Self-harming pop sensation Amy Winehouse is now making headlines for simply showing up and performing. [Guardian]

Purple Rain vs. Chocolate Rain: Prince is suing YouTube for not actively removing illegal copies of his work. His argument is simple and solid: "YouTube ... are clearly able (to) filter porn and pedophile material but appear to choose not to filter out the unauthorized music and film content which is core to their business success." YouTube responded with the usual lines.

We are driving the whole office crazy with our repeated playing of The Cribs' Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever, but who cares, it is completely infectious. Of course, we felt the same way about that Dogs Die in Hot Cars record, and look how that turned out. Anyway, it's our favorite album of the summer. Other recommendations? Because, seriously, these people are going to kill us if we don't play something different soon.

The Times has a good listening guide to composers of the Minimalist "school" and their forebears. [NYT]

David Byrne's Music For The Knee Plays will finally be released on CD this October! Whatever, we're excited about this! [David Byrne]

"I don't get Rufus Wainwright. What's he whining about?" [Kausfiles]

Today, the Internet radio industry, imperiled by a new plan for music-webcasting fees, received a temporary "reprieve". An onerous schedule of royalty payments proposed by SoundExchange, the music industry's Web-licensing arm and okayed by a compliant Congress, is still in place. Basically, nothing has changed. And despite the stalling, nothing really will. Despite widespread claims of the imminent death of Internet radio, both music websites and record labels will soldier on. This is not a war of utter annihilation: It is Spy vs. Spy. Both sides will be around to throw new bombs in each other's direction tomorrow and forever, no matter how dastardly and deadly their assassination attempts are today. The music industry will eventually compromise at some rate that falls short of bankrupting webcasters, and Internet sites will, eventually, turn their attentions away from whining about the rates and toward finding ways to make money. No one ever really dies, but they sure make a lot of noise.

Diminutive, platform-heel-sporting rock genius Prince will indeed be bringing his traveling funk circus to Hollywood's Roosevelt Hotel. And as was initially hinted at when news of the residency first broke, dinner plus an audience with demonschlonged royalty will cost die hard fans an Amount Formerly Known As A Lot:

The LAT Buzz Bands blog is breaking some potentially exciting news for deep-pocketed fans of pop music's leading pint-sized, demon-cocked provocateur: Prince is close to announcing a seven-week residency at the Roosevelt this summer. The details:

NICK DOUGLAS — I always wanted newspapers to come with standardized "This is good" stamps on the right articles; it turns out they already do, but the stamp reads "by Clive Thompson." The writer interviewed top bloggers for a New York Magazine thought-piece on their success last year. (Unlike most shallow articles that quote C-list bloggers and draw USA-Today-level insights, Thompson went for the big guns and gave a realistic picture of the (scant) money and (scant) fame made by bloggers. Now he's done the same in-depth look in the New York Times at online musicians. He checks on OK Go, the Hold Steady, and nerdstar Jonathan Coulton, who sang the famous acoustic version of "Baby Got Back." Thompson has no agenda (no "Internet killed the video star!" or "The cult of the amateur is dead!") so he actually lets the subjects tell their stories. If only all journalism about the Internet were like Clive Thompson's.

Unceremoniously dumped (or self-dumped!) during the sale of Spin a year ago, glamourpuss Sia Michel, once the first woman to edit an American rock mag, has finally made her berth at the Times permanent. She'll now be the pop music editor, in charge of all the Arcade Fire needs of the young generation of newspaper semi-readers.

Today's the day that thousands of sensitive young men with artfully-mussed hair and faded Luna t-shirts have been waiting for: Neon Bible, the second record from sorta-Canadian indie heroes Arcade Fire, sees release shortly. That's right, the album that's going to cure cancer and end famine and bring Trump and Rosie together is almost on the shelves! The young men, of course, don't care about that—they downloaded it off the Internet months ago—but they do want to know what Pitchfork has to say about it so that they can adjust their opinions accordingly.

The glorious day has finally arrived: After the painstaking tabulation of over 500 ballots, the kids at Idolator, with the invaluable assistance of Michaelangelo Matos, are ready to rip the rotted corpse of the Voice's music section from its fetid tomb and violate it like they were Canadian butt-burgling specters. That's right, Jackin' Pop is here! Featuring fresh faces alongside the usual suspects, five brilliant essays (Jason King on Gnarls Barkley; Daphne Carr on TV on the Radio, Mr. Matos on the poll itself; Rod Smith on metal and critics; Maura Johnston on fugitive number-ones), and the stunning MS Paint artistry of Jess Harvell, Jackin' Pop is the only look back at the last year in music that you'll need. Plus, you're spared the embarrassment of being seen holding the Voice. Go forth and enjoy.

As you probably recall, the last time "Your Body Is a Wonderland" crooner John Mayer attempted stand-up comedy, things didn't go so well. And since that abortive performance, the climate's gotten, well, maybe a teeny bit less receptive to stand-up comedians with a tendency to drop the "nigger" word, as Mayer did at his last visit to the Comedy Cellar. However, even though we hate his date-rapey singing voice, Mayer has since endeared himself to us a little bit with that whole "Don't believe the [Simpson-manufactured] hype" thing. So when a tipster reported having seen Mayer's comedic stylings last night, we were intrigued. Maybe he was funny this time! We kind of liked where he was going with that whole "women are sluts" thing, you know? Could he redeem himself and rack up some laffs?

SCOTT KIDDER — Continuing our international web 2.0 coverage here at Valleywag, this morning Arista Records LLC, Warner Bros. Records, Capitol Records, and UMG Recordings Inc. sued everyone's favorite Russian Web 2.0 business, AllofMP3.com. As we all know, AllofMP3.com sells DRM-free MP3s for just under $2 an album.

Remember how, even when the rest of the paper sucked, you would still excitedly anticipate the Village Voice's Pazz & Jop music-critic survey each year? How it either confirmed your prejudices or made you think differently about something you had dismissed out of hand? How it served as a scouting report for fresh critical voices nationwide that (especially in the pre-Internet days) you might never have heard of otherwise? No? Just us? Well, whatever, we loved it. And one of our biggest worries when the new ownership came in and fired pretty much anyone with talent in the music section (Chuck Eddy and Bob Christgau in particular) was what would happen this year. We're not sure whether or not they'll even do a Pazz & Jop, but we are sure that if they do it'll blow (and be written mainly by music critics from the Columbia School of Journalism). That's why we're thrilled that the kids over at Idolator have picked up the ball and run with it. Curated by the brilliant Michaelangelo Matos, Idolator's Jackin' Pop (haha, get it?) Critics Poll "will maintain the Voice's thoughtfully anarchic approach to music criticism, merging it with the technological reach of Gawker Media." (Don't let that last part scare you.) Full details after the jump.

What is wrong with you people? We told you earlier to snatch up tickets for the Kevin Federline show at Webster Hall next Saturday before they sold out, but if today's Page Six is to be believed, the show may be cancelled due to poor sales. Do you not listen to us any more?

• Music industry decides that illegal downloaders are people too. Which means they can be marketed to. [WSJ]
• Or sued. [Reuters]
• "By contrast, I don't know anyone who comes to a Web site out of a feeling of obligation. People gravitate to the Internet because they want to, not because they need to. The public's rallying cry might well be, in Nirvana's memorable words: 'Here we are now, entertain us.'" Okay, now Jon Friedman is starting to freak us out a little bit. [Marketwatch]
• Time Warner Cable files for $100 million IPO. The company will be listed on the NYSE some time in the next three weeks between the hours of nine and four. [Reuters]

Surely there's more important news with which to start the morning (or, uh, not), but we'd be remiss if we didn't alert you of a today's most-important to-do: at noon, tickets go on sale for Kevin Federline's concert at Webster Hall. Get your clicking finger ready for some heated competition, because rabid CSI fans, ironic music bloggers, and a bargain ticket price are going to make this one a quick sellout.

CD-swapping site LaLa used some of its nine million bucks to buy an resurrect a dead Internet radio station, WOXY. Just when you thought a site already made obsolete by Amazon, eBay, and iTunes couldn't get any more irrelevant, ya know?