He says: "There are so many opportunities in front of me that I'm really excited about. I'm just not sure I can give them the time and effort I'll need, and continue with the band.

He and David Gilmour spent many years at loggerheads through lawyers after Waters decided to depart in 1985. Waters claimed the group had "dissolved" and fought to stop the remaining members from continuing under the Floyd name.

In a Tweet on January 18, Taylor said: "HUGE checks off the Bucket List today � did a song with Dave Grohl and Butch Vig. Do the words 'holy s--t' say enough about it?!?"

Dappy tells the U.K's Daily Star, "I would love Brian to make me a guitar. He told me all about his guitar that he made with his dad out of wood from a fireplace in his old house. He even got a five-sided coin to put in the neck and he replaced the Queen's head with his own head. Now that's his pluck, so I want one with my head on it."

Speculation about the metal legends' Download slot followed news that Iommi's illness meant the band wouldn't be able to play at California fest Coachella as originally planned.

The event will be celebrating their 10th anniversary at North Beach Asbury Park, New Jersey, May 18, 19, and 20.

"I don't like the fact that it is in our human nature to steal music, and I wish we could change that, but one good thing that has happened is that there was a change that needed to be made as artists have always been taken advantage of.

The bassist's passing in 2010 put the band's future in jeopardy, but frontman Taylor says: "2012 will be a strengthening year for us. I just know if we try to rush in and make an album that doesn't feel right, the audience will know it isn't genuine, and we have always been as genuine with our audience as possible.

Fans worldwide will also be able to check out a special virtual acoustic performance and Q&A session with Lacuna Coil on January 24th via www.stageit.com. The band's performance and Q&A session will be broadcast live at 7:00PM, EST from acclaimed record store Vintage Vinyl in Fords, New Jersey.

ATP had this to say along with the lineup: Since their formation in 1999, The National have grown organically from indie cult heroes in their early years, to creating truly stunning LPs such as the amazing Alligator and Boxer, and more recently with the success of High Violet deservedly achieving crossover success to become one of the most acclaimed bands on the planet. Much of this success is based on their incredible live shows - ATP are very excited that the band have accepted our invitation to headline and to curate an exciting supporting bill featuring many of their favourite artists.

The tour kicks off on April 10th at Denver's Ellie Caulkins Opera House and then culminate with a May 13th homecoming concert at Seattle's Paramount Theatre.

Diamond Rugs is a collaboration between John McCauley (Deer Tick), Robbie Crowell (Deer Tick), Ian Saint P� (The Black Lips), Steve Berlin (Los Lobos), Hardy Morris (Dead Confederate) and Bryan Dufresne (Six Finger Satellite).

The Telegraph reports that Commando: The Autobiography of Johnny Ramone will be published by Abrams Image on April 2, some eight years after Ramone's death. Linda finished the book that had Johnny started when he was sick.

The January 27, 28 and 29 gigs at The Iridium and will see Bach and Stevens "doing two sets a night," including "some special unexpected songs," according to Sebastian, adding, "I have always wanted to play with Steve, so I am really looking forward to it."

Among the artists who will be displaying pieces are My Chemical Romance frontman Gerard Way and Metallica's own bassist Robert Trujillo with his wife Chloe.

The 31-date tour will kick off on March 24th at San Francisco's Regency Ballroom, and will then make its way around the country, culminating with a performance at the House of Blues in Los Angeles on May 3rd.

The tour is set to kick off with West Coast North American run beginning on April 27th. East coast dates are expected to be announced soon.

Paul will be spending the afternoon in London talking with press from around the world to promote the release of his new album, 'Kisses On The Bottom' which will be released on February 6th in the UK and Feb 7th in the US.

This stop of the HMV's Next Big Thing tour will take place on Saturday, 11th February at the HMV Ritz in Manchester.

River has been inspiring audiences with his ecstatic and versatile percussion for over 30 years, and has performed and recorded with such groups as the BBC Concert Orchestra, Omar Faruk Tekbilek, Tan Dun, Tibetan Singing Bowl Ensemble, Paul Winter Consort, Chuck Berry, Sophie B. Hawkins, The Billy Sea and Ziggy Marley/Gipsy Kings. He also co-founded the world jazz group Free Planet Radio and Talujon Percussion Ensemble. The music on his new CD 'Grooves for Odd Times' represents a body of work that spans five years. This time period includes: 1) composing music for solo and mixed ensembles, 2) performing with inspiring artists, 3) recording/archiving the process of these creative cells.

Winds Of Genocide will release their debut, Usurping The Throne Of Disease, which will feature cover art by legendary gruesome graphic artist Mark Riddick (Arsis, Slayer, Morbid Angel, The Black Dahlia Murder, Suffocation, Cephalic Carnage, etc).

The first recording was made on the very day Kayla & I came up with the main ideas for the song. We were sitting in our house in Old Road, Oxford with the TV on and there was a shot of a crew in a helicopter filming some polar bears swimming. It was talking about endangered species and I just started singing the lines 'as we fly in the helicopter, watch the bear swimming in the water!' over a few suspended chords that sounded good to me. Somehow a polar bear turned into a panda bear shortly after. As you'll hear from the first recording, there weren't too many lyrics at this stage and we were so excited to get a recording that I didn't bother tuning my guitar. The date of this recording is 18th December 2006. Listen here.

The next recording is a home demo recorded by just Kayla and myself again on 26th September 2007. By this point, we had played the song live with Dan Pacrami (original bassist), who had written the bass intro (played here on a casio keyboard), and the basic structure of the song was down, although the second half of the song was purely instrumental and also lacks a lead guitar line. Listen here.

Al Grice replaced Dan on bass around this time and we went to St John's College in Brighton in December 2007 to record the first full band version of the song. It was produced by Matt Twaites and Ben Elliott from Restlesslist. Matt ended up producing the whole of the album. By now, the song is complete and the 'voice' of the first part of the song is revealed to be Anneka Rice, as Kayla sings "Anneka, can't you see that there's nothing left but the bamboo tree?". Listen here.

We upped the tempo and tried to go hell-for-leather for the album version of the song. Otherwise it was not hugely adjusted from the first studio version, apart from some additional keys and backing vocals. Listen here.

The lyrics have a nice throwaway goofy nursery rhyme feel to them. I liked the idea of putting cutesy animals into an upbeat pop song but having a sub-context of more serious issues as well. It has a light-hearted, fun feel but with a darker undercurrent and as such, perhaps a good song to define how a lot of our songs work. Musically, it crams quite a few ideas into a short space, I don't like to waste any time when songwriting and get bored easily by repetition. Sometimes this causes a jarring first listen as things change all over the place but hopefully, after a few plays, things start to make more sense, that's the plan anyway!