Music

Bring Me the Horizon‘s Malta Weekender festival will be better than Fyre Festival in at least one regard.

Speaking to NME about the upcoming destination event, which the “DiE4u” rockers will host and headline on the Mediterranean island country, frontman Oli Sykes declared, “It’ll be like Fyre Festival, but with better sandwiches.”

In case you blocked it out of your memory, Fyre Festival was billed as an exclusive, luxury event in the Bahamas, co-founded by rapper Ja Rule and promoted by high profile models including Kendall Jenner and Emily Ratajkowski. However, when attendees arrived, they were instead greeted with unfinished facilities and disaster relief tents.

One of the enduring images from the doomed 2017 event is of a not-so-luxurious cheese sandwich, which may or may not be fake.

Better food aside, BMTH’s Malta Weekender just needs to happen at all to have a leg up on Fyre Festival, which was soon canceled after headliners Blink-182 and other artists dropped off the bill.

Malta Weekender takes place May 26-30. In addition to Horizon’s own headlining sets, the lineup includes Bullet for My Valentine, Beartooth, Motionless in White, PVRIS and Spiritbox.

In related news, Bring Me the Horizon has helped Ed Sheeran earn a career-first with their joint rendition of the pop star’s song “Bad Habits.”

The collaboration, which the two acts performed together at the BRIT Awards in February before releasing a studio version, debuts at number two on Billboard‘s Hot Hard Rock Songs chart, marking the first time Sheeran has appeared on the ranking.

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Lights, camera, action: All the staging and performance details are falling into place for the 2022 ACM Awards, and all the acts on the bill are eagerly awaiting the big night — even if it rains.

“I think they’ve got a roof on that place, right?” jokes Josh McSwain of Parmalee, who will perform their hit duet with Blanco Brown, “Just the Way,” along with special guest Brooke Eden.

With an extra act onstage with them, Parmalee’s Matt Thomas promises “a different version of the song,” but he’s not spilling too many details for now.

“It’s good to kind of just broaden the view of the song,” he elaborates. “And for us, you know, [it’s] the first time being on an awards [show] stage, you know?…So we’re blown away already by just being part of it.”

Mitchell Tenpenny admits that he’s feeling anxious as he gears up to perform “At the End of a Bar,” his single with Chris Young. “I’m a little nervous, honestly, because it’s just been so long since we’ve done it,” he notes.

But those are good nerves: It’ll be a lot of fun to get onstage during the show, especially with a friend, he admits.

“I’m beyond excited,” Mitchell says. “It’s been two or three years since I’ve been back. So I’m excited to, first…go to the ACMs again and sit down there with everybody. But then to get to perform with my buddy Chris?…Exciting is the word.”

The ACMs will stream on Amazon Prime Video on March 7 beginning at 8 p.m. ET.

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Less than a month shy of his second birthday, Maren Morris’ baby boy Hayes is rocking his first pair of cowboy boots.

It’s rare that the country star shares photos of Hayes on her socials, but she made an exception to document the big moment, which took place during a trip to Fort Worth, Texas. The family snaps show Hayes giving his new boots a spin outside the store where he bought them, as proud parents Maren and Ryan Hurd watch their boy embrace his Texas roots.

“First pair of boots,” Maren wrote.

The Forth Worth Stockyards is familiar stomping grounds for Maren, no pun intended. The place where the photos were taken is just blocks away from Billy Bob’s Texas, a mainstay honky tonk on the regional and national country touring circuit.

Hayes comes by his flair for Western wear honestly. Not only are his parents country singers, but Maren’s also a Texas native. In March 2020, when she was nine months pregnant with Hayes, she played the famed Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo, meaning that Hayes was yee-hawing even in utero.

Sure enough, hours after purchasing the boots, Maren shared a picture of Hayes, still rocking his new kicks. “He won’t take them off,” she explained.

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ZZ Top frontman Billy Gibbons has curated a new exhibit called the “Billy F Gibbons Texas History Experience” celebrating his career and music and their connections to his home state, which will open on March 25 at The Bryan Museum in Galveston, Texas.

Gibbons will be taking part in an exclusive Q&A session at a VIP opening event for the exhibit on the 25th beginning at 5:30 p.m. CT, and tickets are available now at TheBryanMuseum.org.

The exhibition will feature some of Gibbons’ personal equipment and will look at how some songs written by Billy relate to Texas history and certain locations in the state.

A webpage dedicated to the exhibit at TheBryanMuseum.org features biographical information about Gibbons, as well as background on four ZZ Top songs with Texas-related themes — “La Grange,” “Heard It on the X,” “Deguello” and “Balinese.”

The “Billy F Gibbons Texas History Experience” will run through July 3 at the museum.

The Bryan Museum opened in 2015, with a mission of bringing to life the history of Texas and the American West.

In other news, for a second year in a row, Gibbons will be headlining the Tennessee Motorcycles and Music Revival, taking place this year May 19-22 at country legend Loretta Lynn‘s ranch in Hurricane Mills, Tennessee.

While Gibbons performed with his solo band The BFG’s at the 2021 event, this year he will be accompanied by a star-studded group of friends and guest artists. Billy performance is scheduled for May 20. The lineup also features more than a dozen other artists, including The Outlaws.

Besides the music, the four-day event will feature stunt shows, bike shows, motorcycle racing, off-road trail riding, a custom motorcycle showcase, and more.

Tickets for the extravaganza can be purchased at Tixr.com.

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Michael Bublé’s new album Higher will be out March 25, and an initial glance at the track list shows that it includes material you’ll find on most of his albums: originals, new interpretations of standards and pop classics, and a duet or two. But Michael says the album does have a theme: When you listen to it, he says he wants you to feel “joy and hope and peace.”

“It’s funny, I went from all of these different ideas of ‘Do I have a concept record? Is it this? Is it sexy, is it romantic…?'” Michael told ABC Audio last year about the project. “And the further I got along, the more I kept thinking, ‘No, I just want to make a great Michael Bublé record, and I don’t want to chase hits. I just want to try to chase great music.'”

Making the album during the pandemic further cemented Michael’s determination to make the kind of music that would lift people’s spirits.

As he explains, “As we got into COVID and as more and more of my friends, and people that I loved — or even strangers — [became] affected by it, and as we started to see people and the heartache of them losing people and…their fear and losing jobs…the more I realized that as a human being and as an artist, my job was simply to try to bring joy and hope and peace.”

Michael is also calling for hope and peace amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Posting an image of the country’s flag, he wrote, “I stand with the Ukrainian people. At a time when we can all feel a bit helpless and our hearts are breaking, join me in supporting them.”

He linked to Unicef’s home page — the charity is focused on helping children caught in the conflict.

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Vampire Weekend and Cage the Elephant lead the lineup for the 2022 Float Fest, taking place July 23-24 in Gonzales, Texas.

Other artists on the bill include CHVRCHES, Lord Huron, Two Feet, Sueco and Daisy the Great.

As for the floating part of Float Fest, festival-goers will have an opportunity to purchase a floating pass, which allows you to go tubing down the nearby Guadalupe River.

For the full lineup and all ticket info, visit FloatFest.net.

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After giving Spotify a Weezer makeover, Rivers Cuomo and company have now turned their attention to Wordle.

The “Buddy Holly” rockers have launched Weezle, their own version of the popular word game that’s been sweeping the internet over the past few months. Just like with the original Wordle, Weezle gives you six chances to guess a five-letter word, though this version, of course, is all Weezer-themed.

“If you like Wordle and Weezer, you’ll probably like Weezle,” Cuomo says.

If that describes someone like you, you can try out the first Weezle now at Weezle.web.app. If you need a hint — spoiler alert — try looking at the track list for Weezer’s Blue Album.

As for that Weezer version of Spotify, that would be Weezify. Cuomo launched Weezify in January amid artists including Neil Young and Joni Mitchell removing their music from the streaming platform in protest of its continued hosting of Joe Rogan‘s podcast The Joe Rogan Experience, which has been criticized for spreading misinformation regarding the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccines.

Meanwhile, Weezer has been working on new music, and plans to release four albums this year as part of the band’s SZNS project.

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Iron Maiden has become yet another rock artist to have concerts canceled because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The legendary U.K. heavy metal band has scrapped shows in Kyiv, Ukraine, on May 29 and in Moscow on June 1. In a statement, Iron Maiden writes, “We are very sorry to announce that due to the ongoing situation in Ukraine, the promoters have cancelled the two Iron Maiden shows…on the 2022 Legacy of the Beast World Tour.Ticket-holders for both shows will be informed by the respective promoters on refunds at the appropriate time.Our priority is, and will always be, the safety of our fans.”

The rockers launch their 2022 trek with a European that that begins May 22 in Zagreb, Croatia. The Legacy of the Beast tour’s North American leg gets underway with a September 11 show in El Paso, Texas. 

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