For those who can’t wait to find out more about the upcoming episode of the CBS program, Cold Case, here’s your spoiler alert!

The Daily Trojan student newspaper at the University of Southern California has a little spoiler alert:

In the all-U2 episode, written by executive producer Veena Sud, the team tries to connect two drug-related murders that happened at 8:03 a.m. on the same day in 2002.

With both a wealthy white teenager and a poor African American teenager as two murder victims, the episode provides a valuable commentary on the negative effects drugs can have, regardless of race or socioeconomic background.

The @U2 Calendar shows that U2’s music will be featured on the CBS television program Cold Case on January 28. In this week’s TV Guide, writer Stephen Battaglio reports that CBS is going to do something that other networks haven’t done - start up its own label as a cost-cutting measure so that the network does not have to pay upwards of $25,000 in royalties for the use of a song. The article states:

CBS thinks TV can be the new radio. That’s why the network’s parent company has started up its own record label that will develop artists whose music can be used on its shows. Music is an increasingly important element on network dramas, but when shows have to pay up to $25,000 for a track - like CSI:NY recently did for the use of a Bruce Springsteen tune - the costs can add up. CBS Records figures it can give producers a lower-priced alternative if it develops its own artists. And if viewers like those tracks, they’ll be able to buy them as digital downloads or old-fashioned CDs. Of course, CBS had been in the record business for decades before selling it off to Sony in 1988. Too bad. One of its artists was Bruce Springsteen.

What a great way to earn a few more quid! U2’s music has also been featured on CSI: Las Vegas when How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb was first released.

This morning’s broadcast of NBC’s The Today Show featured a story on celebrity impersonators who roam around at the Universal Studios theme park in Los Angeles. Among the impersonators interviewed was Pavel Sfera, an actor who portrays Bono. Not a bad body double, although I don’t think Bono would wear the type of earing he does in the piece. Check it out for yourself here. (As a side note, it doesn’t surprise me that Universal Studios would have a Bono impersonator given that U2’s record company is part of Universal.)

“The Daily Show” segment “This Week in God” featured the U2-charist service that I’m sure you’ve read about. Or, as correspondent Samantha Bee put it, “Finally, a church service combining the spirituality of the Bible with the preachiness of Bono.” It starts around the 2:38 mark:

VH-1 is having another one of its ’80s flashbacks, this time counting down the “100 Greatest Songs of the ’80s,” according to votes from viewers. U2 made it into the countdown twice: at No. 38 with “Pride” and at No. 13 with “With or Without You.” As the rest of the countdown seemed to consist mainly of pop-electronic one-hit wonders and hair metal — not that there’s anything wrong with that — I was pleasantly surprised to see the boys make the list.

Of course I don’t put a lot of stock in a poll that puts “Pour Some Sugar on Me” and “Living on a Prayer” in the top spots, but I’ll take my U2 sightings anywhere I can get them.

And apparently “Streets” just barely missed the cut. If you’re an ’80s junkie like me, you can see more here.

Mary J. Blige performed an abbreviated version of “One” with 3rd place contestant Elliott Yamin last night. They omitted the second verse. This was the first time I’ve heard a U2 song on American Idol, not that I watch it obsessively or anything like that. The performance was 10% Yamin, 90% Blige. And, you know, either you like Mary’s version or you don’t. The easy-to-please audience at the Kodak Theater ate it up.