Nestled between this weekend's Sunset Junction and the Sept. 3 FYF Fest is West Hollywood's three-day celebration of rock 'n' roll riffage and crossover hip-hop. The third annual Sunset Strip Music Festival closes with an all-day street fest and headlining sets from Billy Corgan's current incarnation of the Smashing Pumpkins, as well as former Guns N' Roses slinger Slash and rising psychedelic rapper Kid Cudi. 

Though events start happening at West Hollywood clubs on Aug. 26, only Aug. 28 will feature two outdoor stages and a host of nationally known acts. 

Set times for that day's fest, which will close down a stretch of Sunset Boulevard to house the two stages, were unveiled today, and will feature a closing hand-off of sorts from a pair of Chicago-bred artists. Veteran rap lyricist Common will finish out a stage near the corners of Sunset and San Vicente Boulevard, ending his set moments before the Smashing Pumpkins take to a stage closer to Doheny Drive at 8:20 p.m.

The Aug. 28 portion of the fest, in which music starts at 1 p.m., will involve a host of Sunset Strip venues, including the Cat Club, the Key Club, the Roxy Theatre and the Whisky A Go-Go, with bands playing throughout the afternoon and into evening. Tickets for Saturday are $49.50 in advance, and $60 at the gate. Other acts on the bill include Semi  Precious Weapons, Travie McCoy, Neon Trees and the Binges. Fergie is slated to guest with Slash.

Full set times after the jump:

Guns N' Roses ringleader Axl Rose has countersued his former manager Irving Azoff, seeking $5 million in damages, according to reports. 

As Pop & Hiss previously noted, Azoff's Front Line Management sued Rose for about $1.8 million for management commissions Front Line claims the singer owes for recent performances across Asia, Canada and South America.

The Times' Patrick Goldstein analyzed the Rose's suit, as first reported by the Hollywood Reporter, on his Big Picture blog. Writes Goldstein of this week's filing:

The Guns N' Roses singer has filed an eye-popping countersuit against Azoff ... claiming that Azoff, among other things, "tried to implement a scheme to force [Rose] to reunite with the original Guns N' Roses band members and, as part of the plot, failed to properly promote the 'Chinese Democracy' album, lied about a prospective Van Halen super tour and mishandled the band's tour dates."

Rose wants $5 million in damages from Azoff, who is now arguably the most powerful man in the music business. With the merger between Live Nation and Ticketmaster, Azoff now controls roughly 70% of the concert ticket market (via Ticketmaster), a huge swath of the live concert business (through Live Nation) and handles the careers of roughly 200 top artists (from the Eagles, Van Halen and Christina Aguilera to Willie Nelson and the Kings of Leon) thanks to Azoff's Front Line Management.

So Rose isn't taking on just anybody. In fact, in his suit, he says that Azoff is violating the government's consent decree (which allowed the merger to happen in the first place) by coercing and bullying artists to do what he wants. In Rose's case, he claims Azoff wanted a Guns N' Roses reunion. So Rose claims that Azoff proceeded to sabotage Rose and his new band so Rose would have no option but to reunite the old band. As the filing puts it: "Upon realizing that he couldn't bully Rose and accomplish his scheme, Azoff resigned and abandoned Guns N' Roses on the eve of a major tour, filing suit for commissions he didn't earn and had no right to receive."

There's oh-so-much more. But surely one of the highlights is Azoff's response to the countersuit. When the Reporter's Gardner contacted longtime Azoff lawyer Howard King, volunteering some of the highlights of the claim, King quipped: "[Rose] didn't accuse Irving of being on the grassy knoll in Dallas on November 22, 1963?" Over the years, Azoff has been in the midst of a number of outlandish feuds, going at it with the likes of David Geffen and former CBS Records chief Walter Yetnikoff, so I suspect there will be more fireworks yet to come. 

Read the full post on the Big Picture. 

Photo: Axl Rose performing in San Bernardino in 2006. Credit: Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times

On Slash's first solo album the most faithful approximation of the classic Guns N' Roses sound doesn't come in the track featuring Ozzy Osbourne or the one with Avenged Sevenfold frontman M. Shadows. Nor is it in "Watch This," which includes input from another ex-GNR member, Duff McKagan. Rather, it's "Beautiful Dangerous" that comes closest to old hits like "Welcome to the Jungle" and "You Could Be Mine."

The guest vocalist on that cut? Fergie of the Black Eyed Peas.

Slash's recruitment of such a heavy-metal outlier illustrates his determination to find a replacement for Axl Rose, whose paranoid whinny so perfectly complemented the guitarist's arsenal of trashy glam-blues riffs. You can look at the 14 all-star collaborations on "Slash" as evidence of his impressive Rolodex, or you can view them as a series of creative tryouts -- musical speed dating in search of a new Mr. (or Ms.) Right.

Team-ups with Ian Astbury ("Ghost"), Chris Cornell ("Promise") and Wolfmother's Andrew Stockdale ("By the Sword") produce familiar sparks but die out quickly.

And a ballad with Adam Levine of Maroon 5, "Gotten," aims for "November Rain" but ends up pretty soggy.

Slash seems more energized in "Doctor Alibi," a brainless fist-pumper with Motörhead maestro Lemmy Kilmister, and "We're All Gonna Die," in which Iggy Pop up offers some of the cheerful nihilism that originally inspired Rose.

-- Mikael Wood 

Slash
"Slash"
(Dik Hayd/EMI)
Two stars (Out of four)

Front Line Management is suing Guns N’ Roses front man Axl Rose for about $1.8 million in management  commissions Front Line claims the singer owes for recent performances across Asia, Canada and South America.

Front Line’s suit, filed Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court, states that around August 2008 the company entered into an oral agreement to represent Rose as his personal manager, and that the company has not been paid the 15% commission that Rose agreed to pay stemming from performances that grossed nearly $12.5 million.

Rose could not be reached immediately for comment.

A Front Line spokesman said Thursday that the filing “speaks for itself” and company officials would have no further comment.

Front Line is the heavyweight management firm headed by industry veteran Irving Azoff, who also is executive chairman of Live Nation Entertainment, the new industry giant created by the recent merger of the Ticketmaster ticketing firm and the Live Nation concert promotion and facility management company. 

-- Randy Lewis

Photo: Axl Rose performing in San Bernardino in 2006. Credit: Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times

Watching Faith Hill sing ABBA’s “The Winner Takes It All” during Monday night’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in New York brought to mind two words that hall officials should seriously consider before next year’s show:

Tribute bands.

There was nothing technically wrong with Hill’s performance — she even had ABBA member Benny Andersson accompanying her at the piano, and it was endearing to see this guy who was part of a group that sold 10 kazillion records in the '70s shaking nervously upon getting onstage in front of an audience of music-biz heavyweights.

But ABBA’s music wasn’t designed to be the kind of spare pop ballad that Hill delivered. Without the scintillating four-part harmonies and shimmering production of the group's records, it was just another drippy breakup tune.