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New book ‘Tonight in Jungleland’ takes a deep dive into Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Born to Run’

August 4, 2025 by WDNY Radio

As Bruce Springsteen‘s breakthrough album Born to Run turns 50 in August, author and journalist Peter Ames Carlin takes a deep dive into the record in his new book, Tonight in Jungleland: The Making of Born to Run, out Tuesday.

While Born to Run was a critical and commercial success for Springsteen, prior to the record he was coming off two commercial failures — Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. and The Wild, The Innocent & the E Street Shuffle — and was close to being dropped by his label.

“That was like an existential threat to him because he was so about his work and his career and he was still discovering his voice and his identity,” Carlin tells ABC Audio. He notes that Born to Run turned out to be the album where Springsteen “figured out who he was and what Bruce Springsteen, the performer, was supposed to be.”

Carlin, who also wrote the 2012 biography Bruce, says for Born to Run, Springsteen focused on “simplifying his songs” and “making the lyrics direct and conversational.”

Carlin notes that while making the record Springsteen also had to get to a place “where he could acknowledge and work with his own desire to be successful.”

“I think he was a little leery of that up to that point,” he says.

Carlin got a chance to talk to Springsteen for the book and says The Boss didn’t have a hard time looking back at that period in his career.

“He loves to look back into the past, especially when it’s something that was that transformative of an experience for him,” the author says. “And I think it was also really interesting for him to look back at 50 years later and to remember what it was like to be young and hungry and with so much to prove.”

Soulja Boy arrested on weapon charge during traffic stop in Los Angeles

August 3, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Soulja Boy was arrested early Sunday morning during a traffic stop in Los Angeles on a charge of felon in possession of a firearm, according to the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD).

The 35-year-old rapper, whose real name is DeAndre Cortez Way, was a passenger in a vehicle stopped at Genesee and Melrose, the LAPD said.

According to the LAPD, a gun was discovered in the car, leading to Soulja Boy’s arrest. He was later booked into the LAPD’s Wilshire Division jail, the authorities added.

Soulja Boy was arrested around 2:50 a.m., online records show. It is unclear whether he has been released or where he is currently being held.

ABC News has reached out to Soulja Boy’s representatives for comment but has not yet received a response.

In April 2023, a jury ordered Soulja Boy to pay $235,900 in punitive damages to a woman who claimed he assaulted her at a party at his Malibu home in 2019, according to ABC Los Angeles affiliate station, KABC-TV. Soulja Boy denied the assault allegation. The amount matched the compensatory damages awarded to the woman a week earlier.

This marks Soulja Boy’s second arrest involving firearms.

In December 2016, he was arrested at his Hollywood Hills home after officers say they found a gun while he was on probation. He pleaded no contest to felony weapons possession and a misdemeanor charge in April 2017, receiving five years of probation and 240 days of community service, according to TMZ.

Forget Shakedown Street — San Francisco now has a Jerry Garcia street

August 3, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Jerry Garcia would have turned 83 on Friday, and in recognition, his native San Francisco gave the late Grateful Dead founder a big honor.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that on Friday, San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie led a dedication ceremony as a stretch of Harrington Street, where Garcia spent part of childhood, was renamed Jerry Garcia Street in his honor. The ceremony took place just a few steps away from the home where Garcia lived with his grandparents.

“Jerry gave San Francisco and its people lasting memories and music,” Lurie told the crowd, according to the paper. “He created something out of nothing. Jerry had the spirit of a rock star, an innovator and a futurist.”

Garcia’s daughter Trixie was also present, and she said, “Jerry was a magical person. He was humble, he was generous, he was talented. It’s truly an honor, on behalf of Jerry Garcia’s family, to witness this historic street naming.”

San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park also hosted three days of Dead & Company concerts on Aug. 1, 2 and 3 celebrating the Grateful Dead’s 60th anniversary. During those shows, the band was joined at various points by Phil Lesh’s son Grahame Lesh, as well as Billy Strings and Sturgill Simpson.

Say it ain’t so! Olivia Rodrigo brings out Weezer during Lollapalooza set

August 2, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Olivia Rodrigo was Mary Tyler Moore to Weezer‘s Buddy Holly Friday night at Lollapalooza.

During her set at the Chicago festival, Olivia asked the crowd if it was anybody’s first concert. She then said, “You always remember your first concert. Very, very special moment. I remember my first concert. It was a very memorable night.”

“I watched this incredible band and I am so over the moon because that incredible band is actually here tonight to play a few songs,” she continued. “Will you please say hello to Weezer!”

The band then took the stage with Olivia to perform “Buddy Holly” — which she said was one of her “favorite songs of all time” — and “Say It Ain’t So.”

Weezer is the third major rock act that Olivia has tapped to join her onstage at festivals this year. She brought out David Byrne of Talking Heads during her set at Governors Ball in New York, and The Cure‘s Robert Smith while performing at the U.K.’s Glastonbury festival.

John Lennon confidant says he was jealous of ‘attention’ Paul McCartney got in the ’70s

August 1, 2025 by WDNY Radio

John Lennon took himself out of the spotlight for five years in the 1970s to raise his son Sean Lennon, but during that time he was “insanely jealous” of his former Beatles bandmate Paul McCartney‘s musical success. That’s according to longtime Lennon friend and confidant Elliot Mintz.

While appearing on Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan‘s podcast, The Magnificent Others, Mintz said that Lennon would speak “so lovingly” of Paul. But Mintz claimed Lennon was “insanely jealous” of all the “mega hits” that Paul was scoring with his band Wings.

“He was jealous of the amount of attention and accolades, and the fact that Paul was filling stadiums,” Mintz claims. But when Mintz would argue that Lennon wasn’t even making albums or doing concerts, he says Lennon would tell him, “You’re missing the point. They’re embracing his genius, but have you heard ‘Silly Love Songs’?”

Mintz says he would respond, “Look, let’s be fair. He’s done things other than ‘Silly Love Songs.’ But that would go nowhere.”

He recalls that for Christmas in 1978, Paul and wife Linda McCartney came by John and Yoko Ono‘s New York City apartment and everybody got along fine. According to Mintz, Paul asked John if he was making any music, and John said no. When John asked Paul the same question, he responded, “I’m always making music. I make music every day of my life. I can’t stop making music.”

Mintz says at the time he thought to himself, “What would have happened if John [took] the bait and said, ‘I got a couple of guitars in the other room. What if I bring them out just for the hell of it?’ And the two of them could’ve sat in the living room and changed the face of contemporary music.”

Biffy Clyro premieres video for ‘Futique’ track ‘Hunting Season’

August 1, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Biffy Clyro has premiered the video for “Hunting Season,” a track off the band’s upcoming album, Futique.

The clip does not feature any hunting, but instead finds the “Many of Horror” trio rocking out in a room together covered in sheets. We also get a few first-person point-of-view shots of each member as they play their respective instruments.

You can watch the “Hunting Season” video on YouTube.

Futique, the follow-up to 2021’s The Myth of the Happily Ever After, drops Sept. 26. It also includes the single “A Little Love.”

Michael Jai White says he wanted his new film, ‘Trouble Man,’ ‘to be an experience’

August 1, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Michael Jai White wrote, produced, directed and stars in his new film, Trouble Man, out in theaters Friday. Though it’s being associated with the Blaxploitation genre, he tells ABC Audio the film is generally influenced by action comedies.

“I have certain issues with [the Blaxploitation era] because there were just a lot of movies that were just action movies and dramas that got swept up into that title,” he explains.

While he admits Trouble Man carries the spirit of “brotherhood, sisterhood and pride” often seen from films in that era, he says the movie falls into the genre of urban action comedy and is nothing like anything he’s seen before.

“I’m not into the formulaic stuff that you’ve seen all the time. I always wanted it to be an experience,” Michael tells ABC Audio.

With Trouble Man now out for the general public to see, he hopes fans can watch and enjoy it much like did when watching Uptown Saturday Night, A Piece of the Action and other movies as a child.

“I want to leave a legacy of movies like that. That’s really my benchmark,” he says. “These movies have made you feel good by the end of it. And there’s just not many of them anymore. So this is where my aim was.”

Trouble Man follows Michael’s Jaxen, a private investigator hired to help find missing R&B star Jahari. Gillian White, Method Man, LaLa Anthony and Orlando Jones also star in the film.

Jimmy Page settles writing credits dispute with ‘Dazed and Confused’ composer

August 1, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Back in 2011, Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page and Jake Holmes, who wrote the song “Dazed and Confused” in 1967, settled a copyright infringement lawsuit that would lead to Zeppelin’s rendition of the song being credited as “written Jimmy Page, inspired by Jake Holmes.” However, due to events including the release of the film Becoming Led Zeppelin, Holmes sued Page again earlier this year — and that case has now been settled too.

After Holmes wrote the song, Page’s previous band The Yardbirds recorded it, and then Page reworked it for Led Zeppelin in 1969. Holmes’ new complaint, obtained by ABC News, asserted that in the past three years, Page released numerous Yardbirds recordings that featured them performing “Dazed and Confused,” and those recordings falsely attributed authorship of the song to Page. As per the original settlement, though, the version that The Yardbirds recorded had always been credited to Holmes.

Plus, there were two performances of “Dazed and Confused” in the Becoming Led Zeppelin documentary, one by The Yardbirds. Once again, Holmes contended, that rendition was incorrectly credited to Page, not him.

On Friday, Holmes filed a notification that “a settlement has been reached that resolves the entire case.” The details of the settlement were not stipulated.

Def Leppard prepping first new album since 2022’s ‘Diamond Star Halos’

August 1, 2025 by WDNY Radio

A new Las Vegas residency isn’t the only thing that Def Leppard has planned for 2026.

The band tells USA Today that they’re working on a new album for release next year. It’ll be their first new studio album since 2022’s Diamond Star Halos. And like that record, they’re working on the new album remotely, rather than all the members together in a studio.

“We’re blessed that technology has allowed us to do this,” singer Joe Elliott tells USA Today. “We get together metaphorically rather than physically and do Zoom meetings all the time. This way five people can work on the same song at the same time and it adds excitement to the flavors of what you’re doing. Laptops have become Abbey Road.”

Elliott added that there’s “plenty of stuff” completed for the new album, and that they just need to figure out which songs will make the final cut and in what order.

Meanwhile, the band is currently on tour. When they wrap up their dates in October, they’ll start preparing for Def Leppard: Live at Caesars Palace The Las Vegas Residency. The 12-show run is scheduled for Feb. 3, 2026, to Feb. 28, 2026, at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace.

Elliott, who’s spent 48 years with Def Leppard, tells USA Today, “Health allowing, we’ll keep going until we feel we can’t anymore.”

Nathaniel Rateliff to perform at Joe Walsh’s 2025 VetsAid concert

August 1, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Nathaniel Rateliff is performing with Joe Walsh during the Eagles guitarist’s 2025 VetsAid concert, taking place Nov. 15 in Wichita, Kansas.

The “S.O.B.” artist will join Walsh for a “super-set” alongside Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks of the Tedeschi Trucks Band.

Tickets go on sale Aug. 8 at 10 a.m. CT. For more info, visit VetsAid.org.

VetsAid, now in its ninth year, supports veterans services charities. Previously VetsAid performers have included Dave Grohl, Eddie Vedder, Nine Inch Nails, Metallica‘s James Hetfield and The Black Keys.

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