Learning Mandarin - Van Halen singer back in band after 20 years

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ENTERTAINMENT / Music






Van Halen singer back in band after 20 years


(Reuters)
Updated: 2007-08-14 10:03





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David Lee Roth (R), original lead singer of the rock group Van Halen,
poses with band member Eddie Van Halen after a news conference announcing
their North American tour, in Beverly Hills, August 13, 2007.[Reuters]

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After more than 20 years of bitter feuding, the principal founding
members of Van Halen hugged each other on Monday during a news conference
to announce a rebirth of one of America's premier rock bands.

Flamboyant singer David Lee Roth, 52, has returned to the fold for a
25-date North American arena trek that will kick off on September 27 in
Charlotte, North Carolina. International dates and a new album are also
in the planning stages.

Roth quit the band in 1985 for a disappointing solo career, and he spent
the subsequent years sniping at his old bandmates and their replacement
singer Sammy Hagar.

But as excited reporters cheered them on, the garrulous "Diamond Dave"
embraced his old antagonist, guitarist Eddie Van Halen, during the
gathering at the Four Seasons Hotel.

"My new brother," said Van Halen, also 52, as his 54-year-old brother,
drummer Alex Van Halen looked on.

It is indeed a family affair, with Eddie's 16-year-old son, Wolfgang,
replacing Michael Anthony on bass, to the chagrin of some fans hoping for
a reunion of the classic lineup famed for such hits as "Runnin' With the
Devil," "And the Cradle Will Rock" and "Panama."

Asked about Anthony's absence, Roth said: "This is not a reunion. This is
a new band. ... Usually when a band comes back like us it's rockers with
walkers, and this is everything but. Meet us in the future, not the past."

NEW ALBUM

Roth said Van Halen was "plotting and planning" a new album, his first
with the band since 1983's blockbuster "1984."

"Saving the world is (U2 singer) Bono's job. We just want to save a
hundred cities," Roth said. "Then we want to save Europe, then we want to
save Japan, Australia and ... Hong Kong. Then we make an album. Lots of
big dreams here, lots of ambition."

Added Eddie Van Halen: "We are a band and we're gonna continue."

The band has been on the rocks since 1996, when Hagar acrimoniously left.
That year, Roth reunited with his old bandmates to record two songs for a
hits album, and to present an award at the MTV Video Music Awards. He had
assumed this would lead to a full-blown reunion, but later claimed he had
been duped by Eddie Van Halen.

The band, instead, cast its lot with a new singer, Gary Cherone, the
former vocalist with soft-rock band Extreme. His one album with the band,
1998's "Van Halen III" was a flop, and he left the following year.

The Van Halen soap opera entered a bizarre phase in 2002, when Roth and
Hagar launched a co-headlining tour, despite Roth's description of his
replacement as a "mediocre talent." Also that year, Eddie van Halen
underwent cancer treatment, and the band was dropped by its longtime
label, Warner Bros.

In 2004, Hagar and his old bandmates embarked on an unhappy reunion tour,
with Anthony and Hagar claiming that Eddie Van Halen had alcohol
problems. The guitarist, a recovering alcoholic, entered rehab earlier
this year.

Observers are hoping for better things this time around.

"The real question is whether Eddie and Dave can peacefully co-exist,"
said Matt Blackett, associate editor at Guitar Player magazine. "For the
sake of their die-hard fans let's hope so, because it was that pairing
that created the band's most groundbreaking music. Eddie never played
better than when he was with Dave."

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Pnyin - Chris Noth to reprise Mr. Big role

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ENTERTAINMENT / Movies






Chris Noth to reprise Mr. Big role


(AP)
Updated: 2007-08-11 17:34





NEW YORK - Mr. Big and Carrie Bradshaw will be together again, this time
on the big screen. Chris Noth, who played Sarah Jessica Parker's love
interest on HBO's "Sex and the City," is slated to reprise his role in a
feature film spun from the long-running TV series.

Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon will also reprise
their roles for the romantic comedy, to be distributed by New Line Cinema
in association with HBO.

"There is no need for funeral arrangements," said Michael Patrick King,
who will direct the film. "I assure you that Mr. Big is a very `big' part
of the `Sex and the City' movie."

"While I have not spoken to him myself, Chris Noth assures me that Mr.
Big is alive and well and ready to report to the set in September," King
said in a statement Wednesday.

King was one of the executive producers of the TV series, which ended in
2004.

Noth, 50, plays police Detective Mike Logan on NBC's "Law & Order:
Criminal Intent."

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Chinese Character - Jessica Alba signs on for Mike Myres' 'Love Guru'

? ?



ENTERTAINMENT / Movies






Jessica Alba signs on for Mike Myres' 'Love Guru'


(ANI)
Updated: 2007-08-09 17:46




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Jessica Alba

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Jessica Alba has signed on to star in Paramount Pictures鈥� new movie
鈥楲ove Guru鈥�.

The sexy star will be playing the female lead opposite funnyman Mike
Myers, who has also scripted the film along with Graham Gordy.

Also appearing with the two will be Romany Malco, and Verne Troyer, who
played Mini-Me in Myres鈥� three "Austin Powers" films, reports Variety.

In the movie, Myers plays Pitka, an American who was left at the gates of
an ashram in India as a child and raised by gurus.

After returning to America, he tries to settle a rift between a hockey
player, to be played by Malco, and his wife, who in turn is enamored with
the star player of a rival team.

Alba plays the hockey team owner and Troyer the team coach. Pitka's job
is to check that romance between Malco and his wife, so that the star
player can lead his team to the championship.

The pic, scheduled for a June 20, 2008 release, will be helmed by Marco
Schnabel.








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Chinese Character - Jessica Parker confirms 'Sex and the City' film role

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ENTERTAINMENT / Movies






Jessica Parker confirms 'Sex and the City' film role


(IANS)
Updated: 2007-08-08 15:02




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Sarah Jessica Parker and Coty launch her new perfume "Covet" at Macy's
in New York City on August 7, 2007.[WENN]

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Sarah Jessica Parker has confirmed that she will be part of the movie
adaptation of the hit television series 'Sex and the City'.

The shooting is scheduled to start in six weeks and the actress says she
and the rest of the cast - Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon
- are 'deep in prep'. She, however, has refused to give too much away
about the cast or the plot of the film, contactmusic.com reported.

She says: 'We still have some stuff to iron out, silly stuff before a
studio says OK. It looks closer to actually happening. It's a dream. We
know it's (storyline) in the present. All else has been wiped from my
memory.'























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US: Iraqi fighters extort, kidnap to raise funds

Al-Qaida in Iraq is increasingly embracing extortion and kidnapping to finance its operations as cash carried in by its dwindling foreign fighter network is drying up, according to U.S. intelligence and documents captured in Iraq.

Al-Qaida in Iraq's funding scheme could drive an even deeper wedge between the terrorist organization and the Iraqi tribes and others who once joined forces against the U.S.-led invasion and occupation.

The smuggling network that funnels foreign fighters and weapons into Iraq has been under increasing pressure in the past year, squeezed from three sides: by Iraqi tribes, who, repelled by the violence, are making it increasingly difficult for terrorist networks to operate and hide among them; by more effective U.S. and Iraqi military operations, and by governments in the region — notably Saudi Arabia and Morocco — that are cracking down on al-Qaida and the smuggling networks that feed the insurgency.

The flow of foreign fighters into Iraq has been cut to an estimated 20 a month, a senior U.S. military intelligence official said. That's a 50 percent decline from six months ago, and just a fifth of the estimated 100 foreign fighters who were infiltrating Iraq a year ago, according to the official, speaking on condition of anonymity in order to discuss intelligence reports.

Ninety percent of the foreign fighters enter through Syria, according to U.S. intelligence. Foreigners are some of the most deadly fighters in Iraq, trained in bomb-making and with small-arms expertise and more likely to be willing suicide bombers than Iraqis.

Foreign fighters toting cash have been al-Qaida in Iraq's chief source of income. They contributed more than 70 percent of operating budgets in one sector in Iraq, according to documents captured in September 2007 on the Syrian border.

The more than 500 pages of al-Qaida in Iraq papers gave a snapshot into at least one of the several smuggling networks that has brought thousands of foreigners into the country over the past five years. The Combating Terrorism Center at the U.S. Military Academy has issued five reports on the documents, the latest focusing on funding and the entry and egress of outside fighters. Most were conveyed through professional smuggling networks, according to the report.

As income had dried up from foreign fighters, the group has in the past two years adopted criminal tactics against Iraqis to raise money — carjackings, kidnappings for ransom, hijacking fuel trucks, counterfeiting and demanding protection money of local businesses, the senior official told The Associated Press. Al-Qaida in Iraq's total budget is unclear, the official said.

"A year or two ago they were able to receive funds from couriers from the greater al-Qaida organization. A lot of that outside access has been cut off," the official said. "Most of the funding for al-Qaida in Iraq is now internally generated."

The official added that as Iraq becomes more secure and the economy improves, al-Qaida in Iraq, ironically, has more wealthy Iraqis from which to extort money.

Acting on tips from locals and other intelligence, he said U.S. and Iraqi forces are capturing or killing one or two key Iraqi insurgent leaders every week, many of whom are responsible for receiving and moving foreign fighters around Iraq. This further drains the terrorist organization of both people and money.

But U.S. intelligence officials are struggling with a chicken-and-egg question: Is the foreign fighter flow into Iraq tapering off because of a strategic decision by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida organization to shift its focus, or is it a tactical reaction to a string of setbacks in Iraq, the premier battlefield for terrorists looking to take on the United States?

"We do think they are considering what should be the main effort," Gen. David Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, said in an interview with the AP on July 19.

Iraq for several years has been the central battlefield between U.S. forces and al-Qaida-affiliated terrorists. But in recent months violence in Afghanistan and Pakistan has increased relative to Iraq. It is unclear whether al-Qaida has consciously decided to change its focus, or whether the shift was forced by U.S. success against the Iraqi insurgency in the past year.

That question was the subject of a videoteleconference last week between U.S. military and intelligence community analysts in Iraq and Afghanistan who confer routinely to determine whether and how one war affects the other.

They know this: Foreign fighters are not being moved out of Iraq to fight in Afghanistan, the official said. But it appears fresh recruits are being moved into Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and North Africa at increasing rates. They may have more freedom to operate because the terrain is difficult, and fewer U.S. and allied troops are there.