- Artist: Ke$ha
- Label: Photo Finish Records
- Director: Isaac Ravishankara
- Album: Streets of Gold
Source: http://www.mtv.com/overdrive/?artist=3213641&vid=523194
Danica Patrick Daniella Alonso Danneel Harris Deanna Russo Denise Richards
Monday 21 November 2011
Ke$ha - My First Kiss
Sunday 20 November 2011
Conrad Murray Verdict: Nicki Minaj, More Celebs React
Ryan Seacrest, MJ producer Darkchild and other stars also weigh in.
By James Dinh
Dr. Conrad Murray reacts after the jury returned with a guilty verdict in his involuntary manslaughter trial at Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday
Photo: Al Seib/Pool/Getty Images
Just like Michael Jackson's legions of die-hard fans, stars are also sounding off about the guilty verdict for former Jackson doctor Conrad Murray.
Shortly after the announcement Monday afternoon (November 7), the blogosphere was flooded with celebrity opinions, from Nicki Minaj, Ryan Seacrest, sister LaToya Jackson and more.
"People are cheering but there really are no winners here," Minaj tweeted. "This has been an utter tragedy from beginning to end. #RIPMichaelJackson."
Seacrest questioned how much time Murray will actually serve behind bars, writing, "Big question is will conrad murray serve time? Judge has 20 days to sentence him, and can give him up to 4 years in prison."
MJ producer and collaborator Darkchild was content with the news, tweeting,"#GUILTY Justice has been served but we still lost a great man, great father, greatest entertainer, and a great friend of mine! R.I.P MJ."
"VICTORY!!!!!! Michael I love you and I will continue to fight until ALL are brought to justice! Thank you EVERYONE for your love and support! It will ALWAYS be appreciated!" sister Latoya Jackson wrote on her Twitter, with the entire family also releasing a joint statement.
Piers Morgan described Murray's behavior as "unethical for a doctor." "#ConradMurray didn't deliberately kill #MichaelJackson, but his negligent actions allowed the death to occur," he wrote on Twitter.
Tyrese sent his wishes to the Jackson family, hoping they found closure in the ruling. "MICHAEL JACKSON YOU WILL FOREVER BE MISSED BUT NEVER FORGOTTEN... REST IN HEAVEN!! REST IN HEAVEN!! I hope the family has closure!! RIH!" he tweeted.
While some celebs, like ?uestlove of the Roots, had mixed feelings about the verdict ("Guilty. now what?" he wrote), Bravo star Patti Stanger rejoiced in the news: "The karma kat got Conrad Murray...guilty! Greed is never worth a person's life. X0," she tweeted.
MTV News will be covering the Conrad Murray case live. Go to MTVNews.com for breaking news, reactions and analysis from Los Angeles or tune to MTV for the latest updates.
Related Photos Related ArtistsU2's Iconic Achtung Baby: 20 Years Later
To mark the anniversary of the album that changed U2 forever, MTV News spoke to the man who wrote the book on the band's once heady times.
By James Montgomery
U2's Bono
Photo: Harry Herd/ Getty Images
Twenty years ago, U2 — slightly removed from the double-barrel success of The Joshua Tree and Rattle and Hum — were a band in crisis. Sure, they were arguably the biggest rock act on the planet, but, for the first time in their career, they had felt the sting of critical backlash: Many felt Hum's accompanying documentary, which followed the band across America, was grandiose and self-righteous (even its director would later call it "pretentious"), and the group couldn't help but wonder if perhaps the critics were right.
Had U2 become too big? Had their fascination with all things American (the songs of Johnny Cash, B.B. King and Bob Dylan, the spiritualism of gospel choirs, the sanctity of Sun Studios and Graceland) led them too far from their roots? Were Bono's sociopolitical viewpoints detracting from the power of the band? And, really, after a decade spent trying to conquer the world — and succeeding — what did U2 really have left to accomplish?
They took all those questions (and more) to Berlin, where they hoped to be inspired by the German Reunification and the ghosts of David Bowie and Iggy Pop, both of whom had rediscovered and reinvented themselves there. But, as you'd probably expect, things didn't go according to plan. The sessions bore little fruit as U2 struggled to redefine the group and clear divisions began to develop among bandmembers that had always considered themselves friends first. There was talk of quitting altogether; that rather than continue to fracture, perhaps it was time to call it a day.
Thankfully, they didn't. In a way, those Berlin sessions not only made U2 stronger, but they made them realize that things had to change. Gone were the grandiose gestures and bombastic ballads, replaced instead with an entirely new sound: one that embraced the burgeoning club scene of Europe, the streaked sonics of alt-rock, the artful artifice of Bowie and the adventurous explorations of producer Brian Eno. U2 had redefined what it meant to be a rock band in the 1990s, and they did it all with one marvelous album, Achtung Baby, which marks its 20th anniversary on Saturday.
So in celebration of the album that not only forged new territory, but launched the second phase of U2's epic career, MTV News spoke to the man who was there to witness it all, author and critic Bill Flanagan. He wrote what is arguably the definitive book on the band's Achtung era, "U2: At the End of the World," a sprawling, dense thing that followed them from the recording studio to the stage, on their massive, hugely influential Zoo TV Tour, and beyond. And today, he's looking back on the album that changed everything. Starting, of course, at the beginning.
"Rattle and Hum was a hugely successful album, spun off a bunch of hit singles," Flanagan said. "You couldn't have asked for more from it, commercially, but there was a critical backlash, which probably had as much to do with the movie as anything. Critics were saying, 'Wait a minute, when did these guys become the prophets of rock and roll, telling Americans about Johnny Cash and B.B. King and Bob Dylan?' And any other band in that circumstance ... would go, 'Who cares about the critics, what do they know?' But one of the things that's unusual about U2 is that they sort of took the criticism to heart, and thought, 'Actually, they may have a point.'
"When they saw how [the film] looked, they felt it was a dead end. ... And they didn't want to be trapped; they didn't want be stuck wearing cowboy hats and waving a white flag up and down the stage forever," he continued. "It was a huge risk because, look, when you'd become as big as they had become after The Joshua Tree, everybody tells you 'Don't mess with it.' Nobody says, 'What a good idea, you're going to change your sound, change the way you look.' "
Still, undaunted, U2 headed to Berlin's Hansa Studios, the same place Bowie had recorded Low and Heroes, and where Iggy made The Idiot. And it was there where they split into two distinct camps: those who wanted to try something new, and those who argued there was no point in messing with success.
"There was this great argument about what it meant to reinvent themselves. Bono and Edge were very dedicated to the theory that they had to do something that was dramatically different, and [drummer] Larry [Mullen] and [bassist] Adam [Clayton] weren't totally buying it," Flanagan said. "It became really tense. They didn't feel like they were getting the work done, they just felt like they weren't coming up with good stuff, and they talked about maybe throwing in the towel; that maybe they should go out on top and not become one of those bands that just becomes a worse and worse version of itself."
There were also external pressures, namely from the band's significant others, who, having watched them win over the world, wanted nothing more than them to come home.
"There was a lot on the line with the band, and there was a lot on the line with their families. They'd put a lot of things on hold with their families while they were trying to conquer the world in the '80s," Flanagan said. "They were wealthy, so there was a real question from the wives of, like, 'Well, OK, now you've done what you wanted to do, and now you're going to stay home.' So that was part of the pressure that was on them, like, 'What's the reason?' When you started doing something when you were 15 or 16, and now you're 30 ... you're starting to have kids ... things change."
Of course, we all know how things turned out. After additional sessions in Dublin, U2 had gone through the fire and emerged with Achtung Baby, a delightfully odd thing that was a very big risk, to say the very least. ("People were taken aback by it," Flanagan said. "They thought they had lost their minds.") But for all the sonic adventurousness of tracks like "Zoo Station" or "The Fly," there was a definite heart to the lyrics ... one that was very much inspired by Bono's own domestic dilemmas.
"The lyrics were actually, for the most part, actually quite confessional, even if they were disguised. It's about relationships, marriage, the lure of freedom versus the responsibilities of domesticity," Flanagan explained. "And that's what gives the album its emotional weight. ... And the sound of the album, the beats, the rhythmic improvisations they did and the sonics, which I think, really, is where Edge and Eno and Lilywhite and Flood, the engineer, really got to have some fun. People didn't know what to make of the album."
And looking back 20 years later, Flanagan said that all the head-scratching surrounding Achtung Baby probably wasn't justified. Sure, it's a sonically amorphous listen and, thematically, it deals with weighty topics like sexuality and spirituality. Of course, it's a gaudy thing and, yes, it saw Bono playing characters like the Fly and MacPhisto. But at its core, it's also an album unlike any other; the kind huge bands don't have the balls to make these days. And because of all that, it's unquestionably real, and that authenticity makes it an all-time classic.
"The really great albums, like Revolver by the Beatles or Blonde on Blonde by Bob Dylan, just create their own sonic world ... and Achtung Baby does that," Flanagan said. "It doesn't sound like it's part of the Manchester thing, it doesn't sound like it's part of the Grunge thing, it doesn't sound like it's part of what Public Enemy and N.W.A were doing. It just sounds like it's Achtung Baby.
"And that's kind of the most important thing a record can do. That's why people still like Led Zeppelin and that's why people still like Pink Floyd; there's not really other stuff that does it. If you're in the mood for a Led Zeppelin record, you've got to put on a Led Zeppelin record. And I think if you are in the mood for Achtung Baby, there's no other album you can go to, that have that combination of vulnerability in the lyric and authority in the music and just tremendous fun in the production."
Share your favorite cuts from Achtung Baby in the comments below!
Related Videos Related ArtistsSource: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1674658/u2-achtung-baby.jhtml
Claudette Ortiz Coco Lee Connie Nielsen Cristina Dumitru Daisy Fuentes
Saturday 19 November 2011
Justin Bieber, Scooter Braun Address 'Unfortunate' Paternity Suit
Pop star jokes that a better false allegation would have been: 'Justin Bieber went off to South America with this 27-year-old supermodel.'
By Jocelyn Vena
Justin Bieber at New York radio station Z100 on Thursday
Photo: Kevin Mazur/WireImage
Justin Bieber stopped by New York radio station Z100 on Thursday morning (November 17) and addressed a number of subjects, from his favorite candy (Swedish Fish) to his early crush on Selena Gomez to his Christmas album, Under the Mistletoe. But there was one topic he couldn't avoid: the paternity suit.
"Right now, I'm focusing on my album and the music and the [Pencils of Promise] charity we're doing, and just being positive because Christmastime is a time for joy and happiness, so that's what I'm thinking," Bieber told Elvis Duran and crew. "And as far as the whole baby situation, it's unfortunate that it had to happen like that. People make false accusations, but things happen in this industry and you have to keep your head high and be positive."
When asked if he wondered why he was the target of Mariah Yeater's allegations, he joked, "If it was up to me, it would have been a better story like, 'Justin Bieber went off to South America with this 27-year-old supermodel.' That would have been awesome.
"They say that any press is good press — I do not believe that's true," the pop star added. "If you're in the spotlight, then people are looking at you to be a role model, and if you're doing bad things to be getting press, I think that's really, really sad."
While Bieber was diplomatic about his response, his manager, Scooter Braun, had stronger words for Yeater and her legal team. "Look, I don't usually talk in front of mics but the bottom line is they said they're in settlement talks with us, and the only thing I'm gonna say is they will never be in settlement talks with us," he said. "We will never settle with them. That's my little guy right there — I protect him — and they messed with the wrong crew.
"It's false and people should be held accountable when they run out and say this stuff," Braun continued. "And they have this lawyer running around saying, 'Well, we want everything to be held confidentially now.' But you don't get to go out there and badmouth a 17-year-old kid to the entire world then suddenly think it's going to stay confidential. We're not gonna go away quietly. I'm from around [the NYC area], and you know that people from around here don't like to be messed with."
Bieber also revealed what he wants his legacy to be: "[I want people to say], 'He was a good entertainer; a great entertainer,' more or less. I don't want to be second- or third-best, but I want to be the best."
Justin's visit to New York City won't end with Z100. He's also slated to make various radio and media appearances, including a gala held for the Pencils of Promise charity and a Make-A-Wish Foundation event on Friday, where he'll be honored for granting the most wishes in 2011.
Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1674571/justin-bieber-paternity-suit-z100-elvis-duran-show.jhtml
Kylie Bax Lacey Chabert Laetitia Casta Lake Bell Larissa Meek
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