plus: Suge Knight. Perry Farrell. FCC: the Bush years. Nashville whines.

Michael Jackson [ tickets ]'s management company, the Firm, has dropped Jackson, the Associated Press reported. The company reportedly declined to comment on the reason behind the drop, but "a highly placed source" told the Hitsdailydouble.com that Jackson "was too unpredictable and didn't follow directions."

Sonicnet reported that Michael Jackson recently cut a song with Carlos Santana.

Paul McCartney [ tickets ] met with Secretary of State Colin Powell on Thursday (4/19), a meeting in which McCartney "advocated the worldwide abolition of land mines," according to the Associated Press.

Black Entertainment Television will air an interview with Death Row Records founder Suge Knight on April 24 at 7:30 p.m. Eastern Time. The network says it's "the first full on-camera interview that Knight has granted from behind bars." Knight is currently serving a nine-year prison sentence, handed down in 1996, for violating a probation for a 1992 assault by committing a 1995 assault. Knight is likely to be released from prison in a matter of days.

As we write this, we're listening to Perry Farrell's CD "Song Yet to Be Sung," due from Virgin on June 19. Sounds sort of like Radiohead's "Kid A," but funkier, and with more guitarwork.

The Federal Communications Commission said that "one of the four major television networks--ABC, CBS, NBC or Fox--can belong to the same company as a smaller, emerging network such as UPN or WB," the New York Times reported. According to the article, "The action also marks the beginning of what observers expect to be a wave of decisions under the new GOP-led FCC to ease regulations on media businesses."

The Nashville Tennessean reported on a National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences-sponsored panel discussion, featuring record executives bemoaning the current state of country music.

''We have a real dependence on [adult contemporary] records,'' said one of them.

''What I resent is that radio has decided there has to be one sound, and now it's a very pop-oriented sound that excludes traditional country to a large degree," said another.

So that's why country sucks: the executives are helpless.