Music

Elton John is celebrating 300 episodes of his Apple Music show Rocket Hour.

As he reflected on the milestone with Zane Lowe, Elton said one of the things he’s loved most about the show was getting to discover new, young artists like Lorde, Billie Eilish and Dua Lipa.

“When I first heard the first thing I ever heard from Lorde, which was ‘Royals,’ I just thought it was unlike nothing I’d ever heard before,” he said. “It…just blew my mind. It was so simple and yet so moving. The same thing with Billie Eilish; it was like, when I hear her records, there’s nothing [like] the space and the feel of it.”

As for Dua, Elton tells Zane, “She’s amazing…She just has this inner beauty and an outer beauty, but she deserves every success that comes her way.”

Dua, meanwhile, offered Elton praise right back in a congratulatory message for hitting 300 episodes.

“I’ll never forget when you played ‘Levitating’ on Rocket Hour, I absolutely lost my mind,” she said.

“I just think you’re absolutely incredible, but I also love how incredibly supportive you are of so many new artists and artists from all over the world, and how much you champion and love and respect artists all over,” she added. “It’s just been an absolute dream, getting to know you and getting to see all the magic that you are.”

Elton’s 300th episode airs Saturday on Apple Music 1.

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Coming across a YouTube post of her own isolated backup vocals on Foo Fighters’ classic “Everlong” has sent Veruca Salt‘s Louise Post down a rabbit hole — leading her to reminisce about the recording of the song, which Dave Grohl wrote about their then-romance.

Posting a snippet of that isolated recording on Instagram, Post wrote, “I sang these back-ups over the phone at 2am after being woken up from a deep sleep in Chicago by [Dave Grohl] who was tracking the vocals for ‘Everlong’ in LA.”

“He wanted me to sing the doo-doo’s, which were inspired by our song ‘Shimmer Like a Girl,” she continues. “While I was at it, I wrote a harmony for the chorus and sang that too.”

“The whispered section of this song was originally the dream I was having when the phone rang. It was a dream about us,” she adds poetically. “He later removed it and replaced with his own whispers, one which was a love letter to me.”

“Maybe I’ll tell the full story…eventually…if I feel like it,” she concludes. “But I just came across this post and thought I would share for anyone who is interested.”

While Grohl’s relationship with the “Seether” rocker didn’t end well — Post claimed onstage in 1997 during a show in Australia that Grohl had cheated on her with Winona Ryder — she said several years ago that she and the drummer are now “friends.”

 

 

 

 

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After teasing them online, Alessia Cara has released her two much-anticipated new songs: “Sweet Dream” and “Shapeshifter.”

The tracks are the first taste of new music from the singer’s upcoming third album and both have two very different vibes.

“The theme of duality is recurring on this next album, so it made sense to release two songs to introduce both ends of the thread,” Alessia explains in a statement.

She says “Sweet Dream” represents “the hardship and helplessness surrounding my last couple of years.” On the flip side, she says “Shapeshifter” is “witty and sophisticated,” and represents “the more mature and light-hearted parts of the album.”

She adds of “Shapeshifter,”  “I had to go through lots of pain to regain my footing and this song feels unwavering, despite it not being about the happiest of things.”

Alessia debuted the “Sweet Dream” video Thursday and will be premiering the “Shapeshifter” video Friday, July 23 on CBS This Morning. She’s also lined up a performance of “Sweet Dream” on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Monday, July 19 and on Live with Kelly & Ryan on Wednesday, July 21.

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Machine Gun Kelly is featured in the August issue of GQ, and he says appearing in the famed magazine is just another aspect of how he’s currently living his childhood dream.

“You know what the dream was? It was exactly what happened to me [at the Billboard Awards], which was go to an awards show, shut down the carpet, go onstage, accept an award,” Kelly tells GQ.

Kelly dominated the coverage of that awards show, where he was named Top Rock Artist, because he showed up with his girlfriend, Megan Fox. And that’s the GQ part of his dream.

As detailed in the article, when Machine Gun Kelly was just plain old Colson Baker, a teenager growing up in Ohio, he got the Decepticons logo from Transformers tattooed on his arm and hung a poster of the movie’s star — Megan Fox — in his bedroom, vowing he’d marry her one day.

“It was the GQ poster, right?” Kelly shouts to Fox during the interview, asking her to confirm exactly which image of herself hung in her boyfriend’s childhood bedroom.

“It was from her GQ shoot,” Kelly goes on to say. “So that’s some full-circle s***.”

But in addition to his dreamlike love life, Kelly is also experiencing his most successful musical moment yet, thanks to Tickets to My Downfall, his current album, produced by Travis Barker. Barker, who says he considers Kelly his “best friend,” first met him years ago after a Blink-182 show.

“He was successful at a completely other genre of music,” Barker says of Kelly, who was a popular rapper before turning to pop-punk. “Not many people can do that.”

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Granger Smith and his wife, Amber, are just weeks away from welcoming a new baby boy into their family. The couple are already parents to nine-year-old London and seven-year-old Lincoln, and they lost their youngest son, River, at the age of three in a tragic drowning accident in 2019.

From the beginning, the country couple has been open with fans about their emotional journey towards deciding to have another baby. This week, however, Amber highlighted a moment of celebration. She shared a series of snapshots from her shower for the new baby, whose name will be Maverick.

“I honestly can’t believe I’m doing this all over again,” Amber wrote. “Many tears were shed, grief and joy are parallel on this journey, but Mavi is so loved and we can’t wait to hold him in about 5 weeks. God is good.”

In an hour-long documentary uploaded to their YouTube channel this spring, Granger and Amber shared their IVF journey, which included a heartbreaking miscarriage along the road to a healthy pregnancy.

Baby Maverick is due in August.

 

 

 

 

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EST Gee has been on the rise since signing with Yo Gotti’s Collective Music Group in January, a month after releasing his December 2020 mixtape, I Still Don’t Feel Nun.

While fans have been awaiting his next project, the Louisville rapper took to Instagram to share the album’s cover art and title.

“Bigger than Life or Death, July 20th. #EverbodyShineTogether #CocaineMuzik,” Gee wrote, sharing the album cover that shows his tattooed body with a vertical scar on the front of his abdomen.

“It’s Dat Time,” wrote Gotti in the post’s comments, while another fan said, “This album [is] going to be legendary.”

This year, EST Gee’s released his singles “Bigger than Life or Death,” “Lick Back” and “Capitol 1,” and landed his first-career entry on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart for assisting Lil Baby on “Real As It Gets.” Gee made his late-night television debut in January on Jimmy Kimmel Live! alongside fellow Louisiana MC Jack Harlow for a performance of their hometown anthem, “Route 66.”

Bigger than Life or Death arrives on July 20.

 

 

 

 

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Metallica is continuing to roll out content connected to “The Unforgiven” this week in the run-up to the release of the upcoming 30th anniversary box set celebrating the band’s 1991 self-titled album, also known as The Black Album.

Available to watch online now is a live performance of the song recorded at Aggie Memorial Stadium in Las Cruces, New Mexico, on August 27, 1992. What makes the performance stand out is that it took place a few weeks after frontman James Hetfield‘s infamous onstage pyrotechnic accident in Montreal, during which he suffered second- and third-degree burns on his hand and arm. 

As a result, the Las Cruces show featured guitar tech John Marshall playing rhythm guitar, while Hetfield simply stands and sings, with both of his arms and his left hand swathed in bandages.

The video is included on the Wherever I May Roam DVD, which is part of the deluxe Black Album box set, due out September 10. The 1991 album’s official 30th anniversary takes place on August 12. In addition to the box set, the iconic album is being celebrated with a 53-track tribute compilation dubbed The Metallica Blacklist.

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Yung Bleu has revealed the track list and release date for his debut album, Moon Boy, dropping next week. 

According to Bleu’s social media pages, the star-studded album features H.E.R, Kehlani, JohnLegend, A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie, Gunna and Davido, while Moneybagg Yo and Kodak Black join Bleu on the track “Angels Never Cry.”

Moon Boy will also feature Bleu’s singles “You’re Mines Still” with Drake, “Way More Close” with Big Sean, and “Baddest,” with Chris Brown and 2 Chainz.

After sharing the track list, fans on Twitter began asking the Alabama artist about a particular song featuring Wale and Chloe Bailey that didn’t make the album.

“@YungBleu, you really didn’t put the song with Chloe and Wale on your album? Oh nah… that’s sick!” the fan wrote. Bleu responded, tweeting, “Columbia [Records] aka my old label ain’t wanna clear it.” 

Yung Bleu was previously signed to Columbia Records through Boosie‘s independent label, Badazz Music Syndicate. Bleu later secured a management deal with Meek Mill‘s Dream Chasers. 

Moon Boy arrives on Friday, July 23.

 

 

 

 

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It’s been just over three years since Dan + Shay put out their career-defining, self-titled 2018 album, and they’ve been hard at work on a follow-up. Earlier this month, they tweeted, “Just finished our best album yet.”

And while it’s not clear whether or not they’re ready to share more details, Dan + Shay have indicated they’ve got an announcement in the works. The group started teasing something on their social media this week, telling fans to be on the lookout for news coming tonight at 6 p.m. CT.

They’ve told fans when to expect their announcement, but Dan + Shay have kept pretty tight-lipped about what that announcement might be. A teaser video shows an epic but vague montage of clips and images. We see a silhouetted figure who looks an awful lot like Shay Mooney riding a bicycle, flowers floating on water, and both band mates relaxing by a pool.

A follow-up teaser clip builds on the aesthetics of the first video but is equally mysterious. A group of people ride bikes through the desert, as a collection of diverse families gather to watch.

“Good things are coming,” Dan + Shay cryptically captioned their second post. 

To learn for sure what Dan + Shay are up to, tune into their socials tonight at 6 p.m. CT. In the meantime, the duo has released three non-album singles since their last album dropped. Two of those, “I Should Probably Go to Bed” and their Justin Bieber duet “10,000 Hours,” were back-to-back chart-topping hits.

 

 

 

 

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