We arrived early before the doors opened, but already, the backstage area (a corridor, basically) was a hive of activity with a mixture of label execs, managers and publicists who had seemingly brought all their kids and friends to the show.

We were scheduled for an interview with Kelly Clarkson — her first sit-down chat with MTV News in a very long while — but it was a real added bonus when we caught up with an old friend and someone who's been away for even longer: Sean Paul.

"Gimme the Light," "Like Glue," "We Be Burnin'," "Ever Blazin'," "I'm Still in Love With You," "Give It Up to Me," "Break It Off," "Temperature" — from 2002 to 2006, Sean Paul was everywhere! But then, nothing ... until "So Fine" came out a few weeks back. A lot of people have been waiting for Sean to be back on the music scene, and that wait is finally over. After taking time out to recharge in his homeland of Jamaica (he admits to enjoying his time off a little too much — after all, Jamaica is paradise), Sean is putting the finishing touches on his fourth studio album, Imperial Blaze.

Dressed stylish and casual in a shirt, jeans and his ever-present sunglasses, Sean looked like he was still on holiday. After all, that's his vibe. I've known Sean for a very long time, and he has to be one of the most chill people I know. Him and Snoop — must be something in the tea. After explaining why he needed some time out (touring can be real tough) and what he's been up to (relaxing), he broke down what fans can expect from his new album on a musical level. Don't expect any collaborations. This album is pure, 100 percent Sean Paul. And while the Jamaican dancehall scene moves further hardcore, Sean is staying in his own lane instead of following the trend. With the big dancehall anthems that launched Sean's career, some ballads for the ladies and his "most personal song yet" about his mother, Sean has taken his time and a great deal of care in constructing this album to make sure it is worth the wait!

After almost a year of addressing and dodging his old job as a prison guard, Rick Ross' Deeper Than Rap album finally hit shelves today. Lawsuits, controversies and a heated rap battle with knockout king 50 Cent filled Ross' plate, but in the end, the MC packaged it all nicely into his best work to date.

The hip-hop community was looking for 50's next chess move against Ross, which Fif threatened to deliver on Ross' album-release day, but the blow never came. The Bawse seemed totally removed from the beef and focused on his big day, which included an in-store signing at a local chain store in North Miami called BrandsMart. Many supporters came out to show Ricky love, copping his new CD and meeting him in person.

As I sat back and watched Ross signing copies of the album for fans, flanked by pal DJ Khaled and his Carol City Cartel clique, I couldn't help but wonder if I were watching the making of the next rap superstar. Only time will tell. For the duration of his battle with Fif, real heads knew the victor would be based on two things: good music and record sales. Ross gets a point for the endless hits he's been putting out these past months, but the real deciding factor will come next Wednesday, when SoundScan releases the numbers.

I'm putting my money on another #1 debut.

While I loved the bright lights/ big city album art for A Little Big Longer a little bit better, the cover of Lines, Vines And Trying Times is the perfect portrait of the boys as they cross the bridge of their career from teen musicians to mature multimedia moguls — in addition to their massive world tour, their Disney TV show, "J.O.N.A.S.," premieres May 2nd, they’re working on the "Camp Rock" sequel, they’re launching a Jonas-inspired clothing line, and there’s their Jonas Group involvement with Honor Society and Demi Lovato — gotta support your friends, after all. ...

Continue reading and see the new Jonas Brothers album art at Buzzworthy.MTV.com ...

We recently caught up with globetrotter and stage siren Ebony Bones after her triumphant return to SXSW, where she met with the winners who participated in our W.A.R.R.I.O.R. contest.

Currently touring with synth-rockers Passion Pit, Ebony gave us the scoop on her upcoming debut album, now officially called Bone of My Bones. For Ebony — whose moniker was inspired by comic book character Mr. Bones — using a biblical reference from the book of Genesis as her album title holds personal meaning:

"Bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh, she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man."

"It fit perfectly," Bones explained. "It's raw and abrasive and, like Adam to Eve, this entire album feels like an extension of me. I'm ridiculously excited about it."

Fellow Brits can purchase Bone of My Bones in June but citizens of the States will have to wait a bit longer, with a release timed for early fall.

Thankfully, her first U.K. single, "The Musik," will be out in May and we have a preview for you right here:

(Find out how 20 cities and 30 directors contributed to "The Musik," after the jump!)

When Ebony Bones set to create a collaborative video with fans for her upcoming single "The Musik," she wasn't prepared for the overwhelming amount of footage that rolled in.

"[We received tape] from Brooklyn to Brazil — it took forever to sift through everything," she said.

Inspired by the idea of an abstract collaboration with "a collective of like-minded individuals all galvanized by music," "The Musik" is represented by 30 directors from all across the globe, armed with nothing more than a camera phone or digicam and a lot of imagination.

Very much a DIY artist (she's still her own stylist and recorded several tracks for Bone Of My Bones in her bedroom), the singer was pleased with how the production process for "The Musik" brought her closer to fans.

"I was corresponding with everyone directly," she said, "and it really felt like I got to know everyone who'd contributed."

Bones describes the video for "The Musik" as having nothing shiny or glossy about it.

"There's a magical perfection in its imperfection. It's a bit strange at times ... like a bunch of people in on No Pants Day dancing in the snow in their underwear ... but there's no beauty without strangeness."

Speaking of beauty, the eclectic fashionista is aware of her trend-inspiring threads but doubts that "the world really needs another singer assuming everyone wants to dress and smell like them." A geek at heart, Ebony would rather produce a range of fancy USB sticks.

"I've been approached about a few campaigns, so who knows? It's nice, but right now my entire energy is invested in getting the music heard."

It's not that I don't like PJ — in fact, they've grown to be one of my favorite live bands over the past decade or so. But before I started writing about music for a living, I was much more regimented about my listening habits. I'd devour everything I could, but for some reason PJ's music just didn't grab me back in my Nirvana-centric days.

Which is why listening to the remixed reissue of Ten that hits stores Tuesday (March 24) is something of a revelation. I've been spinning it almost exclusively for the past few weeks and each time I give a song like "Once" or the ominously alluring "Garden" another try, I'm newly blown away at their power, punch and the intensity of singer Eddie Vedder's voice. I'm not telling anyone who's already a big fan anything new, but even if you've listened 1,000 times, the crispness of these tracks is like someone grabbing you from the back row and pushing you up to the sweaty pit, pulling your ear plugs out and shoving you up against the speaker as the seasick guitars start swaying crazily during "Deep."

Of course "Even Flow," "Alive" and "Jeremy" still pack a wallop — and the band continues to tear into them like they're brand new in concert to this day — but these other songs, the ones I hadn't really investigated fully before ... wow.

The remixed songs crackle with a jazzy, swinging energy I began to remember from the time I saw PJ play in a dumpy little off-campus bar in Madison, Wisconsin — called the R&R Station — in March 1992. Mike McCready's feral guitar playing on "Why Go," all coiled energy and chicken scratching bursts of ominous noise; bassist Jeff Ament's finger popping, deep funk bass and Vedder's dog snarl bellow of "Why go home!" are like my own personal discovery of a 12-million selling Rosetta Stone my friends have been trying to tell me about for more than 15 years.

Listening to the undulating, Jane's Addiction-like "Oceans" now, you can clearly see the through line to Vedder's pastoral solo soundtrack to "Into the Wild," which makes all the bizarre twists and turns the band has taken between then and now even more fascinating. The set has been remixed by producer Brendan O'Brien, who didn't work on PJ's debut, but helmed their next four albums and, for a while, was practically a sixth member of the group.

The band are also offering up all the master tracks from Ten for download at the "Rock Band" music store for use on Xbox 360 and PS3. And, if you dare, drummer Matt Cameron is playing "Rock Band 2" with Xbox Live Gold members on March 27 at 7 p.m. EST.

Mastodon rule. For proof of this, check their bludgeoningly brutal-yet-surgically precise back catalog (2002's Remission, 2004's Leviathan and 2006's Blood Mountain). For further proof, be aware that each of these efforts (well, maybe not Remission, but they were just getting started) are also concept records, about chasing metaphorical white whales and scaling terrifying mountains. They make rock mythical again, and for that, they rule even harder.

Their new album, Crack the Skye, hits stores March 24. While there's still a concept (more on that in a second), there's less pummeling this time around. Skye is still dazzlingly technical in scope, and there's plenty of riffing, but there's also newfound space. Songs are expansive, given room to breathe and explore quieter passages. For the first time, Mastodon don't sound like they're rushing to fit as many chords as possible into a song — tracks stretch to six, 10 and, in the case of album closer "The Last Baron," nearly 13 minutes. And that is most certainly a good thing.

We sat down with guitarist/singer Brent Hinds and drummer Brann Dailor last week at the Russian Tea Room in New York. We'll have a full-blown story and interview clips for you tomorrow, but we figured we'd give you a sneak preview right now. We asked Dailor to explain the rather heady concept behind Crack the Skye, and you can watch an exclusive clip of him laying it all out after the jump.

U.K. television star, fashionista and Afro-Punk-embracing songstress Ebony Thomas, a.k.a. Ebony Bones, is no stranger to the movement's DIY aesthetic, having crafted all the songs on her upcoming Spring '09 debut album — tentatively titled Bone Idle — in her bedroom.

"Different people wanted to be involved," Ebony explained. "Major labels were excited and driven by all the positive press, but the only way I could keep to my set ideas for sound and inspiration was to be the main producer myself."

Influenced by the punk credo of "Do It Yourself," Bones described the album as "schizo-sounding" and "like me, a collection of contradictions and subjects close to my heart."

During our phone interview, Ebony was working on the album art herself and described her creative process.

"The one thing about taking my time and not rushing into anything is I've been able to have so much more control creatively of the whole project, and that's the real magic for me. I love bands like Funkadelic who made their costumes in their own van and put them on the same night — very DIY."

(You can watch Ebony in our Afro-Punk news brief below.)

(More from Ebony Bones PLUS exclusive video from her recent shoot, after the jump!)

Although her debut album will be filled with dance-y post-punk tracks, like "I'm Your Future Ex Wife" and "Don't Fart on My Heart," Bones notes that there are definite political connotations weaved throughout.

"I remember waking up and hearing the bass line for the '1984'-inspired 'We Know All About You' and recording it that very day," Ebony explained. "I played it for my cousin, who said I should put it on MySpace, and from there it kind of took off."

Took off, indeed. Having already played SXSW, CMJ, the last McCarren Park pool party and numerous festivals around the globe on the strength of tracks uploaded to MySpace, Thomas has a rapidly growing fanbase and counts Mark Ronson as both an influence and fan.

"I recorded my latest single 'The Musik' in New York with my friend Andrew Wyatt, who is Mark's writer," Ebony explained. "Ronson heard the demo and he was like, 'Who is this?' and played it on his radio show live that very day."

Bones recently wrapped up her video shoot for "The Musik," which was inspired by Ebony's friend Mike Long from Canada. "He did a project this year where he performed a different song with crazy dances in it in a different city every day for a year and put it on YouTube. So, in [The Musik], we have different people from all over the world — from Los Angeles to New York to Japan — dancing to the track."

(Check out our exclusive clip from "The Musik" featuring Mike Long!)

Ebony said "The Musik" will definitely have a "Spike Jonez-inspired edge to it" and will "probably be leaked on YouTube and MySpace" in early January '09, with the official video release on multiple networks to follow. Bones is definitely a fan of how word-of-mouth can be spread on the Internet, but is also quick to point out how so much information can be dangerous in the wrong hands.

"I am always inspired by what is going on politically in the world as well as the phenomenal apathy. '1984' was a book I read as a child that is still relevant." She mentioned the way that the average London resident is recorded over 300 times a day, adding, "[the album] was definitely influenced by the book and what goes on in today's world."

Bones sees music as a universal connector that can reach over political divisions — with a great beat.

"The last line of 'The Musik' is, 'All we have is each other and the music to keep us warm,' and everyone we've met so far is really embracing that."

Can't get enough Ebony Bones news? Visit the MTV Newsroom blog tomorrow! We'll have an exclusive track from her debut album and it may help you win a prize fit for a warrior...

We here at MTV News are a pretty diverse bunch, so the views expressed by some in our more official-type year-end lists (like James Montgomery's Top 25 Albums and Best Songs, and the Mixtape Monday Awards) are not necessarily shared by the rest of the newsroom. So, this week we gave everyone else a chance to chime in with their own lists and explain (or defend) their choices. You'll find all of the staff faves of 2008 here.

By Sabrina Rojas Weiss, Senior Copy Editor

10. The Ting Tings, We Started Nothing: I love singer Katie's shouty power and the way their beat makes me jump around like a little kid. "That's not my name!"

9. Chromeo, Fancy/ Fancier Footwork: With this playing on my headphones, I am instantly in an '80s movie montage. (The original came out last year, but I bought this year's "deluxe" set.)

8. Coldplay, Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends: I avoided buying this for months because the hype bored me. But that soaring wall of sound in the title track finally got under my skin.

(What was Sabrina's #1 album from 2008? Find out after the jump!)

7. Death Cab for Cutie, Narrow Stairs: I have a short attention span, and yet I can totally get lost in all eight minutes of "I Will Possess Your Heart."

6. Magnetic Fields, Distortion: This isn't my favorite Fields album ever, 'cause of all the distortion, but "California Girls" is the perfect antidote to a day of editing too many stories about Heidi and Spencer.

5. Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend: For a few years when I was a kid, my mother played Paul Simon's Graceland every single time we were in the car. Amazingly, that didn't traumatize me. Anyway, I went to Columbia and live in Brooklyn, so I've got to love the VW boys.

4. Beck, Modern Guilt: I love the retro, melodic sound of this album. Booty-shaking Beck is so much better than experimental or mopey Beck.

3. The National, The Virginia EP: I worship the National in the same overly emotional way my 15-year-old self worshipped the Smiths and the Cure. So, even though this is just an EP, I'm making up for not having a list last year on which I could place Boxer.

2. Kings of Leon, Only by the Night: OK, I can't always understand what Caleb's saying, but this entire album makes me feel like I'm on a road trip and in love for the first time and I'm going to live happily ever after.

1. Girl Talk, Feed the Animals: I have ADD, and Girl Talk's songs are like looking inside my head: There are usually two or three things playing at once, and each track flits from topic to topic every few seconds. It's like flipping through radio stations in a magical world where there is only good music. This album's introduced me to a ton of hip-hop artists I'd otherwise only know by name (UNK, Birdman, the Cool Kids) and brilliantly blended them with guilty pleasures from the '80s and '90s (Kenny Loggins, Sinead O'Connor). Also, it’s the best workout music ever.

What were your top 10 albums for 2008? Let us know in the comments!

The Noisettes want Afro-Punk to come to England.

"We'll look after the lot," frontwoman Shingai winked when we last spoke to the band in October, backstage at the Afro-Punk showcase at the CMJ Festival in New York.

"[Afro-Punks] are such an amazing group of people who are doing something unbelievable," Shingai gushed. "I mean, the standard's good, man. All the events that we've been involved with have had great bands. They put on really interesting, eclectic, amazing events. It's like Earl Greyhound, Santogold, it's great. [Afro-Punk] knows how to show kids a good time. There's nothing like it in England. Nothing."

Guitarist Dan Smith sees the festival as a catalyst, helping to eradicate some old notions. "The [punk] music movement in America has always been perceived as being a white thing, and [Afro-Punk] is making it more inclusive," he said. "It's about people getting a wider understanding of rock and roll and its history and its roots, where it comes from and that anyone can do it. And it can be loads of fun, yeah?"

The CMJ crowd loved the Noisettes' live show (see some of it in the Afro-Punk video below), so we got on the phone with them Wednesday to talk about their new video for "Wild Young Hearts," their spring '09 album of the same name and their list of the artists they fell for in 2008.

We've got the goods on the Noisettes after the jump!

The playful "Wild Young Hearts" video currently circulating on YouTube and MySpace was more than just a clip to promote the soon-to-be-released album. It was also created in the spirit of giving.

"We did a benefit show for Big Issue earlier this month at the Proud Gallery in Camden, and all proceeds went to the organization," Smith explained, referring to a charity that helps the homeless. "We made the video from footage shot at the show, with solo stuff of Shingai done after sound check in the backstage area."

"Wild Young Hearts" will be available December 24 as a 7-inch single and digital release.

Coming soon is a video for their official single, "Don't Upset the Rhythm," a project Smith mysteriously described as "a dance piece — psychedelic, with mountains, gold dancers not very covered up, lots of colored gels and silhouettes." Added Shingai, "We needed a video with loads of dancing in it. We're tired of videos with just the three of us."

When Shingai isn't in Berlin making art films with friends, the band is putting on small shows "here and there" to promote the 11-track Wild Young Hearts. The band described the album as being filled with "loads more sounds."

"We spent a lot more time writing the songs," Shingai said. "On the first one, we wrote and recorded a song a day pretty much, and it was just done so quickly in a cheap demo studio, so that is how that came about. This one is a bit different, and there's a lot more thought and premeditation to it."

Shingai gave credit to the guidance of "great producer" Jim Abbiss as well as "our moms and dads, who came and helped us as well in the studio, tucked us into bed every night and made sure we didn't drink too much and got a lot of sleep.

"We can't wait to play it for you," she said. "We really hope that you dig it."

In the spirit of our end-of-the-year coverage (read about other artists' favorite albums of 2008 here), Smith shared a few bands that the Noisettes have been checking out lately. Enjoy!

Muhsinah — "It's very psychedelic and R&B," Smith said. "She's also the keyboard player for Common. Our friend gave us Muhsinah's demo while we were touring the States, and we think she's great."

Mayor McCa — "He's a one-man band from Canada. We've toured with him, and he's amazing — check him out on YouTube and look up 'One Million Songs for You.' It's a video he made himself with $50, and it's all stop-frame animation. He's someone we're really into."

Genesis — "There is an early Genesis song, 'The Fountain of Salmacis,' from their album Nursery Cryme, that we've been really into. It's a really long song, sort of epic with swirling sounds, and it fuses a lot of Greek mythology. It talks about Aphrodite and a woman who takes the form of a lake and the man drinks the water so they become one. Really beautiful."

Who were some of your favorite artists in '08? Sound off below!

By Matt Harper

Tomorrow is a big day for Baltimore "electronic" musician Dan Deacon. Please take note: I'm putting "electronic" in quotes because after tomorrow — when Dan takes the stage of the Brooklyn Masonic Temple with a full 14-piece ensemble — he can no longer be called an electronic musician ... which is the point of the whole thing, I suppose.

My co-worker and I got the opportunity to drive to Baltimore this week to check out Dan and his 14-piece entourage practice for the very first time for their upcoming show. So after two speeding tickets and a belly full of Waffle House, we made it to the practice space where Deacon would realize his vision of translating his pulsing, addictively danceable beats into live instrumentation.

(More from the Dan Deacon rehearsal, after the jump!)

I was skeptical at first. I've been to a few Dan Deacon shows, and part of the thrill of seeing him perform is that he doesn't just sit there austerely surveying his crowd from the stage. Instead, he chooses to perform his complex electronic sets from within the teeming crowd, with waves of people clustering and dancing around him. But when we sat down together, he assured us that he wasn't about to trade in his effects pedal for a conducting baton. Dan will still be there performing with his infamous table of electronic mixers and modifiers ... he'll just have 14 additional musicians to round out the sound and make it more complex.

So as my co-producer and I arrived at the Baltimore loft that would serve as the launching pad for this experiment in electronic vs. traditional instrumentation, we were pleasantly surprised to see that the frenetic energy and danceability of Dan's music was not lost in its translation to an ensemble band. In fact, I was impressed by how much richer and more dense the music sounded now that it was coming from 14 different sources (15 if you include Dan, who was still doing his own thing while simultaneously directing his ad hoc orchestra).

Of course, the rehearsal wasn't perfect. There were quite a few moments when they had to work out division of parts on the spot or had to take a moment to re-evaluate a part that just couldn't be played by human hands. But as Dan pointed out, this was the first time that the ensemble had ever assembled in their completed form (many were meeting for the first time that day), so, of course, there were kinks to work out. And if nothing else, music should be about experimentation and not being afraid to try new things.

As Dan told us during one of the rehearsal breaks, this is the direction he has taken with his upcoming album Bromst — so while this may be the first time we got to see Dan with his ensemble band, I'm banking on the fact that we'll see them all again real soon. ...

Just don't call Dan an "electronic" musician anymore.