TOMORROW ON OUTQ

I'm glad to be returning to the OutQ airwaves tomorrow. Since I usually go on the air on Thursdays, and the last two Thursdays were New Year's Day and Christmas Day, it's been three weeks.

I don't have a theme, per se, but here's what I will be talking about:

• The late great Ron Asheton of The Stooges who died earlier this week.
• How cool a subscription to (RED)wire is. I just got my third issue, which inlcuded a new Joseph Arthur song, and a live mashup between Elvis Costello & The Imposters and The Police of "Watching The Detectives" and "Walking On The Moon," which was recorded for Elvis' new TV show.
• Some great releases that I didn't get to talk about on the air last year (and some I still need to write about): The Drive-By Truckers' Brighter Than Creation's Dark, Bob Dylan's The Bootleg Series Vol. 8: Tell Tale Signs, Lucinda Williams' Little Honey and the Lu In '08 EP, Mavis Staples' Live: Hope At The Hideout, the deluxe reissue of Steve Earle's classic Copperhead Road and Neil Young's Sugar Mountain: Live At Canterbury House 1968.
• And stuff to look forward to in 2009: new albums by U2 and Bruce Springsteen, and possible reunions by The Kinks, The Faces, blur (who I don't care about but I'm sure a lot of people do) and one of my favorite bands ever, Faith No More (more on that as I find out about it).

(RED) WIRE ABOUT TO LAUNCH

Over the summer, I wrote about (RED) WIRE, the online music magazine that is part of the Product (RED) project. Basically it features big name artists contributing exclusive songs - they hope that you subscribe to dig the tunes, and the money will go towards fighting hunger and disease in Africa. Learn more about it here. I just watched U2's cover of Greg Lake's (!) "I Believe In Father Christmas," John Legend's cover of Bob Marley's "Redemption Song" and The Police with Elvis Costello & The Imposters' mash-up of "Watching The Detectives" and "Walking On The Moon." Pretty cool stuff. I'm happy to pay for this stuff.

THE POLICE TO RELEASE LIVE CD/DVD

No surprise that The Police will be releasing a live CD and DVD documenting their reunion/final tour, which wraps up in a few weeks. I'll pick it up, although I wasn't blown away by the show that I saw, and I think there were canned backing vocals going on, unless Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers suddenly sing just like Sting. I'm curious to see the doc on it, which was directed by Stewart's son Jordan Copeland. The band have a few more area shows coming up (including their final show at MSG) with Elvis Costello & The Imposters opening. I'd love to catch one, but they are in town right after "Seven Nights To Rock," so we'll see.

THE POLICE TEAM UP WITH MAYOR BLOOMBERG

Oddly, just a day after The New York Post's lame attempt at swiftboating Sting and Trudie Styler's Rainforrest Foundation, The Police and Mayor Bloomberg announced that the band will play their final gig - ever - in New York City and the tickets will raise one million dollars for Bloomberg's Million Trees project - to make the city "greener." Money from the concert will also go to public television channels in New York City and Long Island.

So who knows, maybe Fox News, who surprisingly defended Sting and Trudie from the Post, will turn on them.

Anyway, lots of credit to the guys for donating lots of money to good causes. Yes, the band have earned millions and millions of dollars from this tour, so it's easy to be cynical. But I believe public televison and the enviornment are important issues, and they are important to the guys in the band - or at least Sting.

THE POLICE'S VICTORY LAP

Like everyone else, I was totally stoked when I heard that The Police were getting back together. They were one of my first favorite bands. They had lots of hit singles, but they were cool. They were rock and roll, but they were different. And they didn't have an intimidating catalog. Where The Rolling Stones, The Who, The Kinks, The Beatles, et al, had these humongous catalogs with tons of compilations, I got into The Police during the Ghost In The Machine era - and that was thier fourth album.

I got to see them last summer at Giants Stadium, and I had to be honest with myself and admit it fell a bit flat. Maybe it was the anticipation. Maybe it was the lame crowd. But it was also that they were stretching out every song - they did it just a bit too much. "Roxanne" is perfect at 3 minutes. That said, "Driven To Tears" was devastatingly awesome.

And that said, I just heard that they're going to be doing some "final" dates this year. I will definitely try to get tickets for this show. I wonder, will people be as excited to see Sting solo gigs any more, now that they've had the chance to see The Police?

Personally, I hope that Stewart Copeland will get back with Oysterhead - the band he had with Les Claypool of Primus and Trey Anastasio of Phish.