Hawthorne Heights News

The two major album releases of this week are Ohio emo band Hawthorne Heights' sophomore effort, If Only You Were Lonely, and soul singer Ne-Yo's debut, In My Own Words. However, only one can reign supreme in the number-one spot on next week's Billboard chart. So Hawthorne Heights' label, Victory Records, has sent the following "heartfelt call to arms to their loyal supporters" to make sure their band comes out on top:

"You buying our album tomorrow has much greater meaning than simply supporting Hawthorne Heights. ROCK music needs your support. Our society and culture has put rock music on the backburner. If our album can debut at #1 all of us will have taken ROCK music back to the top of the charts where it belongs. You might ask, how has ROCK been put on the backburner? A current example is an artist that we are up against called Ne-Yo. Many people are saying that Ne-Yo is going to outsell us because Ne-Yo has had a tremendous amount of over the top, mainstream media coverage. His album will be in stores tomorrow. Radio has played his single 160,000 times. Our single has been played 3,800 times. We know that does not seem possible but it is the truth. Ne-Yo is on a major label. Hawthorne Heights is on an independent label. ROCK music needs to win tomorrow. Independent needs to beat Major tomorrow. If all of you take action we can create history. The mainstream media may not choose to fully embrace this ROCK band from Dayton, Ohio but all of you have. No one can take that away from us. It cannot be bought because it comes from the heart. That is what makes us different. Your support means everything to us and is the most valuable thing that we have. You are the people that we depend on. This is as much about you as it is about us. You hear our voices every night. Now, we need to hear yours. You see us at our merch table every night. We need to see you in the stores tomorrow. We cannot come out on top without you. Passion and music with real meaning has a chance to beat out what the media forces down our throats. No one expects us to win. We need to prove them wrong. They underestimate us. Please help us create history tomorrow. This is a 'call to arms', a 'battle cry', not just for Hawthorne Heights but for all of the other great ROCK bands and independent labels that we all love. All of us deserve this and it is something that we can do together."

Hawthorne Heights later appeared on MTV's Total Request Live to clarify that this manifesto came from Victory and that they had nothing to do with it. As for whether or not Victory's "manifesto" was successful, we will all have to wait until SoundScan sales figures are released next week.