In a commendable but too-late effort to save Saturday’s Toronto/Barrie Live 8 show from TOTAL farce-ness, Neil Young, who performed at the original Live Aid in 1985 (as pictured here), has been added to the bill as show closer. He will not be appearing with Crazy Horse, but the Fisk University Jubilee Choir who will perform the one-note solo from “Cinnamon Girl” a capella, choral-style. I have to wonder if they’d been trying to get Neil from the start or if his addition was in response to the chorus of naysayers? Probably the former, but I’ll let myself believe the latter.

Either way, it’s going to be good to see Neil back out and about. He’s had a bit of a rough time of it lately, what with that brain aneurysm back in April and his father passing away earlier this month. He’s still keeping busy, though – in addition to working on his umpteenth album, the follow-up to Greendale, he’s also filming a concert video with director Jonathan Demme over the course of a five-night stand in August at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville.

Meanwhile, back to Live 8 for a moment, Tom Cochrane thinks critics of the bill should shut up. In other news, no one cares what Tom Cochrane thinks, but eye and Pop (All Love) have taken the time to respond.

Bob Dylan is the latest artist to buy into the insidious Starbucks-only release game. The coffee shop will be the only place you can get a copy of Bob Dylan: Live at the Gaslight 1962, which compiles live recordings from very early on in Dylan’s career. It will be released on August 30 and won’t be available anywhere else for at least 18 months. Also coming out on the 30th but available everywhere is No Direction Home: the Soundtrack, the seventh volume in the consistently excellent Bootleg Series. The Scorcese-helmed documentary it accompanies will debut on PBS in late September. More info at Billboard.

Okay, enough with the old dudes. Here’s some sort-of old dudes – Aversion talks to The Posies about the inevitabilty of their reunion and Every Kind Of Light, which came out on Tuesday. From For The Records.

And now, all the young dudes. Bradley’s Almanac has most of a live set from Dirty On Purpose’s Boston show a couple weeks ago available to download. And it seems a little silly to congratulate the band on their first Pitchfork news item, but I will anyways.

eMusic talks to Colin Meloy of The Decemberists about this and that and this.

Largehearted Boy gets my favourite pop culture pundit, Chuck Klosterman, to put together a theoretical mix tape to tie in with his new book, Killing Yourself to Live : 85% of a True Story, which came out yesterday and which the Toronto library does not even have on order. Boooo.

The Incredible Hulk is sick of Tom Cruise. Hulk smash puny actor!

np – Frontier Index / Frontier Index

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