June 23, 2003 – By: Robbie ChaplickThe Dismemberment PlanBowery BallroomNew York CityFeb. 4th, 2003 It was all going according to plan, wasn't it? We were the coolest couple on the scene, together for ten years. Eventually you cultivated a loyal following with what the critics called a "unique brand of sample-laden punk-funk." Fine, it hurt a little bit, but I was cool sharing you with the rest of the world. You sold 25,000 copies of your last album, the bombastic yet introspective Change, selling out city after city on your most recent tour. I was faithful to you the whole freaking time, wasn't I? So how could you leave me when things were going so good? More than one fan was left feeling like a jilted lover when Dismemberment Plan abruptly announced their plans to break-up during a recent US tour.

June 23, 2003 – By: Andrew Beaujon, and Kate SullivanFrom ubiquitous summer Jeep anthems to that darn car commercial,members of N.E.R.D and Foo Fighters rate the hits of 2002 Chad Hugo and Pharrell Williams are two of the lap dance-lovin', rock star- slummin' guys behind N.E.R.D, and theyalso produced some of the biggest club jams of the year as their alter ego, the Neptunes. Dave Grohl and Taylor Hawkins are the frontman and drummer of rock survivors Foo Fighters, who are back with a truly excellent fourth album, One by One. We asked them tobreak down this year's radio gaga. NELLY, "HOT IN HERRE" HUGO: I didn't know this was gonna be as big as it was. It was fun to make [the Neptunes produced the song]. Everything Nelly says islike a hook in itself.GROHL: You know this song? Nelly?HAWKINS: He could have gang affiliations--we'd better be careful.SPIN: I don't think he does anymore.HAWKINS: Anymore.

June 23, 2003 – By: William V. Meter Peaches makes dirty punk-rock dance music, but her first lovesare mullets, hot pants, sex and body hair It's mid-september at Brooklyn's famously decrepit Coney Island. A few weeks ago, the seaside beach park was surging with sunburned children screaming for funnel cakes, men in mesh tank tops spitting out chicken bones, and barkers beckoning passersby to spend $5 for the indoor freak shows. But now school has started, and the place looks more like the setting for a Scooby-Doo mystery--chain-link fences surround the roller coaster and Ferris wheel, plastic bags float by like tumbleweeds. This is more than fine with silver-tongued, she-devil electro-rapper Peaches.

June 23, 2003 – Buy My Album or Fuck Off! As last year's breakout star of The Osbournes, Kelly brought her badass punk personality to the masses. We caught up with the most celebrated 18-year-old since Britney Spears at the Beverly Hills Hotel a week before she released her debut album, the aptly titled Shut Up. We ate fries, gossiped about rock stars, and managed to lose her new dog. Thank God we found it or Sharon would have killed us. How much of Shut Up did you write?I wrote all the lyrics. The only lyrics I didn't write are for "Too Much of You,"which is on the record because it's really funny and I like singing it. It's about masturbation. What does your family think of the album?My mum and dad love it. Jack hasn't heard it. I think he's too busy jacking himself off. How about your sister, Aimee?She hasn't even heard the single.

June 23, 2003 – By: Greg MilnerThe System of a Down frontman doesn't listen to much nümetal System of a Down are hard-rock renegades, so it makes sense that frontman Serj Tankian has an outsider's take onAmerican rock 'n' roll. As a child growing up in an Armenian community in Lebanon, the first music Tankian, 35, heard was Armenian folk, though he's forgotten most of the artists' names. When his family moved to Los Angeles in the 1970s, he discovered pop music via the Bee Gees: "I started with Saturday Night Fever and worked backward," he says. A few weeks before the release of System's latest, Steal This Album!, Spin hooked up with Tankian, and he gave us some insights into his life on record. A. The Beatles Revolver (Capitol, 1966) I'm a huge Beatles fan, but I've only really gotten into them as an adult.

June 23, 2003 – The legacy of Run-D.M.C.'s legendary DJ, Jam Master Jay With two turntables set on wreck, Jam Master Jay was one of hip-hop's definitive b-boys. At 37, he had a lifetime of achievements behind him and alifetime of possibilities ahead of him. As Chuck D has said, Run-D.M.C. were the Beatles of rap, and Jam Master Jay was George Harrison and Ringo Starr combined, with a little Brian Epstein hustle thrown in. He left us too soon, but we can still say, "Goddamn, that DJ made my day!" On November 4, outside the J. Foster Phillips Funeral Home in Jamaica, Queens, hundreds of cameramen, reporters, and fans braved the rain to gaze at a long line of mourners. Shoutouts erupted whenever a hip-hop celebrity like Grandmaster Flash arrived, and a few ill-mannered folks even handed out business cards.

June 23, 2003 – Chris Cornell's superunknown secret I was only able to interview Chris Cornell for 20 minutes. This isn't much time, but I just assumed he was busy.And he was--sort of. The 38-year-old Cornell--who's been married for 12 years and is the father of a two-year-old daughter--had to get back to a place that nobody knew about. Spin: There's a rumor that you just got out of rehab for OxyContin addiction. Is that true?Chris Cornell: OxyContin? Who told you that? That's a weird rumor, because the truth is that I'm in rehab right now. I've been there for a month. I'm here [at this interview] on what amounts to work release. What are you in rehab for?Various things. I'm not picky. [Laughs] Mainly for drinking. I can see how that could happen, since the whole Seattle music scene was always built around getting obliterated.Yeah, that was sort of the nature of it.

June 23, 2003 – Tom Morello is a relentless zombie-slaying mofo. He's destroyed a dozen pixilated monsters in the past 45 seconds, and he's ravenous for more carnage. "I actually like this a lot," he says as he wastes a fast-charging catatonic corpse. "When we toured in Japan, this is all I did." We are in a video arcade on the Santa Monica Pier, and the machine Morello is raging against is The House of the Dead 2. It would be great to claim that playing videogames and whacking zombies is something Morello and I do together all the time, but that would be a lie; I am only here because I am writing a story about his band, Audioslave, and he is only here because he knows his new band needs coverage. He's a pro. We've completed our interview in a beachside hotel room and are now trying to hang out and be cool, which makes for kind of a weird vibe. But here's what's even weirder: It's working. It is cool.

June 23, 2003 – By: Dave ItzkoffDirector Alexander Payne drives Jack Nicholson over the edge inAbout Schmidt "The depression of others is funny," declares a characteristically chipper Alexander Payne. The 40-ish writer/director has proved this point in scathing comedies like Citizen Ruth and the marvelously misanthropic Election. And he doesn't want anyone to feel guilty for laughing at the misfortunes of his sad-sack protagonists. "They're just movies," Payne says, standing in the New York City apartment of his writing partner, Jim Taylor. "The stories that I've told so far are about desolate lives. I'm just finding a cinematic expression for that." Still, it's hard to know whether to burst into hysterical laughter or tears at his latest film, About Schmidt.

June 23, 2003 – By: Andy GreenwaldFor the past few years, Dashboard Confessional have been arelentless cult phenomenon, with fans who fill large arenas, bondonline, and memorize painfully intimate songs as if they were smashhits. But who is the man behind Dashboard? Where did he come from?And why do kids break down in tears at his concerts? Now a newalbum backed by big money will try to make the cult go pop For the past few years, Dashboard Confessional have been a relentless cult phenomenon, with fans who fill large arenas, bond online, and memorize painfully intimate songs as if they were smash hits. But who is the man behind Dashboard? Where did he come from? And why do kids break down in tears at his concerts?