently scoring 90 percent on the ol' Tomatometer; The Mountain Between Us, which is scoring 53 percent; and My Little Pony, scoring 69 percent.  Battle of the Sexes expands wide at 85 percent.  Victoria and Abdul opens near-wide at 67 percent.

HARRISON FORD & RYAN GOSLING know how to do an interview.

HARVEY WEINSTEIN: Decades of Sexual Harassment Allegations.  Weinstein's written response is...not good, though one is hard pressed to imagine him doing better given his reputation as a toxic personality. ANd he now claims he's going to sue the NYT. Good luck with that.

BEN AFFLECK is still seeking treatment for alcohol addiction seven months after his rehab stint,whichis  I think is how it's supposed to work, a la AA etc.

IGGY AZALEA owes Amex 300K, originally.

WINONA RYDER talks to Marie Claire about Stranger Things and social media (but I repeat myself).

JASON BIGGS and Jenny Mohlen welcomed their second child.

MOCHI, the Gene Simmons of dogs.

ROMEO & JULIET, but with chimps.

ARE THOSE SNAKES in your socks, ora re you just... oh.

BOMB SQUAD officers called to investigate a suspicious package left on a Queensland street were relieved to find it was merely a pot of crabs.

BUT I HAVE THINGS:

SPOON shares a video for  “I Ain’t the One.”

TOM PETTY:  Here's his final interview.  Here's Wilco covering "The Waiting." Here's TP & the Heartbreakers covering The Animals circa 1978. And 74 artists discuss their fave Petty tunes.

HARVEY WEINSTEIN has enlisted an army of attorneys and crisis managers in recent weeks and has unleashed them on the NYT over a planned story on his personal behavior.

RACHEL BILSON buys a mansion after her split from Hayden Christensen. 

IDRIS ELBA plays Confirm or Deny.

KATE WINSLET is joining the Avatar franchise. roman

ROMAN POLANSKI is accused of rape. Again.

More tomorrow, I hope!

ST VINCENT shares a celeb-skewering video for "Los Angeles."

THE MOUNTAIN GOATS play a mini-set at KEXP.

GRIZZLY BEAR plays a mini-set at the legendary Electric Lady Studios for WFUV.

TOM PETTY is remembered at World Cafe.

THE BREEDERS share "Wait In The Car," their first since 2009.

THE REPLACEMENTS share a live "Hold My Life" from 1986.

THE MEMBERS: "Working Girl," from the "Where Are They Now?" file.

THE KINKS get a two-hour Political Beats with author Jay Cost.

TOM PETTY, the unassuming rock star with the economical songs.

ALVVAYS: Love, death and jangles.

LOU REED: Rolling Stone excerpts the new bio from Anthony DeCurtis.

PRINCE HARRY & MEGHAN MARKLE may already be planning their walk down the aisle.

JARED LETO will star in a Hugh Hefner biopic.

JULIA ROBERTS is profiled by Harper's Bazaar.

TYRA BANKS and her photographer baby-daddy Erik Asla have split after five years.

L.A. CONFIDENTIAL Turns 20.

THE 100 BEST SCREENWRITERS, selected by current screenwriters. No Axelrod or Mazursky?

THE SQUIRREL THREAT mesmerizes dolphins.

A RACCOON INVASION shuts down a Toronto bank.

EXOTIC ANIMALS, hanging out in the kitchen of a cafe.

A FRISKY TORTOISE "dashed' six miles to a local zoo for some action.

TOM PETTY – singer, songwriter, and leader of the Heartbreakers – has passed away after suffering a full cardiac arrest in his Malibu home Sunday night.  He was 66. Here's the NYT obit. The confirmation of his death follows a day after premature reports from a variety of major news outlets.  His musical saga goes as far back as Petty's days in Mudcrutch, which led him -- and some future Heartbreakers -- to legendary A&R man Denny Cordell, who would produce the first TP records, with songs including "American Girl," "Breakdown," "I Need To Know" and "Listen To Her Heart." Melding the classic folk-rock sound of the Byrds with Southern rock made him sound like instant classic rock to mass audiences in the mid-70s, while his no-frills pop approach would appeal to those looking beyond over-produced and seemingly self-indulgent AOR to Punk and New Wave (only Cheap Trick could make a similar claim to be at this intersection).

In some ways, Petty was more Punk than the punks.  He fought -- and beat -- his label twice.  The first fight -- over the sale of his contract to MCA -- preceded the seminal Damn The Torpedoes album (the master tapes were kept in hiding during litigation) that would launch the band to super-stardom with tracks like "Here Comes My Girl," "Even The Losers," "Don't Do Me Like That" and the signature "Refugee."  The second fight was over the pricing of his follow-up, Hard Promises; here's Petty sharing the backstory for "The Waiting" from that LP.  During the Hard Promises sessions, he also recorded duets with Stevie Nicks, including "Insider" (which he kept for his album) and the smash "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around (which he gave to Nicks).

Petty later collaborated with Eurythmics' Dave Stewart, whom he suggested write more for Nicks, but ended up turning her breakup with Joe Walsh into  "Don't Come Around Here No More," a slab of psychedelic bubblegum unheard since the heyday of Tommy James.  It didn't really fit with songs like "Rebels" on the Southern Accents LP,but it was too good to leave off, and its Wonderland-themed video supplied Petty the Mad Hatter persona who would pop up in later videos for songs like "Into The Great Wide Open," which was expanded to almost seven minutes just because they had great footage from Johnny Depp and Faye Dunaway. While I'm less of a fan of Petty's later work, I did like the Traveling Wilburys, which reminds you that not just anyone gets to be in a band with Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne and the late Roy Orbison.  Indeed, TP & the Heartbreakers backed Dylan on tour (saw it) and later backed Johnny Cash. 

And Petty was still capable of turning out great stuff: TP's first solo LP spawned hits like "Won't Back Down," "Free Fallin'" and "Runnin' Down A Dream."  Indeed, it was Petty's biggest album to that point. He co-wrote "King of the Hill" with Roger McGuinn for Byrdsy karma; it's an keenly observed elegy for John Phillips of the Mamas & the Papas.  And "Learning to Fly" was huge, tho I prefer the more decadent side of his later years, including the wry, presumably Mel Brooks-inspired "It's Good to Be King."

Although Petty is sure to be widely remembered in the following days, I tend to doubt any tribute will beat what Steven Hyden wrote about him in 2014: "Here’s what I think I know: Tom Petty has been a rock star for almost 40 years. He has a dozen or so songs that will be played on classic rock radio for as long as there is classic rock radio. If you’re a music fan of a certain age, there was a time in your life when he seemed inescapable. Even now, Petty is still a guy that most people know, even if you don’t actively care about him one way or the other. Tom Petty’s music doesn’t necessarily demand a value judgment. It’s like having an opinion on tap water or concrete. Why bother? It’s just there, reliable to the point of invisibility. If it went missing, you would notice. But it’s never going missing, because Tom Petty has existed since the beginning of time, and will continue to exist until time is extinguished."

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN joined BRYAN ADAMS for “Cuts Like A Knife” and “Badlands” at the Invictus Games .

BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE stopped by The Current for a chat and mini-set.

DAWG YAWP plays a Tiny Desk Concert.

SONIC YOUTH:  The Fall Covers (John Peel Sessions, 1988).  Technically, "Victoria" is The Kinks.

L7 shares “Dispatch From Mar-a-Lago," their first in 17 years.

LOU REED: The Guardian excerpts the new bio from Anthony DeCurtis, and briefly interviewes him about the book.

BILLY JOEL: The Stranger turns 40; Rolling Stone takes a track-by-track tour.

PROTOMARTYR takes All Songs Considered on a track-by-track tour of the new LP.

MARILYN MANSON cut his Saturday night show at New York's Hammerstein Ballroom short after a stage prop collapsed atop the shock rocker.

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: The numbers may shift when estimates become actuals, but so far It topped the chart with 17.3MM, narrowly edging American Made, which placed with 17MM. That's bad news for Tom Cruise, whose recent record is spotty -- but for the overseas audience that will likely bail him out here (he made 65MM in foreign markets this weekend).  Indeed, Cruise could wind up behind Kingsman: The Golden Circle, which showed with another 17MM, albeit on a scary 56 percent drop when compared to the legs of the original.  The LEGO Ninjago Movie took the fourth slot with 14 MM on a 41 percent drop, the steepest of this franchise to date, a big problem for a franchise that makes more here than abroad so far.  The Flatliners reboot rounded out the Top Five with 6.7MM, which is less than the 10MM opening of the original back in 1990. Ouch.

SEX AND THE CITY 3 is not happening.

KRISTEN STEWART is being eyed for the Charlie's Angels reboot.

HUGH HEFNER'S WIDOW is well set, but may not inherit much.

THE PRISONER turns 50, with retrospectives from NPR, the BBC and the Telegraph.

THE VIETNAM WAR: How Ken Burns and Lynn Novick assembled an epic soundtrack.

MONTY HALL, the genial host and co-creator of Let’s Make a Deal, the game show on which contestants in outlandish costumes shriek and leap at the chance to see if they will win the big prize or the booby prize behind door No. 3, died at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif., on Saturday. He was 96.

SPAIN: There's a riot goin' on.

GATORLAND will loan 60 alligators to a Texas park damaged by Hurricane Harvey.

A BEAR, just chillin on a couch at the dump.

BOLD EAGLES: Angry birds rip pricey drones from the sky.

THE HIGH-END HORSE MARKET has finally recovered from the financial crisis. A grateful nation sighs in relief.