Music

Nia DaCosta accomplished a major career milestone when her supernatural slasher flick Candyman bowed at number one in theaters over the weekend — she became the first Black woman to debut a film at number one at the domestic box office with a $22.4 million opening.

Deadline reports that DaCosta, who directed the “spiritual sequel” of the first Candyman movie, which came out in 1992, also grossed the second-highest opening over a three-day period for a Black female director.  Ava DuVernay‘s 2018 film A Wrinkle in Time holds the top honor, with a $33.1 million opening weekend.

DaCosta, 31, co-wrote Candyman alongside Jordan Peele and Win Rosenfeld.  The 2021 reboot is the first in the horror franchise’s nearly 30-year history to feature an all-Black main cast. Candyman is the second film DaCosta’s directed, behind her 2018 debut, Little Woods.

Now, DaCosta is onto her next big project — the Captain Marvel sequel, The Marvels, which is due out November 11, 2022.

Candyman — which stars Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Teyonah Parris and Colman Domingo — is in theaters now.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Pepsi Gulf Coast Jam has tapped an all-star lineup for its 10th anniversary. 

Florida Georgia Line will serve as one of the headlining acts of the three-day festival, taking place in Panama City Beach, Florida June 3-5. They join previously announced headliners Old Dominion and Brooks & Dunn. 

Jordan Davis, Maddie & Tae and Mitchell Tenpenny have also been added to the lineup, joining other performers Scotty McCreery, “My Boy” singer Elvie Shane, Tyler Rich and more. 

FGL replaces Chris Stapleton, who was set to headline the 2021 event but had to bow out of the new date in 2022 due to a scheduling conflict. 

The 2020 edition of Gulf Coast Jam was postponed to June 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With a surge in COVID-19 cases across the U.S., festival organizers decided to move the 2021 event, originally planned for Labor Day weekend, to 2022. Pepsi Gulf Coast Jam COO Mark Sheldon says the first weekend in June will be the festival’s new permanent date. 

Tickets are available now.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Elton John has announced that he’s, well, making an announcement tomorrow. And from some of the hints he’s posted on social media, it seems like it could be some kind of duets project.

On his Instagram stories, Elton has posted a sparkling rhinestone star graphic, and on top of that, various names are displayed, including Stevie Nicks, Pearl Jam‘s Eddie Vedder, Charlie Puth, Stevie Wonder, Miley Cyrus, Dua Lipa, rappers Young Thug, Nicki Minaj and Lil Nas X, country star Jimmie Allen, singer/songwriter Brandi Carlile, British act Years & Years, alt-rockers Gorillaz, British singer/songwriter Rina Sawayama and American pop duo Surfaces.

In the past year and a half, Elton has released singles with Years & Years, Rina Sawayama, Gorillaz and Surfaces.  He’s very friendly with Brandi Carlile, and he’s just worked on a Metallica cover song with Miley Cyrus.  In addition, in the past, he and Charlie Puth have both referred to some sort of collaboration they did.  And of course, Dua Lipa and Elton just released their new single “Cold Heart.”

As for Nicks, Minaj, Wonder, Lil Nas X, Vedder and Jimmie Allen, well, Elton pretty much knows everyone, so it wouldn’t be surprising if he’s worked with those folks too.

Based on the artists involved, it’s likely that the project will collect all the collaborations Elton’s done since the pandemic, along with some newly recorded tracks.

In 1993, Elton released an album called Duets that featured him collaborating with the likes of Don Henley, Bonnie Raitt, Stevie Wonder, George Michael, the late Little Richard and Leonard Cohen, and more.

 

 

 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A post shared by Elton John (@eltonjohn)

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

AJR has teamed up with the indie pop band Daisy the Great for a new song called “Record Player.”

The track is a reworked version of the Daisy tune “The Record Player Song,” which was originally released in 2017 before finding a new life recently on TikTok. It was on TikTok that AJR‘s Jack Met heard the original song, and decided to reach out.

“This has never happened to us before, but we came across this Daisy the Great chorus, and thought it was the catchiest thing we’d ever heard,” AJR says. “We thought if we could team up with the artists behind that hook and build a new song using the existing hook as the basis, it could be something pretty special.”

You can download “Record Player” now via digital outlets. Its accompanying video is streaming now on YouTube.

“Record Player” follows AJR’s new album OK ORCHESTRA, which was released in March. It includes he singles “Bang!” and “Way Less Sad.”

AJR will launch a headlining U.S. tour in support of OK ORCHESTRA September 7 in Madison, Wisconsin. Daisy the Great is opening for the fall trek.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

David Lee Roth apparently did not “Jump” at the opportunity to open for Mötley Crüe.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the “Dr. Feelgood” rockers asked the Van Halen icon if he wanted a spot on the bill for their upcoming stadium reunion tour. When bassist Nikki Sixx got an answer back from Roth, Diamond Dave did more than just decline the invitation.

“‘I don’t open for bands that I influenced,’ Sixx says Roth told him,” the Los Angeles Times report reads.

As for who will be sharing the lineup with the Crüe on the tour, that’d be Def Leppard, Poison and Joan Jett & the Blackhearts. The outing is finally set to kick off in June 2022 after being postponed from 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

By the way, Roth turning down Mötley Crüe isn’t the only bit of opening-act drama he’s been involved in this year. He was supposed to support KISS on their ongoing farewell tour, like he had been doing before the pandemic. However, when the trek started up again this summer, Roth wasn’t included on the bill anymore.

Asked about Roth’s absence by Rolling Stone, Gene Simmons suggested that he is no longer the “ultimate frontman” of his “heyday,” and seemed to compare him to “bloated naked Elvis on the bathroom floor.”

Roth then responded by posting 18 photos of a boy giving the middle finger on his Instagram, after which Simmons apologized for hurting Dave’s feelings with his comments, admitting that he suffered from “diarrhea of the mouth.”

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

If your kid has dreams of starring Broadway and can belt out Jackson 5 numbers like nobody’s business, then listen up.

The producers of MJ, the Broadway musical inspired by the life of Michael Jackson, are launching a nationwide search for an actor to play “Young Michael Jackson” in the production.  Time’s running out to find the actor, though, because performances begin on December 6; the official opening is February 1, 2022.

The producers are looking for someone that looks 10-12 years old, with an “unchanged” singing voice.  You can be older or younger than 10 to audition, but you have to be able to sing in Young Michael’s range.

Here’s how to apply:

1. Make a video of the kid singing a Michael Jackson song, such as “Rockin’ Robin,” “ABC,” “The Love You Save” or “I’ll Be There.”

2. In the video, have the kid say their name, age, height, where they’re from and how they heard about the opportunity.

3. Email a link of the video to audition@mjthemusical.com by September 20 to be considered.

MJ features Michael Jackson’s music, and a book written by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

After several days of testimony from women claiming they were groomed and sexually abused by R. Kelly, a man took the witness stand at Kelly’s sex-trafficking trial in New York City on Monday to say the R&B star exploited him in the same way when he was a high school student.

The witness, testifying in federal court in Brooklyn without using his real name, told a jury how Kelly allegedly lured him to his Chicago-area home in 2007 with false offers of helping him with his fledgling music career.

Kelly asked the alleged victim, then 17, what he was willing to do for music, then proceeded to perform oral sex on him. 

In a later episode, Kelly snapped his fingers to summon a naked girl from where she was hiding under a boxing ring to give Kelly and the witness oral sex, the man told the jury.

The witness testified as part of a cooperation agreement stemming from his guilty plea in a separate case, which alleges he was part of a botched scheme to bribe a woman to not testify against Kelly. No charges were brought against Kelly related to the scheme.

Earlier Monday, a woman testified that Kelly sexually assaulted her at age 17 following a performance in Miami in 1994.

Kelly, 54, whose birth name is Robert Sylvester Kelly, faces state and federal charges for sex trafficking, racketeering, coercion and other charges related to the alleged abuse and exploitation of six women — three of whom were underage at the time — over the course of 25 years. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Six years ago, Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello appeared on The Late Late Show with James Corden and awkwardly dodged questions on whether they were dating in real life. On Monday night, Camila returned to Corden and admitted that back then she totally had feelings for Shawn, who’s now her boyfriend of two years.

“I was completely in love with him,” she says of the fateful late show appearance in 2015. “And he was the one I thought didn’t love me back.”

Camila says she was taken by surprise when Shawn seemed to indicate on the show that he was the one who liked her and she didn’t like him back.  “I remember backstage after our interview, I was like, ‘Why did you say that? ‘Cause you know that I like you!’” Camila recounts. “…And look at us now.”

Camila also celebrated the Los Angeles premiere of her new film Cinderella on Monday. The film hits Amazon Prime September 3.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.