Metallica has premiered a new song called “Screaming Suicide,” a track off the band’s upcoming album, 72 Seasons.
“‘Screaming Suicide’ addresses the taboo word of suicide,” says frontman James Hetfield. “The intention is to communicate about the darkness we feel inside.”
“It’s ridiculous to think we should deny that we have these thoughts,” the singer continues. “At one point or another, I believe most people have thought about it. To face it is to speak the unspoken. If it’s a human experience, we should be able to talk about it. You are not alone.”
You can listen to “Screaming Suicide” now via digital outlets, and watch its accompanying video streaming on YouTube.
72 Seasons, the follow-up to 2016’s Hardwired…to Self-Destruct, will be released April 14. It also includes the previously released single “Lux Æterna,” which has sat at #1 on Billboard‘s Mainstream Rock Airplay chart for the last six weeks.
Metallica will support 72 Seasons with a giant world tour, which kicks off in April in Europe and then comes to the U.S. in August.
If you are in crisis or know someone in crisis, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741.
The first general on-sale date for tickets to Madonna‘s The Celebration Tour isn’t until Friday, but the tour has already added a bunch of shows for the usual reason: “overwhelming demand.”
The global tour, which will feature Madonna playing four decades’ worth of hits, now boasts 13 new dates, including second shows in Seattle, Chicago, Toronto, Montreal, Boston, Miami, Houston, Dallas, Austin, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Las Vegas, plus a third show in New York.
Tickets for those new dates will go on sale Friday, January 20, at 10 a.m. local time, alongside the shows that have already been announced in those cities. As previously reported, tickets go on sale for the remaining cities on January 27 at 10 a.m. local time. Visit Madonna.com for all the details.
The Celebration Tour kicks off Saturday, July 15, at Rogers Arena in Vancouver, British Columbia. It’s set to wrap up Friday, December 1, in Amsterdam.
This will be Madonna’s first tour since her Madame X trek, which saw her doing multiple dates in theaters in select cities. It ended in early March 2020, after being cut short by the pandemic. The Celebration Tour will see the Queen of Pop performing in arenas.
Kevin Kane/Getty Images For The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)
Def Leppard makes a cameo in the new Netflix film Bank of Dave, and they are giving fans a look at what went into the making of their scene. The band shared some behind-the-scenes footage of them shooting the cameo, which was filmed March 5, 2022, in Wakefield, England.
In the video, Joe Elliott calls the film a “feel good” movie, which he seemed happy to be a part of. “I get to do some acting. I’m hoping I get my Equity card, so I’m just trying to get into character,” he says. “It should be a bit of fun.”
Bank of Dave tells the real-life story of a working-class, self-made millionaire named Dave Fishwick, who istrying to set up a community bank to help his town’s local businesses survive. It stars actor Rory Kinnear, whose been in Penny Dreadful, Black Mirror and James Bond films, including Quantum of Solace and Skyfall. The cameo has the band performing at a charity fundraiser for the bank.
“What a special day,” drummer Rick Allen shares in the behind-the-scenes video. “I’m really excited about how this turns out and I think it’s just really an honor to be involved with something like this, with such a fantastic story.”
Bank of Dave is currently streaming on Netflix in the United Kingdom.
(WASHINGTON) — Another spending fight looms between the White House and Congress, reviving similar stalemates in 2011 and 2013 under President Barack Obama.
Then, as now, Congress was divided — a Republican House and a Democratic Senate — and the White House had a Democratic president.
Then, as now, ascendant House Republicans sought to use must-pass spending and debt legislation to negotiate priorities they said their voters wanted, such as major spending cuts and, in 2013, an effort to stop the Affordable Care Act.
The U.S. does not take in enough money in taxes or other revenue to pay for its expenses, so it must borrow to cover the rest — and on Thursday, the U.S. hit its current debt limit of approximately $31.4 trillion. The Treasury Department has begun what Secretary Janet Yellen called “extraordinary measures” to keep the federal government funded and give Congress more time to act.
Last week, Yellen wrote to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy that she didn’t expect the department’s “cash and extraordinary measures will be exhausted before early June.”
That timeline sets the stage for a fierce political fight, with Republicans portraying Democrats as out-of-control spenders — racking up debts upon debts upon debts — and Democrats responding that the GOP, which holds the House, is unable to responsibly govern by paying the country’s bills for the military, Social Security and much more.
All the while, the Treasury says, the country is pushed closer to the brink of major economic consequences if it runs out of “extraordinary measures” and can’t borrow money.
“This has become a political football because it’s so easy to pass back and forth and get points for hitting the other side,” said one House Democratic aide, granted anonymity to speak candidly. “There’s less incentive to actually solve problems when there’s a chance to have a news cycle hitting the other side on it.”
A “football” is what the White House says they don’t want, citing how Congress has usually addressed the debt limit in a bipartisan fashion, under presidents of both parties and even when Republicans controlled the House and Senate.
“Congress is going to need to raise the debt limit without — without — conditions and it’s just that simple,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said earlier this month.
And while Jean-Pierre has since said there are ongoing conversations between the White House and members of both parties, “Attempts to exploit the debt ceiling as leverage will not work,” she told reporters this month. “There will be no hostage taking.”
McCarthy, R-Calif., has insisted that he would not support any debt limit increase without reducing spending back to fiscal year 2022 levels. He has pointed to the most recent election results.
“Republicans were elected with a mandate from the American people in the midterm elections. We campaigned on the fact that we were going to be serious about spending cuts. The Senate has to recognize we’re not going to budge until we see meaningful reform with respect to spending,” he said on Fox News over the weekend, referencing negotiations with the Senate.
Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., echoed that in an appearance on ABC’s “This Week.”
“The Republicans were largely elected to get control of reckless funding. That’s the mission that their voters have given them. So, when President [Joe] Biden says he’s going to refuse to negotiate with Republicans on any concessions, I don’t think that’s right,” Bacon said.
“I want our side to negotiate with the Democrats in good faith,” he said, “but President Biden has to also negotiate.”
Lawmakers and congressional aides who spoke with ABC News say they bristle over the pall over the prospect of negotiations but admit that they see political advantages for each party.
“I think members, especially the Republican side, are very pressured right now to be able to rationalize not just to themselves but to their constituents what $31.4 trillion means to the country in debt. And if they just blindly go forward with the same old, same old, they’re not doing their job,” former Rep. Mike Bishop, R-Mich., told ABC News. “That’s exactly what their constituents will tell them. So, for every opportunity you have to address the issue of spending, you really, as a member, gotta take advantage of it.”
Former Rep. David Jolly, R-Fla., who has since left the party, predicted that “House Republicans will play hardball.” Jolly added that concessions by McCarthy would be an “early broken promise” to the more conservative members whom he persuaded to vote him in as speaker.
President Biden, too, could see political upside in holding his line, some in his party say.
“Biden won’t need to negotiate as long as the public continues to understand that MAGA Republicans in the House are to blame for the looming crisis. They have done a good job so far. It will help him in the reelect to run in 2024 against a Republican House that’s out of control,” said one Senate Democratic aide.
Looking back at past spending, debt ceiling fights
The modern era of spending and debt limit fights traces back to the 2010 midterms, when Republicans retook the House in what was the largest gain for a party in the chamber since 1938. Conservatives demanded the Obama administration tackle deficit reduction in order to raise the borrowing limit.
In the summer of 2011, after months of fractious wrangling, Obama told reporters that “crisis” had been averted — the U.S. government’s debt limit would be raised, ensuring it could continue to borrow money to pay its bills, in exchange for major spending cuts sought by Republicans.
“It ensures also that we will not face this same kind of crisis again in six months or eight months or 12 months,” Obama said then. “And it will begin to lift the cloud of debt and the cloud of uncertainty that hangs over our economy.”
Even so, the fiscal fight had tiptoed close to the cliff of the Treasury exhausting its resources, leading Standard & Poor’s to downgrade the credit rating of the United States government for the first time ever.
Two years later, Obama was again celebrating a breakthrough with Congress over the government’s spending and debt limit.
This time — in the wake of Obama’s 2012 reelection and Democrats picking up seats in the House and Senate — a standoff with the House GOP majority ended in the conservative lawmakers conceding on almost all of their demands, with both parties in the Senate hammering out a deal.
“We’ve got to get out of the habit of governing by crisis,” Obama said at the time.
A 2013 ABC News poll showed that 54% of Americans agreed with Obama’s handling of the issue and only 40% agreed with Republicans’ handling.
However, that disapproval didn’t appear to bring with it any broader voter reaction, with the GOP seeing gains in the 2014 midterms.
Since then, the debt limit has either been paused or increased eight times, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center, with Congress largely choosing to simply extend the debt limit rather than hold a vote on raising it.
“It should be done in a bipartisan way. It always has been,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said on CNN last week, seeking to play down the possibility of another bruising battle.
“I think Republicans learned their lesson,” he said then. “They suffered, we won the election after that [in 2012], and they will hopefully come and work with us.”
With the debt ceiling looming again as a priority and a problem, some other lawmakers are getting frustrated.
“I’ve blamed both sides for a long time,” one House Republican said. “It’s an inherent problem that we must get serious about.”
The House Democratic aide took this view: “I think both sides will run aggressive messaging on this and, in the end, both will get blamed. Voters tend to channel anger at who is ‘in charge.’ In this instance, that includes a bipartisan group of leaders because of the current divide.”
Graham Nash has shared a heartfelt tribute to his Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young bandmate David Crosby, who passed away Thursday at the age of 81.
“It is with a deep and profound sadness that I learned that my friend David Crosby has passed,” he writes on Instagram. “I know people tend to focus on how volatile our relationship has been at times, but what has always mattered to David and me more than anything was the pure joy of the music we created together, the sound we discovered with one another, and the deep friendship we shared over all these many long years.”
He adds, “David was fearless in life and in music. He leaves behind a tremendous void as far as sheer personality and talent in this world. He spoke his mind, his heart, and his passion through his beautiful music and leaves an incredible legacy. These are the things that matter most.”
Finally he offers, “My heart is truly with his wife, Jan, his son, Django, and all of the people he has touched in this world.”
Crosby, Stills & Nash, which also featured Stephen Stills, formed in 1968. They released their self-titled debut in 1969. Neil Young later joined them, and they released Déjà Vu, their first album as a foursome, in 1970; it went to number one. In addition, Crosby & Nash released four albums together.
(NEW YORK) — When Grace Featherston, a senior theatre education major at the University of Texas at Austin, received an email Tuesday notifying her that TikTok was being restricted at the university, she went on TikTok to share her reaction to the news.
She captioned her nine-second video post, “UT Austin just banned Tiktok on their WI-FI.”
“This whole thing with the Wi-Fi, that was kind of like, ‘Whoa, what’s going on?'” the 22-year-old told “Good Morning America.”
This week, UT Austin said it was blocking access to TikTok starting Tuesday on the school’s wired and Wi-Fi networks, joining several schools in the Lone Star State in doing so. The university said it was taking the action to comply with Gov. Greg Abbott’s December directive “to all state agencies to eliminate the cybersecurity risks posed by TikTok.”
In the last month, numerous public colleges and universities in multiple states have announced bans on TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, from their schools’ campus Wi-Fi networks and devices, with many responding to directives from their state governments.
More than half of states have set a partial or full TikTok ban on government devices as both state and federal officials have voiced fears that American data and information could be shared with the Chinese government.
The federal government and TikTok developed a preliminary agreement last year to respond to national security concerns, but further review is required, The New York Times reported last September.
TikTok has said the data it collects from U.S. users is stored in the U.S. and in Singapore. The company said it has not taken down any user posts at the request of the Chinese government.
TikTok has previously rejected cybersecurity concerns state and federal agencies have raised, telling ABC News in December, “We believe the concerns driving these decisions are largely fueled by misinformation about our company. We are happy to continue having constructive meetings with state policymakers to discuss our privacy and security practices. We are disappointed that many state agencies, offices, and universities will no longer be able to use TikTok to build communities and connect with constituents.”
Featherston said she uses TikTok daily and has been on the app for the last four years — a period, she said, when people started using the app more during quarantine or while staying home during the pandemic.
Featherston said the new campus TikTok ban won’t affect her too much since she’s on the UT Austin campus one day a week and can switch to her personal phone data to use the app if she wants to, but she said the restriction has led her to consider other sides and question the restriction in the first place.
“UT is following the law but on the other hand, I can see it as a constitutional issue because we have students who live on campus who, that is their Wi-Fi, they pay to be there, they pay to use that Wi-Fi, and TikTok being restricted could honestly be a constitutional issue for freedom of the press and freedom of speech. Because, I mean, it’s censorship,” Featherston continued.
“I think we’re at that point where we’re gonna have to review it, let it go through the system, and if people aren’t happy with the result, I mean, I just think that’s all better incentive to say, ‘Hey, there’s a way to fix it. Time to go vote.'”
In Alabama, Auburn University first announced back in December that it would block TikTok access in accordance with Gov. Kay Ivey’s executive order banning TikTok from state devices and networks. On Jan. 9, the school announced it would restrict its use on school networks.
Braden Haynes, a senior visual media and marketing major at Auburn, said when she and her peers heard of the upcoming TikTok ban, they didn’t think it would actually happen.
“Everybody was like, ‘Yeah, right,’ kind of like, ‘I don’t see why they would do that,'” the 22-year-old told “GMA,” adding that she knew of schools, such as the University of Georgia, that had not implemented TikTok restrictions even though they were located in states that did have a TikTok ban on state devices and networks.
But by the time Haynes, a station manager for Auburn’s student-run TV station, Eagle Eye TV, returned to campus from winter break, the TikTok usage limit was in place.
“There’s no message. You just get on it and it just doesn’t load. Like it’ll play the first video [if] it’s already loaded up in there, but if you try to scroll or refresh the page, it just doesn’t do anything.” Haynes explained.
Daniel Schmidt, a journalism major at Auburn, said the TikTok ban on campus also would affect certain classes that had incorporated the app in coursework.
“Last semester in our multimedia journalism class, it was mandatory that we create a TikTok account and go on campus and create a social media video,” the 27-year-old told “GMA.” “From what it sounds like, we can’t use that as an option at all, which, there are other social media platforms, it’s not a huge deal, but again, there’s some limitations to the learning process here.”
“When it comes to students that aren’t employed by the state, not being able to use it on the university internet, I can kind of see the rationale, but I also don’t think that that’s cool, in my personal opinion,” Schmidt added. “That’s just a limitation of students’ expression for security reasons.”
From her perspective, Katherine Carroll, another Auburn senior, said her peers didn’t seem too worried about the campus TikTok ban and said others would likely find a workaround or pivot to other social platforms.
“I think, for most people, when you’re on campus, you’re at least trying to think about school. You might use TikTok to unwind but there’s so many other social media apps like Instagram Reels. It’s just a very small part of a bigger social media bubble that like, if they banned all social media, then I think people might wither up and die but it’s just one app. So I think it does have some impact, but we just haven’t seen it yet,” the 21-year-old journalism major said.
When it comes to the ban, Haynes said she felt TikTok was being singled out even as there have been concerns about other social media apps as well.
“Personally, I don’t see the point. I mean, I get where they’re coming from with privacy and things like that,” Haynes said. “…They can ban TikTok because it’s new and I think because it’s not a U.S.-based company … but the other apps probably have [issues]. So I don’t know that banning one app is going to make that much of a difference.”
Days after an unreleased version of Metro Boomin‘s “Trance” surfaced, revealing that Drake was once on the song, the producer provided an explanation for why the 6 God was not on the final cut.
“Really, it was a song I had did with Travis [Scott] and [Young] Thug originally for my album,” Metro said during his appearance on DJ Drama’s Streetz Is Watchin Radio. “I was in the studio with Drake one time because we were gonna do some stuff for my album. He just wanted to hear some songs from my album, and then he heard that one.”
According to the producer, Drake insisted on recording some bars to the song despite being told that he was “set on how it was.” “He had hit me and was just like, ‘Let me see if there’s anything you could add to it,'” Metro recalled. “He was like, ‘If you don’t like it, then whatever.'”
The producer eventually stuck to his guns and released the song without Drake’s verse. “He did some stuff, a couple parts was cool but, like, I just felt, like, just even with, like, Slime verse and Trav verse and the outro, it wasn’t just no room,” Metro explained. “It wasn’t nothing personal … I just ended up using the original and I guess the other one just leaked or something.”
Heroes & Villains dropped last month and debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200. Also featured on the star-studded album are Takeoff, A$AP Rocky, 21 Savage, The Weeknd, Future, Chris Brown and more.
Cordae and Anderson .Paak are reuniting for a song that’s produced by J. Cole, per XXL. “Two Tens” is slated to drop on January 25. The artwork, released Thursday, features two Black girls with Afros lying down on a multicolored rug in the grass.
The announcement of the new song comes days after Cordae celebrated the one-year anniversary of his sophomore album, From A Birds Eye View.
“I put a lot of heart and soul into this project! Took a lot of artistic risks and I seen a lot of growth in myself as a songwriter/lyricist,” the rapper tweeted. “This jaint gonna age like fine wine.”
“Two Tens” will mark the second collaboration for Cordae and .Paak, who previously teamed up on 2019’s “RNP.”
(NEW YORK) — Over the last two months, following lengthy periods of detention in Russia, Americans Brittney Griner, Sarah Krivanek and Taylor Dudley were all allowed to return home — but Alabama native David Barnes continues to be held by Russian authorities.
Now, after more than a year of incarceration in Russia, Barnes’ trial resumed this week before a judge in Moscow.
Barnes, a 65-year-old father who was living in The Woodlands, Texas, prior to his arrest during a trip to Russia, appeared in district court on Thursday for the beginning of testimony.
Barnes is being tried on allegations by Russian authorities that he abused his two sons in suburban Houston, even though law enforcement in Texas previously investigated Barnes following similar accusations from his ex-wife, Svetlana Koptyaeva, and did not find cause to file charges.
With his hands cuffed, Barnes was seen being escorted up a courthouse staircase in jeans and a long sleeve shirt at 1:00 p.m. local time before the hearing began.
When asked by an ABC News reporter if he had anything that he wanted to say, Barnes said, “I love my boys.”
The hearing lasted for more than four hours. Koptyaeva, who is wanted in the U.S. on a felony interference with child custody charge, was questioned on the stand.
Koptyaeva’s mother also provided testimony, but details from inside the courtroom are scarce due to restrictions in Russia on public access to trials involving minors.
“It is a civil matter. It should not be a criminal case,” Barnes told ABC News. He was also asked whether he is currently having any health issues, but said he is not.
Two additional people are expected to be called to the stand to testify during the next hearing. Since the trial is not occurring on consecutive days, Barnes is not due back in court until February 22.
A U.S. State Department official told ABC News that they are aware of media reporting about the resumption of Barnes’ trial this week, adding, “We have requested permission for another consular visit and are awaiting a response from Russian authorities.”
“Generally, the Russia[n] Federation does not abide by its obligations to provide timely notification of the detention of U.S. citizens in Russia,” the State Department official said. “Additionally, Russian authorities also do not regularly inform the U.S. Embassy of the trials, sentencing, or movement of U.S. citizens detained in Russia.”
Griner was released from a Mordovia penal colony in December 2022 through a highly-publicized prisoner exchange. Krivanek’s detention ended the same day while Dudley was transported across the border to Poland last week as part of his release.
“There are still no charges in Montgomery County related to David Barnes,” Kelly Blackburn of the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office told ABC News in November.
Texas authorities did file a felony charge of interference with child custody against Koptyaeva, a native of Russia, after she allegedly took the children out of the United States on March 26, 2019, in violation of a court judgment.
Interpol, the International Criminal Police Organization, considers the children to have been missing since that date, and Barnes’ family says he has not seen his children since.
In late 2021, following a Texas judge’s 2020 decision to designate Barnes as the sole managing conservator of his children, Barnes traveled to Russia in the hope of being granted similar custody or visitation rights in Russian family court, according to Barnes’ family. But he was detained just over a month after arriving in Moscow.
Koptyaeva continues to say that the children suffered abuse from Barnes, writing in part in a September 2022 email to ABC News, “We were running away just to protect the boys. Do you really think that a person would take two kids and go into [the] unknown, without [a] job, without any source of income, into nothing just to hurt someone?”
Barnes’ trial began in November following a series of delays that, according to his family, were caused by issues associated with transporting him to the courthouse. The trial, which is not occurring on consecutive days, was previously slated to continue on Dec. 15, but was adjourned until January after court representatives reported that there were absences involving trial participants.
“My hope is that they can actually get him transported to the courthouse and there’s no confusion again as to when the trial is scheduled to begin,” Carol Barnes, David’s older sister, said in an email to ABC News on Tuesday. “My real hope is that they dismiss the case, but we know that’s not going to happen.”
A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department said in December that representatives from the agency have visited Barnes in custody five times since his arrest.
“Our last visit to Mr. Barnes in detention was on December 13, 2022,” the State Department spokesperson told ABC News. “U.S. Embassy representatives attempted to attend his trial on December 15, but were denied entry.”
Barnes maintains his innocence, writing to his family in December that he is hoping that he can be part of another prisoner exchange between the U.S. and Russia, but adding, “I still want a shot at the trial … but who knows how long the trial could last.”
ABC News’ Tanya Stukalova and Anastasia Bagaeva contributed to this report.
Måneskin‘s new album, Rush!, arrives Friday, and the Italian rockers apparently celebrated with a wedding.
Last week, the “Supermodel” outfit teased a collaboration with Spotify with a video of guitarist Thomas Raggi shredding the famed classical composition “Wedding March.” Now, Spotify has shared a photo of the band members in wedding attire along with the caption, “Just Married in a RUSH!”
Måneskin retweeted the photo, which features vocalist Damiano David kissing Raggi and bassist Victoria De Angelis kissing drummer Ethan Torchio, while writing, “Yes, we do” alongside a wedding chapel emoji.
So, did the Måneskin members actually marry each other? ABC Audio has reached out to a rep for clarification.
Rush! is Måneskin’s first album following their 2021 breakout. It includes the singles “Supermodel,” “The Loneliest” and the Tom Morello collaboration “Gossip.”
