Today, we’re introducing another new sporadic feature around here called Hidden Track: At The Barbecue. This is a chance to get a little loose with the Dead Guy Ales, suck down a variety of tube steaks, and shoot the shit with the gang.

Basically, this is an opportunity for the various HT contributors to talk about the germane on goings in the music world or just chat about who likes what.

So, for this first barbecue, we thought we’d kick it off with a little icebreaker: What was your very first favorite song?

Big Papi: For somebody who grew up in the ’80s, a very first favorite song can easily be Eye of the Tiger or Jump. However, the choices are broad, so favorite song needs to be expanded to the first song that you memorized all the lyrics to, which in my case would be The Beastie Boys’ Paul Revere. Perhaps nothing rolled off the tongue of a pre-puberty fifth grader better than repeating the lines:

The sheriff’s after me for what I did to his daughter

I did it like this, I did it like that I did it with a wiffleball bat

So I’m on the run the cop’s got my gun

And right about now it’s time to have some fun

The King Adrock that is my name

And I know the fly spot where they got the champagne.

Read on to see what your favorite HT’ers got down to as young ‘ens…

One of the cooler venues near my hometown is the historic Count Basie Theater in Red Bank, New Jersey. The Count Basie offers the only chance Bayshore residents have to see nationally touring acts year round, but the theater was starting to fall into a state of disrepair. The situation looked dim for a while.

Local hero Bruce Springsteen has come to the rescue by scheduling a benefit performance at the theater on May 7 with all proceeds going towards renovation. The restoration and renovation is scheduled to begin this summer. What can’t Bruce Springsteen do? Well he can’t give you links, but we can:

• Traffic issues and rain cause problems at Langerado
• The Beasties worked through technical difficulties at Terminal 5
• Match Made in Heaven: Danger Mouse and Beck collaborate
• The Dave Matthews Band summer tour will feature new material
• Jeff Tweedy blogs about his migraines for the New York Times
• Weird combo alert: Pitchfork curates the MLB 2K8 Soundtrack
• Live Music Blog compiles the schedule for the SXSW Webcasts on NPR
• Nate Chien reviews the Black Crowes Warpaint Party at the Fillmore
• The Punch Brothers offer an unconventional take on bluegrass

And we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention a couple of outstanding interviews over on Glide’s main site. Travis Atria sat down with Stephen Malkmus to discuss his new album, Pavement’s legacy and why he loves The Beatles. Also, be sure to check out Eric Ward’s chat with Chuck Garvey about approaching 20 years of moe., playing the new songs from Sticks & Stones and vinyl.

It seems that the folks at Ticketmaster aren’t going to let Live Nation get away with starting their own ticketing service. According to Billboard, Ticketmaster is teaming up with Cablevision to purchase 49% of AEG Live, the second largest promoter in the world. We’ll see how Live Nation likes a taste of their own medicine. Regardless of the increase in competition for the giants, we’re sure concert goers will still wind up with the short end of the stick. As usual.

Here’s the last batch of links we’ll dump on you this week:

• Expect to see Beatles songs on upcoming episodes of American Idol
• Andrew Bird throws in with Obama at a fund-raising concert in Chicago
• Radiohead said no to Glastonbury due to environmental concerns
• Fortune profiles newcomer RCRD LBL, the first free online music label
• Rolling Stone lays out the Beastie Boys return to the studio
• Perpetual Groove broadens the approach of jambands
• Air’s Moon Safari gets the re-release treatment after ten years
• The New York Times profiles booking agent Bill Bragin

Finally, the lineup for the soundtrack to NBC’s Heroes seems pretty damn good to us. Besides the fitting title track from David Bowie, the album also features killer tracks from a slew of artists including Wilco, Nada Surf and My Morning Jacket.

As many of you prepare to head down to “Hippie Spring Break,” we thought we would check in again with Ethan Schwartz - one of Langerado’s founders and promoters - about the move from Sunrise to Big Cypress, late-night sets, and two bands that his mom has actually heard of plus so much more…

Some Dude: Sunrise had been home to the festival for the past three years, why did you guys decide to make the move to Big Cypress? Was the switch in sites in hopes of being able to secure it for the long term, like Superfly has done with Manchester?

Ethan Schwartz: We were limited to 15,000 attendees at Markham Park, and last year we reached that. We’d been in discussions with the Seminole Tribe for a few years, and last year they came out, loved what they saw, and invited us to our new home. We’ve got a lot of room to grow at the new site, but at our own pace.

SD: What will the new site offer that you weren’t able to in the past?

ES: It’s actually a lot easier for the attendees this year. Besides offering on-site camping for everyone, the late night shows will take place on site this year, so that will keep people from having to drive 30 minutes to downtown Ft. Lauderdale to see a late night show. Plus, there’s no chance the late night shows will sell out, so no one misses anything. It’s actually cheaper to attend Langerado this year, camp and do the late nights than it has been in the past. Read on for more of Some Dude’s interview with Ethan Schwartz about Langerado…

We’re just waking up after a long night of watching the results from Super Tuesday roll in. Barack Obama may have split delegates with Hillary Clinton, but he clearly has the support of the anti-establishment rock star crowd. Bright Eyes, M. Ward and members of the Grateful Dead all played benefit concerts for Obama, while Stone Gossard and a few other members of Pearl Jam recorded the cleverly titled Rock Around Barack. Meanwhile, John Mellencamp doesn’t want people to think he’s supporting probable Republican nominee John McCain.

BESIDES BONNAROO, let’s see what’s been happening around the ‘nets:

• Jesse Jarnow profiles Rocks Off’s Jake Szufnarowski for the Village Voice
• A new study finds popular music is still awash with drug references
• College Humor throws down this excellent Roadie Hero sketch
• Yo La Tengo? The Mets to announce the name of a mystery artist who will close out Shea Stadium with a concert
• Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks announce more tour dates
• Toots and the Maytals, Lee “Scratch” Perry and Inner Circle head up an impressive list of artists covering The Police for a new album
• Madness won’t play Coachella after all; hope to play some shows in 2009
• Nedstalgia recalls Phish’s first and only visit to PPAC
• The Beastie Boys’ Adam Yauch launches Oscilloscope Pictures

Finally, we couldn’t help but laugh at LA Weekly’s clever list of 10 Star Wars Toys That Unintentionally Look Like Other Celebrities. The resemblance between General Rieekan and John Kerry is absolutely uncanny.

We couldn’t have been happier when the New York Times finally took down their Times Select pay wall, allowing free access to nearly all of the illustrious paper’s articles since 1981. While we love reading old reviews, news stories and columns from some of the best music journalists in the history of the game, we don’t like paying $3.99 to read a 500-word article. Mr. Sulzberger, tear down this wall!

We’ve been bookmarking some of our favorite articles from the vast NYT archives, and recently we realized we should probably share the links so people don’t have to enter 100 different search phrases like we did. This week’s B List compiles one great article from each year between 1981-2007:

1981: Tom Petty: Ready to Fight the Good Fight [May 6th, 1981]

”A lot of our fans have been with us for a long time, and I think they trust us,” the 29-year-old singer, songwriter and guitarist said recently. ”MCA has done a great job selling our records, but they couldn’t see the reality of what it’s like on the street - they couldn’t see that raising the album’s price wouldn’t be fair.”

1982: Talking Heads Fans Get a Night to Remember [August 23rd, 1982]

”THIS ain’t no party,” the Talking Heads warned gravely a year ago when they made their most recent concert appearance in the New York area. But the group’s expanded lineup, with a vocalist, guitarist, percussionist, extra bassist, and keyboard player added to the basic Talking Heads foursome, belied those words. Their shows were parties -joyous, celebratory, and loose.

1983: Police perform for 75,000 at Shea [August 20th, 1983]

”We’d like to thank the Beatles for lending us their stadium,” said Sting, the bassist and singer of the Police, near the end of the trio’s concert at Shea Stadium.

1984: Miles Davis Returns With Revamped Band [June 24th, 1984]

This revamped unit provides richly layered, rhythmically emphatic accompaniments for Mr. Davis and for two other absorbing soloists, the saxophonist Bob Berg and the guitarist John Scofield. The earlier group sounded like a collection of competent but uninspired individuals. Now Mr. Davis has a real band , and like all his better bands, it is an instrument that he plays as deftly and dramatically as he plays the trumpet, an extension of his own personal sound.

Read on for many more articles, reviews and columns from the Grey Lady…

You gotta love a band with a sense of humor, and no one keeps us in stitches like the Beastie Boys. The B-Boys summoned the immortal words of William Martin Joel to explain why they decided to accept the headlining gig at Langerado in an email they sent to their fans:

You may be right, we may be crazy, but we just may be the lunatics you’re looking for. For no particular reason, we will be playing the Langerado Festival at the Big Cypress Reservation in South Florida on Friday, March 7 2008.

We also found it cute that Pitchfork makes it seem as though there are only indie bands playing at the festie. Screw Phil Lesh, Minus The Bear is playing!

Add Langerado to the growing list of festivals remaking themselves so as to benefit from economies of scale. Or something. We don’t know really know what that means.

For better or worse, the big outdoor festival scene continues to diversify from what were typically jamband-dominated affairs to more varied lineups capable of drawing both hippies and hipsters. We’re slowly phasing out free hugs, nitrous tanks and grilled cheese while simultaneously ushering in silent contempt, post-ironic T-shirts and [something hipsters eat].

This one’s a bit more curious, but for the most part the trend continues: Five days after missing the initial artist deadline, Langerado promoters finally confirmed REM, the Beastie Boys and Phil Lesh will headline the 2008 Langerado Festival alongside 311, The Roots, Ani DiFranco, Thievery Corp. and more. Now settled at Big Cypress on March 6th - 9th, Langerado aims to double the size of last year’s crowd at Markham Park in Sunrise, which hosted the festival for the last three years.

Tickets go onsale this Friday at 12pm and include camping as well as late night shows on site. Read on for the full lineup, and look for more artists to be added soon:

Coming up with the perfect title for a new album is something artists have struggled with since Leo da Vinci named his masterpiece “Mona Lisa” instead of the more catchy “Hot Chick I Fucked Last Night.”

Giving an album a good title can make all the difference in the world. Squeeze’s Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti may be a decent record, but I’m not putting anything with that title on my iPod. Meanwhile, Me First and the Gimme Gimme’s Ruin Jonny’s Bar Mitzvah probably sold an extra thousand copies due to its awesome title.

Most of the time record companies don’t really care too much what a band names an album, but once in a while they put their proverbial foot down (perhaps their literal feet as well). A few weeks ago we looked at 10 albums released with controversial cover art, so this week we look at eight albums whose titles were rejected either by members of the band or the big bad record company…

1. Grateful Dead — Skullfuck:

The Grateful Dead submitted a live album to Warner Brothers in 1971 with the title Skullfuck. As you can imagine, the record company rejected the title, and instead decided to release the album with no title. Fans call this album Skull and Roses to avoid confusing it with the band’s eponymous debut.

2. XTC — Black Music:

XTC released their debut album, White Music, on Virgin Records in 1978. The band wanted to call the album Black Music but Virgin nixed the idea because they thought the title may suggest a blues or soul album. Racists!

Read on for six more rejected album titles we would liked to have seen…

Sly Stone took himself higher than most, and the resultant burnout saw the funk legend living the life of a complete recluse. But the comeback trail beckons, and Sly and the Family Stone will make their first NYC appearance since 1974 on December 7th at B.B. King’s. How long Sly will actually take the stage that night remains to be seen. If the band’s recent European tour is any indication, don’t expect much more than 20 minutes worth of Sly singing inaudibly and banging on a keyboard. And oh yeah…expect to pay $85 for that opportunity.

• The space that was CBGB’s will now house an upscale designer boutique
• Bloggers are pissed that OiNK has been shuttered
• HT Friend Dan Alford looks at the recent Grateful Dead vault releases
• You’ve heard about Dumbledore: Vulture presents 10 Other Fictional Characters Who’s Outings Won’t Shock Us That Much
• Johnny Marr feels The Smiths will reunite sooner rather than later
• Mars Volta have announced both a New Year’s concert in San Francisco and a February release date for their new album
• Cake relaunches their Unlimited Sunshine traveling festival in December
• Wow, it’s been 22 friggin’ years? Glen Friedman shares photos and audio from his visit with the Beastie Boys in 1985
• Former NHL’er Shjon Podein tells us about how John LeClair got him into Phish towards the end of this ESPN article

And tickets for the upcoming Mighty Mighty Bosstones reunion concerts are harder to come by than World Series tickets. Who’s got my extraaaa?