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Blender magazine has closed. READ STORY

It seems like Hot 95.7 KKHH in Houston might be changing…or at least that could be what CBS wants us to believe. Supposedly there is a recorded announcement on the station saying that the music is changing formats or something due to the bad economy this Monday.

Enter a handy online petition to save the station which reads like a promotions director’s dream. Remember how Clear Channel launched the Save our Buzz campaign when KTBZ The Buzz went from 107.5 to 94.5? Seems kind of familiar. Remember how no advanced warning came when KLOL flipped to Mega or The Wave washed away to become Hot 95.7?

This attention has led folks online to speculate that it is:
1) A promotion about paying your bills - like the station has been doing
2) The station will become Britney 95.7 since Ms. Spears is playing Houston Monday
3) The station really is changing formats (possibly to the Amp format)

We’ll see. If it is a promotion, then it is working because losers like me are writing about the station.

Email me, Twitter or Facebook me (all located on the right side of this blog) if you know anything.

The LA Times is reporting that iTunes is raising the price of some songs from .99 to $1.29:

The world’s largest music store, Apple’s iTunes, plans to boost the price of many hit singles and selected classic tracks to $1.29 on April 7, breaking the psychological barrier of 99 cents in what could be the first big test of how much consumers are willing to pay to download individual songs.

Although the date for higher prices has not been publicly announced, Apple has been notifying record labels it will go into effect on that date, industry executives said. READ MORE

Industry experts say are you crazy?

(via Daily Swarm)

Sad Tuesday for the Houston Chronicle as Hearst begins cutting 12% of the paper’s work force. READ MORE

Richard Connelly of the Houston Press has been covering the story. He has the internal memo and a list of employees affected. Our thoughts go out to all of them.

MORE BLOG TALK UPDATED
Newspaper Death Watch | The Clownvision Chronicles | deadspin | The Huffington Post | blogHOUSTON

MORE BLOG TALK
LoneStarTimes | Banjo Jones | IFOC | John Royal | Fourth and Fifty

Officer Mike McCoy at the Houston Police Department Recruiting Blog found a great video from 1972 called The Houston Policeman: Main in the Middle. It was a documentary made about HPD and the challenges it faced at that time.

As the film states, this is the time when the image of a police officer had changed from that of the friendly face patrolling the street to “a dehumanized, mechanized, faceless robot in a cold blooded computerized society.” A little over the top, but it is the film’s words, not mine. It sounds like the inspiration for The Terminator!

The reason given for this change was the fact that Houston was growing rapidly and officers had to take “to wheels” over walking the streets. It makes you think back to old films when the image of cops consisted of the guy who knew everyone’s name as he strolled through the neighborhood. A different view from the contemporary one because that would be impossible today in a major city.

In a lighter sense, it is fun to see the shots of Houston back then.

PART 1
PART 2
PART 3

If you like this topic, then check out this video .

The rightful King of Catbloggers Laurence Simon (@isfullofcrap) is starting a new tradition Fridays on Twitter:

When it’s time to go home on Friday, I’ll post “YABBA DABBA DOOOOO!” like Fred Flintstone does when it’s quitting time at the quarry.

He says others are doing the same.   Meet Bruwyn by the way.

Hello all,
SKetkar here.  We at Astrocast will be going on a short haitus.  Think of it as end of the season with no lame repeats.  We’ll back with fresh new episodes after May 10th.  You maybe ask “why SKetkar”, “why are you leaving us”, well truth be told, I’m getting married in about a month, […]

Only Jack White could turn a slipped disc and severe case of bronchitis into a new band. He plays the drums for Dead Weather:

The tracks — a sludgy, bluesy blend of psych-rock guitar, alternately stark and explosive rhythms and Mosshart’s sultry-to-siren vocal — take relatively logical leaps from the members’ other bands, White’s groove-heavy drumming elevating the Dead Weather’s Stripes-esque blues-rock moods and Fertita and Mosshart pulling in atmosphere and disaffected cool, respectively.

The band’s beginnings, White said, trace back to the tail end of the Kills/Raconteurs tour, when he suffered a slipped disc and severe case of bronchitis that threatened to waylay his voice. His band went heavy on co-frontman Brendan Benson’s songs to finish the tour, and brought Mosshart in to take the lead for well-loved White tracks such as “Steady, As She Goes.” READ THE REST

The band’s album drops in June. Hear two songs at http://thedeadweather.com.

Fox owned and operated stations are making it easy for bloggers to embed video:

Fox Television Stations (FTS) and the Web broadcasting outfit Redlasso have ironed out a deal that gives Redlasso the rights to syndicate content from the Fox group’s local newscasts. Starting in April, content from the Fox O&Os will be made available to bloggers and news-oriented Websites at redlasso.com. READ MORE

OMG we are BFFs forever LOL.

WATCH THE VIDEO

At a Houston or Dallas Galleria near you.

(Image courtesy Charlie White)