One week from today, Brothers Osborne could add to their already impressive collection of CMA trophies, potentially claiming the prestigious Album of the Year award for Skeletons, which celebrated its first birthday last month. 

The cover shows TJ and John walking through an enormous keyhole — an equally ominous piece of symbolism for the siblings.

“We didn’t want to be extremely on the nose with having a skull and bones on there or something, but we wanted a skeleton keyhole…” TJ explains. “For us, it’s really kind of symbolizing us kind of stepping out into a new era of Brothers Osborne.”

Skeletons builds on 2016’s Pawn Shop and 2018’s Port Saint Joe, without fundamentally altering the DNA of the duo.

“Obviously, with every record, you want to get, not only better, but you also just wanna be different than the record before,” TJ tells ABC Audio, “so you have something fresh, and it’s not the same thing over and over again, but at the same time, not lose that very thing that the fans love to begin with.”

Ultimately, it’s an evolution that leaves TJ and John right where they want to be.

“I think we’ve learned a lot about who we are between our first two records,” TJ reflects. “And it really allowed us to kinda be able to focus in on what Brothers Osborne is, and what people respond to.”

“And that hasn’t always been what we thought it would be sometimes,” he confesses. “And I think now that we’re here, I really feel like this is the version of us that our fans have grown to love over the years.” 

The brothers are also up for Music Video for the non-album track, “Younger Me,” as well as Duo, which they’ve won three times before.

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Whitesnake recently released the latest installment of its deluxe reissue campaign, a four-CD/DVD set focusing on the band’s 1997 studio album, Restless Heart.

The Restless Heart: Super Deluxe Edition features newly remixed and remastered versions of the album, various unreleased demos and studio outtakes, and a DVD containing official music videos, fan videos, and a short making-of documentary.

Frontman David Coverdale tells ABC Audio that the new collection is “packed solid” with quality, like an “amazing box of chocolates.”

He’s “doubly excited” about the deluxe package’s arrival because the album wasn’t even released initially in the U.S.

Coverdale says he wasn’t happy with the album’s original mix, so the remix was beefed up with added tracks from current Whitesnake guitarist Joel Hoekstra and ex-Dream Theater keyboardist Derek Sherinian.

“They brought in this early Whitesnake vibe,” Coverdale notes. “[And Derek is] almost like the son of [late Deep Purple/Whitesnake keyboardist] Jon Lord, bringing this element…of scorching Hammond organ.”

The new mix also features a different running order than the original Restless Heart, and David explains that’s because he put “a lot more thought [and] a lot more care” into the updated version. He adds, “These things I’m looking upon as my legacy as an artist.”

Restless Heart was a particularly diverse collection of tunes for a Whitesnake album, which Coversale says was because the project originally was intended to be his third studio album.

Besides hard rockers and power ballads, the album included two power blues songs and a cover of the 1966 R&B hit “Stay with Me.”

Meanwhile, another interesting element of the Super Deluxe set is an “Evolutions” disc, which features tracks that show how each song evolved from demos to the studio version.

Visit Whitesnake.com for full details about the reissue.

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This Friday, Ingrid Michaelson is releasing a deluxe version of her 2018 Christmas album Songs of the Season, with five new tracks. One of them is “Merry Christmas, Happy New Year,” a duet with actress Zooey Deschanel, and Ingrid says she’s got  Twitter to thank for that.

“I love her as an actress,” Ingrid says Zooey, who’s also one-half of the musical duo She & Him. “And Elf is one of my favorite Christmas movies, and so she’s kind of stamped in my brain as a Christmas figure. So I actually wrote on Twitter last year, ‘All I want is to write a Christmas song with Zooey Deschanel.'”

“It was sort of the height of the pandemic…y’know spirits were very low and it just came to me,” she tells ABC Audio. “And she wrote back to me on Twitter, like, ‘Let’s make it happen!'”

“I was blown away that she even knew who I was and we exchanged phone numbers and she’s just, like, she is as lovely as…you would think she is,” raves Ingrid, who describes the duet as “the warm hug that we all desperately need.”

As for the rest of the new tracks, there’s “Winter Wonderland,” “Marshmellow World,” “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas,” and her 2019 Jason Mraz duet, “Christmas Valentine.” Ingrid says she knew from the day she released the original album that she’d do a deluxe version eventually.

“I wanted to add more [songs], but I didn’t have time,” she says of the original album. “And I knew…John Legend and Gwen Stefani and a lot of other, like, ‘Christmas heads,’ were putting out their deluxes. And so I thought, ‘Well, you know, in a few years, we’ll do a deluxe, and we’ll add some extra stuff then.'”

Mission accomplished.

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Halestorm is back on the charts with “Back from the Dead.”

The band’s latest single has hit number one on Billboard‘s Mainstream Rock Airplay ranking, marking their fifth leader on the tally.

Not only did “Back from the Dead” signal Halestorm’s return with new music for the first time in three years, it also served as their declaration of intent after being sidelined from the road for the longest time in their career due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“This is very representative of what we went through during the pandemic,” drummer Arejay Hale tells ABC Audio of “Back from the Dead.” “Now, it just seems so fitting that it’s called ‘Back from the Dead’ and we’re also kind of back from being dead in the water for a year-and-a-half.”

The song also reflects Hale’s struggles with his mental health amid the pandemic, as well as that of his sister and band mate, Lzzy Hale.

“The pandemic was a real test for both of our mental health and our mental wealth,” Arejay shares. “We really had to force ourselves to take care of ourselves mentally.”

The best way to do that, Hale found, was to “be creative.”

“The only thing that got me through the pandemic was songwriting,” he says.

After finally getting back on the road to play shows these past couple months, Halestorm will now embark on a big U.S. co-headlining tour with Evanescence starting this Friday, November 5, in Portland, Oregon. In addition to being excited to playing live again with good friends, Hale feels that working on “Back from the Dead,” and more upcoming new material, has made Halestorm an even better live band.

“I feel like these new songs have really challenged us as players,” he says. “I love it!”

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Maxwell is officially a “Legend.”

The three-time Grammy winner will receive the Legend award at the 2021 Soul Train Awards.

“It’s an honor to be presented with the Legend award by a community that’s been growing with me throughout my career,” Maxwell said in a statement Tuesday. “I’m so grateful to be sharing this moment with everyone and returning to the Apollo for an evening of excellence.”

Ashanti will also receive a special award.

“I’m honored to be recognized as this year’s Lady of Soul honoree,” said the “Rain on Me” singer, who will also receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in April 2022. “This is a full circle moment for me because I received the Aretha Franklin Entertainer of the Year Award at the Lady of Soul Awards in 2002. As we commemorate 50 years of Soul Train, I’m proud to be a part of this legacy and to return to the Apollo to celebrate.”

The Soul Train Awards nominations were also announced Tuesday, and H.E.R. leads with eight nods. The Oscar and Grammy winner is up for Best R&B/Soul Female Artist, Song of the Year, Album of the Year and Video of the Year, and she also scored two nominations for the Ashford and Simpson Songwriter’s Award, and two more nods for Best Collaboration.

Jazmine Sullivan and Chris Brown each received six nominations, followed by Wiz Kid and TEMS who received five nods each.

As previously announced, Martin stars Tisha Campbell and Tichina Arnold will return to host the show for the fourth year in a row.

The 2021 Soul Train Awards, which will be held at the iconic Apollo Theater in New York City, airs Sunday, November 28, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on BET and BET Her.

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Lady Gaga throws herself 100% into everything she does, and her starring role in the upcoming movie House of Gucci is no exception.  Gaga tells British Vogue that while portraying Patrizia Reggiani — who was convicted of putting a hit on her ex, Maurizio Gucci — she went so deep into the character that she had a hard time coming back out again.

“I lived as [Reggiani] for a year and a half,” Gaga tells the magazine. “And I spoke with an accent for nine months of that…[even] off-camera. I never broke. I stayed with her.”

“It was nearly impossible for me to speak in the accent as a blonde,” she continues. “I instantly had to dye my hair, and I started to live in a way whereby anything that I looked at, anything that I touched, I started to take notice of where and when I could see money.”

However, Gaga admits, “I had some psychological difficulty at one point towards the end of filming. I was either in my hotel room, living and speaking as Reggiani, or I was on set, living and speaking as her. I remember I went out into Italy one day…to take a walk…and I panicked. I thought I was on a movie set.”

But throughout the experience, Gaga says, “Every minute of every day, I thought of my ancestors in Italy and what they had to do so that I could have a better life.”

She adds, “I just wanted to make them proud, which is why I made the decision to make the performance about a real woman and not about the idea of a bad woman.”

House of Gucci opens November 24.  Gaga’s cover story is on newsstands Friday.

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Machine Gun Kelly just wrapped up his Tickets to My Downfall tour over the weekend, but he’s already reminiscing.

In a tweet Tuesday, Kelly writes, “The best tour I’ve ever had is over and now I’m an emotional wreck.”

The tour, which concluded on Halloween night in Connecticut, featured Kelly playing nearly the entirety of Tickets, his 2020 Travis Barker-produced album that found the former rapper’s music transitioning to a pop-punk sound.

With many shows selling out, it’s easy to see why MGK would declare the tour to be his best. However, the run wasn’t without a few bumps in the road. During his set at Chicago’s Riot Fest, Kelly dissed beloved metal institution Slipknot as “old weird dudes with masks,” which led to the crowds at a subsequent rock festival to boo him.

Kelly is set to return to the live stage later this year for a homecoming Cleveland concert on December 18. He’s also working on a new album called Born with Horns, which will again be produced by Barker.

the best tour ive ever had is over and now i’m an emotional wreck.

— blonde don (@machinegunkelly) November 2, 2021

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