The succubus strikes back! While we thought Winona “Sticky Fingers” Ryder had dropped out of the rock- star-shtupping business following an unceremonious dump by the latest in a long string of musical flavors du jour, Pete Yorn (and for angly faced Minnie Driver, no less), it appears we spoke too soon. Word from L.A. is that the former ingenue has recovered enough from December’s pills-thrills-and-shoplifting debacle to get her candy-cane colors up again for none less than the White Stripes’ Jack White. While the details and dates are a little fuzzy, we still must commend White on his rock star rite of passage—a long and illustrious line of messy-haired boys with major-label record deals and guitar cases full of cred have taken a Ryde on this particular actress express. Still, there is always more to look forward to: as long as she’s back in the game, a Winona/Julian Casablancas meeting of the minds is always a shining possibility—or, dare we dream it, one hot minute with Conor Oberst? . . . It looks like Courtney‘s off the hook, for now: A King County Superior Court judge ruled last Wednesday that Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic didn’t sufficiently present grounds enough to require that Love visit a court-appointed psychiatrist for a battery of psychological tests and said that such an examination would only “contribute a circuslike atmosphere” (a.k.a. DOON’s bread and butter) to the proceedings. The trial itself isn’t set to begin until September. . . . From a singer-turned-actress, let us go to an actress-turned-singer. Lippy movie star Gina Gershon is busy laying down vocals for her starring role in the upcoming Prey for Rock & Roll about an all-girl band trying to make it on the L.A. scene. Though the soundtrack is produced by Hedwig and the Angry Inch genius Stephen Trask and features Joan Jett on guitar duties (she will also appear as herself in the film), we

can’t help wondering if Gershon, while still very hot, isn’t pushing the “girl” part of “all-girl band” a little, seeing as how she’ll be turning 40 in June. We’re intrigued. . . . Minnesota slow-core trio Low are hard at work in England on their follow-up to the lovely Steve Albini-produced Things We Lost in the Fire, this time hitting the studio with famed nob man Tchad Blake, he of Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, and Dandy Warhols fame. A U.S. tour is a definite maybe for fall. . . . Things are getting ugly in the House of Weezer: Former bassist Matt Sharp has filed a five-count lawsuit against the band, along with its lawyers, management, and accountants. Though Sharp left nearly four years ago to focus on his side project, the Rentals, he takes issue with the distribution of royalties for, among other things, the band’s first big hit, “Undone—the Sweater Song,” which he claims he never received a co-writing credit for, and 25 percent interest owed him for the first nine tracks of the group’s 10-track sophomore opus Pinkerton. According to Billboard, Sharp and frontman Rivers Cuomo remained on friendly speaking terms as recently as a year ago, when it looked like Sharp may have had to fill in for then-replacement bassist Mikey Welsh, who was suffering from drug problems, on the video for the band’s “Islands in the Sun.” The remaining members of the band are, of course, saying the whole thing’s a crock of poo and have released a statement saying they’d rather use the court of law than the court of public opinion to deal with it, so no more juicy bits there. . . . There’s now talk of bad karma playing a role in the death last Thursday of TLC’s Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, who was killed instantly when the SUV she was driving spun off a Honduras road. Nearly three weeks before her own accident, Lopes was a passenger in a van driven by her assistant that struck and killed

a 10-year-old Honduran boy. Though the accident was never reported to authorities, Lopes did reportedly pay for all the boy’s medical expenses, as well as his funeral. Regardless of that morbid postscript and the mind-numbingly commercial nature of this weekend’s tributes to the late star (the record label president who only months ago permanently shelved Lopes’ pet project, her solo debut, suddenly releasing statements saying how like a daughter she was to him; Web sites hawking TLC video deals before the singer’s body had even been flown home to the states), she’ll truly be missed. Not only for her musical talent, which was pretty obvious, but for her refreshing lack of celebrity skin—Lopes was loopy, and she didn’t care who thought so. So she burned down her boyfriend’s house—she was sorry, but she didn’t try to spin it; so she knew a guy who she believed could cure AIDS—she didn’t care if talking about it made her sound flaky; she hated her bandmates sometimes and had no problem admitting it. Whatever she liked or didn’t like, she was always without apology herself, and how many of today’s PR-armored stars can you say that about? Rest in peace, Lisa.

Send news flashes, sightings, and bitchy bits to nights@seattleweekly.com.