Stone Temple Pilots frontman Scott Weiland is getting a jump on the holidays.  The singer recently told "Explore Music" that he's working on a Christmas CD.  He said he's taking a conventional route with the project, noting, quote, "It'll be very traditional.  You know, strings, upright bass, jazz horns, piano, and guitar."  While he was vague about the track listing, he offers, quote, "I'm sort of picking various versions of these songs, because they've been covered so many times, but my favorite versions -- with a little twist."  Weiland dropped one detail -- that he's recording a reggae version of "The Little Drummer Boy."  He also added -- when the interviewer tried to compare Weiland's upcoming set to Rob Halford's holiday CD -- that his disc, quote, "is not a metal Christmas thing."  The title and release date for Weiland's Christmas album haven't been announced yet.

The upcoming album isn't Weiland's first foray into holiday music.  Last December he covered "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," which was released as a single.  He also performed the song on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno."

Sony Music Entertainment Chief Creative Officer Clive Davis and Carlos Santana hosted a VIP listening event on Wednesday, August 25 in Las Vegas to unveil Santana’s new covers album, Guitar Heaven... The Greatest Guitar Classics Of All, which is due on September 21. The event was followed by a special performance of the Las Vegas residency show, Supernatural Santana: A Trip Through The Hits, where for one night only, Santana was joined by guest vocalists India.Arie, Chris Daughtry and Gavin Rossdale to sing the songs that all appear on the new album. On Guitar Heaven, India.Arie joins Santana on the album’s first single "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," Daughtry sings "Photograph" and Rossdale is featured on "Bang A Gong."

Switchfoot will head out with The Almost on a tour that launches October 1 in Lynchberg, VA. Switchfoot, which just wrapped up a summer outing with Goo Goo Dolls, will also perform at Celebrate Freedom Atlanta on September 4 and the Austin City Limits Festival on October 10.

Sammy Hagar says Chad Smith won't be recording with Chickenfoot.  Chickenfoot is about half way through finishing a new album, but one obstacle in their way will be the new Red Hot Chili Peppers album, which drummer Chad Smith is working on right now. "Once they start recording, Chad's never going to be able to get a break," singer Sammy Hagar told Billboard.com. "If he does, he'll get a couple weeks here, a couple days there, which is not really enough to devote to Chickenfoot. And when they're done with [the album] they're gonna go on the road for a year and a half. So we either have to get a new drummer or wait for Chad, which is unfair to Chickenfoot. It's too good a band." Chickenfoot will play together on September 10 in Indio, CA and September 11 in Stateline, NV and then things are "kind of up in the air." "We probably have a record ready to go," Hagar says. "It's just waiting for when we can all get together to do it." Meanwhile, Hagar and his band The Wabos are currently on tour supporting Aerosmith.

Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair thinks that Bono has what it takes to run a country.  Spinner.com cites excerpts from Blair's new memoir in which he writes that the U2 rocker would have been a better choice to succeed him than Gordon Brown.  In the book, titled "A Journey," the former PM says Bono, quote, "could have been a president or prime minister standing on his head. He had an absolutely natural gift for politicking, was great with people, very smart and an inspirational speaker...motivated by an abundant desire to keep on improving, never really content or relaxed."

Bono has expressed his admiration for Blair over the years, too.  In 2007, immediately preceding Blair's exit from office, Bono told NME.com, quote, "What I admire the most about Tony Blair is that despite all accusations of a slick PR machine, spin doctoring and the like, he has almost all of the time exposed himself to bad press and outcry for doing the things he believed in."

Stone Temple Pilots bassist Robert DeLeo is backing frontman Scott Weiland.  Questions about whether Weiland uses a backing track in concert began to surface after a recent show in which he fell from the stage but kept singing without missing a beat.  DeLeo tells "The Weekender" the allegations are a bunch of bunk.  He adds, quote, "It's so funny, because first off, if anyone in this band was lip-synching or faking it, I wouldn't be up there."  DeLeo adds, quote, "I don't know how he didn't get hurt.  He fell six feet off the stage in between the stage and sub monitors.  No one in the band saw what happened.  We just saw him get back on stage.  That's the kind of makeup he has as a person."  Stone Temple Pilots are on the road in support of their recently released self-titled album.  The band will be in Atlantic City, New Jersey Friday night.

Guns N' Roses have another memorable gig that they probably would like to forget.  Entertainment.ie reports that the group exited early from their performance at Dublin's O2 arena after a bottle was thrown onstage.  The band started their set well over an hour after support act Danko Jones left the stage.  Once they began, several bottles were hurled toward the stage, which led Axl Rose to warn the unruly crowd, quote, "One more bottle, we go home.  It's up to you.  We would like to stay.  You want us to stay?  We wanna stay.  We wanna have some fun."  The band played three more songs, but between songs -- as Rose was introducing the group -- another bottle shot out from the crowd.  The rocker made good on his word.  He and the rest of the band exited the stage.

O2 staff members reportedly spent more than a half-hour trying to quell the crowd without success.  Guns N' Roses eventually returned to perform for a what was described as a "small but pretty irate crowd."

Slash already has a video for "By The Sword," but the clip will get a multi-dimensional update in the near future.  The guitarist tells Spinner.com, quote, "We're applying three-D to it after the fact.  It's actually the perfect video for it because it's got a lot of depth shots and shots where everything stops, freezes, and stuff is moving around it, so the three-D of that will look cool."  The video also features the song's vocalist, Wolfmother's Andrew Stockdale.  Slash is also planning another clip from his self-titled solo effort.  He recently revealed via Twitter that during his stint in Los Angeles for the Sunset Strip Music Festival, he was planning to shoot a video with Fergie that came from a concept she had for "Beautiful Dangerous," the song she contributed to his album.

Queens Of The Stone Age are celebrating some of their early releases with the "Rated R" reissue and the upcoming re-release of their out-of-print debut.  But leader Josh Homme admits there was a time when he thought the band wouldn't be around anymore.  The vocalist says after firing bassist Nick Oliveri he considered breaking up the group.  He tells The BBC's Zane Lowe, quote, "I thought about giving up a lot.  I wanted to respect what was there, but you come to a spot where you say, 'Should some mistake really be the end of us all?  Someone else's mistake.  Is that fair?'  In the split, I found my reason to continue, to make it about the music."

While the focus at the moment is on Queens Of The Stone Age's history, Homme says the band will make another album.  However, he notes they're in no rush to get started, explaining, quote, "It feels like a brand new band.  It feels like we can do anything.  So we're going to do it, go to the middle of nowhere, not record at all, and just be a band for a while."

Alter Bridge is prepping for the release of their next album.  The group worked on "AB III" earlier this year, before Myles Kennedy began fronting Slash's band and the rest of the group reteamed with Scott Stapp for more Creed dates.  The album is Alter Bridge's follow up to 2007's "Blackbird," and is said to be a darker effort than its predecessor.  "AB III" is slated to hit stores internationally via Roadrunner Records on October 11th.  Details regarding "AB III's" U.S. release date have not yet been announced. 

Sully Erna says his new CD, Avalon, is a mood setter. "It is very eclectic and intellectual. It is something that you will want to put on when you're in the mood to lie on your couch, dim the lights, and light all your candles and incense. Just vibe out to this hypnotic variety of music, and enjoy the pictures that will be painted in your mind."

Corey Taylor once paid an audience member to walk out of a Stone Sour concert because the man kept demanding to hear Slipknot songs. He says, "Playing gigs where three-quarters of the audience are screaming 'Slipknot!' and you're just like, 'If you'r e here for that then you're at the wrong gig.' "I can remember pulling money out of my pocket onstage and giving it to someone at the front and having security escort them out. If you don't w ant to be here and you want your money back, then here you f**king go, no w get out, you're gone."

Steven Adler has apologized to Matt Sorum for slamming his percussion skills. He once said, "Nothing personal against the guy, but he's like a drum machine. He's got no heart; he's got no soul; he's got no feel. And as life and the years have shown obviously I'm not t he easiest drummer to replace."

Adler now says, "I need to apologize to Matt Sorum. I'm sorry about what I said in those interviews. The words just came out wrong. I think you're amazing and I love you, man. Sorry about that."

ON TV:

Five Finger Death Punch is a guest on ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live."

BIRTHDAYS:

30 Seconds To Mars lead guitarists Tomo Milicevic is 31.

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