C103 Rock Report Tuesday March 11, 2008

• After postponing a week’s worth of concerts last week, Van Halen has decided it needs to hold off their reunion tour for the next month while Eddie Van Halen receives “medical tests” for an unspecified problem. The tour has now been put on hold until April 19th, leaving seventeen postponed dates — including a show at New York City’s Madison Square Garden — in limbo. No rescheduled dates have been announced, but fans are being asked to hold onto their tickets for use on a later date. According to organizers, Eddie Van Halen “is currently under doctors’ care” and will “continue medical tests to define a course of treatment.” The tour is, as of now, expected to resume with an April 19th show in Las Vegas.

• Peter Gabriel is an investor in the new ad-supported ‘We7' download site that will offer free music from Sony-BMG’s back catalogue of 250,000 tracks. It’ll be free ... and legal!

• R.E.M. will stream their new album Accelerate in its entirety via “social music discovery service” iLike, which has a partnership with Facebook. The “Worldwide Listening Party” will happen March 24th, a week before the album is released to stores.

• Metallica anticipates completing their new album in six weeks with the goal of a September release, drummer Lars Ulrich said. He says he likes it and admits he’s one of Metallica’s harshest critics. The album is being produced by Rick Rubin.

• In a new “Playboy” magazine interview, Chad Kroeger of Nickelback admits he used to subsidize his income by selling cannabis & magic mushrooms back home in Hanna, Alberta before the band hit it big.