Following the news that Tesla would be postponing their next few shows due to “members of the touring party contracting COVID,” the band’s guitarist, Frank Hannon, has now confirmed that he’s one of those suffering from the disease.
Tesla’s shows on August 5 and August 6 featured guitarist Howie Simon filling in for Hannon. On Instagram, Hannon writes, “I want to thank my friend Howie Simon for stepping in to help us. please accept my apology for not saying anything sooner, but I’ve not been able to move all week in pain.”
“The day the bus was leaving I woke up w 102 fever, shakes and couldn’t hardly breathe. So I stayed home. I’ve been unable to hardly move or function since,” he continues. “Tested positive for Covid. (yes I got the vax, thought maybe it was side efx). Howie did the 2 Oregon shows for me, and the guys are postponing more dates until we’re all cleared up and safe .. I love you all LET’sGET REAL.”
Tesla bass player Brian Wheatposted, “Hello folks it’s obvious some of us have come down with Covid please send out good vibes to my brothers in the crew and the band we’ll get back out there when everyone is healthy again …… and for the record this isn’t fun.”
Prince‘s album Welcome 2 America, originally recorded in 2010 but just recently released, has debuted at number four on the Billboard album chart. It marks the late legend’s highest-charting new album since 2009’s Lotusflow3r/MPSound.
Lotusflow3r debuted and peaked at number three in April of 2009. Since then, Prince has had higher-charting albums, but only with previously released material. For example, The Very Best of Prince hit number one after his death in 2016.
Welcome 2 America also debuted at number one on the Billboard R&B Album chart.
To coincide with the album’s release, a video of Prince performing his song “17 Days” at The Forum in Inglewood, CA, recorded during the Welcome 2 America tour in 2011, is now available to watch on YouTube. It’s part of the footage in the concert Blu-ray that comes with the deluxe edition of Welcome 2 America. “17 Days” was the B-side of Prince’s 1984 classic, “When Doves Cry.”
If you need more Prince, a new season of The Prince Estate’s official podcast has launched, starting with The Story of Welcome 2 America. It documents the years 2010 to 2011, when Prince recorded the album, shelved it and then decided to perform concert residencies around the world.
Zac Brown Band brought their The Comeback Tour to Boston’s Fenway Park on Sunday, and they made a little bit of history in the process.
The band last played the beloved baseball park — which is home to the Boston Red Sox — in 2019 for back-to-back nights during The Owl Tour. During those appearances, they set a venue record, becoming the only musical act to sell out 11 consecutive shows at Fenway Park.
But as of Sunday night’s performance, ZBB has one-upped themselves yet again: Their sold-out show marked 12 consecutive sell-outs at the venue.
The milestone comes in the middle of a busy summer full of new music. The group’s current single, “Same Boat,” is inside country radio’s Top 20. Meanwhile, they’ve dropped a number of other songs, including two co-written by Luke Combs and another that’s a duet with buzzy Americana up-and-comer Marcus King.
The Comeback Tour continues later this month with a stop in Maryland and will last through mid-October, ultimately wrapping up with a hometown show grand finale at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena.
Kit Harington is opening up about getting sober and the tough times he faced after Game of Thrones ended in 2019.
According to People, the 34-year-old actor revealed to the U.K.’s Sunday Times, “Things that have happened to me since Thrones ended, and that were happening during Thrones, were of a pretty traumatic nature and they did include alcohol.”
“You get to a place where you feel like you are a bad person, you feel like you are a shameful person,” Harington continued. “And you feel that there’s no way out, that’s just who you are. And getting sober is the process of going, ‘No, I can change.'”
The GoT alum added, “One of my favorite things I learnt recently is that the expression ‘a leopard doesn’t change its spots’ is completely false: that a leopard actually does change its spots. I just think that’s the most beautiful thing. It really helped. That was something I kind of clung to; the idea that I could make this huge fundamental change in who I was and how I went about my life.”
Harington, who recently welcomed his first child, a baby boy, with wife and former Game of Thrones co-star Rose Leslie, also got candid about suffering from depression and whether he faced suicidal thoughts.
“I will give you an answer to that question: the answer is yes. Yes of course,” he said. “I went through periods of real depression where I wanted to do all sorts of things… maybe [speaking about this will] help someone, somewhere. But I definitely don’t want to be seen as a martyr or special. I’ve been through something, it’s my stuff. If it helps someone, that’s good.”
If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, help is available. Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 [TALK] for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You can also reach the Trevor Project at 1-866-488-7386 or the Crisis Text Line by texting “START” to 741741.
Acclaimed and prolific session drummer Josh Freese appears to be The Offspring‘s new drummer.
Freese, who’s played with bands including Guns N’ Roses, Nine Inch Nails and A Perfect Circle, manned the kit for the “Self Esteem” rockers during their show in Los Angeles Sunday. The drummer posted video from the performance on his Instagram.
The LA date marked not only The Offspring’s first full in-person show since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, but it was also the band’s first concert to follow the departure of drummer Pete Parada.
Parada, who’d played in The Offspring since 2007, announced last week that “it has recently been decided that I am unsafe to be around, in the studio, and on tour” because he’s unable to get the COVID-19 vaccine due to his history with the neurological condition Guillain–Barré syndrome.
It’s unclear whether Freese is a permanent replacement or just a one-off fill-in. It does appear the arrangement was relatively last-minute: according to another Instagram post from Freese, Offspring frontman — and licensed pilot — Dexter Holland flew him to and back from Denver Saturday where he was playing another gig so that he could make Sunday’s concert.
By the way, Freese has played drums on the past four Offspring records, including this year’s Let the Bad Times Roll.
Mick Jagger and Annie Lennox are two of the many stars who’ll take part in We for India, a three-hour virtual benefit show that’ll be broadcast on Facebook on India’s Independence Day, August 15.
The event is designed to encourage donors worldwide to give $3.5 million for post-COVID relief work in India, as well as preventative measures against the future spread of the pandemic. All donations will go to GiveIndia, the country’s largest charity donation platform, to provide humanitarian aid and support the country’s medical infrastructure.
It’s not clear whether Jagger will simply be seen in a video message or if he’ll perform. Lennox will perform, alongside her daughter, Lola Lennox. Others appearing include pop superstar Ed Sheeran, Nile Rodgers of CHIC, podcast host Jay Shetty and Oscar-winning composer A.R. Rahman, who created the music for Slumdog Millionaire. A host of Bollywood stars are also involved.
(WASHINGTON) — Senate Democrats on Monday unveiled details of their $3.5 trillion budget resolution, setting up Congress to begin work on the second portion of President Joe Biden’s major economic objectives.
The legislative language comes just as the Senate is preparing to complete its work on a separate $1.1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill late Monday or early Tuesday morning. Taken together, the bills are designed to comprise the whole of Biden’s American Families Plan priorities.
Unlike the bipartisan infrastructure plan, which focuses on “core” infrastructure needs such as roads bridges and waterways, the budget resolution includes many of Biden’s social programs focusing on family, climate and health care.
Key campaign promises, including universal pre-K, free 2-year community college, and paid family leave are included in the package, as are many of Biden’s climate priorities. The bill, pushed by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., also secures investments in public housing, invests in job training, adds new Medicare benefits and extends expansions of the Affordable Care Act.
Democrats are expected to try to force the massive package through the Senate this week without a single GOP vote. Budget bills are not subject to the regular 60-vote threshold generally necessary to move legislation forward.
But any Senate action on the budget this week is just the first in a long series of steps before these objectives make it to Biden’s desk.
After the Senate votes on the budget bill, individual committees must craft legislation in line with the new budget, and that legislation will go before the full chamber for a second vote, likely in the fall.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has also been clear that she’ll need to see the Senate’s final budget product before she brings the House in to vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill and the budget resolution. House progressives want assurances that the Senate can approve social programs in the budget bill before they lend their support to the slimmed-down bipartisan package.
Republicans have vowed to fight the budget resolution at every step, including through what is expected to be a marathon of votes this week on partisan amendments designed to score political points and make centrist Democrats squirm.
The Democrat-only bill is expected to be funded in part by raising taxes on big corporations and wealthy Americans, something Republicans see as a referendum on the 2017 tax cuts, which many of them view as on one of former President Donald Trump’s most significant legislative achievements.
As well as general opposition to the massive $3.5 trillion price tag, Republicans have also promised a bruising fight over language incorporated into the legislation aimed at implementing significant changes to immigration policy, including providing a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
According to a top-line summary of the budget resolution released Monday, the package will “provide green cards to millions of immigrant workers and families” and “fund smart technology for safe and efficient borders for trade, travel and migration.”
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin, D-Ill., has told reporters that his panel, which will write this portion of the final bill, plans to draft legislation that would provide green cards for so-called “Dreamers” — children brought to the U.S. illegally – and for farmworkers.
It is not yet clear whether these immigration policies will be permissible under the strict rules governing what may be in a Senate budget bill, but barring a ruling by the chamber’s parliamentarian that such policies are out of bounds, there isn’t much that Republicans can do to stop passage of the bill if all Democrats are on board.
It will require all 50 Senate Democrats plus the tie-breaking vote of Vice President Kamala Harris to move the budget resolution forward, but it is not yet clear that the caucus will remain united.
Earlier this month, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., announced that she would not support a $3.5 trillion top-line package. She said she’ll allow the process to move forward this week by lending her support to the budget bill for now, but as committees slog through their work, she said she wants to see overall spending reduced.
It is also not clear if all Democrats will agree with the leadership’s budget strategy for keeping the overall price tag of the bill down. Committees are expected to sunset costly programs – like the childcare tax credit – before the bill’s 10-year budget window, even though the programs could be extended in later years, thus growing the ultimate spending on the plan.
Foreshadowing another major partisan fight to come, Democrats also left a hike of the federal debt limit out of their budget blueprint, perhaps to appease moderates in their ranks, many of whom are up for re-election in 2022 and fearful of growing deficit spending in Washington. Republican challengers are all but certain to use a vote to raise the debt limit against them.
A suspension of the federal debt limit expired at the end of July, and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has warned that the US could exhaust its borrowing authority in the coming months without swift congressional action.
But Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has repeatedly insisted that Republicans will not vote to increase the debt limit, arguing that Democratic policies, like the massive COVID-19 relief bill and the upcoming budget bill, are driving up the debt, even though an increase in the nation’s debt ceiling is done to accommodate spending and tax cuts that have already occurred, including the effects of the 2017 GOP tax cut.
“They won’t get our help with the debt limit increase that recklessly, that these reckless plans will require. I could not be more clear,” McConnell said of his Democratic colleagues on the Senate floor last week. “They have the ability. They control the White House, they control the House, they control the Senate. They can raise the debt ceiling and if it’s raised, they will do it.”
But the administration challenged that notion in a statement Monday from Yellen, who urged Congress to use “regular order,” rather than the budget bill, to raise the debt ceiling.
“The vast majority of the debt subject to the debt limit was accrued prior to the Administration taking office. This is a shared responsibility, and I urge Congress to come together on a bipartisan basis as it has in the past to protect the full faith and credit of the United States,” Yellen wrote.
Failure to act could prove catastrophic. The last time the parties engaged in a partisan fight over the debt ceiling in 2011 resulted in a historic downgrading of the U.S. credit rating for the first time. World and U.S. markets plunged.
The Senate is expected to leave town for a shortened August recess upon completion of its work on the budget. When they return the second week in September, they’ll have just weeks to forge a path forward on the debt limit, as well as pass a final version of the Democrat-budget bill, this as the government runs out of funding on Oct. 1.
(DENVER) — The Colorado Rockies are investigating after a racial slur was used during Sunday’s game against the Miami Marlins during a ninth-inning at bat by Marlins outfielder Lewis Brinson, who is black.
The slur was picked up by the Bally Sports television broadcast.
“The Colorado Rockies are disgusted at the racial slur by a fan directed at the Marlins’ Lewis Brinson during the ninth inning of today’s game,” the team said in a statement. “Although the subject was not identified prior to the end of the game, the Rockies are still investigating this incident.”
“The Rockies have zero tolerance for any form of racism or discrimination, and any fan using derogatory language of any kind will be ejected and banned from Coors Field.”
Brinson went 2-4 in the game with two RBI’s. Colorado won 13-8.
Molly Ringwald honored her late father, jazz great Bob Ringwald, over the weekend by penning a heartfelt obituary in The Sacramento Bee.
“Jazz musician Robert Scott Ringwald, known to most as Bob, and to a lucky few as Dad and PopPop, died Tuesday, Aug. 3. He was 80,” the actress eulogized on Saturday, sharing how he overcame blindness to become a professional musician.
Bob established the first-ever Sacramento Jazz Festival in 1974 and, in 2012, was honored with the title “The Emperor of Jazz” by the same festival he co-founded — a title that “both touched and embarrassed him,” said Molly.
“Anyone who knew Bob also knew his mischievous streak, and his ever-present, slightly ribald sense of humor,” the Pretty in Pink star continued. ” If you didn’t sufficiently beg to get off of his email joke list, you would have received one just a couple of days before he died.”
“Though he never wanted to be defined by his blindness, he couldn’t help being an ambassador for changing the perception of what is possible to do while living with a disability,” she closed. “His dignity, humor, strength of character and courage will always be remembered and cherished by everyone whose lives were touched by his.”
In addition to writing her father’s obituary, Molly alerted fans of her father’s passing on Instagram. Sharing a series of throwback photos, the Breakfast Club actress wrote, “It’s with a heavy heart that my family says goodbye to my father. I consider myself very lucky to have had in my life as long as I did.”
Besides Molly, Bob Ringwald is survived by his wife of 60 years, Adele, and children Beth and Kelly. He is predeceased by son Robert Scott Jr., who died at age three from leukemia.
Idris Elba says he didn’t have to feign an aversion to rats in the new DC Comics superhero film The Suicide Squad. In fact, Elba, who plays the mercenary Bloodsport, tells ABC Audio that he’s still not a fan of the rodents, even after getting some major one-on-one time with them on set.
“No — next question,” quips an expressionless Elba when asked if he had developed a new appreciation for the garbage-loving creatures.
“Listen, they’re very intelligent. Very intelligent and to some degree… have a real human interaction. They understand [and] you can communicate with them,” he says. “So I was like, ‘What? Really?'”
Elba’s co-star Daniela Melchior, who plays Ratcatcher 2 — a woman who inherited the ability to control rats and communicate with them — says her experience working with the rodents actually made her a big fan.
“After shooting the movie…[and] getting to know a little bit more about these animals, and…how smart they are, I now follow a bunch of Instagram accounts from people that have rats as pets. And I’m loving it,” she says. “Like, I can’t wait to have a rat again in my hand.”
A stunned, and perhaps disgusted, Elba looks at Melchior, and says, “You need to get out more, Daniela. You need to get out more.”
The Suicide Squad, also starring Viola Davis and John Cena, is now in theaters nationwide and streaming on HBO Max.
