Rap-music mogul Marion ``Suge'' Knight skipped a court-ordered appearance at a hearing on Saturday about his assets, setting the stage for courts to take control of his Death Row Records label.
Knight has missed several hea-rings in a legal battle since he lost a US$107 million judgment last year to Lydia Harris, a former associate who claimed she helped start the rap record empire with her former husband, Michael Harris.
Michael Harris, an imprisoned drug dealer, says he put up US$1.5 million to help start the record label -- an assertion Knight has repeatedly denied.
A judge last month ordered the record company into receivership, which hinged on Knight's appea-rance at the weekend's hearing.
A court-appointed ``receiver'' would take control of all assets of Death Row Records, including a music library containing the records of such artists as Tupac Shakur, Snoop Dog and Dr. Dre, said Steve Goldberg, attorney for Michael Harris.
``He's had his last chance as far as we're concerned,'' Goldberg said.
He predicted this could be ``a death sentence for Death Row Records.''
Meanwhile there was court trouble of a different kind for hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons and his model-turned-entrepreneur wife, Kimora Lee: Their marriage has come to an end.
In a statement provided on Friday, Simmons announced the pair had decided to break up after seven years of marriage. Rumors had swirled for the past week that a split was imminent. The couple have two young daughters.
``Kimora and I will remain committed parents and caring friends with great love and admiration for each other,'' Simmons said. ``We will also continue to work side by side on a daily basis as partners in all of our businesses.''
Domestic problems that have not been handled in such a gentlemanly way, include those of Greek-born musician Yanni, who was arrested earlier last month for domestic battery. Police have said, however,charges will not be filed.
John Yanni Christopher, was arrested at his Manalapan home after his girlfriend Silvia Barthes, 33, told police Yanni grabbed her and shook her, then threw her on the bed and jumped on her, according to a police report.
Barthes had a bloody lip but told officers she thought she might have hit herself when Yanni shook her, the report stated.
Onto more peaceful pastures and news that jazz great Dave Brubeck, who has written more than 45 religious works, including songs, hymns and carols, will be honored by the University of Notre Dame with its Laetare Medal.
The school will present the 85-year-old catholic pianist with the medal -- considered the most prestigious honor for American Catholics -- during its May 21 commencement.
Since 1883, the Laetare Medal has been awarded annually to a Catholic ``whose genius has ennobled the arts and sciences, illustrated the ideals of the church and enriched the heritage of humanity.''
Brubeck is best known for writing a number of jazz standards, inclu-ding In Your Own Sweet Way and The Duke. After The Dave Brubeck Quartet disbanded in 1967, he has focused on writing many predominantly religious compositions.
David Lee Roth says he won't jump from his gig as a morning radio host.
Roth, who replaced shock jock Howard Stern on seven stations in January, has struggled in making the move from rock star to radio host. But during his Friday show, the former Van Halen frontman vowed to stick with it -- although he acknowledged that problems continue.
``I'm going to give it a try,'' Roth told his audience. ``I've invested too much in this show not to.''
Roth's show underwent drastic changes last week, with the removal of his three on-air sidekicks and the ditching of background music. According to Roth, he received four letters in five days from CBS Radio officials demanding ``extensive changes'' in his four-hour show.
Last week Joseph Nye, the well-known China scholar, wrote on the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s website about how war over Taiwan might be averted. He noted that years ago he was on a team that met with then-president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), “whose previous ‘unofficial’ visit to the US had caused a crisis in which China fired missiles into the sea and the US deployed carriers off the coast of Taiwan.” Yes, that’s right, mighty Chen caused that crisis all by himself. Neither the US nor the People’s Republic of China (PRC) exercised any agency. Nye then nostalgically invoked the comical specter
April 15 to April 21 Yang Kui (楊逵) was horrified as he drove past trucks, oxcarts and trolleys loaded with coffins on his way to Tuntzechiao (屯子腳), which he heard had been completely destroyed. The friend he came to check on was safe, but most residents were suffering in the town hit the hardest by the 7.1-magnitude Hsinchu-Taichung Earthquake on April 21, 1935. It remains the deadliest in Taiwan’s recorded history, claiming around 3,300 lives and injuring nearly 12,000. The disaster completely flattened roughly 18,000 houses and damaged countless more. The social activist and
Over the course of former President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) 11-day trip to China that included a meeting with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping (習近平) a surprising number of people commented that the former president was now “irrelevant.” Upon reflection, it became apparent that these comments were coming from pro-Taiwan, pan-green supporters and they were expressing what they hoped was the case, rather than the reality. Ma’s ideology is so pro-China (read: deep blue) and controversial that many in his own Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) hope he retires quickly, or at least refrains from speaking on some subjects. Regardless
Approaching her mid-30s, Xiong Yidan reckons that most of her friends are on to their second or even third babies. But Xiong has more than a dozen. There is Lucky, the street dog from Bangkok who jumped into a taxi with her and never left. There is Sophie and Ben, sibling geese, who honk from morning to night. Boop and Pan, both goats, are romantically involved. Dumpling the hedgehog enjoys a belly rub from time to time. The list goes on. Xiong nurtures her brood from her 8,000 square meter farm in Chiang Dao, a mountainous district in northern Thailand’s