The Sheepdogs win Rolling Stone cover contest (AP)

NEW YORK – Landing the cover of Rolling Stone is usually confirmation of superstar status. The Sheepdogs — winners of the magazine's first contest to be on the cover — aren't there yet, but they may be on their way.

The Canadian rock band beat out 15 other competitors in "Do You Wanna Be a Rock & Roll Star?" to land on the cover. The winner was announced Monday.

The magazine hits newsstands Friday.

The previously unsigned act is also getting a deal with Atlantic Records, and on Tuesday they'll release a digital EP "Five Easy Pieces" and perform on NBC's "Late Night With Jimmy Fallon."

"The biggest thing is ... just being able to tell everybody, and seeing what happens," Ewan Currie, lead singer of the quartet from Saskatoon, said in an interview last week with The Associated Press.

The runner-up is singer-songwriter Leila Broussard. Her soft, guitar-strumming tunes are a marked contrast to the hard-driving, rollicking rock offered by the Sheepdogs.

There was apparently no love lost between the two acts. Currie said of Broussard: "She could be rather sullen and not particularly friendly."

They battled it out at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Tenn., and in the end, readers showed their preference.

Currie said that while Rolling Stone has had its share of pop acts over the years, the Sheepdogs probably best embody the magazine's spirit.

"In the end, rock `n' roll won," he said.

While the Sheepdogs, all in their 20s, are being introduced to the masses, they're hardly a new group. The band — which also includes drummer Sam Corbett, guitarist Leot Hanson and bassist Ryan Gullen — have been around since 2006. They have released their albums independently, are regular road performers and have a website.

"We were helped by the fact that we are experienced, and we have been running this operation," Currie said. "We were fully formed ... we were ready to seize it."

The group is excited to be on Atlantic Records and to have access to the resources a major label can offer. But band members are hoping the label won't try to change them too much.

"Ultimately we want to put out a record that represents us, and we don't want to change ... so if it changed, it would be a shame," he said.

A massive billboard of the Rolling Stone cover was to be unveiled Monday evening in New York's Times Square.

"It's going to be pretty surreal," Currie said.

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Online:

http://www.rollingstone.com

http://www.thesheepdogs.com

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Nekesa Mumbi Moody is the AP's music editor. Follow her at http://www.twitter.com/nekesamumbi

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Rolling Stone selects final 2 for cover contest (AP)

NEW YORK – Bonnaroo will be more than a gig for two acts: It will help serve as the final battle for the cover of Rolling Stone.

Lelia Broussard and The Sheepdogs have been announced as the finalists for the magazine's "Do You Wanna Be A Rock & Roll Star" contest. It started in February with 16 acts.

The winner also gets a deal with Atlantic Records.

The victor will be picked by Rolling Stone readers. They can see both acts perform at next month's Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival in Tennessee; their performances will be streamed on the magazine's website.

The winner will be crowned on NBC's "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon" and also perform on the show. The Rolling Stone cover will appear on the Aug. 18 issue.

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Online:

http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/ap/ap_en_mu/storytext/us_rolling_stone_contest/41520514/SIG=10uk0g9he/*http://www.rollingstone.com/

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"Like a Rolling Stone" Dylan's best song (Reuters)

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – No reason to get excited, as Bob Dylan once sang, but the bard's 1965 anthem "Like a Rolling Stone" has been declared his greatest song by none other than Rolling Stone magazine.

Its latest cover story, marking Dylan's 70th birthday on May 24, lists his 70 greatest songs, as determined by an expert panel of writers, academics and musicians.

Additionally, celebrity rockers such as Bono, Mick Jagger and Lucinda Williams have weighed in with essays about various songs on the list.

"Like a Rolling Stone," which Bono described as "a black eye of a pop song," was followed in the rankings by "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall," "Tangled Up in Blue," "Just Like a Woman" and "All Along the Watchtower."

Jagger raves about the three-chord simplicity of the 11-minute "Desolation Row (No. 12), Williams zeroes in on the theme of jealousy over artistic success in ""Positively Fourth Street" (No. 16), and Keith Richards says "Girl from the North Country" (No. 30) was better in its original incarnation as a solo tune than as a later duet with Johnny Cash.

Even though Dylan has enjoyed a resurgence in the past 14 years, the highest-ranking song from the era came in at a modest No. 21 -- "Mississippi," a tune from 2001's "Love and Theft." Sheryl Crow, who recorded the song three years before Dylan did, said it introduces him "as somebody facing mortality with an upbeat attitude."

A list published on Rolling Stone's Web site lists 20 "overlooked classics," a handful from Dylan's difficult '80s period when albums such as the gospel release "Saved" and the synth-heavy "Empire Burlesque" left many fans scratching their heads.

Other lists identify the best covers of Dylan songs -- inevitably including Jimi Hendrix's overhaul of "All Along the Watchtower" -- his most inscrutable songs, and his best bootleg recordings. A 30-question quiz will keep Dylan nerds entertained, briefly.

(Editing by Jill Serjeant)

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