AUSTIN, Texas -- When Snoop Dogg passed through Willie Nelson's neck of the woods during South By Southwest in March, he took some time to pay tribute to his unlikely friend.

He regaled reporters with mostly NSFW stories about time the pair spent together in Amsterdam, sharing their mutual love of music, marijuana and fried chicken. The always lighthearted Snoop also got serious when talking about his friendship with Nelson and the 79-year-old singer's unique role as a musical ambassador.

"When I first met him you would think he was a hip-hop artist because he showed love to me as if I was in his world and I never made country music or none of that, but he understood who I was," Snoop said. "And it drove me to make country music. I made a couple of country records and was a part of his album and went to the Country Music Awards and worked with Brad Paisley, went to Johnny Cash's house. I was getting heavy into it and finding country music is a form of hip-hop music. It's the same thing. We're the same people. Don't let the rhythm fool you. It's the same game."

The feeling is mutual, which is why Nelson included Snoop on his newest album, "Heroes," a collection of songs sung with Nelson's musical heroes that came out this month. The 40-year-old rapper is the only musician on the album not connected to country music in some way.

"I just like the guy personally and his music is great," Nelson said. "I'm not a big rapper-type fan, but I know he's great because he's already a legend and he's not that old, and there's a lot of people out there who are huge Snoop fans. He and I have a lot in common because we both smoke a little dope together now and then. Mainly we like to get together and play a little music and hang out any chance we get."

Others who appear with Nelson on the 14-track album include Ray Price, Merle Haggard, Billy Joe Shaver and Sheryl Crow. Nelson and Snoop Dogg are joined by Kris Kristofferson and Jamey Johnson on "Roll Me Up," one of three songs Nelson wrote or co-wrote. And Nelson and Haggard recast "A Horse Called Music." He also covers songs by Tom Waits, Coldplay and Pearl Jam.

That list also includes Nelson's son, Lukas, who appears on more than half the songs on the Buddy Cannon-produced album. The two have recorded together before, but never so extensively.

"It's kind of the first time it happened with us," Lukas Nelson said. "It was cool. It was exciting for me, at least. This was nice to be a part of."

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If crazy Britney and troubled Demi Lovato don't deserve to be on the X Factor panel, who does? Watch me moan about it.

I started on this difficult topic last week, but Britney Spears and Demi Lovato aren't the first people I'd ask to judge anything. Literally anything. And because the institution of reality television is sacred, it pains me that Britney and Demi have taken up two valuable spots as judges on Simon Cowell's enormous freakshow X Factor. Will Britney burn the whole place down on day one? Will Demi do it and blame it on Britney? (Clever.) The possibilities for despair are endless. The question remains: If these two are wrong for the job, then who's right?

In this week's Weeklings, I tear apart all the other candidates for Simon Cowell's co-anchors. This means Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Adam Levine, Sheryl Crow, Paula Abdul, Nelly Furtado, and the Jonas Brothers all come up and go down hard. Scared? Don't be! Unless you're Avril Lavigne.

You can find previous Weeklings episodes here.

For music fans, the main way to avoid hefty TicketMaster or other fees is to purchase tickets directly from a venue. But it's not just fans that are buying tickets at the box office--its bands too.

As the New York Times recently reported, one Colorado band, the String Cheese Incident -- a jam band with a devoted granola-and-Birkenstock fan base -- has taken fee-avoidance on behalf of its fans to a new level and recently pulled off a massive crowdsourcing feat to help its fans avoid TicketMaster fees.

The band, which is headquartered in Colorado, rallied about 50 of its fans in Los Angeles to march over to the Greek Theater and buy tickets in person -- each person could buy eight tickets -- for an upcoming show. The group bought all 400 available tickets at $49.95 each and mailed them back to the band's office. String Cheese Incident is now selling them from its website -- at face value -- though with a shipping cost of $12 per order.

“We’re scalping our own tickets at no service charge,” Mike Luba, one of the group’s managers, told the NYT. “It’s ridiculous.”

The band's tactics underscore the extreme lengths fans -- and some fan-friendly artists -- will go to get around ticket fees, which can add as much as 30 to 40 percent to the cost of a show, according to the NYT.

Much to fans' frustration, service fees and other vendor fees have just become part and parcel of concert going, bumping up the cost per ticket from a few bucks to almost $20.

Some venues have moved away from TicketMaster to other ticketing systems, such as the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, Ga., but that doesn't necessarily mean lower fees. For example, a $72 ticket to see Nicki Minaj at the Fox this summer will cost another $14.25 in fees, according to the AJC.

While getting tickets at the box office can cut down on most fees, another way to save money is to just wait until the last minute. Buyers on ticket resale website StubHub.com reported that they paid 30 percent less in ticket costsby purchasing on the day of the event, than if they had purchased tickets one month prior.

Of course, String Cheese Incident is hardly the first band to sell tickets directly to their fans. The Grateful Dead sold tickets through mail order -- a practice that ended up becoming a time-honored ritual with fans decorating envelopes for their ticket orders.

What are you doing to avoid service fees for summer concert tickets? Share a comment or email money@huffingtonpost.com.

The "Glee" Season 3 finale (Tuesday, May 22 at 9 p.m. ET on Fox) will be emotional and that's partly due to Gloria Estefan, who guest stars as Santana's (Naya Rivera) mom Maribel in the season finale. (Take a look at Estefan in her new role in the slideshow below.)

"She needed a supportive mom," Gloria Estefan told TVGuide.com about Santana coming out to her abuela earlier this season, which didn't go well ... at all. "That bugged me."

The season finale sees many members of McKinley High's New Directions prepare to move on as their senior year comes to a close. And that means Santana has to say goodbye to her girlfriend and fellow Cheerio Brittany (Heather Morris).

"For Maribel, the issue is not that her daughter is gay. The issue is that if ... she leaves and the other one doesn't -- how is that going to affect her decision-making?" Estefan told TVGuide.com. "She really wants Santana to be educated and go to college."

Unfortunately, Estefan said she wouldn't be singing this time around. "Hopefully I'll be back," she said. "In a way, I'm happy because once I'm singing, it throws me more into Gloria Estefan-land. You can hear me sing everywhere else." But she does throw around some Santana-esque zingers. "The apple doesn't fall from the tree," Estefan told TVGuide.com with a laugh.

"Glee" star Cory Monteith, who plays Finn, told ET Online earlier that the finale contains "a lot of cliffhangers, but it explains a lot too."

His on-screen (and possibly off-screen) girlfriend Lea Michele, who plays Rachel Berry, echoed his statements previously to ET Online. "It definitely does wrap everything up really nicely and let you know where everybody is going to be heading off to, but it does leave a lot open because a lot of people will be back next year," she said. "It leaves their storylines open to go to lots of different places for next season."

Click over to TVGuide.com for more form Gloria Estefan and click through the slideshow below to see photos from the "Glee" Season 3 finale, which airs Tuesday, May 22 at 9 p.m. ET on Fox.

Courtney Stodden doesn't turn 18 for three more months, but she has already started making what can only be described as "fetish videos."

The teenage bride channels (and ruins) Hello Kitty in her new video "Hello Courtney," which was posted on YouTube on May 18.

Dressed in a hot-pink tutu and midriff-baring white tank top, Stodden completes her costume with Hello Kitty's trademark pink bow and has whiskers drawn on her face. The self-professed actress, singer and model then proceeds to literally crawl around her house on her hands and knees acting like a cat.

The bleached-blond teenager continues to attempt her best impression of "sexy kitty" by drinking out of a bowl on the floor, coughing up a hair ball, and -- yes, we're not making this up -- playing around in kitty litter.

The video is just plain creepy, and we can't help but feel as if we stumbled upon some weird role-play thing meant only for Stodden and her 51-year-old husband, actor Doug Hutchison.

WARNING: Watch at your own discretion. The following cannot be unseen:

While most of the royals from around the world were day-drinking at Windsor Castle today (seriously, most of them), one of Monaco's royal darlings was at a different party, hanging out south of London at a wee little film festival called Cannes.

The celebs were out in full force today in the south of France, taking time out from their packed roster of indie film screenings to catch a little light-hearted flick around noon: DreamWorks' "Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted."

Some celebs, however, went to see a more erudite flick: a re-release of the Sergio Leone’s 1984 film "Once Upon A Time In America," sponsored by the Gucci Film Foundation. Gucci girls Gemma Arterton and Natasha Poly were in attendance, as well as Jane Fonda, Naomi Watts and Salma Hayek, who looked lovely in a sparkly -- you guessed it -- Gucci dress..

But the lady that most caught our eye on the red carpet was Charlotte Casiraghi, the 25-year-old daughter of Princess Caroline of Monaco and granddaughter of Princess Grace of Monaco, who gave the premiere a little royal flair in her deep green ruffly Gucci fall 2012 dress. And in her long wavy hairdo, we can't help but think Charlotte resembled another royal who did some socializing today.

Casiraghi, a model who's covered Vogue Paris, is also the fresh new face of Gucci.

Check out photos of Charlotte -- and all the celebs -- below!