Rock Bottom Remainders go out on their highest note
It took 20 years but the group Bruce Springsteen once praised as being almost as good as a lousy garage band is finally calling it quits.
The Rock Bottom Remainders, a contingent that has made it clear with every performance that literary giants like Amy Tan, Stephen King and Scott Turow really did make the right decision when they set aside their musical ambitions to write books, is calling it a career.
“We’ve gotten as good as we’re ever going to get,” said lead guitarist and best-selling humorist Dave Barry, explaining the band’s decision. “We’re up to almost four chords now, and the Beatles quit at that point, I’m pretty sure.”
The final shows are in Los Angeles and Anaheim with proceeds, as always, going to charity.
Jack Osbourne says he has MS
New father Jack Osbourne is facing a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis.
The former reality star and son of Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne revealed his health crisis in an interview with People released Sunday. He told the magazine he was angry and frustrated when he found out, and he’s concerned about his family.
Osbourne and his fiancée Lisa Stelly had a daughter, Pearl, in April.
Multiple sclerosis attacks the brain and spinal cord and can cause somewhat mild problems or serious disability, such as paralysis.
Jack Osbourne gained fame as a teen when his heavy metal father and his mother allowed the family to be profiled in the MTV reality show “The Osbournes.”
Culture Ministry not gaga over flag use
Thailand’s Culture Ministry is criticizing Lady Gaga over what it says was her inappropriate use of a Thai flag during a Bangkok concert last month.
Lady Gaga wore a traditional Thai headdress and a bikini and sat on a motorcycle with a Thai flag tied to it.
The ministry says the act was “not appropriate and hurt the feelings of the Thai people.”
The ministry’s Permanent Secretary Somchai Seanglai says his agency gave police a summary of public complaints it received.
Somchai says that is protocol but the ministry does not intend to seek legal action against the American pop diva.
The birthday bunch
Musician Paul McCartney is 70. Movie critic Roger Ebert is 70. Keyboardist John Evans (The Box Tops) is 64. Actress Isabella Rossellini is 60. Actress Carol Kane is 60. Actress Andrea Evans (“The Bold and the Beautiful”) is 55. Singer Alison Moyet is 51. Keyboardist Dizzy Reed (Guns N’ Roses) is 49. Country singer-guitarist Tim Hunt (Yankee Grey) is 45. Singer Nathan Morris (Boyz II Men) is 41. Rapper Silkk The Shocker is 37. Country singer Blake Shelton is 36.