Everything You Weren't Expecting (Or Maybe Not)

+ I was going to do some not-very-elaborate April Fool's Day Joke today, but I figured that that would be played out, considering my only good ideas were to proclaim one of my fave girl groups is breaking up, etc. I'm not very good with these kind of things, thus the idea was scrapped.

+ Check out this interesting article regarding Performance Rights Day yesterday...

+ For you Chart Stalkers like me who haven't heard yet, it's official -- Miley Cyrus got beat out by "Now 30" this week by a scant 7,000 copies. This has of course led to thousands of articles asking the question if Hannah Montana has jumped the shark due "disappointing sales" of the new movie's soundtrack. Newsflash: It moved 139,000 copies! In this sales climate, that is hardly "disappointing". I've also heard a lot of people talking about the attempts to "position" Miley into the country market, especially with her most recent single, "The Climb", most likely in attempt to squander some of Taylor Swift's mightiness. Call me crazy, but I'm guessing the whole "country thing" was in Miley's blood from birth. She is from Tenneesee after all, and displays her country-ness all the time on "Hannah". Give her some slack -- I honestly think her voice is better suited for country tunes.

+ And in a related note -- Keri Hilson bowed at #4. Not shabby for an album that took literally a millenia to come out. FYI - PopTastic has a (short-ish) copy of Keri covering Kelly Clarkson's trademark track "Since You Been Gone" and it makes me very happy. If you went to Justin Timberlake's "Future Sex/Love Show", you may remember Timbaland featuring his then relatively unknown (other than "The Way I Are") protege with the track during his intermission DJ set. I've been looking for it ever since...

+ News has recently broke that Ashley Tisdale's new single, "It's Alright, It's OK", will premiere to radio in two weeks, so it should leak anytime now. I have high hopes for Ms. Tizz, however I recently heard an interview in which she tried to play off her Headstrong album as a learning experience and it made me worried. I really dug that album, cheesyness and all. That was a real guilty pleasure. So I'm hoping her new record delievers. Fingers crossed for you, girl...

+ I heard a new track from Demi Lovato's re-release of her debut album called "Behind Enemy Lines" and it's good. Her album is pretty much a toss-up of alright ("Get Back", "La La Land"), predictiable ("On the Line" with the Jonas Brothers), and freakin' amazing ("Don't Forget"), so this new bonus cut is a welcomed surprise. I see big things for this girl that have nothing to do with the Jonas Brothers, "Camp Rock" or its upcoming sequel...let's hope it comes true.

+ In more re-release news, I heard a new bonus cut from Jesse McCartney's upcoming "Departure: Reloaded" dubbed "Body Language" and its lyrics are random and harken back to his breakout single "Leavin'". It'll take time to grow on me, but I dig the various foreign language references. Who would have thought five years ago I would be psyched about Jesse's solo works? Certainly not me.

+ The Lady Gaga mixes continue to intrigue me and continue to make songs that should be stale by now even better than they inherently are. I just heard a presumably old mashup of "Just Dance" with the Eurythmics' classic "Sweet Dreams" and it knocks my socks right off. I gotta say, Gaga mixed with anything is a good deal, even if it's such a go-to mashup like with "Sweet Dreams", because I swear I've heard about 10 different pop song mashups with the song -- yet, it still sounds fresh...and sort of like it was meant to sound like that, honestly.

+ I was watching that (new!) countdown special on Vh1 where they celebrate the 100 Best One Hit Wonders of the 1980's and one of the songs they featured was T'Pau's classic from my birthyear, 1987, "Heart and Soul", and it made me re-fall in love with this beauty of pop lusciousness. So I thought I'd share.