Breland’s got his first-ever country radio single — not to mention, his first-ever top-twenty and rising hit — in the form of “Beers on Me,” his Dierks Bentley-led collaboration that also includes Hardy.
Dierks, Hardy and a few other co-writers penned the song at a writing retreat in Colorado, but when Dierks asked Breland to be a part of it, the up-and-comer asked if he could add a verse of his own.
“I wanted to be able to add some of my own flavor to it, so I was really glad that they were cool with me trying to write my own thing,” Breland remembers. “And it came together really fast. It might have been, like, 10 minutes, 15 minutes or so.”
His verse was a hit with his duet partners, and “Beers on Me” became a big song for Dierks: He sent it to country radio, and borrowed its title for his tour.
But that day in the studio, when Breland asked to make changes to “Beers on Me,” he had no idea just how important the song was. Looking back on it, he says, that was a good thing.
“You know, I’ve never had a song at country radio before,” the singer points out. “So it was a really big opportunity for me. I’m glad I didn’t know that when I was writing the verse. Then I probably would’ve been second, third-guessing myself.”
Breland’s currently on the road with Russell Dickerson for the All Yours, All Night Tour, which kicked off on Tuesday in New York City.
Tonight, Bastille kicks off a series of intimate U.K. shows to preview the band’s upcoming album, Give Me the Future. For frontman Dan Smith, the run allows him to return to one of his “favorite things in the world.”
“I think about the countless hours I’ve spent crammed up against complete strangers, sweating and shouting along to music that I love,” Smith tells ABC Audio.
As heard in the singles “Distorted Light Beam” and “No Bad Days,” Give Me the Future is perhaps Bastille’s most electronically-driven album. Fittingly, its themes are related to technology and virtual spaces, which Smith hopes to represent with a “stage space that feels totally transportive and totally futuristic.”
Still, Smith wants to stay true to the grounded nature of the live show, which he feels is the “antithesis” of Give Me the Future.
“To use the language of our album, the gig is like the ‘Shut Off the Lights’ moment,” Smith says. “It’s being pulled into reality, it’s being tangibly close to other people, these things we’ve not done for a couple of years.”
“It’s about human contact,” he adds. “It’s about being in a room with other people, with strangers who have this common enjoyment of one thing.”
After the winter U.K. run, Bastille will return to their home country in the spring for a more expansive tour, followed by a trip to the U.S. kicking off in May.
“I’m excited for people to see the show,” Smith says. “And to hopefully explore, like we do with the videos and everything else, the ideas of the music and the ideas of the lyrics in more depth on a bigger scale.”
America‘s self-titled debut album was released 50 years ago this month in the U.S.
The trio of Dewey Bunnell, Gerry Beckley and Dan Peek, whose fathers were U.S. Air Force personnel stationed in the U.K., formed America after graduating from the same London high school.
All three were talented singer-songwriters who contributed multiple songs to the America album. The album was released in the U.K. in December 1971, initially without the lead single, the Bunnell-penned folk-rock classic “A Horse with No Name.”
When “A Horse with No Name” began enjoying some chart success, it was added to the U.S. version of the album. The single topped the Billboard Hot 100 for three weeks in the spring of 1972, while the album spent five straight weeks at #1 on the Billboard 200 around the same time.
Reflecting on the band’s immediate success, Beckley tells ABC Audio, “It doesn’t happen too often. We had a number-one single and album with our very first release. We’d barely been together a year. It was a rocket ship that basically burned pretty solid for almost 10 years.”
The album’s follow-up single, the Beckley-written ballad “I Need You,” also was a hit, reaching #9 on the Hot 100.
America was co-produced by Warner Bros. staff producer Ian Samwell, whom Beckley says was tasked with recording the songs simply, without much studio embellishment. Beckley also recalls that the album was recorded quickly and inexpensively, and he credits engineer Ken Scott — known for his work with David Bowie and The Beatles — for keeping the sessions going smoothly.
America was the group’s only album to top the Billboard 200, and has been certified Platinum by the RIAA for sales of one million in the U.S.
Here’s the America track list:
Side One
“Riverside”
“Sandman”
“Three Roses”
“Children”
“A Horse with No Name”
“Here”
Side Two
“I Need You”
“Rainy Day”
“Never Found the Time”
“Clarice”
“Donkey Jaw”
“Pigeon Song”
It may be the longest Netflix title ever — the show The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window, debuting on Friday, tells the story of a woman who witnesses a gruesome murder, or did she?
Don’t think this is just another psychological thriller, though. Michael Ealy, who stars in the film along with Kristen Bell, tells ABC Audio that the title should be a hint that the show doesn’t take itself too seriously.
“The shortest way to describe it is a satire on the psychological thriller genre itself,” he explains. “I think the title, The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window, I mean you can’t say that without kind of smiling, right? You can’t say that without kind of questioning what am I getting myself into?”
Even though Ealy describes the show as a satire, he admits that after filming one rather gruesome scene early on, he wasn’t exactly sure how it would play out.
“I remember shooting it and being like…is this going to be funny?” he recalls. “It’s so tragic and you’re like, is it OK to kind of laugh at this? I mean, really?”
The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window, which consists of eight 30-minute episodes is perfect for bingeing, according to Ealy, because even though it’s a satire on the genre, it’s very subtle.
“I got through the first one and was like, wow, this is intense. Got through the second one, it was like, wow, this is intense,” he says. “The third one is when you start to feel like you’re being taken, you know, a little bit to the left here. And then from there you’re just on a rollercoaster.”
(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Wedneday’s sports events:
NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Cleveland 115, Milwaukee 99
LA Clippers 111, Orlando 102
Charlotte 158, Indiana 126
Atlanta 121, Sacramento 104
Miami 110, New York 96
Chicago 111, Toronto 105
Denver 124, Brooklyn 118
Memphis 118, San Antonio 110
Dallas 132, Portland 112
Phoenix 105, Utah 97
NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE
San Jose 4, Washington 1
Calgary 6, Columbus 0
Toronto 4, Anaheim 3 (SO)
Chicago 8, Detroit 5
Colorado 4, Boston 3 (OT)
TOP-25 COLLEGE BASKETBALL
Providence 65, Xavier 62
Tennessee 78, Florida 71
LSU 70, Texas A&M 64
Marquette 73, Seton Hall 63
Iowa St. 84, Oklahoma St. 81
VCU 70, Davidson 68
Meagan Redman,Jake Lefferman, Zach Fannin, and Libby Cathey, ABC News
(HOLLOMAN AIR FORCE BASE, N.M.) — Thousands of miles away from her native Afghanistan, Laila finds relief in small comforts like a warm meal inside a makeshift tent camp in a desert in New Mexico.
Laila, whose name has been changed for safety concerns, is among thousands of Afghan refugees who have found a temporary home cycling through the “Aman Omid Village” on Holloman Air Force Base, one of several military installations in the U.S. designated to provide housing to Afghan refugees while they transition into more permanent homes. The camp’s name which is in Dari — an Afghan dialect — expresses what they are searching for in the United States: peace and hope.
Watch the full story on “Nightline” TONIGHT at 12 p.m. ET on ABC.
“The first very important thing about the camp that I and everyone else here likes is the safety that they are giving us,” Laila told ABC News “Nightline” co-anchor Juju Chang in a recent interview. “Safety is something that we didn’t have for years in Afghanistan.”
Laila is one of the tens of thousands who were forced to flee her native country last summer, leaving behind family and friends, as the U.S. ended its longest war the same way it started: under Taliban rule.
She says it feels like only weeks ago that she fled the swift takeover.
“I was in the bank waiting to withdraw some money. I heard gunshots,” Laila recalled.
“Everyone was like, Taliban are in here, and we were hiding under the desks after I got out,” she said. “Everyone was, like, panicking.”
President Joe Biden, who has long opposed the war in Afghanistan, inherited a deal with the Taliban to withdraw U.S. forces as the U.S. approached the 20-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, despite pressure from lawmakers and other allied nations to extend the mission. As his August deadline neared, the Taliban seized power and overtook the presidential palace in Kabul, signaling the collapse of the Afghan government and igniting chaos.
“Every time that there is a knock on the door, I think they are coming for me because I have worked with international agencies,” Laila told ABC News in a video diary at the time.
In many respects, she was exactly what the Taliban feared: A college-educated woman who flourished with the freedom gained during the 20 years of U.S. intervention.
Struggle to flee
Laila was a young girl when the Taliban last came to power and said she remembers being taught to hide her education from the group that governs the country under a strict interpretation of Shariah, or Islamic law.
“My mother and a friend of my mom would teach us how to read and write, like we would hide our books and notebooks inside the Quran. And then we would go to my mother’s friend’s house and then learn how to read and write there,” she told ABC News.
She said she was given no reason to believe this reign would be different — so she and her husband, Yusuf, whose name has been changed for safety concerns, escaped with some 76,000 other Afghans, many of whom worked for American or Western allies that the U.S. evacuated under the Biden’s administration’s mission, “Operation Allies Welcome.”
Though she said she suspected she might be pregnant at the time, Laila left her home with nothing but a small backpack.
When she landed at a U.S. base in Doha, Qatar, she was given a pregnancy test which confirmed that she was pregnant. She later learned she’ll be having twins — which made her all the more grateful to have escaped. Tens of thousands of Afghans, who also had valid paperwork, were left behind in the chaos — and to a new order of power.
“In Afghanistan, it was scary because I didn’t want to have a baby in that situation, especially with the Taliban,” she said.
Human Rights Watch, an international human rights advocacy organization, estimates that the Taliban have already killed over 100 Afghans at the top of their list for revenge for helping Americans.
Military base offers peace, hope
“Aman Omid Village,” the massive refugee camp at Holloman Air Force Base, was just months ago a barren desert. Rows of tents spanning 50-acres were erected in the final days of the fall of Kabul as officials prepared for refugees like Laila.
The commune operates as a de facto American boot camp for new arrivals and offers resources to prepare refugees for their new lives in the U.S. Residents can participate in classes from English to sewing and receive training on how to pay taxes and avoid spam calls, for instance.
At least half of the refugees there are children who often take advantage of the open area for games and recreation.
“This is sort of that shining place for them to come to,” Air Force Brigadier Gen. Daniel Gabrielli, who heads operations at the camp, told ABC News.
Gabrielli, a commercial pilot who volunteered to deploy as part of his National Guard Service, completed three tours of duty in Afghanistan. In his 33-year military career, he said helping Afghan refugees at the base has been the most gratifying experience.
“I think it is because we’re taking care of people who’ve taken care of us, right?” he said. “What they have sacrificed for our security which is a large amount.”
“My grandfather came over after World War I from Italy, so there’s no difference in this migration, and that migration,” Gabrielli said, when asked about any resistance to their arrivals. “It is just the latest in the Great American story.”
To the general and many others, the compound in New Mexico has transformed into a modern-day Ellis Island, with people like Laila among its first immigrants — but many will never find the same refuge.
More than 3.5 million people have been displaced by conflict inside Afghanistan, including 700,000 from 2021 alone, while the war-torn country continues to face conflict, famine and COVID-19.
Writing her own American dream
The resettlement agency handling Laila’s case told her that her new home would be in South Carolina.
Organizations tasked with helping Afghans arriving in the U.S. have said they are scrambling to ramp up operations following years of downsizing due to the Trump administration’s slashed refugee program. Despite some delays to her own move, Laila expressed to ABC News her excitement at the potential.
“I don’t care if it’s South Carolina or if it’s New York, it is just a new country, a new culture, a new land, a new people,” she said.
At least, for her time there, she made the refugee camp feel like home. In the cafeteria on base, she would eat regularly with young ladies she fondly calls the “three musketeers.”
“When I came here, I was kind of like, you know, depressed from all that happened, and they were the ones that really helped me,” she said. “Every day, they would come to me and because they knew I was having twins, they would take good care of me.”
Finally, after months of waiting at Holloman Air Force Base, Laila and Yusef got permanently resettled in South Carolina in January.
Now 24 weeks pregnant, Laila says she is grateful to embark on a new life on American soil, but part of her heart will always be back home, especially with the women and girls of Afghanistan.
Veteran Canadian rocker Aldo Nova, best known for his 1982 hit “Fantasy,” has unveiled plans for two album projects that will be released in April.
The first is a 10-track EP titled The Life and Times of Eddie Gage that’s due out April 1 and will serve as the first chapter of a planned rock opera.
The Life and Times of Eddie Gage tells the fictional story of a talented young rocker who is tempted and exploited by various characters as he tries to break into the music business. He initially succumbs to drugs, alcohol and other excesses before finding redemption when he delves into spirituality.
Nova began working on the rock opera in 2008, and the final project will encompass 25 songs. Aldo wrote, produced, arranged, engineered and mixed all of the EP’s tracks, and the recording includes a 40-piece orchestra and a full gospel choir.
“The record was done from pure inspiration,” Nova says. “I was truly channeling some place away from myself. It was almost as if something above connected to me and gave me these songs.”
The second project is a three-disc set titled Aldo Nova 2.0 Reloaded that will be released on April 19.
The collection features updated versions of nine tunes from Nova’s back catalog on the first disc, and those same tracks mixed without vocals and without guitar, respectively, on the second and third discs.
“Nobody’s ever done this,” Aldo says of Reloaded. “You can basically sing with me as your backing band or play along as a backing track…I want to encourage kids to improvise and learn.”
Here’s the EP’s track list:
“Hey Ladi Dadi”
“Free Your Mind”
“Follow the Road”
“King of Deceit”
“The Bitch in Black”
“On the Way to the Psycho Ward”
“When All Is Said and Done”
“Say a Little Prayer”
“Burn Like the Sun”
Bonus Track:
“Les Anges”
And here’s the track list for Aldo Nova 2.0 Reloaded:
Disc One:
“Blood on the Bricks”
“Monkey on Your Back”
“Under the Gun – War Suite”
“Foolin’ Yourself”
“Ball and Chain”
“Paradise”
“Modern World”
“Fantasy”
“I’m a Survivor”
Disc Two (No Lead Vocal):
“Blood on the Bricks”
“Monkey on Your Back”
“Under the Gun – War Suite”
“Foolin’ Yourself”
“Ball and Chain”
“Modern World”
“Fantasy”
“I’m a Survivor”
(NEW YORK) — After 139 child deaths since 2010, new safety standards for crib mattresses will go into effect this fall.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission approved a new rule Wednesday to address potential hazards like lacerations, suffocation and entrapment.
“This is intended to reduce the risk of injury,” CPSC spokesperson Jason Levine told ABC News. “The crib is the safest place for your infant, yet what this does is it takes another step in the right direction in terms of ensuring that the mattress itself is as safe as can be.”
New mattresses will be required to comply with the standard this fall, Levine said. The rule covers crib mattresses as well as mattresses in play yards and bassinets.
“Today’s vote means crib mattresses of all sizes will be required to meet safety standards,” CPSC Chair Alex Hoehn-Saric said in a statement. “This will improve safety for babies sleeping in cribs and play yards.”
CPSC said it was aware of at least 494 incidents, including 139 fatalities and 355 nonfatal incidents, related to crib mattresses between January 2010 and April 2021.
Just last week, the CPSC also warned consumers about certain Leachco Podster infant loungers after two children died “due to a change in position” that obstructed the infants’ nose and mouth.
(NEW YORK) — After 139 child deaths since 2010, new safety standards for crib mattresses will go into effect this fall.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission approved a new rule Wednesday to address potential hazards like lacerations, suffocation and entrapment.
“This is intended to reduce the risk of injury,” CPSC spokesperson Jason Levine told ABC News. “The crib is the safest place for your infant, yet what this does is it takes another step in the right direction in terms of ensuring that the mattress itself is as safe as can be.”
New mattresses will be required to comply with the standard this fall, Levine said. The rule covers crib mattresses as well as mattresses in play yards and bassinets.
“Today’s vote means crib mattresses of all sizes will be required to meet safety standards,” CPSC Chair Alex Hoehn-Saric said in a statement. “This will improve safety for babies sleeping in cribs and play yards.”
CPSC said it was aware of at least 494 incidents, including 139 fatalities and 355 nonfatal incidents, related to crib mattresses between January 2010 and April 2021.
Just last week, the CPSC also warned consumers about certain Leachco Podster infant loungers after two children died “due to a change in position” that obstructed the infants’ nose and mouth.
(FAYETTEVILLE, Ga.) — When Jilea Hemmings’ oldest son was diagnosed with autism, she and her husband, Jamie, started experimenting with food that seemed to help improve their child’s performance.
The Georgia couple used plant-based substitutes to create their son’s favorite dishes, including mac and cheese and spaghetti and meatballs.
Soon, they began selling their products at a farmers’ market, and their customers asked if the food was sold in grocery stores, too.
“From there, the rest is history,” Hemmings told ABC News.
The couple just opened Nourish + Bloom Market in Fayetteville, Georgia, believed to be the first Black-owned autonomous grocery store in the nation. Hemmings said their mantra is “real food and real products for real people.”
After moving from Chicago to Fayetteville, the Hemmings family said they realized they were in a food desert — an area where there is limited access to affordable and nutritious food — and decided to use their prior food and technology knowledge to open a market of their own.
Nourish + Bloom Market features a “frictionless shopping” experience where customers can walk in, grab what they need and leave without waiting in line or stopping to scan and pay.
Hemmings has a background in technology and software building, and to bring her and her husband’s vision to life, the market partnered with different companies such as Microsoft, USC Technologies, Nova Dynamics and Intel.
Although the store is fully autonomous, the owners still wanted the store “to feel warm” by having employees that assist customers throughout the market.
“People think that autonomous means that you’re taking jobs away,” Hemmings said. “It actually is not. We are changing the way their jobs are done.”
They also have delivery robots, named Nourish and Bloom, to deliver products in temperature-controlled compartments. With autonomous shopping, vending and robotic delivery, the market can offer 24/7 access to real food and environmentally friendly products.
“The community response has been overwhelming,” Hemmings said. “They are just so proud to see a Black family doing this, and then also to experience the technology, people have been very excited about that.”
The couple plans to franchise Nourish + Bloom Markets around the country, hoping to reach a goal of 800 stores in total.
