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NRA convention kicks off in Texas just days after elementary school shooting

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(HOUSTON) — The National Rifle Association is forging ahead with its annual meeting in Texas days after 19 young children and two teachers were killed in a mass shooting in the state. A roster of leading Republicans, including Donald Trump, will appear — with protesters set to gather outside.

The weekend-long event starts Friday in Houston, some 270 miles away from the killings Tuesday at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde. Multiple demonstrations, organized by interfaith leaders, Moms Demand Action, Indivisible Houston and other gun control advocates, are planned at the George R. Brown Convention Center, where much of the programming will be held.

Scheduled performers including Lee Greenwood said they would not be at the convention in light of the mass shooting. “After thoughtful consideration, we have decided to cancel the appearance out of respect for those mourning the loss of those innocent children and teachers in Uvalde,” Greenwood said in a statement.

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner acknowledged the controversy on Wednesday but said, “It’s a contractual arrangement. We simply cannot cancel a conference or convention because we do not agree with the subject matter.”

The NRA plans to “reflect on” the Uvalde massacre and said this week that its “deepest sympathies are with the families and victims involved in this horrific and evil crime.”

“Although an investigation is underway and facts are still emerging, we recognize this was the act of a lone, deranged criminal,” the group said in a statement. “As we gather in Houston, we will reflect on these events, pray for the victims, recognize our patriotic members, and pledge to redouble our commitment to making our schools secure.”

Former President Trump is headlining NRA’s leadership forum on Friday. His oldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, were slated to speak Thursday night at the related NRA Hunters’ Leadership Forum Dinner and Awards Ceremony at the Rice Hotel, also in Houston.

Notably, no firearms will be allowed inside the assembly hall of the convention center on Friday due to President Trump’s appearance. The NRA said the ban is enforced by the Secret Service.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem — all Republicans — were also previously confirmed to speak at Friday’s forum. Abbott declined to say earlier this week whether he would still attend, telling reporters on Wednesday he was “living moment-to-moment right now.” His office said Thursday he would be in Uvalde rather than at the NRA event, instead recording remarks for them by video, according to The Dallas Morning News.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., denounced Abbott as an “absolute fraud” ahead of the NRA event.

With Congress in the early stages of another bipartisan negotiation on possible gun legislation, Abbott stressed this week that he sees the Uvalde shooting as an issue of mental health, not guns — echoing Cruz and other conservative officials in contending gun laws are misplaced.

President Trump, who has embraced gun rights lobbyists despite occasional criticism, said in a Gab social media post earlier this week that “America needs real solutions and real leadership in this moment, not politicians and partisanship. That’s why I will keep my longtime commitment to speak in Texas at the NRA Convention and deliver an important address to America. In the meantime, we all continue to pray for the victims, their families and for our entire nation — we are all in this together!”

The NRA and other gun rights organizations are under renewed scrutiny amid a string of deadly public shootings. Earlier this month, 10 people were killed in a grocery store in Buffalo, New York, in what law enforcement described as a racially motivated attack by a suspected white supremacist. Days later, a gunman opened fire at a California church, killing one person and wounding five others; authorities have said that alleged shooter was driven by the political tension between China and Taiwan.

In Uvalde this week, 17 people were injured in addition to the 21 who were fatally shot, authorities said. A motive in that attack is not yet clear.

“When in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby?” President Joe Biden said after the latest tragedy. Democrats have limited options to pursue gun regulations given they don’t have the votes needed to squash a Republican-led filibuster in the Senate. The GOP has consistently said they won’t back sweeping changes to the law, citing their views on the Second Amendment, but some Republican lawmakers support more incremental measures such as expanding background checks.

How influential is the NRA today?

The NRA has been mired in internal strife in recent years. In 2019, it parted ways with its longtime marketing partner, Ackerman McQueen, and lobbyist Chris Cox.

Then last year, the group filed for bankruptcy and tried to reorganize in Texas after New York Attorney General Letitia James raised allegations of financial misconduct. The NRA said then that James had launched an “unconstitutional, premeditated attack” and that it was “committed to good governance.”

A federal judge later dismissed the bankruptcy case, leaving the group to face James’ lawsuit. She is seeking to recoup money that was allegedly misspent as well as ban NRA President Wayne LaPierre and other executives from serving in the leadership of any not-for-profit organization conducting business in the state.

Amid its scandals, the NRA spent $25 million less in the 2020 election cycle than it did in 2016, according to OpenSecrets, a nonprofit tracking data on campaign finance and lobbying. The gun group spent more than $54 million across federal races during Trump’s first campaign, in 2016, compared to $29 million four years later.

In the 2022 election cycle so far, the NRA has spent less than $10,000 on independent expenditures, OpenSecrets Executive Director Sheila Krumholz told ABC News.

But Adam Winkler, a University of California, Los Angeles, law professor who specializes in gun policy, told ABC News the NRA is still a powerful political force after decades of shaping public attitudes on firearms.

“The NRA has been immensely successful at persuading Americans that if you’re feeling in danger, you should have a gun,” Winkler said.

Gun sales hit a record high of 21 million in 2020, driven in part by first-time purchases. In 2021, sales hit their second highest number at 19 million.

The NRA has also been aided by a large constituency of very strong pro-gun voters who are “fighting for the same vision of gun rights,” Winkler said. Other organizations, such as Gun Owners of America, are stepping in to fill any gaps.

OpenSecrets reported last week that gun rights groups spent a record $15.8 million on lobbying in 2021 — more than five times the amount opposing gun control groups spent. The NRA alone spent $4.4 million on lobbying, up from its $2.2 million the year before.

“The gun rights forces in America are so powerful that another school shooting with an obscene number of deaths will likely not lead to significant new federal gun laws,” Winkler said.

ABC News’ Monica Escobedo contributed to this report.

As Gov. Abbott places shooting blame on mental health, what has Texas done to address it?

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(UVALDE, Texas) — During a press conference this week, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott blamed the mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde on mental health issues.

Abbott explained that law enforcement believes what’s behind these types of attacks is a growing prevalence of people with mental health issues and the need for more mental health support, not lax gun laws.

“We as a state, we as a society need to do a better job with mental health,” the Republican governor said Wednesday. “Anybody who shoots somebody else has a mental health challenge. Period. We as a government need to find a way to target that mental health challenge and to do something about it.”

However, advocates said the state has missed plenty of opportunities to address mental health.

The governor has diverted money away from agencies in Texas that oversee mental health programs and recent reports have found Texas is the worst state in the nation when it comes to providing access to mental health care, they say.

“Based on what we know about [the shooter], we cannot come to a formal conclusion that he had a mental illness,” Greg Hansch, executive director of the Texas chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, told ABC News.

Abbott admitted during the conference that the 18-year-old suspected gunman in the Uvalde shooting, Salvador Ramos, did not have a diagnosed mental illness or a known criminal background, but rejected the idea that stricter gun laws would have prevented the shooting.

Debra Plotnick, executive vice president for state and federal advocacy at the nonprofit Mental Health America (MHA), said officials and the public often blame mental health when there is violence in a community.

“When we have a situation like this where people end up dead, it’s very easy to point fingers at mental health, in particular,” she said. “It’s a historic scapegoat and it’s still the case. But hate is not a mental illness … Having a mental health condition does not make someone violent.”

In fact, some critics said the state has not supported efforts to expand mental health care.

Texas is ‘worst in nation’ in mental health care access: Report

In April, Abbott announced he would be moving nearly $500 million from state agencies to fund Operation Lone Star, a Texas-Mexico border security initiative jointly being conducted by the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Military Department.

Of that amount, $210.7 million was from Texas Health & Human Services, which oversees public mental health programs.

In a statement to ABC News, Abbott’s press secretary, Renae Eze, denied that the governor cut any funding from mental health services.

“This is a completely inaccurate, unsubstantiated narrative being spun by those trying to politicize a tragedy,” she wrote. “Governor Abbott did not, in no uncertain terms, cut funding from mental health services being provided for Texans. Governor Abbott has always worked diligently to fully fund and expand mental health programs and services for Texans.”

Eze added the Health & Human Services Commission requested to transfer funs because otherwise, they would lapse at the end of the fiscal year.

“HHSC confirmed in the same letter that the agency and its programs, including mental health programs and services, would not be negatively impacted by the transfer,” she wrote.

The MHA’s most recent State of Mental Health in America report found that Texas ranked last in the nation when it comes to access to mental care.

The report said nine measures made up the ranking including adults and youth with mental illnesses who couldn’t receive care, are uninsured or didn’t have insurance to cover care as well as the mental workforce availability.

“We have the highest uninsured rate in the nation and the most people uninsured.” Hansch said. “That certainly doesn’t help individuals with mental health conditions access care.”

The report adds to a growing body of evidence that Texans are not receiving mental health care. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, nearly 70% of adults in Texas with mild mental illness did not receive mental health care leading up to the pandemic, as well as 57.4% of those with moderate mental illness and 44.7% of those with severe mental illness.

Texas Democratic gubernatorial candidate Beto O’Rourke confronted Abbott briefly during the press conference Wednesday over his comments before being escorted from the auditorium.

Outside, the former U.S. representative held an impromptu press conference during which he criticized Abbott and referenced the MHA report.

“He said mental health’s what’s broken here?” O’Rourke said. “We’re 50th in the nation in mental health care access. 50th. There are only 50 states in the nation. We are dead last.”

He continued, “He’s refused to expand Medicaid, which would bring $10 billion a year including mental health care access for people who need it … For the governor to say this is a mental healthcare issue and do nothing to improve mental health care access, we’re 50th in the nation. This shows that he is in large part to blame for what we see.”

Following the confrontation, Abbott avoided responding to O’Rourke’s claims in detail and called for unity in light of the tragedy. “We need to not focus on ourselves and our agendas, we need to focus on the healing and hope that we are providing to those who suffered unconscionable damage to their lives,” he said.

‘Addressing mental health isn’t going to end mass shootings’

This is not to say Texas hasn’t done anything to address mental health.

Following a shooting at Santa Fe High School in 2018 that killed 10 people, Abbott signed a series of bills that, among other things, sought to improve mental health access.

One bill created the Texas Child Mental Health Care Consortium to train primary care providers in mental health practices as well as provide counseling and psychiatric services to children. Another bill increased mental health training for teachers and other school officials.

Texas HHS also offers Mental First Aid training, during which participants are taught to recognize the signs and symptoms of mental health conditions.

Additionally, HHSC issues a quarterly report on waiting lists for mental health services and revealed plans last year to add 350 new inpatient psychiatric beds at the state hospitals within the next four years.

“Those are good steps and important,” Dr. Octavio Martinez, director of the University of Texas’ Hogg Foundation for Mental Health, told ABC News. “But we’ve been growing very significantly, we’ve been outstripping these resources because of the tremendous population growth needed in the public mental health system.”

Community advocates also want to see more school-based mental health centers, more school counselors and investments in mental health crisis services, which can help reach people who are in need or experiencing a mental health episode.

Even if Texas does divert more resources to mental health programs, experts said that won’t necessarily drive mass shootings down.

“Doing a better job addressing mental health isn’t going to end or even substantially reduce mass shootings,” Hansch said. “We should address mental health because doing so vastly increases the odds of recovery.”

He added, “It saves significant downstream costs for taxpayers, it’s a basic human right, and it saves lives that might otherwise be lost to suicide or co-morbid conditions.”

Yubo explained and why it has emerged as part of Uvalde shooting probe

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Described by its inventors as a “social live-streaming platform” that allows its mostly teenage users to make friends worldwide, join communities and even find a date, Yubo has emerged as part of the investigation into the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, because the suspect sent messages through the app, investigators and users told ABC News.

Launched in 2015 by a French company, Yubo has quickly become known as a go-to site for mostly “Gen Z” users to meet, make new friends and join online communities. In 2019, Seventeen magazine also listed the site as among the seven best dating apps for teenagers.

“Yubo is a social app for Gen Z that allows them to connect and interact with people all over the world through live streaming,” a spokesperson for the platform said in a statement to ABC News. “Yubo gives this generation a space to socialize through one-to-few audio and video conversations, games and chat, and empowers its 60 million users to connect safely and without the pressure of likes or follows.”

Yubo even has separate areas of its app reserved for teenagers. Users who join and say they are between the ages of 13 to 17 are put into different “communities” and supposedly can’t interact with other users who say they are over 18, according to the platform.

Yubo appears to work like a blend of livestreaming social apps like Clubhouse and Twitch, mixed with adult social media and dating apps like Tinder that allow users to swipe through individual profiles. The app lets users make friends, send direct messages, swipe between users, and join livestreams, either video or audio.

But multiple users told ABC News that they believe accused Uvalde mass shooter Salvador Ramos had a more sinister use for the platform.

Two users claimed Ramos allegedly committed animal abuse and displayed videos of the cruelty on Yubo.

An individual who claimed to have known the accused gunman through the social media platform told ABC News that Ramos turned on his video last week on the platform and showed himself with guns and allegedly made statements, including “wait till tomorrow.”

“No one took him seriously,” another user told ABC News.

A law enforcement source said detectives probing the Uvalde mass shooting are aware of a Yubo account believed to have belonged to the accused gunman but can’t definitively confirm the account belongs to the suspect. ABC News has not independently verified that the alleged account belonged to the accused shooter.

“Our thoughts and deepest sympathies are with the families of the victims of the tragic shooting in Uvalde, Texas,” the Yubo spokesperson said. “Due to privacy regulations, we are not able to release specific user information outside of direct requests from law enforcement.”

Just days after his 18th birthday, Ramos allegedly killed 19 students, most just 10 years old, and two faculty members Tuesday at Robb Elementary School in the small rural town west of San Antonio. The suspect was fatally shot by law enforcement officers.

Moments before carrying out the deadly attack, the accused gunman allegedly sent a string of messages to a young girl he met on Yubo, detailing that he had shot his grandmother and was heading to the school for his next target, according to messages reviewed by ABC News.

The messages allegedly show the accused gunman texted with a 15-year-old girl in Germany. He allegedly described an argument he had with his grandmother over a phone bill.

“She’s on the phone with AT&T,” Ramos allegedly wrote at 11:06 a.m. on Tuesday, about a half-hour before the attack at the school, apparently referring to his grandmother with a derogatory term. In another message, he allegedly said, “Ima do something to her rn (right now).”

Moments later, he allegedly wrote, “I shot my grandmother in the head.” He then allegedly wrote, “ima go shoot up a elementary school rn.”

The young girl who allegedly received messages from the Texas gunman moments before his rampage told ABC News Thursday that she has been asking herself “what if I could change the outcome” since seeing the news that her friend had committed the school massacre.

The girl, who asked to be referred to as “Cece,” said, “Ever since May 24th I have been guilt tripping myself, what if I could change the outcome, what if I could change his mind to not do this. I was too dumb to realize why he bought two rifles on his birthday, May 16th, and ordered a package full with ammunition, not knowing what he was going to do with it.”

Cece said she met Ramos on May 9 on Yubo, where they would “join each others live” streams.

While in a previous interview with the New York Times Cece said she read the messages from the gunman “as soon as he sent them,” which would have been minutes before the shooting, she now tells ABC News she “misspoke” and that she only saw them “hours later.”

Cece, who said she and Ramos exchanged cellphone numbers and spoke regularly, claimed there were other warning signs in hindsight, including that the suspected gunman would ask others on Yubo “if they would want to be famous on the news.”

At a news conference on Wednesday, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott referenced similar messages the gunman sent just prior to the school rampage, but misrepresented them as “Facebook posts” when they were instead private “one-to-one text messages,” according to a spokesperson for Meta, the parent company of Facebook.

Russia-Ukraine live updates: Russian airborne forces suffer ‘heavy casualties’

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “special military operation” into neighboring Ukraine began on Feb. 24, with Russian forces invading from Belarus, to the north, and Russia, to the east. Ukrainian troops have offered “stiff resistance,” according to U.S. officials.

The Russian military has since launched a full-scale ground offensive in eastern Ukraine’s disputed Donbas region, capturing the strategic port city of Mariupol and securing a coastal corridor to the Moscow-annexed Crimean Peninsula.

Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:

May 27, 7:08 am
Bucha resident who lost husband, unborn son tries to rebuild her life

Anna Polonska had struggled to get pregnant. So when she did, it was a moment of sheer joy; a happy family life lay ahead.

But days after Russia invaded Ukraine, her unborn son and husband were killed in shelling as they tried to flee Ukraine, she told ABC News.

She was also gravely injured in the attack, and doctors did not think she would survive.

Adding to her loss, soldiers stole almost all of her possessions and destroyed her apartment, she recalled.

But in a remarkable interview, Anna said she is now focusing on picking up the pieces — showing incredible courage and determination to live and walk again.

At least 3,998 civilians have been killed and 4,693 others have been injured in Ukraine since Russian forces invaded on Feb. 24, according to the latest figures from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

At least 260 children were among the dead and 404 among the injured, according to the OHCHR.

“Most of the civilian casualties recorded were caused by the use of explosive weapons with a wide impact area, including shelling from heavy artillery and multiple launch rocket systems, and missile and air strikes,” the agency said in a statement Thursday. “OHCHR believes that the actual figures are considerably higher, as the receipt of information from some locations where intense hostilities have been going on has been delayed and many reports are still pending corroboration.”

Those areas include Mariupol in the Donetsk Oblast, Izium in the Kharkiv Oblast and Popasna in the Luhansk Oblast, where the OHCHR said “there are allegations of numerous civilian casualties.” Casualty numbers from those locations “are being further corroborated” and thus are not included in the latest statistics, according to the agency.

May 26, 6:06 am
Russia’s airborne forces suffer ‘heavy casualties’ after ‘tactical failures,’ UK says

The Russian military’s airborne forces, known as the VDV, “have been heavily involved in several notable tactical failures since the start of Russia’s invasion” of neighboring Ukraine, according to the U.K. Ministry of Defense.

“This includes the attempted advance on Kyiv via Hostomel Airfield in March, the stalled progress on the Izium axis since April, and the recent failed and costly crossings of the Siverskyi Donets River,” the ministry said Thursday in an intelligence update.

“Russian doctrine anticipates assigning the VDV to some of the most demanding operations,” the ministry added. “The 45,000-strong VDV is mostly comprised of professional contract soldiers. Its members enjoy elite status and attract additional pay. The VDV has been employed on missions better suited to heavier armoured infantry and has sustained heavy casualties during the campaign.”

The VDV’s “mixed performance likely reflects a strategic mismanagement of this capability and Russia’s failure to secure air superiority,” according to the ministry.

“The misemployment of the VDV in Ukraine highlights how Putin’s significant investment in the armed forces over the last 15 years has resulted in an unbalanced overall force,” the ministry said. “The failure to anticipate Ukrainian resistance and the subsequent complacency of Russian commanders has led to significant losses across many of Russia’s more elite units.”

May 24, 4:47 pm
Drone footage shows devastation inside Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol

Drone footage released by Russian media shows the devastation inside the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, Ukraine, where Ukrainian forces fended off Russian troops for weeks amid intense fighting before surrendering.

The drone footage released by the Russian news outlet MIC Izvestia showed the collapsed walls of the plant and twisted metal and debris strewn about the entire facility.

The Russian Defense ministry on Friday said the last Ukrainian fighters defending Azovstal had surrendered, giving Russia full control of the port city of Mariupol.

The seizure of Mariupol, gives Russia command of a land route linking the Crimean Peninsula, which Moscow seized in 2014, with mainland Russia and parts of eastern Ukraine held by pro-Russian separatists.

Millie Bobby Brown teases independence for Eleven in ‘Stranger Things’ season 4

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

The wait is over.

Stranger Things returns to Netflix on Friday with volume one of its fourth season. Star Millie Bobby Brown told reporters at a recent roundtable what to expect from Eleven this time around, especially after the loss of her character’s supernatural abilities back in season 3.

“Without her superpowers, who is she?” Brown said. “What does she have? What does she bring to the table? What does she know?”

That’s not the only thing she teases Eleven will be without this season. Previously, the character has been written as “dependent on her friends,” Brown said, insinuating that will change this season. “She’s also trying to figure out who she is without them, without Mike specifically.”

Even though it’s been almost three years since new episodes of Stranger Things dropped in the summer of 2019, Brown said the cast and crew embraced the passing of time instead of shying away from it. “I think the Duffer Brothers do a great job in talking about the time that has passed but also moving forward,” she said. “Our fans are very dedicated and are willing to wait that time out.”

And while it may seem like Eleven is losing a lot this season – her powers, her dependence on her friends – Brown assured that she is gaining just as much.

“These are all things that I think are really nice to explore this season, and, also, [are] really good timing,” she said. “You know, she’s getting older. The kids are all getting older, and with growing up, young people want to gain autonomy from not only their parents, but their friends, and really finding out who they are and searching for that. So, I think it’s quite nice to see Eleven do that this season.”

To get in shape for Vegas, Katy Perry says she has to “let go of my Taco Bell”

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

Katy Perry returns to Las Vegas Friday night for more shows in her PLAY residency: She’ll perform through June 11, take a break, then return for more shows in July and August, with more shows expected to be announced later this year. But Katy says she can’t just breeze into Sin City and get on the stage. She says she’s got to work up to it.

“You definitely have to be mindful that you have a show coming up after a six- or eight-week break,” the American Idol judge tells USA Today. “I get really strict about two or three weeks before. [The set] is like a giant kid’s jungle gym and I’m a 37-year-old adult. So I have to train like an athlete and do physical therapy and use the sauna and let go of my Taco Bell.”

The one song that’s part of Katy’s residency show that isn’t one of her hit singles is her rendition of “The Greatest Love of All,” originally recorded by George Benson and made famous in 1985 by Whitney Houston. Katy says she decided to add it to the set after becoming a mom to daughter Daisy Dove, who’ll turn 2 in August.

“After I had my daughter, the song spoke to me in a different way,” Katy tells USA Today. “I feel like Daisy has given me the greatest love of all and I find it now in my family life.”

In addition to her show, Katy also has American Idol, her shoe line and her new line of nonalcoholic beverages, De Soi. In response to that age-old question about balance, Katy says, “There’s a lot more balance when you have a family. A lot falls away that isn’t really important … But I’m at my best multitasking.”

“I’m transitioning a little more into the entrepreneurial space,” she adds, referring to the shoe line and De Soi. “These are branches of my tree. My trunk will always be music, but I have many branches.”

Mark Tremonti recounts “surreal, intense honor” of recording charity Sinatra covers album

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

Of all the unexpected projects to come out of the rock world the last couple years, it’s hard to top the guitarist for Creed recording a Frank Sinatra covers album.

Mark Tremonti, who now plays in Alter Bridge and his own namesake solo band, tells ABC Audio that he’s always been a fan of Ol’ Blue Eyes, but didn’t know how to channel it in his career as hard rock guitarist. That changed, however, when his daughter, Stella, was born in March 2021 with Down syndrome.

“Once we got the diagnosis that our daughter had Down syndrome, I was, like, ‘This all had its reasons,'” Tremonti shares. “‘I’m gonna record a record doing Frank Sinatra songs, and I’m gonna do it for charity and raise money and awareness for Down syndrome.'”

Thus, we now have Tremonti Sings Sinatra, which will raise money for the National Down Syndrome Society.

In addition to the charity aspect, it was important to Tremonti that the album sound, and feel like a “real” and “authentic” interpretation of Sinatra’s work, down to getting approvals from the Sinatra family to use his name and likeness.

“[That] was probably the biggest hurdle of them all,” Tremonti says. “They’ve only done that with guys Tony Bennett and Michael Bublé.”

That authenticity was also bolstered by surviving members of Sinatra’s orchestra, including bandleader Mike Smith, who gave Tremonti the same cup of tea Sinatra would drink to warm up his voice, as well as the actual sheet music Sinatra used to perform classics like “Luck Be a Lady.”

“This was the sheet that Frank Sinatra actually held in his hand when he sang ‘Luck Be a Lady,'” Tremonti says. “Every moment of this recording process was a surreal, intense honor to participate in.”

Tremonti Sings Sinatra is out Friday.

Muse headlining 2022 Aftershock Festival in place of Foo Fighters

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

Muse will be headlining the 2022 Aftershock Festival in place of Foo Fighters, which canceled all of their upcoming tour dates following the unexpected death of Taylor Hawkins.

The English trio will fill in for the Foos’ scheduled set at the Sacramento, California, event’s closing night on Sunday, October 9.

“It’s been too long and we can’t wait to come back to Northern California and headline Aftershock on Sunday, October 9, in Sacramento,” says frontman Matt Bellamy.

Aftershock 2022 takes place October 6-9 in Sacramento’s Discovery Park. The other headliners are My Chemical Romance, KISS and Slipknot.

Hawkins passed away March 25 in Bogotá, Colombia, ahead of a Foo Fighters show scheduled there for later that night. He was 50 years old.

Earlier this month, Red Hot Chili Peppers performed in place of Foo Fighters at the New Orleans Jazz Fest, while Nine Inch Nails took their place at Welcome to Rockville. NIN will also headline this weekend’s Boston Calling in the Foos’ stead, while Arcade Fire is filling in at Montreal’s Osheaga in July.

Melissa Etheridge says attending her ‘One Woman Band’ solo shows will be like “coming into my kitchen”

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

Melissa Etheridge kicks off her four-night solo residency show, Melissa Etheridge: One Woman Band, at City Winery New York on May 30. She then heads to City Winery Boston for four more nights — and plans to expand the residency concept in the future.

“That’s one of the things that I’m very hopeful for…that this is something we can do in other places,” she tells ABC Audio. “I’d love to do a longer version of this, because it’s so intimate and it’s just me and it’s really fun.”

“I mean, I love being in front of thousands of people with a rock band behind me, don’t get me wrong,” she adds. “[But] I also like to be able to slip in to this intimate scene and do this, too.”

The set list for these special shows will be different each night — except for the hits.

“I always tell myself, I might do these songs every night, but the people that come to see me, this may be the only time they see me,” Melissa explains. “And they want to have that experience of singing ‘Come to My Window’ or ‘I’m the Only One’ with me, so I’ll definitely do those.”

She’ll also give fans a look at her songwriting process, by playing the components of each song herself in real time — which is basically what she’s been doing virtually since 2020.

“[D]uring the pandemic is where it really grew,” she explains. “Having a year and a half to play all of my songs — like, every song I had ever recorded — I…just really got very good at making a track live and singing to it.”

She laughs, “This is like, you’re coming into my kitchen, [I] got my ingredients. I’m going to make it right in front of you, and we’re all going to sit there, eat it, and enjoy it!”

Maverick City Music’s Naomi Raine delivers her vulnerable new track “Not Ready”

May 27, 2022 by WDNY Radio

She says the song came as the result of a mental illness she didn’t even know she was living with. She revealed details about her upcoming album, The Journey, which speaks to just that — her journey through hardship, healing and leaning on faith. In a recent interview with ABC Audio, Maverick City Music member Naomi Raine spoke candidly about intimate life details ahead of her debut TRIBL Records solo single, “Not Ready.”

The inspirational new track provides listeners with a firsthand account of Raine’s honest conversation with Jesus, about grappling with the idea of having everything she’s wished for but at the same time feeling incomplete.

“I think that first line of, ‘Let’s be honest, Jesus I’m a mess’ — I wrote that when I was on my way out of a depression,” she said. Though “nothing was really wrong,” Raine came to the conclusion that she wasn’t living as her authentic, true self. “I was still trying to please everybody else and make everybody else feel good and I felt like my life was slipping away from me.”

But out of her struggle grew “Not Ready,” which has since served as a healing mechanism and reminder of her not just her power, but the power of music.

“I started to write … and get out of some of the funk that I was in. Putting language to it, just began to heal me in a way that I can’t even explain. I think music is miraculous.”

Raine’s realization that her artistry impacts others who can relate to the content of her songs helped her feel better about the lows life sometimes brings.

“I started to feel like, ‘OK, I’m normal,'” she said. “‘Not Ready’ is just a snapshot of my journey.”

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