Supernova, please meet Supernova OR, which came first, Supernova or Supernova? Suppose you're a struggling band that's been making 45''s, LP's, and CD's on independant record labels since 1989, and while still struggling, one fine day in 2006 you turn on the television only to see Tommy Lee, Jason Newstead, and Gilby Clarke (Motley Crue, Metallica, and Guns and Roses, respectively) searching for a lead singer for a new band they were forming named "Supernova" too? You'd scratch your head and immediately pull out the yellow pages to find a good Jewish lawyer! That's almost EXACTLY how it went down with CBS' RockStar television show. Still buzzed from the success of last season with INXS, I guess everyone in CBS' Legal Department "forgot to look things up" about copyright infringement when they gave the green light to the guys to use "Supernova" as the name of the group they were auditioning for. Truth is, the "original Supernova" which has a big fan base in California may have not even blinked an eye had it not been for candidates heading to the auditions thinking they may be joining the techno/rock/punk group that they love out there on the West Coast only to find three hard rockin', hard drinkin', hard livin' tattooed body pierced guys give them a thumb up or thumb down. Maybe someone at CBS didn't do their research, maybe everyone figured the band was long gone or maybe wouldn't notice or care that these three hard rock heavyweights took their name. Well, thanks to a lawyer and as is always mentioned on My Name is Earl, there's this thing called "karma" (and friends in high places) that turn a bad situation into a positive. The original "Supernova" managed to file a lawsuit against CBS and the three members of the band for the name...and WON! Kind of. You see, the band that emerged from TV has a CD due out for the beginning of November. Since a lot of the artwork and so on was already finished, All that Tommy Lee has to do is add "RockStar" to "Supernova" and that's it...or is it? Tommy and the others probably would have started out with the above name in the first place. I say, take the loss, destroy what's done and come up with a new name for the group. On the other end is the 1989 to present "Supernova" who have used this gaffe as a steppingstone to further their career which has been struggling to get recorded on anything other than someone's MP3 player for years. They want you to know that they appear on the soundtrack to the original Kevin Smith indie film Clerks. You know, the black and white one from the early '90's? Meanwhile, what could be a big break for these California surfer dudes, may not be so good for Tommy Lee. This is only a money-making scheme and I predict, if the original guys chugged along so many years without a major label, they'll be playing clubs and bars a long time after Tommy Lee's side project releases only one CD and then like Tommy, gets burnt out!
