Better luck this time? Pennsylvania act Runner Runner which features former members of the pop/punk band Over It (formerly on Virgin) has generated some buzz lately with a more Top 40 friendly sound. Tracks like “So Obvious” and “Believe” seem prime for success on the heels of the likes of Metro Station’s “Shake It”. Take a listen to Over It’s first single “Siren on the 101” from their Virgin records debut and decide if the change in sound was one for the better, or worse.

Under Appreciated Indie: Atlanta indie rock group The Constellations have remained seemingly under everyone’s radar with the release of their debut LP “Southern Gothic”. Check out the track “Love is a Murder” featuring Cee Lo of Gnarls Barkley.

Singer/songwriters: A few international singer/songwriters worth a listen are Canada’s Shawn Hlookoff who generated buzz with one of his newer tracks, “Without You”. Australia’s Axle Whitehead has also been receiving some airplay in Australia with his singles “Anywhere” & “I Don’t Do Surprises”.

Shifting genres in Australia, the post-hardcore, rock band Closure in Moscow has signed to the US label Science Records and should be seeing a 2009 release. Comparisons have been made to anyone from The Mars Volta to Saosin, check out the single “We Want Guarantees” and the hard hitting “Breathing Underwater”.

Signing? Ohio pop/rock band The Undeserving have apparently signed a record deal, but have not yet revealed with who, read their blog here

Quick Hits:

Rev Theory
Listen to: Wanted Man
Definitely an improvement from the first and fist pumping lead single
“Hell Yeah”.

Valencia
Listen To: Where Did You Go?

Jack McManus
Listen To: Bang on the Piano
UK piano rocker with radio ready singles.

Soundcheck is written by Dallas who currently attends San Francisco State University and works on the Live 105 (KITS) Action Team.

inPASSING who hails from Orlando Florida collaborated with James Paul Wisner (Dashboard Confessional, Underoath, The Academy Is) and released an EP in the spring of 2008. The band also just released a music video for the track “All Together”. Our favorite track is Back Down.

Tour Dates:

Sep 12th    Backbooth - Orlando, Florida
Sep 14th    Green St. - Greensboro, North Carolina
Sep 18th    Big Daddy’s - Tallahassee, Florida
Sep 19th    The Porch - Brandon, Florida

McCain Lifts Off With Van Halen: John McCain introduced Sarah Palin as his running mate with Van Halen’s song “Right Now“. Sammy Hagar has no objection to the Republican Party using the group’s song and said “When I wrote the lyrics to ‘Right Now’, I intended them to inspire people to not sit around and wait for something they believed in but to go out and get it, to make a change however they needed to”

New Video Stream: It’s been the month of Metallica. Metallica has posted the war centered video for the track ‘The Day That Never Comes‘ which can be found on their myspace.

Signings: Post Hardcore band Funeral For A Friend who was signed to Ferret Music and later Atlantic Records have now signed with Victory Records and will release their new album ” Memory and Humanity” on October 28th.

This Week Sales: Slipknot, the metal act from Iowa is expected to sell at least 200k. The band aimed for world domination early in their career and it seems like they accomplished their goal.

The Last Days of Bandwidth Hogs: Comcast recently announced that starting Oct. 1 it would set a threshold for monthly Internet usage. Users will be allowed 250 gigabytes of monthly usage. Comcast said its average residential customer uses approximately 2 to 3 GB while bandwidth hogs could typically use 250 gigabytes. Consuming 250 gigabytes would be comparable to sending 50 million e-mails, 62,500 songs, download 125 standard-definition movies or upload 25,000 hi-resolution digital photos. Frontier and Time Warner Cable are now moving toward imposing internet usage caps.

Universal Music Dodges The Bullet: The Rolling Stones jumping ship and joining Universal Music may have helped Vivendi meet its financial goals, profits for the quarter were up 12%. The rise of digital music is also contributing to the increase of Universal’s market share.