SLY & THE FAMILY STONE:  Pitchfork posted three fave video clips to mark today's reissues of all seven Sly & the Family Stone LPs.  I can't resist relinking the clip of the band playing "My Lady" to win 10K at a talent contest in Ohio.  And this clip of "Stand" from The Mike Douglas Show is pretty cool, too.

NEW RELEASES:  Arctic Monkeys, Patrick Wolf, Patti Smith, Dntel, Mando Diao and The Veils are all streaming in full this week from Spinner.  Golden Smog releases the cheekily-titled Blood on the Slacks.  In addition to the Sly Stone reissues, there are remasters from Leonard Cohen.

PATTI SMITH tells Perth Now that her choice of covers on the new album was governed by accessibility rather than a desire to pay tribute to artists who inspired her. (Thanks LHB.)

SOMEONE STILL LOVES YOU, BORIS YELTSIN frontman Philip Dickey tells Radar magazine, "This is the busiest my phone and e-mail have ever been in my life" after then the first freely elected president of Russia and a towering figure of his time who sttod against the tanks of a military coup, presided over the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the demise of the Communist Party, died Monday.  There are already plenty of tracks from the band to stream via the ol' HM, including alive take on The Troggs' "With A Girl Like You," but I suspect there will be even more by the time you read this.

TOM WAITS:  Just where does the master songwriter and alchemist of sound, get all his ideas from?  MOJO magazine tried to find out at a "raw-steak red" roadhouse.  RTWT.

BJORK was interviewed by Brandon Stosuy for Pitchfork about the emphasis on rhythm on her new album, Volta, and more.  The first video from the album is "Earth Intruders."  If you're lucky, you might find a live version of it as well.

THE RUNAWAYS are headed to the silver screen as the subject of an indie drama, with Joan Jett as an exec producer.

THE TWILIGHT SAD, a Scottish band getting lotsa blog love (and an 8.6 album review from Pitchfork) grab the Song of the Day slot at NPR with "That Summer, At Home I Had Become the Invisible Boy."  And there are currently scads of tracks streamable via the ol' HM.

LAURA VEIRS explains to MSNBC why her new band and album are both called "Saltbreakers."  You can stream the title track and plenty more at the moment via the ol' HM.

OKKERVIL RIVER frontman Will Scheff tells the Austin Chronicle that recording the band's latest album was no picnic.  The album has an Aug. 7th release date.

SCARLETT JOHANSSON will sing back up for the Jesus & Mary Chain at their Coachella warm-up date in Pomona, California on April 26.  No, really.  Now all they need is a cameo from Bill Murray.

MADONNA's marriage to movie director Guy Ritchie is reportedly on the rocks, after the filmmaker was spotted dancing intimately with a leggy mystery brunette at a London club.  Meanwhile, Madge reportedly snubbed the father of her adopted son while in Malawi, working on projects for her charity.

BRUCE WILLIS is said to be romancing his Perfect Stranger costar Tamara Feldman... if you ask her rep.  If you ask his, you'll get a different answer.

JENNIFER LOPEZ made 50 grand a minute to play for Russian billionaire Andrei Melnichenko's wife's birthday party.  Certainly a haul, though Xtina Aguilera made twice as much to play their wedding.

TOMMY LEE, Pam Anderson's first ex, recently spent an evening trying to woo Danish vixen May Anderson away from current beau Kid Rock, Pam Anderson's second ex.  The man has issues.

SIENNA MILLER will be having that threesome with Keira Knightley in the upcoming film The Best Time of Our Lives, after Lindsay Lohan pulled out of the project last week.

LINDSAY LOHAN, meanwhile, was spotted with droopy eyelids and a blank stare on her face as she stumbled out of an L.A. club.  Video at the link.

SALMA HAYEK has never been a fan of the Bible because she hates the way the good book depicts women and subliminally suggests that sex is dirty.  Pretty sure she's wrong on the second part at least.  Wait until she reads the Koran.

SHERYL CROW and LAURIE DAVID claim that presidential advisor Karl Rove was combative toward them on the issue of global warming at Saturday's White House Correspondents' dinner.  I would bet Rove does not care what David and Crow think about global warming, but David's version of the story seems dubious for several reasons: (a) Rove was sitting with staffers of The New York Times, not exactly a White House organ; (b) witnesses (likely said NYT staffers) told the Washington Post and National Review that David was very aggressive with Rove; (c)  Rove was reportedly polite in the last story of this genre; and (d) David's later comment, "I honestly thought that I was going to change his mind, like, right there and then" seems delusional at best.  The David-Crow brand of environmentalism (yes, both are against toilet paper) is mocked even by their friends on the Left side of the aisle; playing the victim sounds better than playing the rude dillitante.  BONUS:  Much like David's frequent private jet travel, it turns out Crow's tour has quite the carbon footprint -- 3 tractor-trailers, 4 buses and 6 cars.

SPIDER-MAN 3 is the most expensive movie ever made?  If not, it should be close enough to limt any profit Sony sees from it, according to Radar magazine.

NANOTECH:  To illustrate nanotechnology's potential in medicine, Northwestern University researcher Samuel Stupp was set to present results Monday showing paralyzed lab mice that have regained mobility through nanomaterial treatments.  Nevertheless, researchers are restrained, talking about results that may occur decades hence. (Thanks, Dad.)

IRAN launched a fresh nationwide drive aimed at forcing women whose clothes are deemed too tight and headscarves overly skimpy to fall in line with its Islamic dress rules.  The parliament is again trying to cut short the term of Pres. Ahmadinejad.  It appears that Tehran is trying to bribe most of the members of the Iraqi parliament.

IRAQ:  Confusion persists over whether or not the US military will continue with its plan to build barriers around the Sunni enclave of Adhamiya in Baghdad.  Controlling access to towns or neighborhoods -- whether via walls or fences ringed with barbed wire -- is a tried and true counterinsurgency technique... and unpopular with the insurgents as well as locals.  Bill Roggio notes significant changes which are occurring with the structure and development of the Iraqi Army.  Documentarian J.D. Johannes is back in Iraq and blogging from Fallujah: "I think there are parts of Al Anbar province where the war may be over and we just don't realize it."

...AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT:  A giant snail, a/k/a/ caracol gigante.

SUICIDE SQUIRREL takes down the grid in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.

BARNEY the MACAW taught a four-year-old autistic boy to talk.

CLONED DOGS will be mated, in an experiment to see whether they can reproduce normally.

PUPPY PROZAC:  The latest hype in pet prescriptions is a new drug called Reconcile, a beef flavored pill that dogs can take to help alleviate pet separation anxiety.