Elvis Costello forced his fans into the wayback machine for his latest release. Over the last two weeks, devotees could only hear the new music by buying it on vinyl - an ancient substance known only to those over 50 or anyone employed as a hip-hop DJ.

Winning an international competition is a fine thing, I suppose. The real prize, though, comes when one of the greatest living composers hears you play and is inspired to write you a masterpiece. It happened to pianist Krystian Zimerman, whose 1975 victor

As a peer-priced alternative to the company's earlier SE110, Shure's new SE102MPA ($120) is a pair of budget-priced earphones that now include the company's "music phone adapter" MPA-3c, enabling iPhone and iPhone 3G users to take calls in the middle

My life was wiped out in Chicago — at least all that mattered in it. No big deal for a city that has wiped out many lives, I suppose, but my demise didn’t come at the hand of some zoot-suited mobster. Mine was a judicial murder in the Seventh Circuit

The Philadelphia band the Roots has always made socially aware, stylistically varied music that's kept it on the leading edge of left-of-center hip-hop.