Responding to criticism that she is too thin, Courteney Cox Arquette recently told Movieline: I understand when people say, Well your face gets gaunt, but to get your bottom half the right size, your face might have to be a little gaunt. Yet another target for natural selection.

CARSON DALY STUD? OR CARSON DALY DUD?

Ooooh. Ohhhhh. Hes soooo hot, cooed the girls in between commercial breaks as mega-celebrity Carson Daly signed pieces of paper shoved in his faces, t-shirts, dollar bills, even the occasional hand or arm. I had the fantastic opportunity to visit MTV Studios last Friday with another Crimson Arts editor and sit in on their highest rated show, Total Request Live, (TRL) hosted, of course, by the one, the only, Carson Daly. Theres no denying itno matter how much you loathe the showTotal Request Live is the arena to launch music (the American Bandstand of the 90s). If you crack the countdown, chances are youll show up on the Billboard Hot 100 the next Thursday. Want proof? Remember, TRL was the show that first flaunted Britney Spears assets (all two of them) with the schoolgirl-themed Baby One More Time last December. But TRL once known for having Backstreet Boys at #1, NSync at #2, 98 Degrees at #3 every single dayisnt just bubblegum pop anymore. On Fridays show, Backstreet held #1, but Korn was close behind at #2, and several R&B groups including Destinys Child were close on their heels. The young girls who dominate TRLs audience might even be getting tired of their boybandsthe countdown is showing encouraging signs of diversity.

We got the royal treatment at MTV. Besides getting to be in the audience of a show for which kids compete vehemently for spots, we also had a chance to sit down with Daly and an executive producer of the show to find out why TRL has become such a runaway pop culture juggernaut. Want to hear Carsons opinion of Harvard? Or find out what really makes these teenage girls tick? Well lay out our whole Incredibly True Adventures of A Boy and a Girl in Love...with MTV in a coming issue.

TREND-O-RAMA: POP MACHINES

What luck! I spotted the next big music phenomenon when two girls and two boys took to the stage as the opening act at a recent pop extravaganza. Critics will argue that theyve got itthat vaguely-defined, over-emphasized star quality which makes success inevitable. But Im pretty sure that theyll launch hit after hit because theyve got the five ingredients to be a pop culture phenomenon:

1. They can dance.

2. Theyre blandly attractive. Blond girl with pretty hair. Blond boy with pretty skin. Brunette boy with big muscles. Brunette girl with big lips. The girls fawn, the boys drool. Ooooh, ohhh, theyre soooooo hot.

3. They cant sing. Theyre professional lip-synchers! No live band, no improvisation. Just pure, 100 percent unconcentrated lip-synching straight out of the carton. No potential for mess-ups, no whines from the crowd that the live versions sound different, no need for talent!

4. They arent original. They dont write their own music (Hanson this is not). In fact, they dont even have producers who write songs for them. Get thisthey only sing ABBA tracks! Hooray! Take Dancing Queen or Mama Mia or Super Trouper: Add in some techno beats, throw in a few trills, make a music videoand bam!youre a superstar with an endless catalogue of hits.

5. Theyre 15 years old! Yup, theyre the new Abba Generation (the title of their first album). The teens will eat it up, parents will indulge in the nostalgia, and TRL will have a new countdown mainstay.

The groups called A*Teens (and you thought I was kidding!) and is currently rockingor rather poppingthrough Europe on their oh-so-demanding lip-synching tour. When they make their U.S. debut later this year, expect mass hysteria (t-shirts, lunchboxes, posters, book tie-ins, etc.oh and a deal with Pepsi once the Ricky Martin contract dies a miserable death in the next few months). After all, theyre young, dreamy and entirely unoriginalwhat more could you want?