Smoking Section

The Smoking Section jetted out to La-La Land to soak up the Grammy festivities. Two days before the ceremony, we ran into Joss Stone poolside at the Sunset Marquis Hotel. She was still high from her Super Bowl pre-game performance, singing "Signed, Sealed, Delivered" with Stevie Wonder, and had her sights set on a showstopping Grammy performance with Sly Stone. The holdup: Sly had shown up that day at rehearsals in Burbank's CenterStaging studios with a bloody hand that he'd just injured while riding his motorcycle. Joss -- the only vocalist to do justice to Sly's melodies during the tribute -- also told us that she has just started recording her third album, and -- outta nowhere -- revealed that "if you ever get sad, hug a tree. It has healing powers."

From there we met up with Beck, and the Bard of the Barrio told us what's crackin' in 2006. He'll play some gigs with Radiohead this summer and celebrate the tenth b-day of Odelay with a deluxe reissue ("I'm trying to find the original 'Debra,'" Beck says, "because it was originally recorded for Odelay"). He'll also finish up an album he started two years back with producer Nigel Godrich. "We recorded everything in a week," Beck says. "And ever since we've been working on it a little bit at a time." He describes it as the bridge between Sea Change and Guero, citing a tune called "The Girl From R.I.P.-anema" that chronicles a disappointing trip to Brazil. And if that weren't enough, he's also scoring and writing tunes for director Jared Hess' follow-up to Napoleon Dynamite, starring Jack Black. "No filmmaker since Fellini has had such an eye for amazing characters," says Beck. "So it's called Nacho Libre -- it's about monks who secretly want to be wrestlers. They have pointy white boots and tights under their robes."

After visiting Billy Idol in his incense-clouded Hollywood Hills mansion, we headed over to Clive Davis' annual star-studded pre-Grammy bash at the Beverly Hilton, where we ran into Dave Grohl and his wife, Jordyn, and felt the kick of their unborn child. "Nine more weeks," the proud pop said, beaming. The next evening, after a luckless Grammy run for the Foos, Grohl was still looking on the bright side. "We may have lost five Grammys, but we just sold 52,000 tickets for our Hyde Park show [in London] on June 17th," he said. "It's with Motorhead and Queens of the Stone Age. Rock!"

At the Grammys, Bono told us that Kanye West was "an inspiration" and said that while Kanye is opening for U2 in Australia and New Zealand in March, they'll do some recording together . . . We also hunted down Chester Bennington after his Grammy duet with Paul McCartney, who reports that he's shelved his solo album for the time being to concentrate on the next Linkin Park record, which should be out in late summer. Rick Rubin is producing, and the band has already come up with fifty new tracks. "It's dark and spooky, poppy and very melodic," says Bennington. "Not a hard, heavy rock record. What it is, is fucking insane!"