Buddy Holly might have been celebrating his 75th birthday on Sept. 7, had the iconic rock 'n' roll pioneer not perished at age 22 in the infamous "day the music died" Iowa plane crash, which also took the lives of Richie Valens and J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson.

This year, Holly's birthday will be celebrated in a huge way, with events including the unveiling of his star on the Hollywood Boulevard Walk of Fame and the release of "Listen To Me: Buddy Holly," an all-star tribute album that also serves as the basis for the "Ultimate Buddy Party," a VIP concert event to be filmed as a PBS special.

Legendary record producer Peter Asher is the man behind "Listen To Me," and he'll be on hand to speak at the star unveiling as well as the concert. He tells us the first performer lined up for the album was Stevie Nicks.

"We asked her very early on, so she got to choose which song she wanted to do," Asher says. "She grabbed 'Not Fade Away' and did a really great job with it. It's a really great vocal."

Others on the highly listenable album include Ringo Starr, Brian Wilson, Eric Idle, The Fray, Cobra Starship, Patrick Stump, Jeff Lynne, Natalie Merchant, Imelda May, Lyle Lovett, Jackson Browne, Chris Isaak, Pat Monahan of Train and Zooey Deschanel.

"It was one step at a time," Asher says. "There are people we thought would be Buddy Holly fans who weren't necessarily. Others heard what we were doing and said, 'I'm in.'"

Zooey — the couldn't-be-hotter indie-rocker/actress who has a new Fox sitcom, "The New Girl," debuting Sept. 20 — was actually the last star aboard the project.

"That was interesting. We were thinking about 'It's So Easy,'" Asher says of the perennial Holly favorite, "and I'd been a fan of Zooey's since I first heard (her duo) She & Him." Then, "I ran into her in my house — at a party my daughter Victoria was giving downstairs." Victoria is a member of Cobra Starship. "I had read that she was a Linda Ronstadt fan," Asher says, "so I knew we had that in common ... She committed right away."

Ronstadt's 1976 hit version of Holly's "That'll Be the Day" — one of many Ronstadt recordings produced by Asher — is also included on the album.

"It's a labor of love for me," he says of the project, into which he's put about a year so far. Holly's career, Asher notes, was incredibly prolific and potent, despite its stunning brevity.

"Not only did he write this extraordinary catalog of songs, but he was starting to change things in other ways. He wanted to start his own label. That was revolutionary at the time. He was questioning the structure of the record business. He would have changed the whole music business."

Not only that, but, "He made glasses cool," praises Asher. "He was the nerdy guy for the nerdy guys among us — like me — to identify with. My songwriting partner at the time wanted to be Elvis. I wanted to be Buddy Holly."

GENRE BENDER: The paranormal meets photogenic reality TV competition in Zak Bagans' "Paranormal Challenge," in which two teams of ghost hunters stay overnight at a purportedly haunted locale to see who can collect the most evidence of supernatural stuff. Yes, really. Tomorrow night's (Aug. 19) show has the ladies of Paranormal Hot Squad squaring off against the Ghost Bros team at Lompoc, California's, La Purisima Mission, site of a bloody 1823 battle between Spanish troops and Chumash tribespeople.

"We have to sit there in our waiting room, in a pitch-black, dark lounge," recalls Camryn Grimes, who guest ghosted with the Paranormal Hot Squad for the night. "I was freaking out. I really was. When they said, 'Alright teams, are you ready? Go!' the fear turns into adrenaline. I'm very competitive."

The pretty 21-year-old actress of "The Young and the Restless" fame, as well as shows such as "NCIS," has been a fan of paranormal programs for years — but she says she'd never had a ghostly experience herself. She says she went into "Paranormal Challenge" wanting to come out with answers, "saying, 'Yes, this is real,' or 'No, this is not real.'"

Guess which way it went.

"I completely believe — completely," says Camryn. Put in charge of equipment, she says she crammed to learn as fast as possible as much as she could about ghost hunting gear. She brought along "digital cameras, one infrared camera ... a thermal imaging camera, two audio recorders ... a Mel Meter ..."

What's a Mel Meter? "That's sort of the Swiss Army knife of paranormal investigation equipment," answers Camryn. She then describes the microprocessor-based, handheld instrument, which detects temperature and electromagnetic field changes and such.

She won't give away what happens but does say she's become hooked on paranormal investigation as a result of the Travel Channel show.

BRICK HOUSE: With Spike Lee, John Ridley, "Entourage" creator Doug Ellin and boxing champ Mike Tyson working together, you just know their planned HBO series is going to be something worth watching — if only out of curiosity alone.

Formerly titled "Da Brick" and now referred to as "untitled," the series, about a young African-American guy who has to face the realities of the mean streets of Newark, New Jersey, after getting out of prison, draws from Tyson's own youth. Casting is under way for the main character — they're looking for someone who can box — and an assortment of his colorful associates. Those include a "thoughtful, deep," twenty-something African-American guy from a stable middle-class home, a 19-to-22-year-old hustler, a "thuggish" half-Latino-half-black 26-year-old and a 33-year-old African American girl.

BAD GUYS: Jamie Harris is among the friends and associates of Tom Felton's who finds it ironic that the young actor is "really a kind person, an absolute sweetheart" — despite being known world-wide for playing evil, as Draco Malfoy of the "Harry Potter" movies and as the abusive animal caretaker who pushes Harris around in the current box office hit, "Rise of the Planet of the Apes."

"I told (Felton), 'Get used to it, man.'" says Harris, son of the late Richard Harris. "'I always play evil.'"

In fact, Harris is now joining the cast of this fall's much-buzzed FX series, "American Horror Story," as a really-not-good guy. "American Horror Story" is the gothic "psychosexual thriller" — as Ryan Murphy calls it — from "Glee" and "Nip/Tuck" creators Murphy and Brad Falchuk. It stars Dylan McDermott and Connie Britton and recurring star Jessica Lange.

"I'm really happy," Harris says. "It's great to be working as an actor in good projects."

Even if he has to be bad.

To find out more about Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith and read their past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com