LOS ANGELES – Demi Moore smoked something before she was rushed to the hospital Monday night and was convulsing and “semi-conscious, barely,” according to a caller on a frantic 911 recording released Friday by Los Angeles fire officials.

The woman tells emergency operators that Moore, 49, had been “having issues lately.”

“Is she breathing normal?” the operator asks.

“No, not so normal. More kind of shaking, convulsing, burning up,” the friend says.

The recording captures the 10 minutes it took paramedics to arrive as friends gather around the collapsed star and try to comfort her as she trembles and shakes.

Another woman is next to Moore as the dispatcher asks if she’s responsive.

“Demi, can you hear me?” she asks. “Yes, she’s squeezing hands. … She can’t speak.”

When the operator asks what Moore ingested or smoked, the friend replies, but the answer was redacted.

“Some form of … and then she smoked something. I didn’t really see. She’s been having some issues lately with some other stuff. So I don’t know what she’s been taking or not,” the friend says.

The city attorney’s office advised the fire department to redact details about medical conditions and substances to comply with federal medical privacy rules.

“She smoked something. It’s not marijuana. It’s similar to incense,” the friend says to the 911 operator.

While Moore’s friends don’t say exactly what she smoked, an increasingly popular drug known as Spice is sometimes labeled as “herbal incense.”

Spice is a synthetic cannabis drug and also called K2. It’s sold in small packets over the Internet, in smoke shops and at convenience stores. The packaging sometimes reads “not for human consumption” to conceal its purpose.

In 2011, there were twice as many spice-related calls to Poison Control Centers nationwide as in the previous year, according to the National Office of Drug Control Policy.

The adverse health effects associated with synthetic marijuana include anxiety, vomiting, racing heartbeat, seizures, hallucinations, and paranoid behavior.

Asked if Moore took the substance intentionally or not, the woman says Moore ingested it on purpose but the reaction was accidental.

“Whatever she took, make sure you have it out for the paramedics,” the operator says.

The operator asks the friend if this has happened before.

“I don’t know,” she says. “There’s been some stuff recently that we’re all just finding out.”

Moore’s publicist, Carrie Gordon, said previously that the actress sought professional help to treat her exhaustion and improve her health.

Isaak’s newest album out this week

LONDON – There’s one note Chris Isaak won’t be hitting — and that’s a sick note.

The U.S. blues singer says he’s never missed a show, and neither has his drummer, Kenney Dale Johnson, or his bass player, Rowland Salley, in the 27 years they’ve been playing together. He says, “I’m very proud of them.”

Isaak released a new album called “Beyond the Sun” this week and will soon embark on a string of concert dates across the United States. The album is a collection of cover versions from Sun Records.

Isaak says his main inspiration for the album was to “sing a bunch of those songs I like singing.”

Cynthia Nixon takes flak for gay comment

SAN FRANCISCO – Cynthia Nixon learned the hard way this week that when it comes to gay civil rights, the personal is always political.

The actress best known for portraying fiery lawyer Miranda Hobbes on “Sex and the City” is up to her eyebrows in controversy since The New York Times Magazine published a profile in which she was quoted as saying that for her, being gay was a conscious choice. Nixon is engaged to a woman with whom she has been in a relationship for eight years. Before that, she spent 15 years and had two children with a man.

“I understand that for many people it’s not, but for me it’s a choice, and you don’t get to define my gayness for me,” Nixon said while recounting some of the flak gay rights activists previously had given her for treading in similar territory.

Truth Wins Out founder Wayne Besen said he found the actress’ analysis irresponsible and flippant.