Here are some notable new tracks to take you through the weekend:
Glass Animals has released their new single, “I Don’t Wanna Talk (I Just Wanna Dance).” Frontman Dave Bayley says the song was inspired by pandemic and needing to find an outlet to let off some steam. “I want people to switch their devices off, put this song on, close their eyes, and have that release for a moment,” he says.
BLACKPINK’s Lisa has officially released her debut solo project, LALISA, featuring the dance and hip-hop inspired title track and a song called “Money.”
Walker Hayes‘ viral crossover hit “Fancy Like” is getting some extra pop star power. The country star has just released a new version of the song featuring Kesha. Kesha sang the praises of the song, tweeting, “This song speaks to me on a very deep level. I’m fancy like…. A southern b**** who loves a Waffle House after a night at the dive bar n karaoke…. How u fancy like?”
And speaking of viral hits, Tai Verdeshas released a new version of his track “A-OK” featuring 24KGoldn.
The Hella Mega tour might be over, but you can still “Rock and Roll All Nite” with Green Day.
Billie Joe Armstrong and company have officially released their cover of the KISS classic, recorded during their trek with Fall Out Boy and Weezer. You can download the cover now via digital outlets, and watch its accompanying video, featuring Hella Mega live footage, streaming now on YouTube.
When Green Day first debuted their version of “Rock and Roll All Nite” live, both Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley praised the performance.
The Hella Mega tour concluded this past Monday in Seattle. The European leg of the outing is set to kick off June 2022.
Foo Fighters will be sticking around Brooklyn for an extra day following their MTV Video Music Awards performance.
Dave Grohl and company have announced a headlining show at the Coney Island Amphitheater on Monday, September 13. Tickets are on sale now. All attendees must show proof of full vaccination against COVID-19, or provide a negative test within 48 hours of entering the venue.
The VMAs, meanwhile, take place Sunday, September 12, at the Barclays Center, the home of the Brooklyn Nets. The Foos will be performing at the ceremony, during which they’ll also be honored with the Global Icon Award.
Other VMA performers include Machine Gun Kelly and Twenty One Pilots.
Doja Cat is putting her own spin on Grease for a new Pepsi ad.
In the promo for Pepsi’s new Soda Shop flavors, the singer takes on the role of Sandy and sings an updated version of “You’re the One That I Want.” But it’s not Danny Zuko she’s after — it’s his Pepsi.
The new ad is set to air during Sunday’s MTV VMAs, which Doja is hosting. The Pepsi Cream Soda and Black Cherry flavors will be available for a limited time only starting on September 20.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden visited a local middle school in Washington on Friday to talk about keeping students safe in classrooms as the raging delta variant has upended the start of the school year — and one day after Biden took his toughest tone yet and announced sweeping new federal requirements for vaccines and testing.
But Biden also offered another lesson to the next generation when asked by ABC News Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott about Republican governors calling his call for vaccination mandates an “overreach” and threatening to sue the federal government over his new plan.
“Have at it,” Biden said.
“I am so disappointed that particularly some Republican governors have been so cavalier with the health of these kids, so cavalier with the health of their communities,” he said following brief remarks on keeping schools safe.
“One of the lessons I hope our students could unlearn is that politics doesn’t have to be this way,” he said. “They’re growing up in an environment where they see it’s like, like a war, like a bitter feud…It’s not who we are as a nation. And it’s not how we beat every other crisis in our history.”
Reintroducing his six-part strategy to combat the pandemic, Biden focused his remarks at Brookland Middle School on how his approach will help keep schools safe, including requiring that 300,000 educators in federal Head Start programs be vaccinated and using the Defense Production Act to produce nearly 300 million rapid COVID-19 tests for distribution at the schools around the country.
He also called for more governors and school districts to implement vaccine requirements.
“We all know if schools follow the science — like they are here — and implement safety measures like vaccinations testing, masking, then children can be safe in schools safe from COVID-19,” he said.
Biden acknowledged the Food and Drug Administration has not yet approved vaccines for children under 12, leaving a large swath of the population without the choice to be vaccinated. He said while the FDA is working on the science “as safely and as quickly as possible,” the onus is on children aged 12 to 17, and adults, to get the shot to keep schools open.
“The safest thing you can do for your child 12 and over is get them vaccinated,” Biden said, speaking directly to parents.
He reminded that vaccine requirements in schools are “nothing new.”
“You got them vaccinated for all kinds of other things — measles, mumps, rubella — for them to go to school, to be able to play sports, they’ve had to have those vaccinations,” he added. “It is safe, and it’s convenient, and we’ll work to bring the vaccine clinics to our schools as well.”
Praising local vaccine incentives already in play, Biden, seemingly going off script, also offered the students at Brooklyn Middle School a visit to the White House once they’re all vaccinated.
“I’m going to get in trouble with the Secret Service and everybody else. I’m not sure how we’re going to mechanically do it, but I assume the buses can get you to the White House and if we can’t get you all in one room. We’ll be out in the Rose Garden or out in the back there and maybe let you fly the helicopter,” Biden said to laughter. “I’m only joking about that.”
The first lady, who returned to teaching this week and has been an advocate for keeping kids in the classroom, speaking ahead of her husband said it was the responsibility of educators and families to make schools safe for kids.
“We owe them a promise to keep their schools open as safe as possible. We owe them a commitment to follow the science. We owe them unity, so that we can fight the virus, not each other as we move forward,” she said.
In his address to the nation on Thursday, Biden also promised to make up the salary of any teacher or administrator whose pay was withheld for opposing state bans on masks.
Ahead of their remarks, the Bidens visited the classroom 6th-grade science teacher Ms. Michelle Taylor and talked with students, all of whom were masked up.
The visit comes after a record-high 2,396 children were hospitalized with COVID-19 as of Tuesday. In the last week alone, nearly 252,000 children in the U.S. have tested positive for COVID-19, marking the largest increase of pediatric cases in a week since the pandemic began, according to a newly released weekly report from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association.
ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos contributed to this report.
Megan Fox didn’t shy away from discussing her mental health in a new interview, where she candidly discussed overcoming a “pretty severe eating disorder” that was triggered by childhood trauma.
Speaking to CR Fashion Book for their forthcoming CR PARADE issue, the Transformers actress opened up about her complicated relationship with body image and self-love.
“I came into the world really bright and sunny and happy,” she began, according to Daily Mail. “However, at a certain point, I went through some trauma in childhood and I developed a pretty severe eating disorder and manic depression, which runs in my family, so there was definitely some wrestling with chemical imbalance going on.”
Fox, 35, related her inner struggle to the character she played in the 2009 film Jennifer’s Body by telling the outlet, “As I got into my early 20s, that hell-hath-no-fury, a woman scorned demon did rise up in me…I did tap into that archetype a few times as well.”
“That’s kind of what you see in Jennifer [of Jennifer’s Body] — that sort of nasty streak that can exist if you align yourself with that ancient energy,” she said.
Fox also opened up about being typecast as the vapid and pretty love interest in movies, and told the outlet, “I had always known that I was smart, so it was weird to have that one thing taken away from me now that I’m famous.”
“All of these other reasons that people recognize me, all of which I don’t resonate with or believe, and then to have the one thing that I do believe about myself be taken away, has been very challenging,” she said, slamming the “archaic slut-shaming, mom-shaming” in pop culture.
Alice in Chains guitarist/vocalist Jerry Cantrell has released the title track off his upcoming solo album, Brighten.
While the previously released single “Atone” sounded very much cut from the same grungy cloth as Alice, “Brighten” feels more like a classic, bluesy rock n’ roll tune.
You can download the song “Brighten” now via digital outlets. Its accompany, surreal video premiered via Consequence.net.
Brighten the album arrives October 29. It’s Cantrell’s first solo outing in nearly 20 years.
Cantrell will launch a U.S. tour in support of Brighten in 2022.
Gabrielle Union, like many parents, found herself talking to her children about racism following the death of George Floyd.
Union is the mother of two-year-old Kaavia James, whom she shares with husband Dwyane Wade. She co-parents his three children from previous relationships — Zaire, 19, Zaya, 13, and Xavier, 7.
Speaking to Health, the Bring It On star opened up about having those sometimes difficult conversations with her kids.
“You want to just try to give them hope, to keep those flames of hope from being extinguished. But we were late. And they were not prepared,” Union said. “This is especially true when you have hope, and you buy into the American dream of having a good work ethic and just being a good person. You think if you just follow all these rules, there’s this promised land of milk and honey. But then [your kids are] like, ‘I did that. And it’s vinegar. You told us…’ So, we’ve had to adjust our approach, especially in the last year.”
“With the older kids, we talk about how the world is — I’m not going to say changing, but at least acknowledging certain truths that we’ve known for the last 400 years,” said Union. “People might say different things, but the proof is always in the pudding. You have to watch their actions.”
The actress adds that speaking with Zaya, who is transgender, is more of a challenge because “there’s so many roadblocks for her and her life.”
“All we can say is, ‘We’re not going to leave you on the road by yourself. We’ll be here. But this is what it is. And it’s OK to still be shocked and hurt and surprised when people that you thought you could count on to be better aren’t,'” Union declared.
(MILWAUKEE) — Milwaukee Public Schools, the largest school district in Wisconsin, will give $100 to students who get the COVID-19 vaccine.
The district’s school board voted unanimously Thursday night to mandate vaccinations for staff by Nov. 1, with exceptions for religious or medical reasons.
The board considered a vaccine mandate for students but ended up unanimously approving a $100 incentive for MPS students 12 and older who provide proof of vaccination by Nov. 1., including those who already got their shots.
The district has about 31,205 students who are eligible for the vaccine, meaning the district could shell out as much as $3.12 million, administrators said during the meeting, the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal reported. Money from the district’s $500 million federal stimulus installment will be used to fund the effort.
The school already has other COVID-19 safety measures in place, such as required face masks, HEPA filtration units and physical distancing.
“The COVID-19 vaccine is one of the most effective strategies to mitigate the spread of the virus,” Superintendent Dr. Keith P. Posley said in a statement. “We owe it to our students, teachers, staff, and community to take all possible steps to ensure safe schools.”
The district’s COVID-19 dashboard reports a total of 525 cases among students and staff since July 1, with 115 students testing positive the week of Aug. 30 to Sept. 3.
Over the last 14 days, there have been 448 cases among children under the age of 12 and 406 cases among 12 to 17-year-olds in Milwaukee, according to the city’s dashboard.
Nationwide, pediatric hospitalizations are a rising concern. Pediatric hospital admissions are at one of their highest points of the pandemic, with more than 2,355 children receiving care across the country for confirmed or suspected COVID-19 infections.
Debates over vaccine mandates continue to unfold in school districts across the nation.
On Thursday, the Los Angeles Unified School District became the first large scale system to require eligible students to get the vaccine. All students ages 12 and up will be required to be fully vaccinated by Jan. 10, 2022, unless they have a “medical or other exemption,” the school district said.
President Joe Biden also announced that private businesses with 100 or more employees must require their employees to be vaccinated or undergo weekly testing.
Walker Hayes‘ viral crossover hit “Fancy Like” is getting some extra pop star power. The country rapper has just released a new version of the song, featuring Kesha.
“It’s going down…I’m yelling timber… I do words for a living and I don’t even how to communicate my excitement,” Walker said on social media ahead of the song’s release.
Kesha also sang the praises of “Fancy Like,” saying, “This song speaks to me on a very deep level. I’m fancy like…. A southern b**** who loves a Waffle House after a night at the dive bar n karaoke…. How u fancy like?”
Walker included “Fancy Like” on his latest Country Stuff album. The song, which went viral thanks to a TikTok dance Walker posted with his daughter, Lela, has inspired two Applebee’s commercials, and the return of the restaurant chain’s famous Oreo shake.
