Warner Music Group's Artists Linkin Park
Access Industries, a holding company founded by oil baron Len Blavatnik, won the auction to buy Warner Music Group Corp. for $3.3 billion in cash, the companies announced Friday morning.
Blavatnik edged out more than a dozen other suitors including Sony Music Group, supermarket magnate Ron Burkle, Platinum Equity, Live Nation Entertainment and investment firm Kohlberg Kravis & Roberts, whose unsolicited offer late last year kicked off the auction process. KKR's partner in the bidding was German music company Bertelsmann.
The deal calls for Warner to receive $8.25 per share, a 34% premium over the company's average stock price over the last six weeks, the company said. It's also 75% higher than Warner's closing price on Jan. 20, the day before the New York Times published news of the bidding. Warner's share closed at $7.90 on Thursday....
My Chemical Romance, 30 Seconds To Mars, Avenged Sevenfold, Bullet For My Valentine and Bring Me The Horizon will go head-to-head at the Kerrang! Awards 2011 Fuelled By Relentless Energy Drink in June.
My Chemical Romance lead the charge with five nominations. The New Jersey rockers are in the running for Best Album for Danger Days: The True Lives Of The Fabulous Killjoys, Best International Band, Best Video presented by Kerrang! TV for Na Na Na, Best Single presented by Kerrang! Radio for Planetary (GO!), and Best Live (presented by Download) at the star-studded ceremony, which is set to take place at a top-secret location in London on Thursday, June 9....
Could Beastie Boys possibly give less of a fuck about trying to sound young? In a word, no. As Ad-Rock proudly declares on their excellent new Hot Sauce Committee Part Two, "Oh, my God, just look at me/Grandpa been rapping since '83!" The Beasties revel in their older-than-old-school references ("Be kind, rewind") and cultural touchstones ("braggadocio" rhymes with "I'll make you sick like a Kenny Rogers Roaster"). Where they used to boast about rocking Adidas instead of Fila, now MCA has different footwear issues: "I don't wear Crocs, and I don't wear sandals/The pump don't work 'cause the vandals took the handles."...
Picture in courtesy of Spin