Pavement’s Stephen Malkmus will be on hand for this year’s Virgin FreeFest.Photo by Kyle Gustafson.Sir Richard Branson kicked off the inaugural broadcast of his company’s brand new Internet music stream this morning with the much-anticipated reveal of the lineup for this year’s Virgin Mobile Festival, slated to be held at Merriweather Post Pavilion on Saturday, September 25. The free festival, co-produced by Virgin and D.C.’s own IMP Productions — who operate the 9:30 Club as…

So you were at the big R.E.M. show last night? Yea, verily. How was it? On balance — awesome! The two Professional Journalists in my car rated it “a solid B” and a B+ on the way home. I might even go as high as an A-. It was the fifth time I’d seen R.E.M. perform a full set since 1995, and it was certainly the second-best, if not the best. What was so good…