Shortly after appearing on ABC’s Good Morning America last Thursday, Carly Pearce traveled to her hometown of Taylor Mill, Kentucky, to accept a rare honor: a road sign recognizing her success in country music, as well as the key to the city.
With #1 songs, CMA and ACM Awards, and Grand Ole Opry membership already to her credit, the “Next Girl” hitmaker points out that this new latest accolade is particularly close to her heart.
“Taylor Mill means so much to me on so many levels,” she tells ABC Audio. “So the fact that they want to give me a sign that says ‘Home of Carly Pearce’ is kind of like every little childhood dream that I had, playing at talent shows in the town…Actually, where they’re presenting this with me is where I played so many shows when I first started out.”
Carly adds, “So I’ve always been told to never forget where you came from. And I think [my upcoming] album [29: Written in Stone] in particular has really brought me home, musically.”
The hometown honor is one Carly was able to share with her parents, who supported her decision to leave school at 16 so she could go perform at Dollywood.
“All of these things that are happening to me were a dream that my parents helped bring to fruition for me,” she reflects. “So it’s definitely like a trifecta of emotions through the three of us because they were there every step of the way. And they were there when it wasn’t working, and when I thought about giving up.”
Impeachment: American Crime Story debuts tonight on FX. The series turns its lens toward the affairs and scandals of former president Bill Clinton, as told through the eyes of the women, including Monica Lewinsky, Linda Tripp and Paula Jones.
Annaleigh Ashford, who plays Jones, tells ABC Audio that the series will tackle the well-known scandal from a different angle.
“We’re really focusing on the narrative of the women and the point of view of the women in the story, which was so ignored, overlooked and taken away from these women during that time in history,” she says, adding the women were “brutalized” in the media and late night comedy.
“That’s sort of the interesting thing about this time in American history…it was such a salacious media event,” adds the 36-year-old actress. “Even as a kid, I was super aware of what was happening and super aware that it was extremely controversial and very sexual. And really, my window into this time was through late night comedy, which I think sort of says it all.”
Ashford believes the series also offers some insight into how the country became so divided.
“I feel like if we could find the root cause for the sickness we have now, it would stem back to this moment in the mid 90s where it just became my team, your team, and it was the beginning of bullying on the Internet,” she suggests. “Monica Lewinsky was the first person to be bullied on the Internet. And it was truly the beginning of sort of the Fox News [versus] CNN battle.”
The third installment of Ryan Murphy‘s American Crime Story franchise also stars Beanie Feldstein, Sarah Paulson, Clive Owen, Edie Falco, Billy Eichner, Cobie Smulders and Betty Gilpin.
Daniele Venturelli/Daniele Venturelli/Getty Images for Luisaviaroma
As documented by paparazzi, Katy Perry‘s summer vacation this year involved frolicking in Italy. But she says her seemingly decadent holiday was her last chance to let it all hang out before she returns to the stage later this year for her first-ever Las Vegas residency.
“I have free time for one last hurrah before I start getting ready for Vegas — i.e., stop thinking about eating pasta all the time so I can get back into tour shape again,” Katy told LuisViaRoma magazine while she was in Italy living la dolce vita.
Her Vegas show, Play, starts in December at Resorts World, which coincidentally, Katy says, “sits on the same ground” as the old Stardust Hotel. That’s where, she says, “my aunt was a topless showgirl and my grandmother was a seamstress for the show…so Vegas is very much in my blood.”
But don’t expect any topless shenanigans during Play. “I’m aiming for my audience to be the family — eight to 80 years old,” Katy tells LVR. “I do everything with a wink. Even if it’s a sexual connotation, it’s subtle.”
Katy reveals that the merchandise for the new show will include NFTs, but she’s also working on making her vast archives of props and costumes available for fans to purchase. “My fans love the tangible,” she says.
Of course, Katy’s one-year-old daughter, Daisy, will be with her in Las Vegas. “She is everything I was ever looking for,” gushes Katy. “She is adaptable and happy; her schedule fluctuates. In the beginning, I worried about a schedule, but decided I won’t be that mom. All that matters is that everyone is happy.”
But that doesn’t mean Katy’s a pushover. “You have to be smart and exercise the word ‘no,” she notes.
TLC kicked off their CrazySexyCool Celebration tour over the Labor Day weekend, showcasing many songs from their landmark 1994 album, CrazySexyCool.
Rozonda “Chilli” Thomas says that she and T-Boz did most of the work on the iconic album, with limited input from Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, who was in rehab after burning down the house of her boyfriend, Atlanta Falcons football star Andre Rison.
“It’s so crazy because Lisa could come to the studio to record, but had to go back to the facility and she was on probation for five years,” Chili tells USA Today. “Looking back, when you’re in your 20s, you don’t even think about how serious something like that really was.”
Despite Left Eye’s limited participation, CrazySexyCool became a massive hit, going on to sell over 12 million copies — making it the best-selling album ever by a girl group. It also earned the trio two Grammys: Best R&B Album, and Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals for “Creep.”
Chilli recalls that before the album was released, she knew it would make history.
“We had a listening party in New York and I remember one of the guys at Arista Records was being so sweet and saying, ‘This is really good — it might sell five million copies,’ and I was like, ‘Nuh-uh, we’re going to surpass that!'” she says. “When I heard [the album], I knew it was special, that the entire album was going to show people that we’re here to stay.”
In addition to “Creep,” CrazySexyCool included the hits “Red Light Special,” “Diggin’ On You,” and their signature song, “Waterfalls.” Sadly, Left Eye died in a 2002 car crash.
TLC’s CrazySexyCool Celebration tour, which features 18 shows, winds down October 10 in Concord, California.
Pretenders frontwoman Chrissie Hynde celebrates her 70th birthday today.
Born in Akron, Ohio, Hynde moved to London in 1973 and eventually immersed herself in the city’s punk scene.
She formed The Pretenders in 1978 with drummer Martin Chambers, guitarist James Honeyman-Scott and bassist Pete Farndon. The band’s first single, a 1979 cover of The Kinks‘ “Stop Your Sobbing,” reached #34 on the U.K. charts.
The Pretenders’ 1979 self-titled debut album reached #9 on the Billboard 200. It featured the band’s first stateside hit, “Brass in Pocket,” which peaked at #14 on the Billboard Hot 100. The Pretenders also featured several other enduring songs, including “Precious,” “Kid” and “Mystery Achievement.”
The band’s 1981 sophomore album, The Pretenders II, reached #10 on the Billboard 200 and included the popular tunes “Talk of the Town” and “Message of Love.”
Tragedy struck the band in June 1982 when Honeyman-Scott, 25, died of a drug overdose, two days after Farndon was fired because of his own drug problems. In April 1983, Farndon drowned in his bathtub after overdosing on heroin. He was 30.
Hynde and Chambers soon re-formed The Pretenders, and the band scored its biggest hit in 1982 with “Back on the Chain Gang,” which reached #5 on the Hot 100. Other hits followed, including “Middle of the Road,” “Show Me,” “Don’t Get Me Wrong” and “I’ll Stand by You.”
Hynde also scored a big hit when she teamed up with U.K. reggae band UB40 for a 1985 cover of Sonny & Cher’s classic duet “I Got You Babe.”
Outside of music, Chrissie has had children with two other famous singers. Her daughter Natalie, whose father is Kinks frontman Ray Davies, was born in 1983. From 1984 to 1990, Hynde was married to Simple Minds single Jim Kerr, and the couple’s daughter, Yasmin, was born in ’85.
Chrissie was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame with The Pretenders in 2005.
Not surprisingly, the pandemic has left a lot of people feeling pessimistic and blue. The good news is: We can MAKE ourselves more optimistic, even during tough times. Here’s how:
First: Visualize your ideal life 10 years from now. What would it look like? How would it feel? Then, every week, spend about 6 minutes writing down how you’d like to change an area of your life, like romance, career, and health, to make your dreams a reality. UC Riverside psychology professor, Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky says, envisioning your dreams coming true will strengthen your “optimistic muscles” and boost your mood. And, dozens of studies show that imagining your ideal future can boost your levels of optimism.
Next: Stop expecting the worst. Dr. Lyubomirsky says you’ll be happier overall if you expect good things, than if you always expect to be disappointed. Because, we get a mood boost from anticipation itself. And that’s true whether you’re planning a future vacation – or just looking forward to a nice meal on Saturday night. And even if we ultimately get disappointed because things didn’t work out – you’ll still have had the mood boost from anticipation.
Would you ask your boyfriend or girlfriend to sign a “relationship contract?”
More and more couples are doing it! The contracts lay out everything from PDA rules, to off-limits fighting styles, to non-negotiable personal quirks.
Couples who sign on the dotted line say the contracts encourage boundary setting, fair fighting and compromise. But some items in these contracts seem kind of arbitrary.
Like, one couple negotiated how much time can be spent watching news, limited sports viewing to one game a week, and stipulated that one partner must call the other every day and stay on the phone for at least 5 minutes.
But therapists say these contracts can be GOOD for couples, because they lay the groundwork for a healthy relationship by setting expectations.
Licensed marriage counselor Lisa Thomas says negotiating difficult situations upfront, before they become a problem, can give your relationship a stronger footing. So hash out things like money, how to resolve conflicts, and chores – and revisit it every once and a while and revise it. The contracts aren’t legally binding, but they can help couples stay on track, because both partners know what’s expected of them.
As life slowly gets back to normal, experts are predicting a surge in auto sales.
But if you’re thinking of selling your vehicle, or trading it in, cybersecurity specialists are recommending “wiping it clean” before you hand over the keys. As in: Erase all the data on your vehicle’s dashboard infotainment system!
That’s according to Justin Schorr, president of DJS Associates, a company that analyzes vehicle data. He says, these days, you have to think of your car as a smartphone on wheels. Because if you’ve ever paired your REAL phone with the infotainment system, it likely has copies of all your text messages, emails, contacts, and even your photos! Schorr says all of that personal data can easily be accessed by others who drive your car… and there have been recent cases of hackers buying old vehicle infotainment systems on eBay, and finding troves of personal information still stored on them!
That’s why Schorr says, before you even think about selling or trading-in your vehicle, read the owner’s manual and perform what’s called a “factory reset” – which should erase most of that data. Then, just to be safe, ask your car dealer to do a separate data wipe, to erase anything you may have missed.
(NEW YORK) — More than a year after Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam ordered the removal of a giant statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee in the state’s capital, the monument will be coming down this week, state officials announced Monday.
The statue, erected in Richmond in 1890, will be removed from Monument Avenue this Wednesday, nearly a week after the Supreme Court of Virginia cleared the way for the state-owned monument to come down following several legal battles.
“Virginia’s largest monument to the Confederate insurrection will come down this week,” Northam said in a statement. “This is an important step in showing who we are and what we value as a Commonwealth.”
Northam ordered the removal of the statue in June 2020, amid nationwide protests against symbols of racism and oppression that erupted following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis while in police custody.
Last week, the Supreme Court of Virginia denied or dissolved injunctive relief sought in two lawsuits challenging the statue’s removal — one filed by a descendant of the former owners of the land where the monument stands, the other by several owners and a trustee of property in the area’s historic district — allowing the state to move forward with its plans.
The removal of the 12-ton, six-story statue is “extremely complex,” the state’s Department of General Services said, and will require “coordination with multiple entities to ensure the safety of everyone involved.”
The removal process will begin Tuesday evening, when crews will install protective fencing on the streets near the monument. All cars and pedestrians will be cleared from the area at that time.
The state will host a public viewing of the statue’s removal beginning at 8 a.m. Wednesday. On Thursday, crews will remove plaques from the base of the monument. The 40-foot granite pedestal will remain for now, with its future still to be determined, the state said.
The statue itself will be held “in secure storage at a state-owned facility until a decision is made as to its disposition,” the state said.
This is the sixth and final Confederate statue to be removed from Monument Avenue.
“We are taking an important step this week to embrace the righteous cause and put the ‘Lost Cause’ behind us,” Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney said in a statement. “Richmond is no longer the capital of the Confederacy. We are a diverse, open and welcoming city, and our symbols need to reflect this reality.”
Last year, the busts of Lee and eight other Confederate leaders were removed from the Old House Chamber in the Virginia State Capitol building in Richmond. The Fairfax County School Board has also changed the name of the Robert E. Lee High School in Springfield to the John R. Lewis High School, in honor of the late Georgia congressman and civil rights leader.
A great-great-great-nephew of Lee has previously said that taking down Confederate symbols in public spaces is a “no brainer.”
“I see them as idolatries,” Rev. Robert Lee IV told ABC News last year. “They have been created into idols of white supremacy and racism.”
Over 160 Confederate symbols were renamed or removed from public spaces in 2020, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
(MOSCOW) — One of Belarus’ top opposition figures, who helped lead massive protests against authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko last year, has been sentenced to 11 years in jail by a court in Minsk.
Maria Kolesnikova was one of three women who found themselves at the head of the huge peaceful protests that last summer threatened to end Lukashenko’s 26-year rule but that have since been quashed with relentless repression.
Most leading opposition figures, including Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who has become the movement’s primary leader, were forced into exile shortly after the protests began last August, triggered by Lukashenko claiming victory in a presidential election widely condemned internationally as rigged.
But Kolesnikova refused to go into exile even as Lukashenko reasserted his grip. Last September, security forces abducted her off the streets in the capital Minsk and then drove her to the border with Ukraine, where they tried to forcibly deport her. But Kolesnikova resisted the attempt, tearing up her passport to make her deportation impossible and refusing to go, despite knowing she faced certain imprisonment in Belarus.
A Minsk court on Monday sentenced her to 11 years in prison, along with another prominent activist, Maxim Znak, after convicting them on charges of extremism and illegally trying to seize power.
He and Kolesnikova were members of the opposition’s Coordination Council that was founded during the protests to demand a peaceful handover of power from Lukashenko.
Their trial was held behind closed doors with no evidence produced publicly and both had pleaded not guilty, denouncing the charges as political.
The sentences follow months of intense crackdown in Belarus as Lukashenko’s regime has sought to smash any organized dissent after riding out the protests. Most independent media and human rights groups have been shut down and hundreds arrested with dozens already sentenced. Virtually all leading opposition figures are now jailed or in exile.
Western countries swiftly condemned Monday’s verdict, with the United States and European Union demanding their immediate release.
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken slammed the sentences as “shameful” and based on “bogus” charges.
“We reiterate our call for an end to the campaign of repression against the people of Belarus for exercising their human rights inside and outside Belarus and for the immediate and unconditional release of all political prisoners — including Ms. Kalesnikava and Mr. Znak,” Blinken said in a statement.
Kolesnikova and a heart shape she forms with her hands became symbols of the protest movement. She and Tikhanovskaya were also seen as emblematic of the pivotal role women played in the protests that saw hundreds of thousands of people take to the streets. During the demonstrations, women holding flowers and dressed in red and white — the colors of the protests — often formed peaceful human chains, early on forcing riot police to back down.
Video from court on Monday showed Kolesnikova smiling and making the trademark heart shape with her hands in handcuffs while standing in a glass cage.
Key opposition figure in Belarus disappears
Kolesnikova had been a professional flute player before getting involved in politics for the first time last year when she became the spokesperson for Viktor Babriko, an energy executive who tried to run against Lukashenko in the election.
After Babriko was jailed before the vote on fraud charges widely criticized as political, she linked up with Tikhanovskaya, who herself had stepped in to replace her own husband as a candidate who was also imprisoned.
“Maria & Maksim are the heroes for Belarusians,” Tikhanovskaya wrote on Twitter following the verdicts.
“The regime wants us to see them crushed & exhausted,” she wrote, noting the video showing Kolesnikova and Znak smiling instead. “But look – they are smiling & dancing. They know – we will release them much earlier than these 11 years. Their terms shouldn’t frighten us — Maksim and Maria wouldn’t want this.”
