Jason Kempin/Getty Images for Big Machine Label Group
Chris Janson loves a bustling Thanksgiving holiday with his kinfolk, but this year’s shaping up to be a tad different.
“I think it’s going to be a little more low-key this year. Unfortunately, a lot of family’s traveling,” Chris tells ABC Audio before laying out how he typically spends the holiday.
“I like to have my [brothers-in-law] in and my in-laws and a lot of fried turkey and just chilling out. We hunt a lot, so we spend a lot of time in the woods, and we’ll be doing all those kind of things and not a whole lot of traveling,” he says. “I like to be home during the holidays. It’s sentimental.”
So is Chris the chief turkey fryer in the Janson household?
“I buy the turkeys, actually, locally from a place called Greer’s out in Franklin. Just country folks, and keeps their small business alive, and they do a better job than I do,” Chris shares.
“I’m not going to take the chance of lighting the house on fire. Trust me, that’s next. This is like throwing a turkey in a damn cannon, you know what I mean? You get a flame going up 10 feet,” the singer says. “So, no, but I don’t mind buying it. I’m not ashamed to say that I buy. No problem.”
Chris recently teamed with Alabama to record a duet version of their festive classic, “Christmas in Dixie.” You can hear it now wherever you listen to music.
Times and Seasons – The Rise and Fall and Rise of The Zombies by Robin Platts promises to tell the band’s “whole story in detail,” using interviews with the group’s five original members.
According to the description, the book follows The Zombies’ career “from the mid-‘60s Decca Records hits and misses through the break-up, the solo years, and their unexpected revival in the 21st century.”
Times and Seasons features a forward by Bangles frontwoman Susanna Hoffs, who shares, “My love affair with the Zombies may have started in the sixties, but I love them still — even more, as I’ve had the great privilege of knowing what fine human beings they are and the great fortune of seeing them perform many times, watching them inspire a whole new generation of music lovers.”
Times and Seasons – The Rise and Fall and Rise of The Zombies is available for preorder now, with shipping to begin early next year.
The Zombies, best known for such songs as “She’s Not There” and “Time of the Season,” were forced to end their touring career earlier this year after Rod Argent announced his retirement from the road after suffering a stroke.
In early November the band held their annual Begin Here Festival in their hometown of St. Albans, England, outside of London, which included an Argent tribute concert that featured his bandmates Colin Blunstone, Steve Rodford, Tom Toomey and Søren Koch.
Andrea Arnold’s coming-of-age drama Bird, available to watch in theaters now, follows a young girl living with her father and half-brother in northern Kent.
The movie, which stars Franz Rogowski and Barry Keoghan, was not sold to its actors on a script, but instead a concept. To convey the film, Arnold sent Rogowski an album and a few images, and told him some stories, he told ABC Audio.
He remembers listening to the music Arnold sent him as he drove through the U.K.
“I had these songs, and I was driving my van and the sun was rising,” Rogowski said. “Her invitation was so physical. The way she introduced her world and the character to me was not based on a story or on drama or, you know, the big five emotions that humans go through on a daily basis … her invitation was only based on images and music and her childhood memories. And that was very interesting.”
Keoghan said he respects Arnold for her bravery in making a film like Bird.
“I think she makes movies really close to the heart and this one especially,” Keoghan said. “She’s a genius. And I’m glad that I got to be part of this because I just got to find a lot, selfishly, about myself as well during it and during the journey of it. And there was no better person to be there with me doing it … Andrea, she basically took my hand and, you know, guided me through it.”
AWOLNATION has shared an acoustic version of “Barbarian,” a track off the band’s new album, The Phantom Five.
The performance finds frontman Aaron Bruno strumming an acoustic guitar while sitting in a room full of children’s toys. You can watch it streaming now on YouTube.
The Phantom Five, the fifth AWOLNATION album, dropped in August and also includes the single “Panoramic View.” AWOLNATION will launch a U.S. tour in support of the record in March.
Perhaps not coincidentally, Bruno’s also recently launched a hardcore side project called The Barbarians of California. Their debut album was released in October.
(WASHINGTON) — The judge overseeing Donald Trump’s election interference case has dismissed the case, after special counsel Jack Smith asked the judge to toss the case due to a long-standing Justice Department policy that bars the prosecution of a sitting president.
Smith earlier Monday moved to dismiss Trump’s election interference case and the appeal of his classified documents case ahead of Trump’s impending inauguration, due to the DOJ’s presidential immunity policy and not because the charges lacked merit.
U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan dismissed the charges against Trump without prejudice, leaving open the highly unlikely possibility of a future prosecution.
In a two-page opinion, Judge Chutkan wrote that dismissing the case without prejudice is “appropriate” and would not harm the “public interest,” agreeing with Smith’s argument that Trump’s immunity would not cover him when he leaves office.
“Dismissal without prejudice is also consistent with the Government’s understanding that the immunity afforded to a sitting President is temporary, expiring when they leave office,” Chutkan wrote.
However, it’s extremely unlikely that any prosecutor would attempt to bring the same charges in the future, in part because the statute of limitations for the alleged crimes will have expired by the time Trump leaves office in four years.
Trump’s lawyers did not oppose the government’s motion to dismiss the case without prejudice.
Smith also asked the judge in Trump’s classified documents case that his appeal against Trump’s two co-defendants in that case, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Olivera, be allowed to continue.
Smith’s requests came nearly 16 months after a grand jury first indicted Trump over his alleged efforts to unlawfully overturn the results of the 2020 election.
“That prohibition is categorical and does not turn on the gravity of the crimes charged, the strength of the Government’s proof, or the merits of the prosecution, which the Government stands fully behind,” Smith stated in his motion.
“The country have never faced the circumstance here, where a federal indictment against a private citizen has been returned by a grand jury and a criminal prosecution is already underway when the defendant is elected President,” the motion said. “After careful consideration, the Department has determined that OLC’s prior opinions concerning the Constitution’s prohibition on federal indictment and prosecution of a sitting President apply to this situation and that as a result this prosecution must be dismissed before the defendant is inaugurated.”
Smith moved to dismiss his appeal of the charges against Trump in his classified documents case, in which Trump pleaded not guilty last year to 40 criminal counts related to his handling of classified materials after leaving the White House, after U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed the case in July over her finding that Smith was improperly appointed to his role. Smith appealed that ruling to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that legal precedent and history confirm the attorney general’s ability to appoint special counsels.
Monday’s filing asked the court to dismiss that appeal — but it sought to keep the appeal in place for Nauta and De Olivera, two Trump employees who pleaded not guilty to obstruction charges.
“The appeal concerning the other two defendants will continue because, unlike defendant Trump, no principle of temporary immunity applies to them,” the filing said.
In a statement, John Irving, a lawyer for De Oliveira, said, “The Special Counsel’s decision to proceed in this case even after dismissing it against President Trump is an unsurprising tribute to the poor judgment that led to the indictment against Mr. De Oliveira in the first place. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. If they prefer a slow acquittal, that’s fine with us.”
Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung, in a statement, called Smith’s motions to dismiss a “major victory for the rule of law” and said, “The American People and President Trump want an immediate end to the political weaponization of our justice system and we look forward to uniting our country.”
In the election interference case, Trump last year pleaded not guilty to federal charges of undertaking a “criminal scheme” to overturn the results of the 2020 election by enlisting a slate of so-called “fake electors,” using the Justice Department to conduct “sham election crime investigations,” trying to enlist the vice president to “alter the election results,” and promoting false claims of a stolen election during the
Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, all in an effort to subvert democracy and remain in power.
Smith subsequently charged Trump in a superseding indictment that was adjusted to respect the Supreme Court’s July ruling that Trump is entitled to immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts undertaken as president.
Earlier this month, Judge Chutkan cancelled the remaining deadlines in the election interference case after Smith requested time to “assess this unprecedented circumstance and determine the appropriate course going forward consistent with Department of Justice policy” following Trump’s election.
Judge Chutkan had been in the process of considering how the case should proceed in light of the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling.
Smith had faced filing deadlines of Dec. 2 for both the election interference case and the classified documents case, after Smith’s team requested more time to determine how to face the unprecedented situation of pending federal cases against someone who had just been elected to the presidency.
Getting Monday’s filings in a week ahead of schedule now raises the question of whether Smith will be able to beat the clock to officially close his office down and submit his final report to Attorney General Merrick Garland — as is required of him per the DOJ’s special counsel regulations — before Inauguration Day.
The final report will have to go through a classification review by the intelligence community, a process that can sometimes take weeks before it is approved for any kind of public release.
Garland has made clear in appearances before Congress and in public statements that he is committed to making public the final reports of all special counsels during his tenure, which included reports by special counsel Robert Hur following his probe of President Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents before assuming the presidency, and by special counsel John Durham following his probe of the 2016 Russia investigation.
Special counsel David Weiss is still continuing his investigation of FBI informant Alexander Smirnov, who pleaded not guilty to charges of lying about President Biden and his son Hunter Biden, and is set to take the case to trial in California next week. It’s unclear whether he will formally close his investigation down and submit a final report prior to Trump taking office.
Lana Del Rey is officially releasing a new album in 2025.
The “Video Games” artist has announced that she’ll be putting out a record called The Right Person Will Stay on May 21.
“Happy for you to hear a few songs coming up before Stagecoach,” Del Rey writes in an Instagram post, referring to the country festival taking place in April.
Speaking of country, Del Rey has been teasing over the past year that she recorded a country record called Lasso. It’s unclear whether Lasso is a different record from The Right Person Will Stay or if maybe one morphed into the other, but Del Rey has released two albums in a single year before, so perhaps we’ll still be getting both.
Del Rey’s most recent album is 2023’s Did you know that there’s a tunnel under Ocean Blvd. Since then, she’s put out a collaboration with rapper Quavo, “Tough,” and a cover of John Denver‘s “Take Me Home, Country Roads.”
The 40th anniversary version of “Do They Know It’s Christmas” is here — along with a video featuring clips of all the artists who’ve sung on the various iterations of the all-star Band Aid charity single over the years.
U2‘s Bono, Sting, Paul McCartney, Phil Collins, Duran Duran‘s Simon Le Bon, Paul Young, the late George Michael and the late Sinead O’Connor are all featured in the video, which begins and ends with a 1984 plea from the late David Bowie asking people to help by buying the record. In addition, the new song and video feature changes to many of the song’s problematic lyrics, which have earned it much criticism over the years.
The video and song also feature excerpts from a famous 1984 BBC News report about famine in Ethiopia that spurred Irish singer Bob Geldof to create the original Band Aid project and the Live Aid concerts. The original song initially raised millions for famine relief and, according to the BBC, the Band Aid Charitable Trust has raised nearly 150 million pounds to date.
Geldof, meanwhile, is defending the song after pop star Ed Sheeran recently wrote on Instagram that if he had known about the remix, he would have denied Geldof permission to use his vocals. He cited an Instagram Story by Ghanian-English musician Fuse ODG, in which Fuse wrote that such all-star charity projects “perpetuate damaging stereotypes.”
Geldof told The Times of London, “This little pop song has kept millions of people alive …why not keep doing that? … [T]here are 600 million hungry people in the world — 300 million are in Africa. We wish it were other but it is not. We can help some of them. That’s what we will continue to do.”
(KENTUCKY) — A former Kentucky sheriff accused in the fatal shooting of a judge in September was arraigned on new charges Monday.
Monday’s arraignment hearing was held in the Letcher County Courthouse — the same courthouse where Shawn “Mickey” Stines is accused of gunning down Kentucky District Judge Kevin Mullins in his chambers on Sept. 19.
An attorney for Stines, 43, pleaded not guilty on his behalf Monday to a new charge of murder of a public official.
The judge denied Stines bond, citing concerns with security, community safety and the charges against him.
Stines previously pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder charges, for which a special judge appointed to preside over the case has said he could face the death penalty.
It is still not clear what led up to the alleged murder of Mullins, 54.
Just days before the shooting, Stines had been deposed in a lawsuit, which alleged he had failed to investigate one of his deputies who sexually abused a woman in Mullins’ chambers.
Kentucky State Police previously said the shooting occurred “following an argument inside the courthouse.” Letcher County Circuit Clerk Mike Watts said Stines and Mullins had lunch together earlier that day.
Mullins was found in his chambers with multiple gunshot wounds after a 911 caller reported gunfire inside the courthouse.
Stines was taken into custody without incident at the courthouse, police said. He retired from his position as sheriff shortly after his arrest.
Ringo Starr appears to have confirmed the rumors that Saltburn star Barry Keoghan is going to play him in Sam Mendes’ upcoming Beatles movies.
Back in February, Mendes announced plans to make four separate Beatles movies, one for each member — Ringo, Paul McCartney, John Lennon and George Harrison — and almost immediately speculation began as to who’ll play the Fab Four, with Keoghan’s name mentioned for Ringo.
In a recent interview with Entertainment Tonight, the 84-year-old Ringo appeared to let it slip that the rumor is true.
When asked how he feels about Keoghan playing him, Ringo shared, “Well, I think it’s great. I believe he’s somewhere taking drum lessons, and I hope not too many.”
So far there’s been no official announcement about the casting.
Mendes’ films will be made by Sony Pictures, and will mark the first time Apple Corps Ltd. and The Beatles have granted a studio the rights to the life stories of band members and their legendary catalog of music. Each film will be told from the point of view of one of the band members.
Erik Menendez, left, and is brother Lyle, in front of their Beverly Hills home, Nov. 30, 1989 Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
(LOS ANGELES, Calif.) — Erik and Lyle Menendez’s infamous case was back in front of a judge Monday, with their aunts appealing to the judge on their behalf, during a status hearing regarding the brothers’ habeas corpus petition, which was filed last year for a review of new evidence not presented at trial.
The hearing was delayed 40 minutes due to challenges with trying to get Lyle and Erik Menendez to be available in court via video. After several attempts, the brothers were able to listen to the proceedings on the phone.
A lottery drawing was held for 16 public seats in the courtroom. Dozens of members of the public arrived early in the morning to wait for a chance to witness the hearing.
Judge Michael Jesic allowed testimony Monday from two of the brothers’ aunts — their mother’s sister, Joan VanderMolen, and their father’s sister, Terry Baralt — due to health concerns.
The aunts “both made impassioned pleas with the judge to send the brothers home,” defense attorney Mark Geragos told reporters after the hearing, calling it a “moving experience.”
The aunts testified about “all of the good things” the brothers have done in prison, Geragos said.
Jesic pushed back another scheduled hearing regarding the brothers’ resentencing recommendation from Dec. 11 to Jan. 30 and Jan. 31.
Jesic said he needs time to go through 17 boxes of files on the case and said he wants to give the newly elected Los Angeles district attorney ample time to get up to speed.
“By Jan. 30 or 31, we’re hoping that by the end of that, or sometime sooner, that we will, in fact, get the brothers released,” Geragos said.
Two new pieces of evidence are at the center of the brothers’ habeas corpus petition.
One is allegations from a former member of the boy band Menudo, who revealed last year that he was raped by the brothers’ father, Jose Menendez.
The second piece is a letter Erik Menendez wrote to his cousin eight months before the murders detailing his alleged abuse from his father. The cousin testified about the alleged abuse at trial, but the letter — which would have corroborated the cousin’s testimony — wasn’t found until several years ago, according to the brothers’ attorney.
The case began in 1989, when Lyle Menendez, then 21, and Erik Menendez, then 18, fatally shot their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez, in the family’s Beverly Hills home. The defense claimed the brothers acted in self-defense after enduring years of sexual abuse by their father, but prosecutors alleged they killed for money.
The first trial, which had separate juries for each brother, ended in mistrials. In 1996, after the second trial — during which the judge barred much of the sex abuse evidence — the brothers were convicted and both sentenced to two consecutive terms of life without parole.
As the habeas corpus petition moves through the courts, the brothers have two other potential paths to freedom.
One path is through resentencing. Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón announced last month he was recommending the brothers’ sentence of life without the possibility of parole be removed, and they should instead be sentenced for murder, which would be a sentence of 50 years to life. Because both brothers were under 26 at the time of the crimes, they would be eligible for parole immediately with the new sentence.
The DA’s office said its resentencing recommendations take into account many factors, including rehabilitation in prison, and abuse or trauma that contributed to the crime. Gascón praised the work Lyle and Erik Menendez did behind bars to rehabilitate themselves and help other inmates.
Shortly after Gascón’s announcement, he lost his race for reelection to Nathan Hochman. The incoming DA, who is set to take office on Dec. 2, said he plans to read through the evidence — including confidential prison files and interviews with family, lawyers and law enforcement — before showing his support for resentencing.
The other possible path to freedom is the brothers’ request for clemency, which they’ve submitted to California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Last week, Newsom said he’ll defer to Hochman’s “review and analysis of the Menendez case prior to making any clemency decisions.”
ABC News’ Alex Stone, Matt Gutman and Ashley Riegle contributed to this report.
