Yesterday was a pretty good day for music news, in that there were a few interesting articles that showed up in the mainstream press.

The first article that caught my attention was about a study that was done, showing that rock stars have a lower life expectancy than most people. While the deaths of rock stars, while they’re on top are mainly attributed to drug and alcohol abuse, it was also interesting to see that many die earlier than expected, after their bout with stardom. It was a really fascinating study.

The next story is actually a blog post referring to a New York Times article about Rick Rubin being asked to help run Columbia Records. Both the post and the article seem to speculate that Rubin was asked to step in, not just because he’s an amazing producer, but because they believe he can save the music industry.

As we’ve discussed many times on this blog, the record industry is in trouble, and it seems that they’re looking outside the box to try and save it. Enter Ruben, whose approach is usually perceived as unorthodox, but whose results are unquestionably astounding. It’ll be interesting to see what he comes up with. We’ll keep you posted on any news we come across about this.