The reunited Stone Roses will not make their rabidly anticipated live return at a trio of massive outdoor homecoming gigs in Manchester next summer, having today announced festival dates in Sweden and Denmark that will precede those sold-out shows.

The reunited Stone Roses — Ian Brown, John Squire, Gary “Mani” Mounfield and Alan “Reni” Wren — today announced they will headline the T in the Park Festival in the U.K., the Benicassim Festival in Spain and the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan next summer.

The Stone Roses sold out their two 2012 reunion concerts in Manchester in just 14 minute this morning, prompting the band to add a third show — which also sold out. All told, the band sold 220,000 tickets in 68 minutes, leading it to declare the concerts the ‘fastest selling rock gigs in U.K. history.’

The Stone Roses — Ian Brown, John Squire, Gary “Mani” Mounfield and Alan “Reni” Wren — this morning announced they are reuniting for the first time since the mid-’90s to play two hometown concerts next June in Manchester followed by a world tour — and they’re writing new songs.

The buzz about a possible reunion of The Stone Roses built over the weekend, with no official denial from the band’s members and seeming confirmation from friends such as Shaun Ryder and Tim Burgess — plus fresh rumors that not only are the Roses mounting a series of concerts, but recording a new album as well.

Two years after the last big swell of rumors, reports of an impending reunion of The Stone Roses once again are flying, thanks to a U.K. tabloid’s claim the band is ‘getting back together after Ian Brown and John Squire buried the hatchet on one of the most bitter feuds in rock ‘n’ roll history.’

It’s Ian Brown’s birthday today — he’s turning 48 — so to mark the occasion, we present one of those oft-told tales of Stone Roses lore: The band’s appearance on BBC’s ‘The Late Show’ in September 1989, which ended less than a minute into a live performance of ‘Made of Stone’ when the power abruptly cut out.

It’s one of the more unlikely covers you’ll ever hear: former New Order frontman Bernard Sumner crooning Elvis Presley’s melodramatic 1969 hit ‘In the Ghetto’ in a new recording made by the singer’s current band Bad Lieutenant for a forthcoming charity album to benefit a U.K. homeless advocacy group.

Turns out Peter Hook’s Freebass may not be the only Stone Roses/Smiths collaboration afoot: Ex-Roses vocalist Ian Brown this week told the BBC he’s planning […]

Former New Order bassist Peter Hook’s long-gestating Freebass project — which also features the four-stringed talents of The Smiths’ Andy Rourke and Gary “Mani” Mounfield […]

Record Rack: A weekly round-up of the pertinent new albums, reissues and/or box sets due out Tuesday. ARTIST: Ian Brown RELEASES: My Way BACKSTORY: The […]

  The Stone Roses last week marked the 20th anniversary of the band’s classic debut — arguably one of the best British albums of all […]

Yesterday, Slicing Up Eyeballs hit a somewhat negligible milestone, the six-month mark in its still-nascent existence chronicling the past, present and future of ’80s college […]