AC/DC are still at least a couple of years away from releasing a new album. According to RTTNews.com Malcolm Young says that singer Brian Johnson may have been too optimistic when he claimed that they would be finished sooner. “You know what Brian’s like. He just says things and then walks away. It’ll be a little while – a year or two anyway. I’ve been doing some jamming on some song ideas but I do that all the time.”

Want to know more? Click here

No reason or official statement has been given for these postponements, nor is there any word on when the rescheduled dates might be announced. The timing seems odd, as the band announced earlier this week they were extending the tour with eight new shows.

A press release from the EnergySolutions Arena in Salt Lake City, Utah, where the band was scheduled to perform in September simply reads: “The Van Halen show at EnergySolutions Arena Tuesday, September 4th has been temporarily postponed. Future dates to be announced.”

The band will apparently still be performing throughout May and June, with their next show scheduled for Saturday, May 19 in St. Paul, Minn, followed by 13 more dates culminating on June 26 in New Orleans. A complete schedule of both postponed and still-scheduled Van Halen concerts follows below.

Van Halen 2012 Tour Schedule:

5/19 — St. Paul, Minn., Xcel Energy Center

5/22 — Kansas City, Mo., Sprint Center

5/24 — Denver, Colo., Pepsi Center

5/27 — Las Vegas, Nev., MGM Grand Garden Arena (This show is good to go!!!)

6/1 — Los Angeles, Calif., Staples Center

6/3 — Oakland, Calif., Oracle Arena

6/5 — San Jose, Calif., HP Pavilion

6/12 — Anaheim, Calif, Honda Center

6/14 — San Diego, Calif – Viejas Arena

6/16 — Phoenix, Ariz., US Airways Center

6/20 — Dallas, Texas, American Airlines Center

6/22 — San Antonio, Texas, AT&T Center

6/24 — Houston, Texas, Toyota Center

6/26 — New Orleans, La., New Orleans Arena

Postponed dates:

7/7 — Uncasville, Ct., Mohegan Sun Arena

7/9 — Hampton, Va., Hampton Coliseum

7/11 — Philadelphia, Pa., Wells Fargo Center

7/13 — East Rutherford, N.J., Izod Center

7/15 — Baltimore, Md., 1st Mariner Arena

7/17 — Rochester N.Y., Blue Cross Arena

7/19 — Detroit, Mich., Joe Louis Arena

7/21 — London, Ontario, John Labatt Centre

7/24 — Toledo, Ohio, Huntington Center

7/26 — Grand Rapids, Mich., Van Andel Arena

7/28 — Cleveland, Ohio, Quicken Loans Arena

7/31 — Fort Wayne, Ind., Allen County Memorial Coliseum

8/2 — Columbus, Ohio, Schottenstein Center

8/4 — Knoxville, Tenn., Thompson-Boiling Arena

8/6 — Memphis, Tenn., FedEx Forum

8/8 — Birmingham, Ala., BJCC Arena

8/10 — Greenville, S.C., BI-LO Center

8/12 — Cincinnati, Ohio, US Bank Arena

8/21 — Spokane, Wash., Spokane Arena

8/23 — Portland, Ore., Rose Garden

8/25 — Sacramento, Calif.,Power Balance Pavilion

8/28 — Fresno, Calif., Save Mart Center

8/30 — Reno, Nev., Reno Events Center

9/4 – Salt Lake City, Utah — EnergySolutions Arena

9/8 — Albuquerque, N.M., Tingley Coliseum

9/11 — El Paso, Texas, Don Haskins Center

9/13 — Austin, Texas, Frank Erwin Center

9/15 — Oklahoma City, Okla., Chesapeake Energy Arena

9/17 — Wichita, Kan. – Intrust Bank Arena

9/21 — Moline, Ill., Iwireless Center

9/25 — Milwaukee, Wis., Bradley Center

Queen have lined up a few European shows with Adam Lambert singing in early July, but there’s no word if he’ll be part of the Olympic performance.

“We’re involved in some way, yes. Not with the opening ceremony, but possibly with something else,” Brian May tells BBC 6 Music. “It’s funny, you have all these meetings with people and they say, ‘Oh, it has to be a top secret’ and then you find it’s all over the papers. So I don’t actually know whether it’s supposed to be a secret or not. So that’s what I’ll say. There’s a strong possibility that we’ll do something.”

KISS has revealed six limited edition covers for the first edition of their Dressed To Kill comic book series. According to RTTNews.com The comics are due out on June 13 and two of the covers will only be available through the band’s website. They will release three of the covers to most book and comic stores (one of those three on a limited basis), two to select book and comic stores and one cover exclusively through their website. The comics will be written by Chris Ryall.

…want to know more? Click here

‘N.I.B.,’ ‘The Wizard’ and the title track of their 1970 debut album ‘Black Sabbath’ are amongst the cuts, as are hits like ‘Iron Man’ and ‘War Pigs’ from ‘Paranoid.’ The only songs featured are those from albums in which Ozzy Osbourneserved as frontman.

Sanctuary is releasing the album, which as of now will be available only in the U.K. This is far from the first greatest hits album for Black Sabbath. As of this writing, the most popular collection is the 1976 album ‘We Sold Our Soul for Rock ‘n’ Roll,’ with sold over two million copies in the U.S.

The band is also working an album of new material, but if that project is pushed back beyond the summer tour dates Osbourne, Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler have scheduled, this album will serve as a nice placeholder. It’s still not clear if drummer Bill Ward will participate in the band’s Lollapalooza show and the pair of overseas dates listed on their website.

‘Iron Man: The Best of Black Sabbath’ Tracklist

1. ‘Paranoid’
2 ‘Iron Man’
3. ‘Changes’
4. ‘Fairies Wear Boots’
5. ‘War Pigs’
6. ‘Never Say Die’
7. ‘Children of the Grave’
8. ‘The Wizard’
9. ‘Snowblind’
10. ‘Sweet Leaf’
11. ‘Evil Woman’
12. ‘Sabbath Bloody Sabbath’
13. ‘Black Sabbath’
14. ‘N.I.B.’

Sammy Hagar announced a concert idea, one that would see the Red Rocker perform material from every stage of his almost 40 year career. according to RTTNews the concert,  ‘Four Decades of Rock,’ will take place September 1 at Lake Tahoe Outdoor Arena at Harvey’s in Stateline, Nevada. According to Hagar, he will begin the show with his current band The Wabos, then bassist Michael Anthony will join him for a set of Van Halen tunes.

…want to know more? Click here

It is expected to surpass both of the Iron Man movies in total gross sales, but the weekend opening beat out Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, and The Incredible Hulk for their total gross in just their first weekend.

Box Office Top 10

1. The Avengers – $207.4M
2. Think Like a Man - $8.1M ($73.1M Gross)
3. The Hunger Games – $5.5M ($380.6M Gross)
4. The Pirates! Band of Misfits – $5.5M ($18.6M Gross)
5. The Lucky One – $5.4M ($47.8M Gross)
6. The Five-Year Engagement – $5M ($19.1M Gross)
7. Safe – $2.7M ($13.1M Gross)
8. The Raven – $2.6M ($12.2M Gross)
9. Chimpanzee – $2.5M ($23.1M)
10. The Three Stooges – $1.8M ($39.7M Gross)

When I finished Iron Man the first time, I immediately went to try and find out everything that I could about The Avengers. Luckily, I have a friend that has been reading comics since he was a wee lad, and was able to fill me in (Wikipedia also helped fill in the gaps). Shortly after that, The Incredible Hulk came out, and Tony Stark showed up at the end to tie the movies together, and let us all know that there was going to be many more movies. Then Marvel had to torture us by having us wait another 2 years before the next movie was going to come out, Iron Man 2. In my opinion, it wasn’t that good, and I was upset that it was the only movie to come out for a while. It should be said, though, that I was one of the few people that didn’t mind that Don Cheadle took Terrance Howard’s place, I don’t think that Terrance is that good of an actor.

After another year, we then got 2 of the more difficult to pull off heroes in film versions: Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger. The difficulty in either of these is that they were more complex origin stories, and required a little more suspension of belief. Thor was somewhat of a disappointment for some, feeling that it was a little too silly to enjoy. Luckily, Captain America was able to bring people back around to the Avengers fold, and began the long wait for the culmination in these 5 films.

Now the the time has finally arrived. The wait is over. You need not put it off any longer.

But what if it was so like Episode 1? The months and years of waiting ended up being for naught, with terrible acting, awful scripting, and nearly unwatchable sight gags from the likes of Jar-Jar? What if everything that you loved and held dear ended up being thrown away to be something that is nearly as heartbreaking to watch as how excited you were to see it?

I can tell you, this is the opposite. Not only did Joss Whedon deliver on every promise, but he kept you guessing, exceeding every expectation that I had for the movie. For those that have been in-the-know for years regarding Mr. Whedon, this isn’t a surprise (if you haven’t watched any of his TV Series, I recommend Firefly to anyone, and I am more partial to Angel than Buffy The Vampire Slayer, but I know I am in the minority). He is one of the few people who is able to dance the line between proper treatment of beloved material, while giving it a freshness and perspective that is enjoyable, making you feel as though you are watching for the first time all over again. For me, I am mildly familiar with The Avengers as an entity, and have little better than a passing knowledge of their inner workings and origins. So I am not going to be able to tell you where the movie strayed from canon (except maybe that I know Iron Man’s suit has a circle, not a triangle for the mini arch-reactor, and the was irksome, but not a deal breaker). I will also say that, true-to-form for Joss Whedon, there is a death that you 1) don’t see coming, 2) hate that it happens, and 3) is essential to the plot, and gives depth to the story ( unofficial 4) will also make you hate Joss Whedon).

The greatest challenge that I could see with the movie is that there was a lot of material to cover without a lot of time. With the movie pushing the 2 1/2 hour mark, they did a great job of making sure that it didn’t FEEL like I was in a movie for 2 1/2 hours. The pacing is fantastic, and the characters are very well done. Robert Downey, Jr. did a typical job as Tony Snark, sorry, Stark, Chris Evans did a great job of playing the unifying commander, Chris Hemsworth was fantastic being the hot-tempered god of thunder, Samuel L. Jackson was a little too light-hearted from what I know of Nick Fury, but he looked like he was having fun, and that made it forgivable. Scarlett Johansson, who I am not normally a fan of, did one of her better jobs. Mind you, I think that she is too wooden and awkward of an actress, but as a spy in the movie, she needed to be wooden and attractive, and she fit the bill. Jeremy Renner, who needs more work because he has more intensity that Sean Penn without being a psycho, was really a great Hawkeye, but the one qualm that I had with the movie was that he was a little under-utilized, but again I think that was mostly due to the large ensemble and minimal time available. I am really hoping that they branch out and make a movie just for Hawkeye, but with him taking over the Bourne series (a franchise I don’t understand why everyone loves, but that’s another matter) I fear that his schedule is pretty tight as is. Then there is of course the newest edition of Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner. I will say that I do like Edward Norton, and I did wish that he would keep with the franchise, but Ruffalo did a great job, and I look forward to seeing all 6 movies that he has signed on for.

I will say that there are a few minor flaws to the film, and that is the only reason why I didn’t give it a full 5 out of 5. Largest of which would be not using enough Hawkeye, who despite not knowing much about, I wanted to know a lot more, and got way less than I wanted. I also had a little bit of a hard time with the end of the climactic battle, where it seemed silly to me that they waited so long to finish the battle, but the battle itself was so fun to watch, I didn’t mind that.

It’s rated PG-13, but I think that with the comicbook movies, it is of course of violence, but it is almost cartoonish and I feel is fairly mild in it’s nature. Seeing Thor hammer an alien robot off something that flies to land in a building is one thing, but there is little blood. The official rating also says that there is a mild drug reference, but I don’t remember what it was, so it is probably because of a joke that Tony Stark makes. If you felt that the earlier movies were alright for your kids, it would be alright to take them to this. I do know that Iron Man and Iron Man 2 did have moments of sexuality that were a little over the top, but there wasn’t any of that in this, so don’t worry about any of that sort of thing.

The only thing that I can say about this movie is that if you liked the predecessors, you can’t not see this movie. It is a great movie that is really fun and funny. There is also not one, but 2 scenes that are after credits. One alludes to a possibilty of the the direction the sequel could go, but the other is the final scene after the credits, and I will say that it is just for a laugh revealing nothing, but well worth the wait. The only other problem with seeing The Avengers left is to say that it is going to be a long while until The Avengers 2.

The Avengers gets a 4.5 out of 5!

Former KISS drummer Peter Criss has revealed the cover art for his forthcoming autobiography, Makeup to Breakup: My Life In and Out of Kiss, which shows the 66-year-old donning his trademark ‘Catman’ makeup and outfit. According to RTTNews.com the book, published by Simon & Schuster, is scheduled for an October 2012 release and promises to be an “unvarnished” look at the sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll world that Criss lived in while manning the drums for the legendary rock outfit.

…want to know more? Click here