THURSDAY

Eddie Vedder – The Pearl Jam frontman and solo artist is 45.

 

PEARL JAM - AMONGST THE WAVES

PAPA ROACH - GETTING AWAY WITH MURDER

 

Papa Roach’s Jacoby Shaddix is ready to celebrate the passing of the old year and the beginning of the new.  The singer tells us, “I have a holiday tradition that I haven’t done for the last year but I am going to do this year because now I know all my neighbors.  I moved into a new neighborhood.  But New Year’s, right at midnight, I would take my Christmas tree and light it on fire and it would burn up.  It would signify that the last year is burned away, it’s done and finished and start anew.” {CLIP}  Shaddix says now that he’s made friends with his neighbors, he figures he can resume the tradition and start fresh for 2011.

 

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Motley Crue star Nikki Sixx has turned Santa for young cancer patients in North Carolina after stepping in to replace videogame systems stolen from a hospice.  Five consoles and equipment, used by kids undergoing life-saving cancer treatment, were taken from the Carolinas Medical Center on December 4 and when the bassist-turned-radio presenter heard the news, he offered to help.  Sixx reached out to Sony, Disney, Activision and Nintendo and asked bosses to donate replacements.  Charles Everett Hinton, 45, was arrested Friday afternoon after Charlotte-Mecklenburg police issued warrants in the Dec. 8 theft. Hinton was charged with burglary, larceny after burglary and damage to property, police said, no patients were in the treatment center when the systems were stolen. 

 

MOTLEY CRUE - PRIMAL SCREAM

JUDAS PRIEST - YOU'VE GOT ANOTHER THING COMIN

 

On this day in 1985, Judas Priest fans Raymond Belknap and James Vance shot themselves after listening to the Judas Priest album Stained Class. The two had drunk beer, smoked marijuana and then listened to hours of the album. Afterwards, they took a shotgun to a nearby school playground where Belknap shot and killed himself. Vance shot himself as well, but lived for more than three years before dying of effects of the shooting. The families of the men would try to lay blame on the music of Judas Priest for this incident. It was the first of many attempts to blame rock for what is obviously a pre-existing medical/Mental condition. Thankfully the judge that presided over this case threw it out of court.

 

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Dave Murray – The Iron Maiden guitarist is 53.

 

IRON MAIDEN - RUN TO THE HILLS