Music Blogs

Hello, and welcome to an almost entirely girl-on-girl edition of That's Really Week! Unfortch, not all of this week's headline-making lovely ladies are in the news for the most upstanding of reasons. But if you believe the old adage that any publicity is good publicity...well, then, we suppose Britney, Amy, Heidi, and the Spice Girls are doing just fine.

But let's start on a positive note for a change, all right? First, the shiny happy stories...

In shiny happy marital-bliss news, American Idol also-ran Katharine McPhee just wed her producer boyfriend, Nick Cokas. Of course, this isn't such great news for a) McPheever-stricken men who have crushes on the suddenly unsingle Kat; and b) traditionalists who frown on May-December romances, since Katharine is 23 and Nick is (!) 42. But hey, if they're happy, who are we to judge? It could be worse. She could be thrown into a psych ward, or denied a visa...but hey, we're getting ahead of ourselves. More on those stories later...

In shiny happy parenting news, Jennifer Lopez's father has confirmed longstanding rumors than his daughter is eating for three. Yes J.Lo and Marc Anthony are indeed expecting twins! Not a major shocker, since the woman's looked about nine months pregnant since early on in her second trimester. Anyway, our congrats go to the happy couple and their rapidly expanding familia.

Moving on to news about big estrogen-powered extravaganzas, featuring still-sexy old-school divas: Madonna just hosted a giant UNICEF charity bash at the U.N., attended by J.Lo and Marc as well as other celebrity power couples like Tom and Katie, Gwen and Gavin, and Demi and Ashton; Cher just announced that she'll be doing a Las Vegas residency at Caesar's Palace, on the same stage recently vacated by Celine Dion; and Paula Abdul just relaunched her pop music career at the Super Bowl. Who says life ends after 40? Not for these grand dames of pop.

OK, enough of that. Now for the BAD news:

We'll start with the Spice Girls. Nope, this is one group of older women whose estrogen extravaganzas have sadly run out of Girl Power. See, the Spices announced this week that they are abruptly cutting their much-hyped world tour short. They claimed "family and personal commitments" were to blame for the cancellation of concerts in China, South Africa, Australia, and Argentina--as opposed to, say, bitter infighting or low ticket sales. Whatever the reason, guess it's not a Spice World, after all.

Some younger women aren't faring too well this week, either. For instance, The Hills' Heidi Montag tried to kickstart her own pop career this week, releasing her first music video, "Higher," directed by her aptly surnamed TV boyfriend Spencer Pratt. Why is this bad news? Well, because the title "Higher" doesn't seem to describe, in any way, the notes Heidi is able to reach. (Seriously, the girl's got maybe a half-octave range.) And if the 8,000+ scathing messageboard comments posted by Yahoo! users the day of the video's premiere are any indication, "Higher" won't describe Heidi's future chart positions, either. But hey, at least she looked tasty in the sherbert-pink bikini she wore in the clip--according to the very, very few complimentary comments on that aforementioned messageboard.

Britney Spears racked up another wreck of a week as well. No surprise there. Sure, Brit was released from the UCLA Medical Center after staying there for psychiatric observation. This may or may not be a good thing. But she also battled with her family, as the stressed-out Spearses filed a restraining order against her Svengali manager, Sam Lufti, and her father James was named as her conservator (presumably because the court determined she could no longer care for her own affairs). Man, the Spears clan might be the only American family in which the 16-year-old unwed pregnant daughter is the good kid, huh? Ironically, Jamie-Lynn is an angel compared to her scandalous sis.

And finally, the biggest female-trouble story of the week obviously comes courtesy of the also-hospitalized Amy Winehouse, who a mere three days before the Grammy Awards--where she is nominated in an impressive six categories--learned she'd be unable to attend the Los Angeles ceremony. See, perhaps unsurprisingly given Amy's well-publicized drug troubles and multiple arrests, the U.S. Embassy said no, no, no to her request for a visa. On Friday she was finally granted her visa; however, at that point  it was too late for her to schedule a last-minute transatlantic trip. So now the difficult diva will perform via satellite at Sunday's ceremony, which means it's definitely going to be the most interesting (read: potentially trainwrecky) Grammy broadcast since Soy Bomb upstaged Bob Dylan and Ol' Dirty Bastard bumrushed Shawn Colvin back in 1998. Set your TiVos now, everyone!

And so concludes seven days of girls-gone-wild news. Do come back next Friday for more headspinning headlines (hopefully about artists other than Britney and Amy), and in the meantime, make sure to check out our awards-show blog on Sunday for details about what exactly goes down on Grammy night.

THIS WEEK'S TOP 10 STORIES:

1) She Tried To Go To The Grammys - But visa officials said no, no, no to Amy Winehouse.

2) Britney Breaks Out - She's out of the hospital, y'all.

3) J.Lo Doubles Her Pleasure - It's true: Jennifer is expecting twins.

4) Nick Cokas Bags Kat - Katharine McPhee marries her much-older boyfriend.

5) Spice World Shrinks - The Spice Girls cancel the rest of the international tour.

6) The Hills Are Alive With The Sound Of Heidi's Music - Hills startlet Heidi Montag launches a pop career.

7) Confessions On A U.N. Dancefloor - Madonna hosts a star-sudded charity bash.

8) Cher Hits The Jackpot - She announces her Las Vegas residency.

9) Bad Medicine - Autopsy results reveal that cold syrup played a role in the accidental death of rapper Pimp C.

10) Still Forever Your Girl? - Paula Abdul stages a musical comeback at the Super Bowl.