Don’t worry, fans: There’s no trouble in paradise, as far as Nick Jonas and his wife Priyanka Chopra Jonas are concerned.
Some fans got concerned when Priyanka, whose Instagram handle used to be Priyanka Chopra Jonas, dropped the “Jonas” from the feed’s name. But according to the actress, who appears in the new Matrix film, she was just trying to be consistent with her social media.
Asked why she made the change, Priyanka told ETimes, the entertainment website of The Times of India, “I don’t know. I wanted the username to match my Twitter, I guess.”
She added, “I just find it really amusing that everything becomes such a huge deal to people. It’s social media, guys. Just chill out!”
Before they became parents, Tyler Hubbard and his wife, Hayley, also figured they’d spank their kids occasionally. After all, that’s how both of them were raised, the couple explain during a new episode of the Meaning Full Living podcast, which Haley co-hosts.
The couple are parents to three young children now, and they haven’t yet used spanking as a form of discipline. That’s simply because they realize it’s not the best way to communicate with their kids’ particular, individual personalities, Tyler explains. For example, he remembers one time when he raised his voice to his oldest daughter, three-year-old Liv.
“She got scared, and she got upset. I thought, ‘Man, that’s terrible,’” the singer recounts. Rather than keep leaning into that stern, disciplinarian side, Tyler says he apologized to his daughter for raising his voice.
“I was able to come to her level and say, ‘Daddy is really sorry. I should not have talked to you that way,’” he continues. “Haley and I want compliant kids, but we also want kids who trust us and want to talk to us about things.”
Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for The Recording Academy
Beyoncé and Jay-Z could become the first married couple in history to compete against each other for an Oscar.
Queen Bey’s “Be Alive,” from King Richard, and Jay’s “Guns Go Bang” with Kid Cudi, from The Harder They Fall, are among the 15 songs on the Academy Awards shortlist for Best Original Song. Five will be nominated. Neither of the two superstars have been nominated for an Academy Award in the past.
Cudi has a second song on the list, “Just Look Up,” with Ariana Grande, from the Netflix movie Don’t Look Up.
H.E.R., who won an Oscar this year for “Fight for Youm” from Judas and the Black Messiah, is on the list with “Automatic Woman,” from Halle Berry’s latest film, Bruised. The four-time Grammy winner composed the song with Berry’s boyfriend, Van Hunt.
Jennifer Hudson, who also is a previous Oscar winner, made the list with “Here I Am (Singing My Way Home)” from the Aretha Franklin biopic, Respect. Hudson won her Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for Dreamgirls in 2007.
The nominations for the 94th Academy Awards will be announced on February 8. The Oscars will air on ABC March 27.
As their incredible 2021 comes to an end, the boys of BTS — JHope, Jimin, Jin, Jungkook, Suga, RM and V— individually sat down for a series of tell-all interviews Vogue Korea recently and reflected on the past year.
V admitted he became more of an introvert this year, adding, he used to be an extrovert but a recent MBTI personality test revealed he became more withdrawn. “I don’t think these changes are a bad thing,” he shared. V also discussed BTS’ “My Universe” collaboration with Coldplay and revealed that, after the band heard him sing, they told him “I was like the second Chris Martin.”
Suga said he is “happier” than he was before because of the success he’s enjoyed in 2021 and, when asked about his future, remarked, “I’ll always be a member of BTS.” He noted some people pushed him to give producing a try and cracked, “I’m not responsible enough to take responsibility for anyone.”
As for RM, he’s thinking of a different future. The singer recently had “a eureka moment” when looking at Claude Monet and Vincent Van Gogh‘s paintings and became “envious” they were able to communicate “directly with a boy from Korea” hundreds of years after they died. RM says he’s “fascinated by art” now and is strying art history to learn the “longevity of painters.”
Jimin reflected on the stress of the pandemic, and confided, “It felt like my whole life’s work was being negated.” He admits that feeling made him focus on keeping BTS’ momentum going.
As for Jin, he admits he’s learned to appreciate his lazy days and declared, “I think that resting should be entirely selfish.”
As for Jungkook and J-Hope, the two expressed hope and excitement for the future.
Fox’s New Year’s Eve Toast & Roast 2022 special, which was going to feature performances by Billy Idol and various other stars, has been canceled due to the surging number of COVID-19 cases driven by the Omicron variant.
The show was set to be hosted live in New York City’s Times Square by Ken Jeong and Joel McHale, alongside special correspondent Kelly Osbourne, daughter of Ozzy Osbourne.
A statement from Fox obtained by Varietyreads, “While we are confident in the health and safety protocols for Fox’s New Year’s Eve Toast & Roast 2022, the recent velocity of the spread of Omicron cases has made it impossible to produce a live special in Times Square that meets our standards.”
The statement continues,”We will not be moving forward with Fox’s New Year’s Eve Toast & Roast 2022 in New York. The health and safety of our casts and crews has always been, and will continue to be, of the utmost importance. Replacement programming for New Year’s Eve on Fox will be announced in the coming days.”
Variety notes that it “remains to be seen” whether the announced musical guests, including Idol, whose performance was among several that were recorded at an earlier date, will still be part of said replacement programming.
In an unrelated note, Idol canceled his planned appearance this past Monday at the 2021 Above Ground benefit concert, an event organized by his longtime touring guitarist Billy Morrison and Jane’s Addiction guitarist Dave Navarro.
Billy explained in a Twitter post that he’d dropped off the bill of the Los Angeles event because he’d caught a respiratory cold that affected his voice, while noting that he’d tested negative for COVID-19 twice.
Idol is next scheduled to perform in February, when he serves as the opening act for Journey‘s 2022 tour.
Matchbox Twenty rescheduled a planned tour with The Wallflowers, originally set for the summer of 2020, to 2021, and then again to 2022. Now it seems like the band may have new material to perform when the tour finally launches May 17 in Vancouver.
Rob Thomas, who’s currently promoting his album Something About Christmas Time, tells American Songwriter that he and the band are “going to be in the studio working on a few new songs next year.”
“I’m also almost done with a whole new solo record, because before COVID the idea was I was going to be out with Matchbox Twenty with the new music touring…so everything got pushed back,” he explains. “And I’ve got the solo record sitting on ice that I’m really excited about.”
“But first, it’s going to be new Matchbox music,” he confirms. “So at least I’ve got no shortage of creative stuff going on.”
The most recent Matchbox Twenty album was 2012’s North. Before his current Christmas album, Rob released his solo album, Chip Tooth Smile, in 2019.
Recently, Brett Eldredge had to postpone a couple of the shows on his Glow Live Tour after testing positive for COVID-19. However, quarantine’s not stopping him from bringing the holiday spirit to fans.
This week, he got all dressed up and performed a half-hour livestream concert of Christmas classics from his living room. Complete with a bow tie, microphone and lit-up tree in the background, Brett delivered a quarantine version of his Christmas tour set list, livestreaming the event on his social channels.
“Yes, I am in quarantine,” Brett joked. “I am healing up nicely. I’m feeling really great.”
Not only was he feeling well enough to perform, but the show was a refreshing pace from Brett’s normal quarantine activities, the singer went on to say.
“Just being able to sing beats the heck out of watching Netflix. I did go sledding down the stairs the other day,” he added. “My dog was just staring at me like I’m a weirdo.”
Brett’s Glow Live Tour isn’t quite done yet. He rescheduled the dates he had to cancel — a pair of shows in Chicago — to December 29 and 30.
Founding Vanilla Fudge lead singer and keyboardist Mark Stein recently released his first official solo album, There’s a Light.
Stein put the album together during the COVID-19 pandemic, mixing brand-new songs with older originals and a few covers, all featuring themes reflecting issues that the U.S. and the world have been facing during this volatile period in history.
Speaking about There’s a Light to ABC Audio, Stein notes that the album features “songs about love and patriotism and social issues that we’ve all been dealing with. Songs like ‘Racism’ and ‘All Lives Matter’ and ‘We Are One‘ and my cover of [The Temptations‘] ‘Ball of Confusion.’ It all holds together and has a message.”
Stein says the song that kickstarted the project was “We Are One,” a song about unity that he wrote in response to the divisiveness he noticed in the U.S. during the early days of the pandemic.
“I wrote that about six weeks after the initial pandemic, in April 2020,” he recalls. “I was compelled to write this song, and it started out like a ball of fire.”
Another song with a positive message on the album is “Let’s Pray for Peace,” and Mark recently released a music video for the tune to coincide with the holidays.
“During this Holiday Season, I hope this song helps to bring our volatile world a little closer together,” Stein says in a message. “Merry Christmas & A Happy Healthy New Year.”
Among the guest musicians featured on “There’s a Light” are longtime Utopia bassist Kasim Sulton, former Billy Joel drummer Liberty DeVitto and Vanilla Fudge’s bassist, Pete Bremy.
There’s a Light is available now. Limited-edition bundles featuring a signed CD copy of the album and special merchandise items can be purchased at MerchBucket.com.
Fox’s New Year’s Eve Toast & Roast 2022 special, which was going to feature performance by Imagine Dragons, has been canceled due to the surging number of COVID-19 cases driven by the Omicron variant.
The show was set to be hosted live in New York City’s Times Square by Ken Jeong and Joel McHale, alongside special correspondent Kelly Osbourne, daughter of Ozzy Osbourne.
A statement from Fox obtained by Varietyreads, “While we are confident in the health and safety protocols for Fox’s New Year’s Eve Toast & Roast 2022, the recent velocity of the spread of Omicron cases has made it impossible to produce a live special in Times Square that meets our standards.”
“We will not be moving forward with Fox’s New Year’s Eve Toast & Roast 2022 in New York,” the statement continues. “The health and safety of our casts and crews has always been, and will continue to be, of the utmost importance. Replacement programming for New Year’s Eve on Fox will be announced in the coming days.”
Variety notes that it “remains to be seen” whether the announced musical guests, including Imagine Dragons, who pre-recorded their performance, will still be part of said replacement programming.
Post Malone is ready to face a greater challenge with his latest endeavor — bringing back Friday Night Magic with the role-playing platform, Wizards of the Coast.
Posty, who is an outspoken fan of Magic: The Gathering, owned by Wizards of the Coast, aims to reboot the popular play program for the trading card game. The Grammy winner will help bring back those Friday night Magic tournaments to game stores across the globe and entice new players to give the tabletop strategy game a try.
The “Circles” rapper said in a statement, “I’m obsessed with Magic: The Gathering. This is really a dream come true. We’ll be doing some cool stuff so keep an eye out.”
He also teased on Twitter, “It’s about to get wild.”
Nathan Stewart, head of franchise marketing for Wizards of the Coast, offered in a separate comment, “You’d be hard-pressed to find a bigger fan of Magic: The Gathering than Post Malone.”
“As a fan for years, he knows just how much Friday Night Magic means to players. We’re thrilled to collaborate with Posty in ways that will allow his signature style, talent and love of the game to combine in ways fans will never forget,” continued Stewart.
Magic: The Gathering was released in 1993 and has ballooned into a global fan base of 50 million players.
