Los Angeles News

Beatles Video Game

Los Angeles (March 2009)

Now the music of The Beatles is a video game: Starting in September you will play with your favourite songs of the 'Fab Four'. Paul McCartney and Ringo Star have granted rights to use their songs in the game that will be available on the major consoles Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii and will be called 'The Beatles: Rock Band'.

The idea for the game was made up by Giles Martin, son of the historian producer of the group George Martin: you will play musical instruments just like the ones used by "The Beatles". "I think it is an excellent opportunity for people to understand how the world of music works and how a song is born" stated Sir Paul McCartney.


The video game of the legendary band from Liverpool "The Beatles" with their amazing "Hey Jude" will be released before the end of 2009: it will feature the entire Beatles catalog and will offer an "experiential journey" of the band. This is the first time the Beatles music has been presented in an interactive, video game format. "This game will take you on a journey from the Beatles first album "Please Please Me" until the last album at "Abbey Road"" said Apple Corps CEO Jeff Jones. "It will span samples of the whole catalog all the way through". "The project is a fun idea which broadens the appeal of "The Beatles" and their music," McCartney said in a statement.

The acquisition of the video game rights to the Beatles catalog is a major, scale-tipping coup for Harmonix and MTV Games as they fight for video game music dominance over the like-minded Guitar Hero.

Santa Monica Pier Centennial

The Santa Monica Pier originally built in 1909, is the home to an amusement park and an aquarium, as well as shops and dining options. Santa Monica has had several piers over the years, however the current "Santa Monica Pier" is made of two adjoining piers that have had separate owners for a long time.

The famous Carousel with its 44 hand-carved horses was built in 1922. The La Monica Ballroom opened in 1924 and closed unfortunatly in 1962: became home to Spade Cooley in the early fifties and from 1958 until 1962 it served as a roller skating rink. In the 1960s the City Council proposed that the removal of the pier for the construction of an artificial island with a 1500-room hotel but citizens formed "Save the Santa Monica Bay" to preserve the pier and the order to raze the pier was revoked by the city council in 1973. This year, this amazing famous pier all round the world, will celebrate its 100th anniversary, on September 9 with a lot of festivities planned for all the summer. The Centennial anniversary is a celebration of the Pier's historical, cultural and recreational contribution to Santa Monica over the past 100 years.

On April 18th there will be the "Sideshow at the Pier", an amazing and electric show with jugglers, fire-eaters, tap dancers, singers, clowns, puppeteers, mimes and a lot of comedy teams.

On June 20th you will find the "Schools out", a manifestation where families can enjoy the art-making activities, the interacting experiences, the storytellings, the dances, the amazing shows and much more.

On July 23th there is the "La Monica Ballroom Redux", a dance with few thousands of friends in tribute to the famous La Monica Ballroom. There will be a free dance instruction by the areas "hottest" teachers and strut your stuff to live Big Band performances.

For the Santa Monica Pier Centennial you can admire the gorgeous fireworks spectacular, the morning festivities of pomp and pageantry along with musical fanfare and even a Centennial birthday cake.

Hollywood Gossip

Talking about Los Angeles, we should not forget the gossip! These are hard times for all, including the founder of Playboy, Hugh Hefner, who sells his 700 m² house in Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles Times, the villa is closer to the Los Angeles Country Club and the famous Playboy Mansion, where Hefner lives with his bunny girls. The father of Playboy is 82 years old. He bought the villa with five bedrooms and seven bathrooms for 6.7 million dollars in 1998. He used to live there with his second wife Kimberly, a former Playmate with whom he has two children.

Bruce Willis, the protagonist of 'Die Hard', which is 54 years old, has remarried the model Emma Heming. His former wife Demi Moore and her husband Ashton Kutcher and their three daughters attended the luxurious ceremony, celebrated in the Caribbean islands. According to American TV, the wedding was attended also by the singer Madonna and many other VIPs. Demi Moore, 46 years old, was married to Bruce Willis from 1987 to 2000. The couple had three children: Rumor who is 20 years old, Scout and Tallulah Belle who are 17 and 15 years old.

Tom Brady, the superbowl-winning quaterback and Giselle Bundchen got married this month in Giselle's home in Costa Rica. An informal ceremony with 25 family members and friends and also Brady's 18 month-old son. The couple first exchanged vows in a quiet ceremony in february in California.

Disney cuts theme park staff

The company Walt Disney Co. has cut about 1.900 jobs at its USA theme parks, in both the Anaheim Park (California), and the Orlando Park (Florida)last March. This 2% cutting of the total workforce is a part of a restructuring announced in February but contemplated for several month. The choice was accellerated by the economic downtown in this last years. The attendance at Disney's theme parks and resorts had held up resonably well in this years but only thanks to deep discounts.

"The decision was not made lightly", said the Disney spokeswoman Tasia Filippatos "but it is necessary to mantain the leadership of the company in the family tourism".

The Labour department announced that the USA unemployment rate rose to 8.5% in March, the highest level in 25 years of history. This restructuring applies basicly only to managers and salaried employers, not the simple workers of the amusement parks.

Electric Daisy Carnival expands to two days

If you love electric music you can not miss this amazing festival of Los Angeles, the Electric Daisy Carnival is the most important electronic music event in the West Coast.

Founded by Pasquale Rotella of Insomniac Events in 1993, by now it has hosted famous artists as Moby, the Deep Dish, Sandra Collins and Mark Farina. Last year 65.000 people attended the event. For this reason this year the Electric Daisy Canrival expands to 2 days, on June 26 and 27, expecting more than 100.000 people.

This amazing event is hosted by the famous LA Memorial Coliseum and Expositional Park, in Downtown, the heart of Los Angeles, with its 5 stages and 6 themes areas of music, art and festivities. The last year the festival was headlined by Moby and this year a lot of important artists such as Paul Oakenfold, Fatboy Slim, David Guetta, Paul Van Dyk, Eddie Halliwell, Boyz Noise, Benny Benassi and Roger Sanchezwill perform in this unique festival. Tickets are on sale from Tuesday April 21st, online on www.electricdaisycarnival.com, two-day packages as well as individual tickets are available.

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