Music

Calling it his favorite thing to do, Ed Sheeran surprised some kids in New York City with what he calls a “school pop-up.”

Ed posted footage on Instagram of himself performing for the kids in an auditorium, listening to them play a string arrangement of his hit “Perfect” and giving them advice about how they should never let anyone tell them they can’t do something.

“If you get your confidence knocked as a kid, and an adult tells you that you can’t do something, you kind of never really recover from that,” Ed said earnestly. “I was so bad at writing songs and singing when I was 12 and 13. So I don’t want you guys to ever, ever, ever let an adult strip you of your confidence.”

At another school, Ed performed a bit of “Perfect” and told the kids, “Sometimes when someone knocks your confidence, you kinda build this … barrier in your head that then tells you you can’t do it. But everyone in here is capable of achieving, like, the most incredible things.”

A few days ago Ed visited Dominguez High School in Compton, California, where he performed and offered the kids a similar pep talk.

Ed’s new album, Autumn Variations, comes out September 29.

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Måneskin has announced an expanded version of their latest album, RUSH!

The RUSH! (Are U Coming?) edition will be released on November 10. It includes the new single “HONEY (ARE U COMING?),” which Måneskin performed during the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards, as well as four more bonus tracks.

The original RUSH! — which marked the first Måneskin record following their global, post-Eurovision breakout — was released in January and includes the singles “SUPERMODEL” and “THE LONELIEST.”

Måneskin’s currently on a North American tour in support of RUSH! It continues Wednesday, September 27, in Toronto.

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Cher is being accused of going to great lengths to stop her son Elijah Blue Allman from reconciling with his wife.

Court documents filed back in December and obtained by Entertainment Tonight reveal that Elijah’s estranged wife, Marie Angela King, claims Cher hired four men to kidnap Elijah in order to prevent the reconciliation.  The documents are now being made public as part of the couple’s ongoing divorce case. 

According to ET, King alleges in the documents that on the night of their anniversary, November 30, 2022, after the couple had spent 12 days together in a New York hotel room, men stormed in and “removed [Allman] from our room.”

“I was told by one of the four men who took him that they were hired by [Alllman’s] mother,” King explains. “Since August 2022, I have been told that I am not allowed to see or speak to [Allman], who is currently in lockdown at a treatment facility that is undisclosed to me. I am also told [Allman] has no access to his phone.”

King alleges Cher had asked her to leave the home she shared with Allman and wasn’t allowed to remove her belongings from it. She notes she left “on the belief that my support payments would be timely, and I would be able to afford housing.”

The case is due back in a Los Angeles court on October 27.

Elijah, 47, is Cher’s youngest child. His father is the late rocker Gregg Allman, to whom Cher was married from 1975 to 1978.

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Dalton Dover has released the music video for his debut single, “Never Giving Up On That.”

Directed by Tristan Cusick and filmed near Dalton’s hometown in Rome, Georgia, the video features Dalton brooding over a breakup in a bar, church, the woods and more, before taking the stage to perform his soaring number.

“Every scene in the video is just somewhere that means something to me, places where I grew up,” Dalton tells CMT. “The people in the video are some of the most important people in my life.”

“Growing up, you’re playing all these small venues around here. Little did you know 12 years later, you’d sign a record deal and film your first music video at the same exact place, the same bar that you played one of your first hometown shows in,” he adds.

“Never Giving Up On That” serves as the title track of Dalton’s new eight-song project. Out now via Mercury Records/UMG Nashville, the collection also includes a tender cover of Alicia Key‘s “If I Ain’t Got You.”

Dalton is currently in the top 40 of the country charts with “Never Giving Up On That.”

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Drake is no stranger to showing love to his rap idols. There’s his mentor Lil Wayne and his label mate Nicki Minaj, but the “6 God” rapper says he’s also indebted to the work and career of Bow Wow.

After walking out to the stage with Bow Wow during the Atlanta stop on his It’s All a Blur Tour, Drake took the stage to acknowledge him as someone who inspired him as a child. 

“I wanna shout out, shout out my boy Bow for walking me to stage tonight, I gotta say,” Drake started. “Atlanta got a lot of legends but that’s somebody I wanted to be like when I was growing up.”

“So, shoutout to Bow Wizzle for walking me to stage,” he added.

It’s not the first time Drake’s publicly given Bow Wow his flowers. Back in 2021, when Drake celebrated his achievement of simultaneously debuting three songs on the Hot 100 chart, he partied with a host of friends including Bow and posted a video, later shared by AllHipHop, explaining how meeting up with the rapper was most important. 

“I had to link with Wizzle. Everybody wants to have drinks and everybody wants to celebrate and turn up and, you know, I just had to see Wizzle,” Drake said. “I had to see Wizzle in person. If it wasn’t for you, there wouldn’t be no me. That’s why, you know the rest.”

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The National Independent Venue Association has responded to the launch of Live Nation’s On the Road Again program, issuing a statement criticizing the ticketing giant’s campaign as an “initiative to squeeze out independent venues.”

On the Road Again declared that certain Live Nation venues of a certain size, including New York City’s Irving Plaza and The Wiltern in Los Angeles, would not charge merch fees and would provide artists with a $1,500 gas and travel stipend for each show played.

The campaign, per Live Nation’s press release, is expected to last “through the end of the year.”

In its statement, NIVA calls On the Road Again a “temporary measure” that “may appear to help artists in the short run but actually can squeeze out independent venues which provide the lifeblood of many artists on thin margins.”

“It appears to be a calculated attempt to use a publicly-traded conglomerate’s immeasurable resources to divert artists from independent venues and further consolidate control over the live entertainment sector,” NIVA’s statement reads. “Such tactics threaten the vitality of small and medium-sized venues under 3,000 capacity, many of which still struggle to keep their doors open.”

NIVA adds that independent venues “continually facing rising costs, increased deceptive ticketing practices in the resale market, and ongoing challenges following the global pandemic.”

“Our stages are critical to the live entertainment ecosystem and local economies, and they must survive,” NIVA concludes. “The economics of touring must drastically improve for artists and independent venues. There has to be a better way. NIVA will continue to support artists and empower independent venues as we collectively find it.”

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A new Jelly Roll duet is on the way.

The country star has joined Warner Music Nashville artist Chris Ryan on “Scared To Go To Church.”

Dropping Friday, September 29, the tune was penned by Jelly and Chris alongside Logan Turner, Dave Kuncio and Jay Joyce, who also produced the track.

“When I started writing for the album, ‘Scared To Go To Church’ was the first song I finished,” shares Chris, who was one-half of now-defunct duo BEXAR. “The minute I wrote it, I knew Jelly could help me tell the rest of the story. I left that second verse open for him.”

“Jelly has been a good friend from day one,” he adds. “It’s an honor to have him on the first track with me.”

“Scared To Go To Church” is available for presave now. While you wait, you can check out a preview of the song and its cover art on Chris’ Instagram.

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Sum 41 has premiered a new single called “Landmines,” the first preview of their upcoming farewell album, Heaven :x: Hell.

“When I wrote ‘Landmines’ I had no intention of writing an old school ‘pop punk’ song,” says frontman Deryck Whibley. “It just came out really quickly and I knew right away that this song felt special to me.”

You can listen to “Landmines” now via digital outlets. It’s accompanied by a video filled with the teenage high jinks seen in an early Sum 41 clip, which is streaming now on YouTube.

Sum 41 had announced in May that Heaven :x: Hell would be the group’s final record. The “Fat Lip” rockers intend to disband following the album’s release and a final tour.

Meanwhile, Whibley’s been recovering after he was hospitalized with pneumonia earlier in September. In a statement posted September 19, Whibley wrote, “Although I’m not out of the woods yet and have been told to be prepared for a bit of roller coaster sickness over the next couple of weeks, I’m staying positive and doing my best to get through all of this.”

(Video contains uncensored profanity.)

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