George Strait, Eric Church and singer-songwriter Caitlyn Smith are holding down one half of the lineup for the second annual ATLive event, Billboard reports. This year’s ATLive will take place in November.
The country performers will hit the stage on November 5, which is the first of two nights of music planned. The following day, November 6, Metallica will headline a bill that also includes Cage the Elephant and Greta Van Fleet.
ATLive took a pandemic-induced break in 2020, and before that, its inaugural 2019 event was made up of entirely country performers. Eric’s a repeat ATLive performer, and last time around, Keith Urban, Blake Shelton, Sugarland, Sam Hunt and Luke Combs joined him.
Bleachers and Americana artist Jason Isbell have teamed up for a charity single featuring covers of each other’s songs.
The split seven-inch vinyl, which will be limited to just 1,000 copies, includes Jack Antonoff and company taking on Isbell’s song “Dreamsicle,” and Isbell putting his spin on the Bleachers tune “45.”
Proceeds will benefit the LGBTQ equality organization The Ally Coalition, which Antonoff co-founded with his sister, fashion designer Rachel Antonoff.
You can order the single now via the Bleachers web store. For a preview, you can check out a teaser of both covers streaming now on YouTube.
Meanwhile, the new Bleachers album, Take the Sadness Out of Saturday Night, is due out July 30. It includes “45,” as well as the Bruce Springsteen collaboration “Chinatown.”
(NEW YORK) — The Canadian Football League and the XFL have agreed to stop collaboration between the two leagues.
The CFL announced the decision in a statement.
“Our talks with the XFL, exploring the potential for collaboration and innovation, have been positive and constructive. While we remain open to finding new ways to work together in the future, we and our XFL counterparts have jointly decided to not pursue any formal arrangements at this time,” the statement said.
The CFL begins its season on August 5 and will run to December 12, where the champion will be crowned at the 108th Grey Cup.
The league canceled its 2020 season after failing to secure a loan from the Canadian government.
In March, the league’s announced they would be working together to “collaborate, innovate, and grow the game of football.”
“It’s clear through our early conversations that we share a passion for football, an expansive sense of possibility, and a deep desire to create more opportunity for players and fans across North America and around the world. Blending the CFL’s rich heritage with our fresh thinking, and the unique reach and experience of our ownership, could be transformative for the game,” said Jeffrey Pollack, the XFL president, and CEO, in a statement at the time.
The 2022 XFL season was put on hold while conversations with the CFL were ongoing.
The second iteration of the XFL began in 2020. The season was canceled after five games because of the coronavirus pandemic. Owner Vince McMahon then put the league in bankruptcy proceedings.
Dany Garcia, Dwayne Johnson, and RedBird Capital Partners bought the league for $15 million last summer.
Eva Marie Uzcategui Trinkl/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — Tropical Storm Elsa made landfall at about 11 a.m. Wednesday in Taylor County, Florida, along the Sunshine State’s Gulf Coast.
Taylor County, in Florida’s Big Bend region, is about 50 miles southeast of Tallahassee.
Elsa, which is slamming Florida with gusty winds and heavy rain, strengthened to a Category 1 hurricane Tuesday night before weakening back to a tropical storm.
A boat capsized near Key West as Elsa blew through on Tuesday, according to the Coast Guard. Nine people remain missing.
As of Wednesday morning, Florida had no reports of fatalities or significant structural damage, Gov. Ron DeSantis said.
About 26,000 customers in Florida are without power, he added.
A hurricane warning was issued for Florida’s west coast from the Chassahowitzka River to the Steinhatchee River.
Tampa Bay is among the areas under a storm surge warning.
Tropical storm warnings have been issued in Savannah and Charleston, and a tropical storm watch extends up to Sandy Hook, New Jersey.
After blowing through the South, the storm is expected to move up the East Coast, bringing heavy rain and gusty winds to the mid-Atlantic, New Jersey shore, New York City, Long Island and New England.
Elsa is forecast to weaken to a tropical depression as it moves up the East Coast, but it could regain tropical storm status as it passes over the waters of the mid-Atlantic.
By Thursday night Elsa will reach mid-Atlantic, dropping flooding rain and gusty winds near Washington, D.C., and into Philadelphia.
The latest path shows Elsa’s center passing right over the Interstate 95 corridor, heading just east of D.C. to near Philadelphia and then north over New York City.
Northerners should be prepared for gusty winds up to 50 mph, heavy rain and potential flash flooding.
By Friday morning, Elsa will be dropping heavy rain along the Jersey shore, New York City and Long Island.
Elsa will move into New England late Friday morning into Friday afternoon. Boston and Portland, Maine, could face strong winds, power outages and flooding.
Flooding is possible in Philadelphia, New York City, Connecticut, Massachusetts and northern New England. Some areas could see up to 5 inches of rain.
Avenged Sevenfold is planning to release a new album by the summer of 2022.
During a recent stream on the DWPresents Twitch channel, frontman M. Shadows revealed, “We’re booking shows for next summer, and the record will be out before then.”
As for what the upcoming effort will sound like, well, you’ll just have to wait until it’s released to find out.
“There’s no way to describe music,” Shadows asserts. “It’s like, ‘Oh, it’s heavy, it’s fast.’ Like, what are we gonna say about it? It’s a work of art that we’ve worked on for a long time.”
Avenged Sevenfold’s most recent album is 2016’s conceptually driven The Stage.
Co-founding 5th Dimension members Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr. recall are sharing the emotional impact of being a part of the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, a series of concerts that took place at Marcus Garvey Park in Harlem over the course of several weekends.
Documented in Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson‘s directorial debut, Summer of Soul, includes footage of the musical group performing in front of a crowd of thousands at the festival. McCoo, the group’s original lead singer, says it was very important to the band members to been “seen and heard in Harlem.”
“The 5th Dimension was known for a lot of our pop success,” McCoo tells ABC Audio. “But we wanted to be known and understood by our audiences in Harlem as well. We knew a lot of those people weren’t going to be able to get a chance to come and see one of our concerts and see the variety of music that we offered. So, doing a performance for this concert was important because we wanted them to have a little bit broader understanding of what The 5th Dimension was about musically. And so this gave us a chance to do it.”
Davis, who’s been married to McCoo since 1969, agrees, noting that being a part of the dynamic lineup that included Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight and Nina Simone to name a few, made perfect sense since they currently had a hit song “Aquarius / Let the Sunshine In” on the airwaves.
“So a lot of people were waiting for us out there for that day,” he explains. [So] to be able to do that in front of our own folks was just a real thrill.”
Summer of Soul is now available in theaters and on Hulu.
(SPOILERS AHEAD)We’re down to the last two episodes of the Disney+ series Loki, and director Kate Herron recently teased what we can expect in the final installments; episode five of Loki drops on Wednesday.
Herron explained to Hollywood Life the purpose of Loki’s first post-credit scene, in which Tom Hiddleston‘s titular character finds himself in a strange place where he confronts three other Lokis after being pruned by Gugu Mbatha-Raw‘s Ravonna.
“I just felt like it would just give it a bit more punch, basically,” she explains. “It was meant to have that kind of surprise intention, obviously, but I just felt prolonging it and giving that gap really gave it the punch that we were after.”
As for the post credits scene, where Loki asks “Is this Hell?” — referring to one of the nine realms — Herron says the significance “is just that he doesn’t know where he is, and he’s wondering if it could be that.”
Regarding Ravonna’s reason for pruning Loki, Herron promises, “We’re going to find out so much of what she knows and where her head is at as the story continues.”
“I love how Gugu played it when Mobius — played by Owen Wilson — is deleted. She’s doing it for the greater good, but she has that moment after where she takes a breath,” she continues. “It wasn’t an easy decision. So I think, for me, more of Ravonna and how she feels about everything is to be answered, but there are definitely questions that we will answer in regards to that.”
Herron also says the series will explore Loki’s reaction to seeing different variations of himself, as well as if he and Sylvie — played by Sophia Di Martino — will be reunited by the end of the series.
Marvel is owned by Disney, parent company of ABC News.
Metallica is headlining Atlanta’s 2021 ATLive festival.
The metal legends will take the stage at Mercedes-Benz Stadium on November 6, the second night of the two-day event. Greta Van Fleet and Cage the Elephant are also on the bill.
Tickets go on sale to the general public next Friday, July 16, at 10 a.m. ET. Those who’ve joined Metallica’s Fifth Member fan club will have access to a pre-sale. Visit Metallica.com for all ticket info.
The first night of ATLive, November 5, will be for the country fans, and features a lineup of George Strait, Eric Church and Caitlyn Smith. That show is ticketed separately from the Metallica day.
In related news, Metallica has shared Biffy Clyro‘s cover of “Holier Than Thou,” which will appear on the upcoming all-star tribute compilation The Metallica Blacklist, celebrating the 30th anniversary of The Black Album.
Along with the Scottish trio’s version, you can also listen to the punk group OFF!put their spin on “Holier Than Thou.” Both covers are available now for digital download.
The 53-track Metallica Blacklist will be released September 10.
Meanwhile, Metallica has also dug up a “Pre-Production Rehearsal” version of “Holier Than Thou,” one of the many bonus tracks included on the 30th anniversary Black Album reissue, also due out September 10.
Filmmaker Ava DuVernay paid tribute to actress Suzzanne Douglas, who passed away Tuesday at age 64. The two worked together on Netflix’s When They See Us, in which Douglas played Grace Cuffee.
“Suzzanne Douglas was a quiet, elegant force as we made When They See Us,” DuVernay wrote on Instagram, sharing a clip from the film. “A gentlewoman. A gem of a lady. A confident, caring actor who breathed life into the words and made them shimmer. I’m grateful that our paths in this life crossed. May she journey on in peace and love.”
News of Douglas’ passing was shared on Facebook by her cousin, Angie Tee.
“Suzzanne Douglas, a beautiful and talented actress, made her transition today,” the post reads. “She warmed our hearts on movie screens and television sets all over the world. This beautiful soul was my cousin. I can remember growing up, there weren’t very many black actresses who had starring roles, but there was my cousin with the lead role in Tap starring alongside great dancers such as Gregory Hines and Sammy Davis Jr.“
Tee continued, mentioning Douglas’ other roles in How Stella Got Her Groove Back, alongside Angela Bassett and Whoopi Goldberg, plus The Inkwell and Jason’s Lyric. “The world will miss your talent, but your soul will live on forever. Rest in Paradise, my beautiful cousin Suzzanne. You will be missed RIP,” Tee concluded.
Suzzanne Douglas is also known for starring alongside Robert Townsend in the family sitcom The Parent Hood, which ran from 1995-1999 on The WB. The cause of her death has yet to be disclosed.
(NEW YORK) — As the Suns and the Bucks face off in the NBA Finals, Chipotle is giving away millions in free burritos.
Amid the on-court action of Tuesday’s Game 1 broadcast, Chipotle raised the stakes for the commercial breaks and hid a keyword that unlocked 10,000 free burritos at the end of its ad.
The fast-casual Mexican restaurant chain announced Wednesday that it has hidden up to $1 million — or possibly more, depending on if the teams go further than Game 4 — worth of free burritos in its TV ads.
As the series progresses, Chipotle will continue to offer a number of prizes that vary from game to game hidden in the end card of the commercial.
Now the word is officially out, the brand said it expects codes will go fast. To score a free entrée, fans will have to put a full court press on texting the keyword to 888-222.
“The final games of the basketball season are arguably some of the most entertaining moments of the year,” Chris Brandt, Chipotle’s Chief Marketing Officer said in a statement. “Along with the high-profile player matchups, off-court storylines, and fan interactions, our hidden code giveaway creates another ‘game within the game’ and elevates the viewing experience for our fans during breaks in the action.”
Check out the full NBA Finals schedule below to make sure you’re tuned in and ready to go.
Game 2 – Thursday, July 8: 10,000 free burritos
Game 3 – Sunday, July 11: 20,000 free burritos
Game 4 – Wednesday, July 14: 30,000 free burritos
Game 5 (If necessary) – Saturday, July 17: 40,000 free burritos
Game 6 (If necessary) – Tuesday, July 20: 10,000 free burritos
Game 7 (If necessary) – Thursday, July 22: 10,00 free burritos
