Category: News

Business mogul Jay-Z has come a long way since his debut in the music game in 1996. Although the Grammy-award-winning rapper has made several guest appearances on records like DJ Khaled’s “God Did,” these days, the father of three has paid a lot more attention to his investments outside of music.

With two significant deals on the table, including the potential purchase of the NFL team, the Washington Commanders, and the plans to open a casino in Times Square, his passion for music remains strong.

The Hollywood Fix captured footage of the entrepreneur leaving the Roc Nation office in the Chelsea section of New York. As he exits the building, eager fan line up for the chance to meet the mogul. While one fan began rapping in the hopes of sparking the emcee’s attention, others prop up vinyl copies of the rapper’s album requesting his autograph.

After signing the outside covers of the vinyl pressing of his albums, In My Lifetime, Vol. 1, Vol. 3… Life and Times Of S. Carter, The Blueprint, and The Black Album, Jay-Z quickly noticed one record that didn’t belong to him.

The record in question, The Black Album Revisited. The album is produced by the Japanese record label, Big Ghost Ltd, and is not an official release of Jay-Z’s. The rapper refused to sign the unauthorized record after saying, “That one ain’t even real.”

Watch the full video above.

James Cameron has done it again! In this circumstance, the “it” is just talking about a film so much that you’re starting to question where James Cameron (person) ends and where James Cameron (The Director Of Avatar) begins. As it turns out, this guy just loves his own movie, which is respectable.

Obviously, Avatar: The Way Of The Water is going to be a major hit, simply because we all want to see Edie Falco on the big screen. But Cameron is hoping that his overly blue franchise is just the beginning of a beautiful new (decade-old) franchise.

Cameron recently spoke to Variety about his aspirations for Pandora, the lush CGI world where teenage Sigourney Weaver lives (this makes sense). As with most successful movies, Cameron hopes that the film will have the same longevity as your childhood favorites. “There’s this epic landscape with epic storytelling. I was trying to emulate a Star Wars universe or Lord of the Rings. Something that’s a persistent world that people can come back to and enjoy over time.” It’s a lot easier to go back and enjoy Avatar due to the fact that it ends up in theaters any time your local AMC needs a little pick-me-up.

Still, Cameron hopes to follow in the footsteps of legendary franchises. “If you look at something like The Rings of Power, with those multiple storylines and interesting characters, that’s what I was aspiring to. But they had a guide; I didn’t,” Cameron said, adding that he had to create his own source text.

“I had to write my own Silmarillion or Lord of the Rings in the form of notes. But I also didn’t want to do it all alone. I knew that I was going to do multiple movies, so I created a little writers’ room like you would for a TV show,” Cameron added. Those writers were given extensive notes on how not to make a movie, so hopefully, they learned a little something.

If Cameron really wants to invest in his source material, he should just speak with George R.R. Martin! The two can bond over how much time passes between their releases. Surely this will go over very well.

You can check out Avatar 2 in theaters this Friday, while the third one will come out sometime over the next decade, probably.

(Via Variety)

Before becoming one of Puerto Rico’s most iconic singer-songwriters, Tommy Torres was working as a general assistant at Sony. On Monday (December 12), Torres reflected on the time he helped Mariah Carey get into the Christmas spirit while she was recording her holiday album.

Torres has experienced great success as an artist and a songwriter for other acts. He produced one of Ricky Martin‘s biggest songs “Tal Vez” in 2003. Torres also co-wrote the smash “¡Corre!” by Mexican duo Jesse y Joy in 2011. Torres’ biggest hits include “Perdame En Ti” and “Quédate” with Kany García. Last year, he returned with the album El Playlist De Anoche that he co-wrote and co-produced with Bad Bunny.

On Twitter, Torres revealed in 1993 and 1994 that he was a general assistant as Sony’s studios. His duties included getting coffee for the artists and cleaning up the cables in the studio. His favorite memory was getting the recording studio ready for Carey who was in the midst of recording her 1994 album Merry Christmas.

“She had a particular request, that we decorate the studio for Christmas,” Torres recalled. “In other words, a full Christmas tree, decorations, spray snow, and wrapped gift boxes. Since it was almost summer, she wanted to feel the Christmas atmosphere while singing.”

Carey would go on to record the global hit “All I Want For Christmas Is You” in that recording studio. Looking back on the impact of Carey’s Christmas album, he now applauds her creative choices.

“What seemed like a diva request turned out to be a very good artistic decision,” he wrote. “Every time I hear ‘All I Want For Christmas,’ I am brought back to that time as a shy but happy boy living in the big city, where Christmas is magical, watching great recordings being made, and learning quietly from a corner.”

Earlier this month, Torres released his bachata-infused love song “Mi Secreto.” Carey returned to the summit of the Billboard Hot 100 chart this week with “All I Want For Christmas Is You.”

RuPaul’s Drag Race will be returning next month. On Wednesday (December 14), the reality drag competition revealed that Ariana Grande will be the first guest judge to kick-off the season 15 premiere.

In a special “Ru-Nouncement,” Grande was announced as the first guest judge of the upcoming season. In a 15-second clip, the pop superstar can be seen strutting down the runway of RuPaul’s Drag Race. “Season 15 is here and so I am,” Grande says in a voiceover.

This will mark Grande’s second appearance as a judge for the drag queen competition. She first appeared as a judge on season seven back in 2015. Grande was living for Jaidynn Diore Fierce who was Lip-Syncing For Her Life against Kandy Ho to the smash hit “Break Free.”

With the past few seasons, RuPaul has always made sure to feature a pop star beloved by the LGBTQ+ community as guest judge on the premiere episodes. Lady Gaga, Christina Aguilera, Nicki Minaj, and Miley Cyrus have appeared on previous season premieres.

Yesterday, the 16 drag queens competing for the title of “America’s Next Drag Superstar” were revealed. Season 15 of RuPaul’s Drag Race will premiere on Friday, January 6 on MTV. As with past seasons, the premiere will be split into two episodes.

In mid-November, Jay Leno made headlines when he was rushed to the hospital after a fire broke out in his garage, where he famously keeps his massive car collection. According to an early report from TMZ, the fire ignited when one of the former Tonight Show host’s vehicles “erupted into flames without warning.” It was noted that, “The flames burned the left side of Jay’s face, but thankfully did not penetrate his eye or his ear.” Now, Leno is telling the story for himself.

As Page Six reports, Leno sat down for his first interview since the accident with the Today show’s Hoda Kotb, where he shared the terrifying details of the incident. On November 12, Leno and his friend Dave Killackey were in the comedian’s Los Angeles garage working on one of his cars, a 1907 White Steam Car.

“The fuel line was clogged so I was underneath it,” Leno explained. “It sounded clogged and I said, ‘Blow some air through the line,’ and so he did… And suddenly, boom, I got a face full of gas. And then the pilot light jumped and my face caught on fire.”

Leno knows the result of the injury could have been much worse, and credits Killackey with reacting quickly — and smartly — to the situation. “Dave, my friend, pulled me out and jumped on top of me and kind of smothered the fire,” Leno explained.

He was then rushed to Los Angeles’ Grossman Burn Center, where he remained for 10 days for treatment of third-degree burns. Just days after Leno’s arrival, Dr. Peter Grossman, the Burn Center’s director, told NBC News that Leno suffered “relatively serious” burns to “approximately seven percent of his body,” including his face, chest, and hands.

Last week, Leno penned an editorial about the incident for The Wall Street Journal in which he joked that he now has “a brand-new face” and “It’s better than what was there before.”

(Via Page Six)

From conscious hip-hop to environmental consciousness, Madlib has dropped a new album featuring samples of sounds from the Coca-Cola recycling plant. Having teamed up with Mark Ronson, the two superproducers introduced Recycled Records in a new video narrated by rap veteran MC Lyte.

“It sounds very crazy and overstated to say it, but anything can become a sample, right? Ronson said in the video. “Like any sound, you can somehow manipulate in to a drum. The sounds and the rhythms and the pulses of sounds from everyday life can also be incredibly inspiring.”

In the video, we see both Madlib and Ronson in their studios, mixing, looping, and distorting sounds from the recycling plant — like the sound of crushing trash, and warping and reshaping bottles — into hip-hop-influenced instrumentals.

“It’s not everyday you get the opportunity to create music using objects found in everyday life to emulate new forms of sound,” Madlib said in a statement on the Coca-Cola website. “Recycled Records is an EP of original tracks made from the sounds of the closed loop recycling process.”

The album consists of seven unnamed tracks, five of which are Madlib beats, and the other two, Mark Ronson beats.

You can check out a trailer for the Recycled Records project above.

This post contains spoilers for The White Lotus season two finale, although to be fair, it’s the cast that spoiled the finale last month. It’s just that no one noticed at the time.

On November 1st, HBO Max uploaded a video, “The Cast of The White Lotus Play Most Likely To,” in which Jennifer Coolidge, Haley Lu Richardson, and Meghann Fahy, among others, answered which one of their co-stars is most likely to go scuba diving, rent a Vespa, etc. It’s a fun video, because the cast seemed to get along, but it’s interesting to watch now because of one question in particular: “Who’s most likely to fall off a boat?”

Oops.

Fahy and Theo James agreed it was Coolidge, as did Sabrina Impacciatore, who was greeted with silence from Beatrice Grannò and the wonderfully-named Simona Tabasco before realizing her spoiler-y mistake. Did they know? It sure seems like it! It’s the nervous look from Tabasco and the knowing smirk from Grannò that gives it away.

In an interview with the New York Times, Coolidge (who probably would have been offended that her co-stars think she’s clumsy enough to topple off a boat, if she wasn’t so chill) was asked whether she did the stunt herself. “I begged to do it!” she replied. “But Mike [White] already had the stunt double there at the shoot. And she had been waiting for hours. There was just no way Mike was going to tell her, waiting out on the cold boat, that she wasn’t going to have her moment. So Mike wouldn’t let me do it.”

Maybe it was her identical twin.

(Via Reddit)

As James Gunn lays the groundwork for the next 10 years of the DC Universe, the director turned studio chief has been doing his best to be as transparent as possible with fans on social media. Part of that process has recently involved swatting down (or confirming) rumors that have been reported by prominent trade publications like the recent debacle over the fate of Wonder Woman 3 and Henry Cavill’s Superman return.

This time around, Gunn politely stepped in to debunk a new rumor about Robert Pattinson’s Batman. Until now, virtually every report has stated that both Gunn and Warner Bros. Discovery plan to leave the self-contained The Batman universe alone after the first film delivered some much-needed box office success earlier in the year.

However, a new report in Variety made a surprisingly bold claim that Gunn and co-chief Peter Saffran are “exploring the possibility” of bringing Pattinson’s Batman into their reimagined DC Universe. Gunn took to Twitter to shoot down the credibility of the “well-placed source” while making sure to praise writer Adam B. Vary for a history of good work.

“There are few reporters I love more than @adambvary – truly a good guy – but in this case he needs to get a new source as this is entirely untrue,” Gunn wrote.

To further toss dirt the rumor, The Batman director Matt Reeves also entered the fray by quote-tweeting his new DC Studios boss. “The source I’m really liking on this is Mr. @JamesGunn,” Reeves tweeted.

So there you have it. We may not know much about what James Gunn is planning for the DC Universe, but we can now say with a reasonable amount of confidence that everyone is going to leave RBattz alone. No one touch the Robert Battinson!

(Via James Gunn on Twitter, Matt Reeves on Twitter)

The 1975 are wrapping their North American leg of their At Their Very Best tour this week — and a chaotic one at that. With lead singer Matty Healy eating raw meat on stage, making out with fans, and chaotically crowdsurfing, international fans are getting their turn to experience the action early next year. The band is bringing their tour to the UK in January, along with a special surprise for a small group of fans.

Healy took to his Instagram stories yesterday to announce that The 1975 would be temporarily calming down and bringing a concert back to their city roots. That’s right, they’re returning to play a one-night-only concert at Manchester’s Gorilla venue.

“Hello everybody, we are playing a show in Manchester on the 1st of February at Gorilla. And all the money will be going to War child so try and get tickets for that one,” Healy shared.

As mentioned, the proceeds would benefit War Child — a nonprofit that helps children in war-torn countries. “Our teams are working around the clock in places like Ukraine, Yemen, and Afghanistan to get children the life-saving aid and psychological care they need, fast,” the company’s website reads.

More information about The 1975’s Manchester show and ticketing will be announced in the future, but the venue will have a 550 capacity for attendees.

R. Kelly is currently serving a 30-year sentence for federal racketeering and sex trafficking. His reckoning and ultimate imprisonment are largely credited to a 2019 docuseries called Surviving R. Kelly, in which several of his victims came forward.

In the second part of the docuseries — Surviving R. Kelly, Part II, which premiered the following year — journalists, music industry experts, and some of his victims and associates took a look at the impact of the first documentary, and how it led to him being dropped from Sony, his ban from radio, and ultimately, his arrest.

The third and final installment will take a look at the process of his conviction and sentencing, as well as upcoming federal and state trials. Kelly’s ex-girlfriend, Azriel Clary, is set to share a testimonial in the latest installment, as well as legal experts, journalists, victims, and parents of those who were targeted.

In the trailer, several activists and leaders of the #MuteRKelly movement are seen protesting outside of courtrooms. Some of Kelly’s supporters are seen, insisting that he is innocent. Toward the end of the trailer, journalist Jim Derogatis, who originally broke the story about R. Kelly’s infamous sex tape in 2002, said, “Kelly will go down in the history of music as the worst criminal predator ever.”

You can watch the trailer for Surviving, R. Kelly, Part III above.

Surviving R. Kelly, Part III airs January 2 and 3 at 8 p.m. ET on Lifetime.