Florence and the Machine already has had an extremely busy year supporting its most recent album, and now the group has announced yet another leg to its already extensive world tour.

And the new dates are good news for U.S. fans in cities the tour had previously left out. The new leg tacks on 15 additional U.S. dates, and will begin September 14 in Mansfield, Mass. The dates will run through October 10 when the group performs in Albuquerque. In between, new dates on the tour include stops in Wantagh, N.Y.; Camden, N.J; Tampa; Kansas City, Mo.; Mountain View, Calif. and Los Angeles.

Florence and the Machine are currently wrapping up the first U.S. leg of the tour, and will head to Australia to begin a round of concerts there before the month is over. Throughout the summer, the band will play festivals in both Europe and North America before coming back to the U.S. for the newly announced dates. After those dates, a handful of European dates will be played as the band stays on the road through December.

The group’s most recent album, Ceremonials, was released in October of last year and debuted at number six on the Billboard 200 albums chart. Other than a few radio dates, the band waited until this year before touring for the record. Florence Welch, the lead singer of the band, spoke with MTV News earlier this year about what kind of tour she wanted to perform.

“In a way, it’s not going to be too big a production,” the singer-songwriter told the network. “We’ve done a lot of quite extravagant stuff, and that’s been amazing, but for this tour, it’s definitely going to be about showcasing the music. The songs are going to be the most important thing. It will be heavily based on the music… no bells and whistles just yet we’re going to try to keep it quite pure.”

Organizers have announced a new Atlanta Festival called CounterPoint that will rely heavily on electronic music artists. The lineup for the first festival will feature Skrillex, Avicii and Bassnectar.

The festival will take place September 27-29 on a privately owned farm about 30 minutes south of Atlanta near Campbellton, Ga. The festival and camping will take place on about 350 riverfront acres on a 1,250 acre farm. In addition to the above artists, other notable acts that will be performing at this year’s festival include M83, Pretty Lights, Reptar, Crystal Castles, Com Truise, Washed Out and Polica.

In addition, the festival will also feature a slew of hip hop acts, as well. Big Boi will make the event a hometown festival, and Wale, Theophilus London and Atmosphere are among the other hip hop acts that will appear.

CounterPoint derives its roots from another festival called Echo Project that was held at the same location in 2007. That event had an impressive lineup including Flaming Lips, the Roots, Cat Power, Common and the Killers, but was poorly attended.

This time, the organizers that put together Echo Park have joined up with C3 Presents, the promoters responsible for other festivals like the Austin City Limits Music Festival and Lollapalooza.

One perk of the festival for those who live or wish to stay in Atlanta is that CounterPoint will provide express shuttle busses to and from the event every day. There also will be day parking for those who want to drive to the event but don’t want to camp.

Not just a music festival, the event also will feature food trucks, local chefs and a beer garden featuring local breweries. Probably unique to the festival, there will be a college football viewing area so that attendees don’t have to miss their favorite school play.

Vince Gill has announced that he will go into full-on bluegrass mode for his next tour.

The 12-date trek will kick off on June 13 when Gill plays at the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden in Richmond, Va. He will then stay on the road through the end of June, playing his final show June 30 at the Honeywell Center in Wabash, Ind. In between these dates, the tour will also visit cities including North Myrtle Beach, S.C.; Charlotte, N.C.; Atlanta and Lexington, Ky.

Gill says the recent death of bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs inspired his newest tour.

“After the passing of Earl Scruggs, it means the world to me to do these dates with this world-class band playing the music that Earl defined,” Gill said. “I absolutely adore this music.”

He also considers the new tour a return to his roots.

“I just love playing music,” he continues. “I don’t know why some people have to think that if they do well they can’t be what they used to be. I like being what I used to be.”

During the tour, Gill will be supported by singer/multi-instrumentalist Sarah Jarosz. Gill also has announced recently that he will release a new album this fall with his acoustic group, the Time Jumpers.

Part of the reason for the bluegrass tour and the new record is that Gill is a newly independent artist. His most recent album, Guitar Slinger, was released last year and represented his tenth and final record in his contract for MCA. He had been signed to the record label since 1989. He recently talked about his new-found freedom with the associated press.

“I’m inspired by the freedom to do as much as I want,” he told the news agency. “I’ve watched Willie Nelson probably record more music in the last 10 or 20 years than he did in the first 30. That’s my goal, is to make 10 times the music that I’ve made at this point. I’m beyond still inspired to be creative, and I see time running out in a sense.”

Beastie Boy Adams “MCA” Yauch passed away on Friday at the age of 47 after a three-year battle with cancer. Over the weekend, there has been an outpouring of tributes for the late rapper, from everyone from “Saturday Night Live” to the Dalai Lama.

Among the most recent tributes was from bandmate Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz, who posted a message to the group’s Tumblr page along with a picture of a hand with “PWR 2 MCA” written on it.

“As you can imagine, s*** is just fkd up right now,” Ad-Rock wrote on the page. “But I wanna say that you to all our friends and family (which are kinda one in the same) for all the love and support. I’m glad to know that all the love that Yauch put out into the world is coming right back to him.

The exiled Tibeten Buddhist leader the Dalai Lama released a statement about Yauch, a Buddhist who was behind the Tibetan Freedom concerts that were held in the late 1990s.

“Adam had helped us raise awareness of the plight of the Tibetan people by organizing various freedom Tibet concerts and he will be remembered by his holiness and the Tibetan people,” said the statement.

“Saturday Night Live” played a clip of the group’s 1994 “SNL” performance of “Sure Shot” during this weekend’s show, and HBO dedicated their broadcast of last month’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony to Yauch. The Beastie Boys were inducted into the Hall during the ceremony, making them only the third rap group to receive the honor.

During a New York Mets game over the weekend, the rapper was honored as every player on the team walked to the plate while a different Beastie Boys song played. Radiohead’s Tom Yorke, who supported Tibetan Freedom along with Yauch, also posted a tribute on his band’s website.

“I was very sad to hear the news of Adam Yauch’s death yesterday,” he wrote. “We looked up to the Beastie Boys a lot when we were starting out and how they maintained artistic control making wicked records but still were on a major label, and the Tibetan Freedom Concerts they organized had a very big influence on me personally and the way Adam conducted himself and dealt with it all impressed me a lot. He was a mellow and v smart guy. May he rest in peace.”

The name of the Jazz Aspen Snowmass Labor Day Festival may be slightly misleading, as it is definitely not only a jazz festival. A newly released lineup for the festival includes such big names as Kid Rock and Sugarland.

The Labor Day festival will take place August 31 to September 2 in Snowmass Village, Colo., which is near Aspen. The festival features genres including classic rock, country, funk, hip-hop, R&B and, of course, jazz.

Other notable names in the lineup include the Steve Miller Band and Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue. Additional artist are expected to be added to the lineup soon.

The festival bills itself as the “Hottest 72 Hours of the Summer,” and the festival is held at Snowmass Town Park. In addition to the big-name headliners that will play on the main stage, the event also features two additional stages. Concertgoers can send tweets with the hashtag #72hoursofjas during the festival to ask questions of the organizers that will make their experience even better.

In addition to the music, festivalgoers can expect all the Colorado town has to offer, including mountain biking, whitewater rafting, sunbathing, spas, hiking and skateboarding. An Early Bird 3 Day Pass is currently available for the event for $199. There’s been no word yet as to what the price will be after Early Bird Passes run out.

In addition to the Labor Day festival, the “Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Festival” also will be held at the same grounds. The event will run for two weeks, with four nights of headliners that will play at the Benedict Music Tent. Those nights will be June 22-24 and July 7. Headliners for the festival will be K.D. Lang, Joe Cocker, Chris Botti and The Dukes of September Rhythm Revue. The latter is a supergroup of sorts that features Donald Fagen, Michael McDonald and Boz Scaggs.

It’s been over a decade since the last No Doubt record, but the band has now announced that a new album will be released on September 25. No title has yet been released.

The band made the announcement in a video on Friday, and the group’s official website contains a letter written from the members of the band.

“We are incredibly excited to share the new music with you,” the letter says. “Ear candy coming your way!”

The announcement also says that the website will be updated as the album release gets closer with new pictures and videos. It states that the album will be a part of the band’s 25^th birthday.

“Thank you all so much for your support over the last 25 years,” said the statement. “We’re really proud of our new album and we hope you love it as much as we do. We’ll be posting updates between now and September as we shoot the video and start rehearsing to perform the new songs live for all of you… Se you soon…”

No tour dates have yet been released. No Doubt originally formed in California in 1986, and released a self-titled debut in 1992. They met widespread acclaim with their second album, Tragic Kingdom, which was released in 1995 and included slew of hits including “Don’t Speak,” “Just a Girl” and “Spiderwebs.” The album gained popularity after it was released and eventually got to the number one spot on the Billboard 200 albums chart. It stayed there for eight weeks and was certified diamond for selling 10 million copies in the U.S. before the decade was done.

The band’s most recent record, Rock Steady, was released in 2001. The band was on hiatus from 2004-2008, a time in which lead singer Gwen Stefani released two solo albums. The group reportedly began recording in 2008, but sessions were cut short when Stefani became pregnant with her second child.

Today the 36th annual Beale Street Music Festival wrapped up, and unlike in years past we made it through the weekend without the slightest hint of rain. Of course, rain probably would have been pretty welcome on a day like today, with temperatures peaking in the mid-90s. The mid day crowd seemed thinner than in days past and everyone was jockeying for a spot in the shade. Water could have sold for $20 a bottle and there still would have been a line wrapped around the block. While the afternoon crowds were entertained by the likes of the Chris Robinson Brotherhood, the Head and the Heart and Coheed and Cambria, the sun finally decided to set taking with it the oppressive heat. That brought to the Horseshoe Casino stage one of folk’s rising young stars The Civil Wars.

If Jane’s Addiction took the award for most elaborate set design this weekend, the Civil Wars may just have taken the most minimal. There was no band to back their melodies. No stage props to monkey around with. It was just our impeccably dressed duo Joy Williams and John Paul White. The pair met at a songwriting workshop in Nashville in 2008 and have been inseparable ever since. They’ve opened for Emmylou Harris and Adele as well as won the Grammy for “Best Folk Album” and “Best Country Duo/Group Performance.” They’ve even collaborated on a song with the newest queen of country/pop music Taylor Swift on the Hunger Games soundtrack.

The Civil Wars opened with the track “Tip of My Tongue” drawn from the Poison & Wine EP. Joy’s voice was as silky smooth as it flows off the album. The first thing that is evident is the chemistry and rapport between the two. They aren’t a couple in real life, but they play one in the musical universe. Joy was performing six months pregnant so that led to the inevitable “he thinks I’m fat” comment, and her threatening to fire him when he suggested they cover a Alison Krauss tune. This verbal wordplay goes a long way to making them likable and fun.

The set list was drawn largely from their debut album “Barton Hollow.” They played their contribution to the Hunger Games Soundtrack, “Safe & Sound,” which doesn’t get taken out of their musical bag of tricks often. They also played three covers; the first from their album (Cohen’s “Dance Me to the End of Love”), one inspired by their recent UK tour (an interesting acoustic take on Portishead’s “Sour Times”) as well as the least likely song you’d expect them to cover (Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean” goes bluegrass). They all were reworked to make them their own.

The Civil Wars are a very talented songwriting pair. They steer to the lighter side of the musical spectrum with their acoustic sensibilities, but it is a beautiful sound. If there was a drawback to their set at Beale Street it is that their genre of music has a tough time competing in the festival atmosphere. At times, their acoustic set had to compete with blasting guitars from Herbie Hancock on the neighboring stage, but for the most part, the crowd was very courteous and quiet, focusing in on the softer nature of their songs. In fact, Joy commented that this was the best festival crowd they’d ever played for.

It was a very sharply executed show. They certainly play to their strengths and looked to envelope the crowd in the experience. Joy admitted the band would be taking a break for a while as life prepares her for the new joys of motherhood, but I look forward to seeing what the follow-up to their critically acclaimed “Barton Hollow” album sounds like. Avoiding the painful sophomore stumble is a challenge for any band, but they have the talent to keep building their audience one song at a time.

Join us tomorrow as we wrap up our thoughts on the Beale Street Music Festival and look for a Beale Street in Photos coming midweek.

The Civil Wars Beale Street Setlist
Tip of My Tongue
Forget Me Not
From this Valley
20 Years
I’ve Got This Friend
Safe & Sound
Barton Hollow
Falling
Oh Henry
To Whom It May Concern
Birds of a Feather
Sour Times (Portishead Cover)
Billie Jean (Michael Jackson Cover)
Poison & Wine
Dance Me to the End of Love (Leonard Cohen Cover)

The Beale Street Music Festival was still muggy from the dense humidity on Saturday afternoon, but the clouds kindly tucked away the sun to provide some relief to the music revelers. The day was jam packed with acts across the musical spectrum on each of the three main stages and the lower profile Blues Tent. The Blues were born on the streets of Memphis so it’s only appropriate that Beale Street would feature one of the legends of the art form, Mr. Buddy Guy.

So who is Buddy Guy? For those who aren’t plugged into the Blues scene, he is only a six-time Grammy award winner, a member of the Rock’N’Roll Hall of Fame and number 30 on Rolling Stone’s greatest guitarist of all time. Oh, did I forget to mention that Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix cite Buddy Guy as a key influence to making them the musicians they are? People throw around terms like icon and legend too loosely these days, but Buddy Guy is the real deal.

At 75-years-old you wouldn’t expect a Blues legend to be strutting the stage in the warm Memphis midday heat, but here he was, soaking up the crowd of people who penciled in Guy on their schedule of must see performances. He wasted no time kicking off the show with “Nobody Understands Me But My Guitar.”

Age may have set into his body but he can still rip into a guitar like nobody’s business. He stretched most of his songs out with generous guitar solos that show why he is a world-renowned strummer. He just has such control and finesse. His face contorts and puckers as he mines the notes from the guitar. The guy is just fun to watch because you can tell he is having a blast doing what he loves.

There were a lot of notable moments during the set. At one point, he disappeared stage right with the guitar still playing then suddenly the backstage gate flung open, and here he was, guitar in hand, walking out into the festival crowd. The crowd was stunned with excitement as they furiously snapped photos with camera phones and patted his shirt on his way through the slowly parting crowd. He also called up to the stage an up-and-coming local musician Scott Holt to jam out on “Fever.” He knows the Blues haven’t had the success of hip hop and R&B, but he was working hard to introduce the next generation to his art, in hopes of breathing new life into this ailing craft.

At one point in the set, he commented about the state of hip-hop as it blared in from the Bud Light Stage behind him. You could tell its success, at the expense of the Blues, was rather tart in his mouth. He said he wanted to show everyone where hip-hop came from as he dug into “74-Years Young.” The lyrics allude to the fact that he’s 74 years young and still feels like he’s 21. No truer words have been spoken, as he has the youth and vitality of a man half his age.

He wrapped up the set with a collage of sounds by the greats like John D Hooker and Eric Clapton during his Cream days. He sat on the stool and told the story of the Blues as his ears had heard it over a lifetime of passion.

Buddy Guy is one cool cat and this was a special performance. He may not have had the glitz and pizzazz of some of the Beale Street headliners, but he outplayed them all in sheer talent. If Blues had the kind of following rock has, we’ve be buzzing about rumors of Buddy Guy’s next arena tour instead of the Rolling Stones. Regardless it’s a gift to see such a talented musician so at home with his craft, and I personally can’t wait to see him tame a guitar next time around.

Jane’s Addiction was the main headliner for the Saturday installment of the Beale Street Festival in Memphis, trumping acts like the incomparable Al Green, Pitbull, and Grace Potter for headlining honors. Jane’s Addiction is currently touring in support of their October 2011 release, “The Great Escape Artist” though it’s difficult to tell when you unwind their set list from the evening. Despite starting things off with “Underground,” the album’s opening salvo, the new album was sorely in neglect. Instead, the show seemed like a massive grab bag from Jane’s catalog of music.

The last time I saw Jane’s Addiction was on the “Strays” tour playing the Fox Theatre in Atlanta around 1993. Amazingly, not much has changed. Ferrell & Navarro are still shirtless. The boys still revel in elaborate stage art and they haven’t forgotten how to rock.

Jane’s Addiction did have the most elaborate set design and lighting of any band at the Beale Street Festival. In the background stood the naked busts of two women, and on stage were the lingerie clad bodies of two lusty young ladies. It seemed the motif was a massive tribute to “Nothing’s Shocking.” There were video boards and a raised platform that mini-melodramas were enacted on. I obviously have no issues with the ladies writhing along to the music and doing their best Carmen Electra routine on the band (Sorry Dave), but some of the Panic at the Disco-type theatrics did more to take away from the show rather than add to it. These bizarre elements took your gaze away from the music and instead you were left to ponder the meaning of a mock hanging, for example.

Some bands can get away with these over-the-top theatric elements, but to be successful, they have to weave them into the fabric of the music to ultimately augment the act. Jane’s Addiction’s setup lent itself more to distraction, and I felt the band losing the audience at times during these sometimes bizarre enactments. Perry Ferrell definitely beats to his own drummer and that creativity is a large reason why Jane’s Addiction’s popularity has persisted for so many years. Just don’t forget your audience wants to see you rock above all else.

The band sounded great whether they were ramping the crowd up on radio candy “Been Caught Stealin” or pulling back for a more introspective “Three Days.” Perry Ferrell had an intensity and a passion in his performance that was impossible to keep under wraps. Dave Navarro was similarly in the zone, yet it was harder to lock in on him since the spastic light display rarely pinpointed him, even during guitar solos. This was a disappointing element of the show, because to many he is just as big a star as Ferrell. The set list served up a little something for every generation of their Jane’s fans. Ritual De Lo Habitual fans could revel in “Ain’t No Right.” Nothing’s Shocking” fans could lock in on the album’s title track and new converts could wallow in “Twisted Tales.”

In all, it was a good set plagued by distraction. They rocked as hard as you’d expect from one of modern rock’s seminal bands, but the lighting and stage theatrics did detract from the music. A little re-jiggering to the formula would go a long way, but something tells me Ferrell’s eccentricity is on firm display and every touch is exactly the way he wants it. Ultimately, if you focus in on the music you won’t be disappointed.

Check back in with us later today and tomorrow as we continue our coverage of the Beale Street Music Festival.

The 36th Annual Memphis in May Beale Street Music Festival kicked off in stellar fashion on Friday, with the likes of Three Six Mafia, Megadeth, and My Morning Jacket performing. Tom Lee Park is an ideal setting for a festival, grazing Beale Street at its most northern point and stretching lazily down the Mississippi River before reaching Georgia Avenue. Though the summer heat and humidity have already arrived here in Memphis, the breeze off the mighty Mississippi provided a welcome reprieve for music fans young and old. As night fell, the temperature dropped and the musical ante was upped as Florence brought “The Machine” in all its unfettered glory to the Bud Light Stage.

Florence was beautiful as she hit the stage, red locks pulled away from her face, draped in a black chiffon cape, embroidered in gold and white. As she ran up and down the stage and danced by the microphone, the cape flowed and billowed in the wind. It was a very ethereal effect that was a small detail, but made a big impact in the overall show.

She launched the set with the bombastic “Only If For a Night.” For those familiar with Florence + the Machine’s MTV Unplugged release, the fully plugged in live show is much more epic and intricate, much as you would expect from her two studio albums. Florence’s stage presence commands you, leaving you transfixed on her, and her alone. She’s fascinating to watch in her body movements, and sheer intensity in which she belts out her notes, and at times you forget she was actually sharing the stage with her band mates.

As one would expect, her voice was the true star of the show. Her register slowly crept up to a stirring crescendo in songs like the haunting “What the Water Gave Me.” She also knew when to dial it back to quietly simmer in the moment like on “Never Let Me Go.” Like the late Jeff Buckley, few vocalists let their voice stand alone against the musical tide. Florence is one of these few, and at just twenty-five, it’s amazing to think of the potential still wrapped up within her vocal chords.

To be fair it wasn’t always a flawless effort. Some of her vocal transitions faltered as she tried to jump from one musical point to the next. It wasn’t a pervasive issue, but more subtle missteps along the way. I would imagine when you are piercing the sky with your voice, it can be hard to dial it back to reality.

She took time away from her vocal styling to interact with the audience. She wanted all the ladies up on their men’s shoulders during “Rabbit Heart” and she started a synchronized hopping experiment during “Dog Days are Over.” I have to say it was a bit disappointing that the audience thinned out considerably after she wrapped her big radio single. They missed a stirring “No Light No Light” and downbeat “Never Let Me Go”

Florence is nothing short of a star in all its blinding glory. Anyone who doubted her talent after her ground breaking debut album “Lungs,” should feel foolish after her strong return on “Ceremonials.” She puts on a fantastic live show that doesn’t slow down for anyone. If you have the means I highly recommend checking out Florence + the Machine the next time they pass through your city. It is a stunning spectacle.

Keep checking in with us over the weekend and Monday as we continue our coverage of the Beale Street Music Festival.

Florence + the Machine Beale Street Setlist
Only If For a Night
What the Water Gave Me
Cosmic Love
Rabbit Heart
Spectrum
Lover to Lover
Hurricane Drunk
Shake It Out – about hangover
Dog Days are Over
Never Let Me Go
No Light No Light