This in from MTV News exec producer Jim Fraenkel:

For those of you who’ve been following our “Idol In Iraq” series here at Newsroom, here’s a little bit of backstory about Private First Class Nathan Puckett — the 19-year-old soldier who made our weekly “Idol” installments happen.

Nathan came to the attention of MTV News strictly by chance…through my Facebook account.

About three months ago, I received a friend request from Nathan. We had no friends in common, so after accepting, I asked why he’d reached out to me. He told me that I looked like someone who had been in “a military class” with him. “Looks like I’m wrong,” he concluded. “Anyways, how’s New York? I’ve never been. After I get out of Iraq, I’m probably gonna try to visit one of my friends up there.”

The two of us struck up a friendship online. Our stations in life, it seemed, couldn’t have been farther apart, geographically or otherwise: I was the executive producer of MTV News, while Nathan had enlisted in the Army “right out of high school.” But we soon discovered common ground… Read more…

Now, personally, I always took the Panic At the Disco song “That Green Gentleman” to be more about the, um, 4:20 club than the Sierra Club, if ykwim. The band, however, wouldn’t cop to that when I talked to them yesterday…Whatever.

But Panic did want to talk about the environmental consciousness of their current trek, the 2008 Honda Civic Tour. Before each night’s show, singer Brendan Urie appears in a video, encouraging fans to take part in an “eco-contest” to decide how a large chunk of change raised on the tour will be used to help the planet. (For more info on that, go here.)

Brendan also explained to me that the band is working on the tour with two non-profit eco organizations: Reverb, which facilitates environmentally friendly touring; and Global Inheritance, which seeks to inspire more eco-activism. “Plus, at each show there’s a few things to get kids involved,” he told me. “Honda have a bike setup where you can charge your phone, and there’s pamphlets and information. Lots of good stuff.”

Ryan Ross said the band has been doing good things as well, from traveling on a biodiesel bus, to re-using plastics, and recycling more backstage. “It’s been cool for us because we’re young guys — we’re still learning about what’s going on, too. So it’s been personal,” he said. “I think it’s been good for everybody to try and do a little something.”

Now fellas, back to this “Green Gentleman”? “Green can be so many things,” Brendan said with a smile. “You’re new to something…You’re jealous…It could be my favorite color…” But Ryan stopped me in my tracks: “You’ll never know, John. You’ll never know!”

There are several things that are awesome about Cobra Starship’s new “Guilty Pleasure” video (above), and Patrick Stump’s cameo is most of them. Don’t get us wrong, we’re suckers for Rollerblades, Zubaz, and DeLoreans, but it’s P’s turn as Cobra’s manager — “Rob McFlynn” — which steals the show (and not just because he appears sans hat, for probably the first time ever).

No, we love it because he’s doing a dead-on impression of Fall Out Boy (and Cobra Starship’s) real-life manager, the burly and barrel-chested Bob McLynn. Stump’s no stranger to acting (earlier this year he logged a “Law & Order” cameo), but his McLynn impression is so great — check the bellowing baritone and the wild gesturing — that we have a newfound respect for the frontman. He’s like our very own Rich Little or something.

Anyway, we’re also fired up about the impression because back in March, when we were down in Chile with Fall Out Boy on the whole Antarctica debacle, we witnessed Stump working on his McLynn impression first hand. And we’ve got the video to prove it.

For a rare look inside the mind of a Method actor, watch the clip after the jump. Read more…

Earlier, we visited a behind-the-scenes clip from John Norris’s exclusive interview with Madonna and Justin Timberlake backstage after their recent Roseland show. Well, there’s more…

We couldn’t resist sharing this with you: John getting schooled by the Queen of Pop.

Ever the dutiful journalist, John refuses to give up on his line of questioning about Madonna’s “milestone” 50th year – but Madge is having none of it. She even starts quoting her own lyrics from her song “Give It 2 Me” to prove her point. As the interview ends, John is still trying to defend himself, telling the diva how much she’s going to miss him when she’s stuck talking to some real idiots during her Hard Candy press junket…

Watch and enjoy. And John, we think you’re adorable — and we kind of suspect Madonna thinks so too.

Working at MTV News is always exhausting, often hilarious, sometimes crisis-inducing, and frequently surreal. As it was earlier this week, when on a single afternoon we played host to a slew of artists who have literally zip in common. We talked YouTube with Tokio Hotel, ate hot dogs with The Teenagers, and got all misty with Snoop as he talked about visiting Amsterdam “coffee shops” with Willie Nelson. Amazing.

Manhattan’s swanky Palace Hotel normally serves as the “UES” HQ for the phenomenal “Gossip Girl” series. But this week it was home to another group of Teenagers: the French pop trio that apparently read the MTV News blog and decided to come Stateside just as the entire 29th floor was becoming obsessed with them at once. (OK, they have an album and a tour. Whatevs.)

Our own John Norris, riding the waves of ironic pop ecstasy, sat down with lead singer Quentin Delafon, guitarist Dorian Dumont, and bassist Michael Szpinern to talk about their Reality Check CD — and, of course, “Gossip Girl,” which featured their anthem “Feeling Better” in a recent episode. (Actually, they’re asking their adorable female fans to shoot their own music videos for the single, which they say they’re planning to edit into one self-referential masterpiece.)

The band also told us why they decided to make themselves a pronunciation-challenged English-language band, why the French music scene is kind of awful [Ed: MC Solaar!!], and how disappointed they were when they first learned that Britney Spears wasn’t really a virgin. Sigh. Check back with MTV News for all of that.

After the interview, the boys were craving some authentic American cuisine, so they wandered down Madison Avenue to the nearest street vendor for hot dogs. After wolfing down his wiener, Quentin turned to the camera and exclaimed, “We love New York!”

Oh, Quentin, we hope you are not toying with us. We can never tell.

More pics from the shoot — and their weekend NY show — after the jump. Read more…

This in from MTV News super-shooter Akshay Bhansali:

I just spent a rather bizarre weekend down in New Orleans. My dad serves on the board of directors of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, and the final weekend wrapped yesterday. It all started with a party at the family house, which involved consuming copious amounts duck po-boy, boudin balls, and soft-shell crawfish (yes, you can apparently soften more than just crab), and fixing Gwyneth Paltrow’s mom’s cellphone(??). Blythe Danner is an incredibly cool woman!

After the party I cruised over to Frenchman Street in the Marigny to catch M.I.A. perform in a crazy steamy warehouse. The crowd hardly seemed to care about the heat — when she opened her epic show with “Bamboo Banger,” the room became pure, awesome chaos. Maya had Cherry, always at her side, onstage with her, and even her brother Sugu was hyping up the crowd! She ended with the album closer “Paper Planes,” which not only puts a new spin on a Clash classic but works shockingly well in the “Pineapple Express” trailer, correct??

Pics from JazzFest — and what M.I.A. reveals to Akshay backstage — after the jump. Read more…

We like to think of ourselves as a mini United Nations here, so we were delighted when the nice young Germans of Tokio Hotel stopped by the office today, hair and all.

We were pretty shocked Tom would make the undiplomatic move of wearing a Red Sox hat here in Yankee town [Ed: WTF??], but the be-dreaded guitarist assured me he was “so pretty” people can’t really get mad at him. Sorry, Tom, they so can. Fortunately for him, there’s usually a pack of screaming 14-year-old girls (and one burly bodyguard) surrounding you at all times.

Anyway, the band’s English language album Scream drops here tomorrow — it’s already out in Europe, which is why so many shrieking American tweens have all the lyrics memorized. Anime porcupine/frontboy Bill said it was pretty weird recording songs in English that he was used to singing in German. His favorite track to do live off the album is title song, while twin Tom favors “Read, Set, Go!” But don’t worry — they agree on, like, everything else!

Much more on the band’s love of Rammstein, The Scorpions, and The Hoff to come here at MTV News. (Oh, yes, it’s true — they are that adorably lost in translation.) And more pics of the band’s visit, after the jump. Read more…

This in from MTV News producer — and gold-medal video-set visitor — Yasmine Richard. Girl hit the LA shoot for The Game and Keyshia Cole’s collaboration, “Pain”:

Last Friday, when we saw “The Hood” as the location for The Game and Keyshia Cole’s new collabo “Pain,” we weren’t sure to expect. But we were pleasantly surprised to see Keyshia and The Game and about 800 of Game’s closest friends making themselves at home on a really laidback set.

The set-up was pretty simple: The Game rolls up and hops in Keyshia’s black ‘64 rag-top Chevy Impala. But it turns out that was easier said than done, because the first time Key Key put her foot on the gas, we heard a loud crash and saw something fall off from the back of the car. Smooth move, Keyshia!

Check back with MTV News for more on The Game and Keyshia Cole.

(Photo: www.JorgePeniche.com)

This is how it happened: An MTV News crew, powerful! and ready!, headed from our NYC HQ out to Chicago to shoot standups in preparation for R. Kelly’s trial. (We’ll soon be airing an updated version of our initial show on the complex child-pornography case, “The Case Against R. Kelly: When the Gavel Drops.”)

For this reason, Sway found himself, on a particularly windy day, standing on the steps of the Cook County Criminal Courthouse rehearsing for an intro along the lines of “It is here, in this courthouse, that R. Kelly will finally stand trial…” (you know the drill)…When who would stroll right out of the courthouse but Kelly himself.

So we got the exclusive, right?? An amazing candid moment in front of the courthouse in the last tense days before the trial! Um, no. As producer Bernard Lumpkin put it, “We were so busy covering R. Kelly that we missed R. Kelly!”

Sway, who requested that we “slay Bernard,” dialed this in from the site:

Comedy, it was classic comedy. I saw him, and I was screaming at the top of my lungs to Bernard, “Yo! Yo!” I’m screaming to Bernard and the dudes — and they’re playing connect-the-dots with the back of the camera! I felt like I was invisible! I was screaming out into the world.

Pure. Comedy.

Oh, Bernard. You’re going to have one looooong day in Chi-town…