THE DEARS' new clip for "Money Babies" is rather apocalyptic.

THE SMITHS are considering reuniting for the Coachella music festival.

JULIANA HATFIELD stopped by WFUV for a chat and mini-set you can stream on demand via NPR.

THE RUMBLE STRIPS stopped by The Current for a chat and mini-set you can stream on demand via MPR.

THE REPLACEMENTS: The Guardian takes stock of the seminal band, with comments from both Tommy Stinson and Paul Westerberg, who says this about the band's legendary drunkenness: "Sometimes it made us fearless and sometimes it made us ridiculous, but it's all part of what made us great. We were what we were supposed to be."

GUIDED BY VOICES is providing the music for a 3-D rock opera about Cleopatra by Steven Soderbergh?

JANE'S ADDICTION reunited for a five-dollar club gig last week; watch "Ocean Size" and "Wh0res" at the 'Gum.

DUNGEN -- and the way the Swedish psych-rockers trancend language -- is profiled in the Boston Globe.

HANK WILLIAMS: Intimate and rare performances that few fans have heard are streaming via NPR.

PHIL SPECTOR: The pop genius and accused murderer uncorks a fresh round of crazy for the BBC: "Depression is a wasted emotion to me, like pity, it's a wasted emotion. I'm concerned with the fact that I have not been made a doctor at any college and Bill Cosby has, even Dylan has..."

VASHTI BUNYAN, the Godmother of freak folk, gets a segment and songs  on NPR's Day to Day.

BONO: Photographed with two 19-year-old hotties in St Tropez, with his wife nowhere to be found.

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: Unsurprisingly, High School Musical 3: Senior Year romped to the top of the chart, making 42 million dollars on an 11 million budget.  Saw V came in second with 30 million (slightly less than Saw IV) on a 10.8 million budget.  Max payne drops about 57 percent to third place with 7.6  million; it's on track to break even. Beverly Hills Chihuahua drops only 39 percent and is on target to make 100 million in the US (Good weekend for The Mouse). Pride and Glory debuts in fifth, with 6.3 million.  Below the fold, Oliver Stone's W. and Body of Lies tank.

LIVE FROM NEW YORK, it's Amy Poehler's (and Will Arnett's) son, born Saturday.

LINDSAY LOHAN says she's not a lesbian and that Samantha Ronson is the only girl for her. NTTAWWT.

BRADGELINA: Jolie has returned from a two-day humanitarian trip to Afghanistan this week, visiting poverty-stricken families, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

AMY WINEHOUSE faces arrest for assault after failing to attend a quiz over allegations she hit a reveller.

MADONNA is having intense Kabbalah "anger management" counselling to deal with her fury against Guy Ritchie as the couple's bitter divorce takes its toll. Ritchie claims his marriage to Madge disintegrated when she started planning their sex life in her diary around her sessions in the gym.

JENNIFER HUDSON and her family are pleading for the safe return of her 7-year-old nephew, who has been missing since Hudson's mother and brother were found dead in their Englewood home on Friday.

ETERNAL SUNSHINE DRUG erases memories in mice. I thought Lacuna already had the patent on this.

SYRIA: US military helicopters attacked territory inside Syria close to its border with Iraq Sunday, targeting the foreign fighter network that travels through Syria into Iraq in an area where the Americans have been unable to shut it down because it was out of the military's reach.  Bill Roggio thinks that the US military must have detected a senior member of AQI in the region.

AFGHANISTAN: Opium production will fall by almost a third this year, according to a US government report; the UN, however, estimates the drop in opium production will only be 6% this year.

IRAQ: Omar and Mohammed Fadhil of ITM survey the latest developments on negotiations over the Status of Forces Agreement.

A FUGITIVE HAMSTER who evaded a team of eight firemen armed with hi-tech rescue equipment including a chocolate-coated camera has been found alive.

PET PYTHON blamed in Virginia Beach woman's strangulation. Video at the link.

SCARLETT the CAT a calico hero who drew worldwide acclaim after rescuing her five kittens from a 1996 Brooklyn fire, has passed away.

LEO the DOG was hailed as a hero on Sunday after risking his life to save a litter of newborn kittens from a house fire, rescuers said.

A FEATHERED DINOSAUR from the Jurassic period was discovered in China. Dr. Grant will be so excited!

THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE:

...with THE WHO! I featured some 70s stuff a few weeks back, but this is some rare TV footage from the 60s. I am not giving details because lawyers are on the move (which is another reason to revisit The Who so soon).  Part One includes "Daddy Rolling Stone," "It's Not True," and "Bald Headed Woman."  Part Two includes "The Kids Are Alright," "Substitute" and "My Generation," when the kids in the studio finally get to dance.

MOUNTAIN GOATS: John Darnielle talks to the Arizona Star about what's keeping him up at night, as well as his new collaboartion with Kaki King.  He and King both talk to the North Country Times about their EP, which started with a note Darnielle scrawled on a dressing room wall.  That sort of thing does not surprise me; I once saw a note the yong Fresh fellows left for Mojo Nixon on a dressing room wall in Iowa City.

THE 25 CHEESIEST HITS OF THE '70s, according to Y!Music, with streaming audio for each.

SONIC YOUTH: Their big Fourth of July show in NYC's Battery Park is finally streaming in full via WFMU.

FRIGHTENED RABBIT: Scott and Grant Hutchinson talk to Glide about growing up together and adding members to the band.

BONO will be working pro bono for the NYT. The company is losing readers and revenues so quickly that free is all they can afford.

LUCINDA WILLIAMS talks to Rolling Stone about finding a good man and getting her joy back.

CMJ MUSIC MARATHON: Jon Pareles of the NYT reports from showcases booked by music bloggers.

TEARS FOR FEARS' "Head Over Heels" gets the literal video treatment, following in the footsteps of A-ha's "Take On Me."

ALL SONGS CONSIDERED: Oasis, Sir Paul's dance music, Wreckless Eric & Amy Rigby and more are streaming in the latest edition of the long-running NPR series.

WHAT MAKES A HIT as record sales decline year after year?

STEPHEN MALKMUS talks to JAM! about the changes in his band, his sound and his songwriting on his latest LP.

96 ST. MARK'S PLACE: How does the building on the cover of Led Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti look today?

ROY HARPER: Jimmy Page wrote a song about him. Paul and Linda McCartney sang back up for him. And now, after decades of languishing as "the longest running underground act in the world", Roy Harper is reissuing his entire catalog to a world that may just finally be ready for him.

CHINESE DEMOCRACY: Here's how to get your free can of Dr. Pepper.

CUTOUT BIN: From William Shatner & Joe Jackson to Baby Huey, from Tom Jones to Locksley, from Sylvia to The Sonics, from Bishop Allen to the Ohio Plyers to the Icicle Works, , plus more -- this Friday's fortuitous finds can be jukeboxed or streamed separately via the Pate page at the ol' HM.

NOW SHOWING: This weekend's wide releases are High School Musical 3, which is currently scoring 67 percent on the ol' Tomatometer; Saw V, unsurprisingly unscreened for critics; Pride & Glory, scoring 34 percent, and a 3-D reissue of Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas.  I'll go out on a limb and predict HSM3 as the big winner come Monday.

MADONNA & GUY RITCHIE: She has offered him an additional £5million to dictate his access rights to their three children. But he reportedly is "in pieces" or in a "rage" after seeing a photo of his son Rocco in a T-shirt supporting Alex Rodriguez's New York Yankees baseball team.

LINDSAY LOHAN is now being cut out of Ugly Betty episodes already filmed, with more details of diva behavior bubbling up on Page Six.

BRADGELINA: Jolie claims she may stop making movies and marry Pitt.

HEATHER MILLS has blown nearly £10million of her £24.3million divorce settlement in only seven months.

MANDY MOORE & DJ AM are back together, reunited by his near-death in a fiery plane crash.

JEN & JOHN: Aniston would like Mayer to keep his mouth shut and stop blogging about his personal life.

JESSICA BIEL talks to Marie Claire about the paparazzi coverage of her relationship with Justin Timberlake.

WATCHMEN director Zack Snyder and cast members unveiled an extended trailer at the Scream Awards 2008.

MAD MEN creator Matt Weiner answers questions from Variety readers ahead of the season two finale this Sunday.

MAD MONSTER PARTY: PopMatters essays the creepy 1969 Rankin-Bass classic.

ANNE HATHAWAY's ex-boyfriend Raffaello Follieri was sentenced in Manhattan federal court Thursday to 4½ years in prison.

DAVID HASSELHOFF: A new videogame will let you pummel the Hoff to the strains of the Culture Club classic "Do You Really Want To Hurt Me." Video at the link.

PAKISTAN plans to arm tens of thousands of anti-Taliban tribal fighters in its western border region in hopes -- shared by the US military -- that the nascent militias can replicate the tribal "Awakening" movement that proved decisive in the battle against al-Qaeda in Iraq. Meanwhile, after a one week lull in attacks inside Pakistan's tribal areas, US unmanned Predator aircraft struck a compound run by the powerful, al Qaeda-linked Haqqani family in North Waziristan.

IRAQ: US forces hand over responsibility for security in the "triangle of death" to Iraqi forces.

WHEN HUMMINGBIRDS ATTACK: Let's go to the video.

HIPPIE APES make love... and war.

INDIA'S LONE GORILLA cannot gate a date anywhere.  Maybe if he moved out of Mysore?

A GIANT SPIDER eats a bird on camera.

A BAR-TAILED GODWIT flies from Alaska to New Zealand without stopping. Let's go to the video.

ISLANDS has released a video for "Creeper." That time of year, I guess.

RYAN ADAMS: Cardinology is still streaming in full via iLike today (and ending today).

JOHNNY CASH: All Aboard: A Tribute to Johnny Cash is streaming in full via PunkNews.

THE FLAMING LIPS have released an unheard track, "Space Bible With Volume Lumps," from the Christmas On Mars soundtrack.

GUNS 'N' ROSES is streaming the title track to "Chinese Democracy" via Q104.3 -- and that free can of Dr. Pepper gets just a little closer.

CALEXICO frontman Joey Burns plays three songs -- "Two Silver Trees," "Writer's Minor Holiday" and "Man Made Lake" -- for a LIveDaily Session.  Scroll down there for an interview with Burns.

OF MONTREAL: Kevin Barnes talks to Paste about the influence of the Outback Steakhouse commercial on the band's new album.

TIMES NEW VIKING is distilled into its component influences at Drowned in Sound. Mostly GbV, but with some other inspired candidates.

MORRISSEY is reportedly writing an autobiography. 

BJORK talks to Pitchfork about "Náttúra" (a new collaboration between Björk and Thom Yorke) and the Náttúra Campaign (the Icelandic environmental movement she co-founded).

WILLIAM SHATNER discusses his snub from George Takei's wedding, suggesting that the former Mr. Sulu has a festering psychosis.

MADONNA & GUY RITCHIE taunted each other in recent years, friends of the couple reveal in the latest issue of Us Weekly. Meanwhile, a source tells Us that Ritchie has already moved on with British actress Kelly Reilly, who is starring in his upcoming drama Sherlock Holmes.

DAVID DUCHOVNY is suing the Daily Mail over the tennis coach story.  But the suit is filed in L.A., instead of the UK, where the libel laws would favor him.  Curious.

CHARLIE SHEEN and wife Brooke are expecting twins.

HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER: Alyson Hannigan is pregnant. She met her husband on the set of Bffy the Vampire Slayer, not at band camp.

JENNIFER ANISTON & JOHN MAYER, otoh, are denying that wacky pregnancy rumor.

WILL SMITH is gay, according to a Hollywood madam? Gawker isn't buying it.

THE SPIRIT: Frank Miller talks about the origin of Will Eisner's hero in the latest promo video for Miller's movie adapatation.

DANCING WITH THE STARS may be hazardous to your health.

GROUNDHOG DAY: A Victorian house transformed into a bed-and-breakfast in the 1993 classic could soon play the same role on a permanent basis.

GARY BUSEY tells Access Hollywood he once snorted cocaine off his dog -- and explains why that's not very healthy.

WEEKEND AT BERNIE'S: Young Hollywood enjoyed the pool at the Roosevelt Hotel over the weekend - oblivious to the fact that the hotel staff never drained the water after a dead body was found in the pool a week earlier, sources told the NYP.

IRAN: Senior Tehran officials are recommending a preemptive strike against Israel to prevent an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear reactors, a senior Islamic Republic official told foreign diplomats two weeks ago in London, according to Haaretz. Iranian speaker of parliament Ali Larijani declared that Iran was proud of its support for the Palestinian Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah movements, rejecting claims that it could be considered support for terrorism. 

IRAQ: Baghdad will demand changes to the wording of the proposed US-Iraq security pact, but will not seek to renegotiate the "backbone" of the agreement, Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said on Wednesday. Tribes in the Al Sakhriya region between Anbar Province and Karbala are launching a wide scale campaign after AQI started to displace families living therein. Iraqi forces arrested 21 insurgents in Mosul, 13 in Kirkuk, and seven AQI fighters in Diyala. Coalition forces captured an AQI bomb maker in Tikrit.

ORPHAN MONKEY at a Chinese zoo gets a guard dog to stop it being bullied by bigger primates.

SWIMMING WITH SHARKS: Still a bad choice.

CHEETA the CHIMP's critically-acclaimed autobiography apparently was ghost-written.

FEED THE BIRDS? An 80-year-old woman has been threatened with prosecution by her local council in Coventry unless she cuts back on feeding the birds in her garden.

SNAKE MASSAGE?  Mmmm... no thanks.

FEIST premieres the video for "Honey Honey" on MSN, of all places.  Steve Jobs will be so jealous.

RYAN ADAMS: Cardinology is streaming in full via iLike today and tomorrow only.

WOLFGANG'S VAULT has seven concerts atreaming at the Guardian, including the Rolling Stones (1973), The Kinks (1977), The Pretenders (1980) and Monty Python's Flying Circus (1976).

THE WHISPERTOWN 2000 is streaming their Swim album in Quicktime via Steve Jobs. (Thx, LHB.)

PHIL SPECTOR: Jury selection in the murder retrial of fthe famed music producer Phil Spector began in Los Angeles Monday. The judge in the case has ruled that the jury can hear from a retired police officer concerning a confrontation at Joan Rivers' home in the early 1990s.

MARTHA WAINWRIGHT talks with the Belfast Telegraph about wishing she was a folk singer, her fact-finding, environmental mission to Greenland, her relationship with your father, Loudon Wainwright III and more...

THE FLAMING LIPS prepare you for salad.

DR. DOG is actually too big for a Tiny Desk concert, so they end up rociking the entire NPR music office.

THE KAISER CHIEFS' bassist Simon Rix gives Drowned In Sound a track-by-track rundown of the new album Off With Their Heads. Frontman Ricky Wilson tells The Sun he's glad to have competition from Oasis, Keane, Snow Patrol, The Killers, Kings Of Leon and Razorlight.

DRESSY BESSY singer/guitarist Tammy Ealom talks to Westword about her musical evolution.

THE BUTTHOLE SURFERS' reunion tour shows they have mellowed -- a little -- with age: "It's more of a rock concert than performance art," frontman Gibby Haynes says. "It's just kind of weird to be a 50-year-old man wearing 10 dresses. I looked a lot better in boxer shorts when I was 30 years old than I do now."

MADONNA gets support from Gwyneth Paltrow. Madge's friends have nicknamed her husband Material Guy because of his alleged cash demands ahead of their divorce.  In turn, Ritchie has reportedly compared her approach to their split as being like "something concocted by the KGB."

BRITNEY SPEARS' driving without a license case has been declared a mistrial.  The charges have been dismissed following news that prosecutors decided not to request a retrial.

LINDSAY LOHAN "had a quiet fight" with Samantha Ronson during the entire train trip from NYC to DC. Meanwhile, the Daily Mirror claims Li-Lo has been calling Gossip Girl star Chace Crawford three or four times a day and sending provocative text messages. Meanwhile, three guys who say Li-Lo held them hostage during an alleged alcohol-fueled drive have sued over the incident.

SIR PAUL McCARTNEY's new love Nancy Shevell has moved in with the Cute One - five months after his divorce from Heather Mills.

GILLIAN ANDERSON and boyfriend Mark Griffiths are parents of a baby boy.

SARAH SILVERMAN was heckled on stage during her UK stand-up debut in London.

ANNE HATHAWAY is crushing on a new mystery man.  Meanwhile, prosecutors urged a federal judge to impose the more than four years in prison that Hathaway's ex-bf Raffaello Follieri agreed to when he entered a guilty plea last month rather than the three years his defense lawyers requested in a recent submission of their own. Follieri sent the judge a photo of himself and the pope while seeking leniency for cheating investors of millions of dollars by claiming he could buy Catholic Church property on the cheap.

MAD MEN: The Emmy-winning drama has been greenlit for a third season by AMC, but producer Lionsgate and AMC not only have no contract with series creator Matthew Weiner, they don't have deals with the cast as well.

RUDY RAY MOORE, blaxploitation comic, self-proclaimed King of the party records and Godfather of rap, died on Friday of complications from Diabetes. He was 81.

AFGHANISTAN: Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal confirmed for the first time on Tuesday that the kingdom has been sponsoring talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban militia.

IRAQ: The spiritual mentor of radical Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, has issued a fatwa against the proposed US-Iraq security pact. US military chief Michael Mullen bluntly warned Iraq that it risked security losses of "significant consequence" unless it approves an agreement. Iraqi security forces arrested 29 suspected insurgents in Baghdad, a car bomber in Tal Afar, an AQI fighter in Jalawlaa, and five members of the "Popular Committees" in Diyala.

CHIMP RIDES A SEGWAY: Let's go to the video. Something vaguely Speed Racer about this.

WEST COAST SQUID INVASION: It went from a small invasion from California to a large invasion, with hundreds now washing up in parts of the coastlines of Washington and Oregon.

HEY, IS THAT SHRIMP IN YOUR PANTS, or... wait, that joke just doesn't work here.

HORSE STUCK in a TREE: The Daily Mail has the backstory for the photo first linked here yesterday.

BEAR ATTACK SURVIVOR attacked by PETA.

PIGEON cuts out the squab middleman.

OF MONTREAL: Kevin Barnes talks to Pitchfork about dance music influences and trying to defy songwriting expectations. You can hear some of that dance influence in the video for "Id Engager."

NEW RELEASES: AC/DC, the Raveonettes, the Dears, the Sea & Cake, Parts & Labor and more are streaming in full this week via Spinner.

THE LONG BLONDES break up because guitarist Dorian Cox is unsure about when he would be well enough to play, after suffering a stroke in June.

DEPT. of EAGLES does the five free songs thing for Daytrotter, two previously unreleased.

R.E.M.: Universal is releasing the double-CD 25th anniversary edition of Murmur on Nov. 25th.  Details at the link.

BURT BACHARACH surveys a variety of topics with the Guardian, from piano lessons to Aretha Franklin's cover of "I Say a Little Prayer," which he prefers to the original by Dionne Warwick, which is part of a medley with "Walk On By" and "Do You Know the Way to San Jose?" from the Bacharach/David concert held at London's Albert Hall in 2000.

DEATH CAB guitarist-production wiz Chris Walla talks to the NYDN about opening for Neil Young, and not being like Neil Young.

U2 now owns a chunk of concert promoter Live Nation Inc. U2 is one of five artists that Live Nation has signed in the last year to expand its business beyond touring, and the only act that didn't hand over recording rights.

CHAD VanGAALEN's journey from busker to basement studio genius is surveyed in SEE magazine.

BEN KWELLER does a video interview with the Examiner on why Evan Dando of the Lemonheads made him drive him around in Ben's own Volvo; his thoughts on the state of the record industry; plus his new EP, How Ya Lookin' Southbound, Come in... and his forthcoming LP, Changing Horses.

MADONNA reportedly plans to raise her kids in NYC, which might explain why Alex Rodriguez is weeks away from buying a NYC penthouse apartment two blocks from Madge's.  Soon-to-be ex-hubby Guy Ritchie reportedly compared making love with her to "cuddling up to a piece of gristle."  The Daily Beast has newly unearthed, 20-year-old Madge music.

MR. BLACKWELL whose annual "worst dressed" list dinged movie stars, music icons and European royalty, has died at 86.  He is survived by a horde of snarky fashion bloggers on the Internet.

JENNIFER ANISTON & JOHN MAYER: Their surprise reunion prompts the inevitable unfounded pregnancy rumor. Or, to quote James Lileks: "I felt good about knowing who Jen and John were, and even better about not caring."

TOM BRADY & GISELE BUNDCHEN: Marriage rumor.

THE FRENCH HOTEL is reportedly relocating to London, which is sure to put a kink in the "special relationship" between the US and the UK.

DAVID DUCHOVNY & TEA LEONI: Duchovny's tennis coach is now denying an affair, after thelling the Daily Mail she would not. Key sentence: Duchovny's lawyer, Stanton "Larry" Stein, tells E! News exclusively  that he spoke with Pakay before and after the Daily Mail's alleged affair story came out, and Pakay told him, "it is all lies and deceit."  Left unanswered is why Duchovny's attorney was speaking to his tennis coach before and after the story was published.

CARRIE FISHER settles a score with ex-hubby and CAA superagent Bryan Lourd.

GREY'S ANATOMY might need a House visit, but not yet.

NORTH KOREA: There was no unusual activity in North Korea yesterday, despite the rumored "important announcement."

AFGHANISTAN: Michael Yon's new photo dispatch features Predator drones and bat caves near Jalalabad.

IRAN busts "spy pigeons" near the nuclear facility in Natanz.  Paranoid much?

IRAQ: Senior officials said that AQI was on the verge of collapse and will soon be eliminated. Iraqi police and border guards have arrested seven members of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps since Oct 18. The leader of the Kurdish administration in northern Iraq is ready to cooperate with Turkey, and could even accept a proposal for a buffer zone as a measure against terror attacks from the PKK.

FAMILY DOG grabs the baby by its diaper to rescue it from a house fire. Let's go to the video.

TIGER SNAKE disrupts fashion show.

A WHITE RHINO is expecting a baby after becoming the first rhino to be artificially inseminated in Britain.

GORILLAS use body language in a similar way to humans. As does King Louie.

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT: A horse with its head stuck in a tree.