HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

Every February, across the country, candy, flowers, and gifts are exchanged between loved ones, all in the name of St. Valentine. But who is this mysterious saint and why do we celebrate this holiday? The history of Valentine's Day — and its patron saint — is shrouded in mystery. But we do know that February has long been a month of romance. St. Valentine's Day, as we know it today, contains vestiges of both Christian and ancient Roman tradition. So, who was Saint Valentine and how did he become associated with this ancient rite? Today, the Catholic Church recognizes at least three different saints named Valentine or Valentinus, all of whom were martyred.

One legend contends that Valentine was a priest who served during the third century in Rome. When Emperor Claudius II decided that single men made better soldiers than those with wives and families, he outlawed marriage for young men — his crop of potential soldiers. Valentine, realizing the injustice of the decree, defied Claudius and continued to perform marriages for young lovers in secret. When Valentine's actions were discovered, Claudius ordered that he be put to death.
A picture of Cupid.

Video: Who is St. Valentine? Why do we celebrate on February 14? Watch the HISTORY OF VALENTINE'S DAY.

Video: From the first mail-posted Valentine on record in 1806 to some of the precursors to today's Valentines, Watch VALENTINE'S CARDS on history.

Video: He's a 3,000 year-old baby with wings, he shoots love-tipped arrows into unsuspecting people, and his name is Cupid: The God of Love.

Other stories suggest that Valentine may have been killed for attempting to help Christians escape harsh Roman prisons where they were often beaten and tortured.

According to one legend, Valentine actually sent the first 'valentine' greeting himself. While in prison, it is believed that Valentine fell in love with a young girl — who may have been his jailor's daughter — who visited him during his confinement. Before his death, it is alleged that he wrote her a letter, which he signed 'From your Valentine,' an expression that is still in use today. Although the truth behind the Valentine legends is murky, the stories certainly emphasize his appeal as a sympathetic, heroic, and, most importantly, romantic figure. It's no surprise that by the Middle Ages, Valentine was one of the most popular saints in England and France.

While some believe that Valentine's Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine's death or burial — which probably occurred around 270 A.D — others claim that the Christian church may have decided to celebrate Valentine's feast day in the middle of February in an effort to 'christianize' celebrations of the pagan Lupercalia festival. In ancient Rome, February was the official beginning of spring and was considered a time for purification. Houses were ritually cleansed by sweeping them out and then sprinkling salt and a type of wheat called spelt throughout their interiors. Lupercalia, which began at the ides of February, February 15, was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus.

PARAMORE NEW ALBUM "BRAND NEW EYES"

Official working title and tracklisting for Paramore’s forthcoming third studio album have finally been shared. It is confirmed that the record is called “Brand New Eyes” and set to arrive across America on September 29.

Paramore have included eleven new songs on the album’s tracklisting. Among them, the band reportedly have chosen a song titled “Ignorance” as its lead single, and will drop it for purchase on July 7. Prior to the release day, they have showcased the song at MTV Unplugged on June 25.

Another new material that Paramore have played during the MTV acoustic show was “Brick by Boring Brick”. In addition, they also performed songs from their “Riot!” effort, “That’s What You Get” and “Misery Business”, as well as “Twilight” soundtrack, “Decode”.

Paramore are currently on the road, serving as an opening act for reunited band No Doubt. They will continue opening for the Gwen Stefani-fronted band through August 12. Most recently, Hayley Williams, Josh Farro, Jeremy Davis and Zac Farro added Taylor York, a touring member of Paramore for over 2 years, as the band’s official rhythm guitarist.

Tracklisting for Paramore’s “Brand New Eyes”:


“Careful”
”Ignorance”
”Playing God”
”Brick by Boring Brick”

“Turn It Off”
“The Only Exception”
“Feeling Sorry”
“Looking Up”
“Where the Lines Overlap”
“Misguided Ghosts”
“All I Wanted”

BREAKING BENJAMIN

Formed in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, USA in 1998 by vocalist Benjamin Burnley and drummer Jeremy Hummel, Breaking Benjamin quickly garnered a strong local following.

1st Studio Album [2002] - Saturate
The band signed to Hollywood Records in 2001 after the success of an independently-released, self-titled EP, which sold all 2,000 copies that were manufactured. Hollywood Records released their full-length, major-label debut, Saturate, on August 27, 2002. The album’s first single, “PlayPolyamorous”, received a fair amount of radio play, although it failed to reach mainstream audiences. A video was released in two different versions for Polyamorous: one that had all live-action footage, and one that had footage of the video game Run Like Hell. The following single “PlaySkin” was also released from Saturate, although it fared worse than “Polyamorous” and received even less airplay.”Skin” was also performed live on the Jimmy Kimmel Live show. “PlayMedicate” was also released as a single, to little commercial success and airplay. Saturate has gone on to sell over 300,000 copies.

2nd Studio Album [2004] - We Are Not Alone
Breaking Benjamin released their second album, We Are Not Alone, on June 29, 2004. The album featured the lead off single “PlaySo Cold”, which reached number two on the United States Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. The band had two music videos made for the song, one of which was a promotional video made for the movie Hellboy. The commercial success of “So Cold” led to We Are Not Alone achieving platinum status in late 2005. Also released as singles from the album were “Sooner Or Later” and a re- recorded version of “Rain”, which was featured on later pressings of the album. While the former again got the band as high as number two on the Mainstream Rock chart and featured a music video, the latter garnered little radio play and had no video created for it. Another song off “We Are Not Alone”, “Sooner or Later”, had a video created for it and got a fair amount of radio play. Later in 2004, the band released the So Cold EP. The EP contained live recordings of We Are Not Alone’s “So Cold” (an acoustic recording), “Breakdown”, and “Away”, as well as studio recordings of “Blow Me Away”, a song that was featured in Bungie’s video game Halo 2, and “Lady Bug”, an early fan favorite of the band’s.

In September of 2004, drummer, and founding member of Breaking Benjamin, Jeremy Hummel was relieved of his duties in the band. Subsequently, on September 28, 2005, Hummel filed a federal lawsuit against the remaining members of Breaking Benjamin, as well as its management, claiming he was not paid for songs he helped write. Hummel’s lawsuit asked for more than $8 million in damages. A message was released October 25, 2006 on the bands official website stating that the band and Hummel had come to agreement on the lawsuit.

3rd Studio Album [2006] - Phobia
In the fall of 2006 the band began a tour opening for Godsmack for the IV tour, hitting up mostly eastern and Ohio Valley venues, and soon moving out west, still in support of the Phobia album, released on August 8 that year. Several of the shows had been canceled, or turned into Breaking Benjamin headliners due to scheduling conflicts. Many of Breaking Benjamin’s tour dates from December 3rd have been rescheduled due to illness in the band’s ranks. All dates were rescheduled as the band announced another headlining leg before going on a nationwide tour with Three Days Grace and Nickelback.

On March 4, 2007, HDNet premiered a one-hour show of the Breaking Benjamin concert in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania at Stabler Arena. This is also the concert that was included on the Phobia re-release DVD in April of 2007, advertised as “The Homecoming”. Footage of the band’s live Stabler Arena performance of “Breath” comprises the song’s music video[1].

On April 17, 2007, Breaking Benjamin re-released the album Phobia. The album featured a DVD with about an hour of their Stabler Arena concert footage.

4th Studio Album [2009] - Dear Agony
On the 29th of September, 2009, Breaking Benjamin released their 4th studio album, entitled “Dear Agony”. Some of the tracks on the album, were co-written by Jasen Rauch, from the Christian-metal band Red.
On September 23, 2009, Breaking Benjamin released a flash video game parody of Altered Beast, aptly titled “Altered Benjamin”. The game contains three levels and plays the same as the original, except the player controls vocalist Ben Burnley and the three bosses are each other member of the band respectively. Altered Benjamin is still available through the band’s website, and their MySpace page.

Certain copies of Dear Agony purchased at Best Buy also come with a bonus DVD that includes the band’s six music videos including a previously-unreleased version of the video for “I Will Not Bow”. The version on the DVD is of the band only and does not contain any footage from the movie Surrogates, unlike the version released on the Internet.

On August 31st, 2009, prior to the release of Dear Agony, Breaking Benjamin released their first single from DA, “I Will Not Bow”. It was featured in the 2009 Sci-Fi film [Starring Bruce Willis], “Surrogates”. The song was not written specifically for the film, but according to drummer Chad Szeliga, “Ben sent a few songs to our record label, Hollywood Records,” which is owned by Disney, who then decided they “wanted a Breaking Benjamin song for this movie.”

The music video for I Will Not Bow was released to the band’s Myspace on August 21, 2009. The video was shot at the World Trade Center building 7, but has no connection or significant meaning having to do with the 9/11 events as stated by Aaron Fink in his Point interview on August 13, 2009. The video was directed by Rich Lee who has also directed for Evanescence. Lee chose the location, feeling it was an eerie place to film.
A second version of the music video without the Surrogates footage was released with the Best Buy Exclusive version of Dear Agony. It includes various bridged footage of the band performing.

On January 5, 2010, Give Me a Sign was the second single released from Breaking Benjamin’s fourth studio album, Dear Agony.

2 extra tracks were featured on the Japanese version of “Dear Agony”. An acoustic version of ‘Without You’, and an acoustic version ‘Give Me A Sign’.


Singles Chronology
2002 - PlayPolyamorous
2003 - PlaySkin
2003 - PlayMedicate
2004 - So Cold [EP]*
2004 - Sooner Or Later
2005 - Rain (Drums re-recorded by Chad Szeliga)
2006 - The Diary of Jane
2006 - Breath
2006 - Until The End
2009 - I Will Not Bow
2010 - Give Me A Sign

*So Cold [EP] featured 5 songs, ‘So Cold (acoustic)’, ‘Blow Me Away’, ‘Lady Bug’, ‘Away (Live)’ and ‘Breakdown (Live)’.


Name Origin
The name “Breaking Benjamin” comes from Benjamin Burnley’s early solo experience. Burnley was covering a Nirvana song during an open-mic night at a club when he finished he dropped the microphone to the ground, breaking it. The person who owned the microphone came on stage and said, ‘Thanks to Benjamin for breaking my fucking mic.’ In 1999, the band briefly renamed themselves “Plan 9.” In late 2000, after various line-up changes, the band changed its name back to “Breaking Benjamin” and two friends of Burnley, Aaron Fink and Mark Klepaski, left their previous band, Lifer, and joined the ranks of Breaking Benjamin as guitarist and bassist, respectively. Lifer was a band that gained brief mainstream attention because of their part in an MTV cover band contest that resulted in a record deal with Universal Records.

The Last Shadow Puppets

The Last Shadow Puppets is a band that consists of Alex Turner of Sheffield band Arctic Monkeys and Miles Kane of The Rascals. They released their debut album, The Age of the Understatement, on the 21st of April 2008 in the UK, and May 6th in the U.S.

The album also features James Ford (producer and half of the duo Simian Mobile Disco) and string arrangements from Owen Pallett a.k.a Final Fantasy. The album went straight to number one in the UK Albums Chart. The first single, “The Age of the Understatement” was released the week before on 14 April, with new song “Two Hearts in Two Weeks” and covers of Billy Fury’s “Wondrous Place” and David Bowie’s “In the Heat of the Morning” (a song previously mentioned by Turner as a favourite) as b-sides.The duo have said they took inspiration from Scott Walker and early Bowie.

The second single, “Standing Next to Me”, was released on 7 July 2008. The third single from the album will be “My Mistakes Were Made for You”. The album was nominated for the 2008 Mercury Music Prize.