Maxim, the magazine known for its pictorials of scantily clad women, had been caught with its pants down, so to speak, in fabricating not one but two album reviews. The Black Crowes called them out when the magazine gave their new album, Warpaint, 2.5 stars.

"They sound pretty much like they always have: boozy, competent, and in slavish debt to the Stones, the Allmans, and the Faces," went the review.

Sounds like a valid assessment if the reviewer had heard the complete album. The problem was, the album wasn't made available for the press at that time.

It gets better.

The rapper Nas' album was also given a 2.5 stars, calling it "radio friendly." Maybe Nas' album could get a better score from Maxim should he ever finish recording it.

He said, "I don't know what a music rating from Maxim is. I don't know what it even means really."

Maxim editorial director James Kaminsky apologized calling these errors "a mistake."

"We have often run previews, which are based on the fact that an album is coming out ... but (those in the March issue) should not have had star ratings attached to (them)," he said. "There was a bit of a breakdown that led to that happening and I'm looking into it and, as I've said, we've already put measures in place to ensure that that will not happen again."

The author responsible for those reviews/previews had this to say:

"I was assigned to write previews of the Black Crowes and Nas albums. I did that. When the issue came out, the previews were laid out as reviews complete with star ratings. I never at any point or to anyone claimed to have heard these albums in their entirety. Whatever decisions Maxim made after I turned in my work were beyond my control."

Goes to show, don't believe everything you read.