Kehlani’s ‘Blue Water Road Trip’ Tour Heading to Australia and NZ

Kehlani is taking their Blue Water Road Trip tour into Australia and New Zealand in the early weeks of 2023.

The Bay Area singer and songwriter will kick of their trek in Auckland, New Zealand on Jan. 20 followed by stops in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth, with a date in Brisbane to be announced “very soon,” according to Live Nation, which is producing the visit Down Under.

Tickets go on sale June 3 at 9am local time, and earlier, on June 1 (from 11am), for My Live Nation members.

The North America circuit of the Blue Water Road tour begins July 30 at Red Hat Amphitheater in Raleigh, N.C., followed by a European leg starting in Copenhagen, Denmark, on Thursday, Nov. 17.

The multiple-Grammy Award-nominated artist has collected over 20 gold and platinum RIAA certifications, and accumulated 5 billion streams in a three-album-strong career.

Kehlani’s Blue Water Road LP, which features appearances from Justin Bieber, Syd and Jessie Reyez, debuted at No. 3 on Billboard’s Top R&B Albums chart, and No. 13 on the all-genre Billboard 200.

It’s the followup to 2020’s It Was Good Until It Wasn’t, which hit No. 2 on the Billboard 200 chart.

Visit Kehlani.com/tour for additional information.

Kehlani’s Blue Water Road Trip World Tour Australia / New Zealand 2023:

Jan. 20 — Spark Arena, Auckland

Jan. 25 — Hordern Pavilion, Sydney

Jan. 27 — Sidney Myer Music Bowl, Melbourne

Jan. 29 — Hindley St Music Hall, Adelaide

Jan. 31 — Metro City, Perth

/by

The Weeknd’s World Tour Will Be ‘Crypto-Powered’ Thanks to Binance Sponsorship

Cryptocurrency exchange company Binance has signed on as the official sponsor of The Weeknd‘s upcoming After Hours Til Dawn tour, it was announced Thursday (June 2). In a press release, the company calls the “crypto-powered” venture the “first global concert tour to integrate Web 3.0 technology for an enhanced fan experience.” Binance is the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume.

A pillar of the collaboration will be a tour-centric NFT collection created in partnership with HXOUSE, the Toronto-based youth talent incubator founded by The Weeknd’s creative director, La Mar C. Taylor. Virtual ticket stubs from the shows will also unlock access to commemorative NFTs providing a variety of experiences. The partnership will also feature co-branded (non-NFT) tour merchandise.

Another key component of the partnership is Binance’s $2 million donation to the XO Humanitarian Fund, launched by The Weeknd in early 2022 to support the World Food Programme’s lifesaving emergency operations in global regions with acute levels of hunger. Five percent of sales from the NFT collaboration will benefit the fund, which is administered by World Food Program USA.

“Excited to partner with Binance and BinanceUS for my After Hours Til Dawn tour !!!” The Weeknd tweeted Thursday. “We’ll use innovative Web 3 tech to connect with you in NEW creative ways and collaborate on charitable efforts to provide food to those in need.”

More details on the partnership will be revealed at a later date.

The After Hours Til Dawn stadium tour launches July 8 in Toronto, Canada and extends across North America in July and August, closing with a pair of shows at Los Angeles’ SoFi Stadium on September 2-3 before moving on to Europe, South America, Asia, the Middle East, Australia and Africa. (Dates for these global legs of the tour have not yet been announced.) The Weeknd’s first international tour since 2017, After Hours Til Dawn will showcase material from the singer’s most recent LP, 2022’s Dawn FM, and 2020’s After Hours, the tour for which was previously rescheduled three separate times due to the pandemic.

/by

Bad Bunny Talks Fame, Marvel & His Relationship | Billboard News

Bad Bunny talks about being cast in a new Marvel movie and continues to prove that there is nothing he can’t do.

/by

Mariah Carey Celebrates the 30th Anniversary of Her ‘MTV Unplugged’ Performance: ‘I Truly Feel Blessed’

30 years ago on June 2, history was made. Mariah Carey‘s MTV Unplugged aired, which she filmed in a rumored attempt to silence naysayers who doubted her vocals on her 1990 self titled album and 1991’s Emotions, and questioned her ability to replicate it in the live setting.

Carey got the last laugh, though: The EP for the singer’s Unplugged appearance sold 2.7 million records and was a catalyst for her superstardom. Now, Carey is reflecting on appearing on the show 30 years later.

“Happy anniversary to my ‘MTV Unplugged’ show! Happy anniversary to that girl on stage who was so nervous and scared to even sing in front of a crowd. Also she had no idea this last minute ‘unplugged’ show would become a ‘thing!’” she wrote in a Friday (June 2) Instagram post, which featured clips from her now-iconic appearance on the program. “During that performance, I remember having a breakthrough moment…the realization that all I needed to do was SING and actually CONNECT with the people in the audience and be in the moment with THEM!!! And then we were in it together.”

She continued, “When I watch this now, it’s revelatory how many insanely talented musicians and singers I had the privilege of sharing that small stage with and I truly feel blessed. I am thankful to that majestic group of people who made that stage come to life and to the audience in the room for sharing what became a life changing experience for me and as always…Thank you my fans for sharing this journey with me. You save my life each day. #MC30.”

The pop singer’s MTV Unplugged EP went on to peak at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 and stayed on the chart for a total of 57 weeks. Carey sang a total of seven songs during her set, all of which charted within the top five of the Billboard Hot 100. Her Unplugged cover of  The Jackson 5’s “I’ll Be There,” feat. Trey Lorenz, earned Carey her sixth No. 1 in June 1992.

See Carey’s anniversary post for MTV Unplugged below.

 

/by

‘Surreal’: Miami Beach High grad accepted to all eight Ivies. Credits speech & debate team

Attending an Ivy League college was always a dream for Ashley Adirika. So after a conversation with a friend who encouraged her to “shoot her shot,” she applied to all … Click to Continue »
/by

Former DR politician found ‘incompetent’ to stand trial on cocaine smuggling charges in Miami

A federal judge has found a former politician from the Dominican Republic “incompetent” to stand trial in Miami on cocaine trafficking charges because of mental health problems and has ordered … Click to Continue »
/by

Miami Herald journalists win top Esserman-Knight journalism award for Surfside coverage

The journalists behind “House of Cards,” the Miami Herald’s forensic investigation into the collapse of Champlain Towers South, took first place at the annual Esserman-Knight Journalism Awards Wednesday. The coverage … Click to Continue »
/by

Publix’s free prescription program has ended. So what can customers do now?

A pharmacy program at Publix that has filled more than 100 million prescriptions at no cost to customers since its launch in 2007 officially ended Wednesday. For 15 years, the … Click to Continue »
/by

Eurovision Star Netta Talks ‘I Love My Nails,’ Rosalia’s Nail Game and More

In the United States — located outside the official Eurovision competition zone — some people first got to know the Israeli singer-songwriter Netta only from watching the Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams spoof movie Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga. In the 2020 film, Netta — who won the famed international song contest in 2018 with her song “Toy” — cameos in a party scene at a castle with a host of other actual Eurovision winners. She steals the moment, emerging from a car singing the Black Eyed Peas song “I Gotta Feeling,” an immediately captivating fusion of flirtiness and swagger.

Known for her humorous lyrics, quirk-pop persona and over-the-top fashion, Netta, 29, has started 2022 by releasing a new single, “I Love My Nails” (S-Curve/Hollywood Records). On the surface, the song sounds like simply a paean to nail art but the Tel Aviv-based singer calls it a celebration of loving oneself.

“Something happened this year. I got my heart broken in, like, the most usual way that people reject other people. I can’t even hate him for not like me because not everybody has to love you. From a very, very confident girl, I became so small. So I thought ‘I love my nails’ is a nice way of saying, ‘I love myself,’” says Netta, who grew up in Nigeria and in Israel and was born Netta Barzilai.

“There is something very, very therapeutic about showing up for yourself even if it’s in the smallest things like doing your nails,” she continues.” Doing nails, doing long nails, takes time and devotion. And I love every second of it.”

Netta — who is known in her work for using a looping device (a portable machine that records her voice and allows her to loop it back) — spoke further with The Hollywood Reporter about how she got started in the music business, why she got put into “nail art jail,” and what it was like for her growing up for four years as a child in Nigeria and then moving back to Israel.

She can next be seen performing live at Chicago Pride (June 18) and New York Pride (June 25 and 26) and in Philadelphia on June 22 and Washington D.C. on June 23.

What kind of nail art are you wearing right now?

This is like the awful truth. I did the music video like a week ago and I needed to do a lot of nail art [for it] and the machines that you use to scrape the nail polish off, they really hurt the nail if you overuse them. So I’m doing my time in nail jail right now. I overdid it.

Who are some celebrities whose nail game you admire or follow?

Rosalía always has the craziest pieces of art on her fingers. She wears something that resembles like drips of glass. And I loved an interview where somebody, I think Ellen [DeGeneres] asked Cardi B, ‘So your nails, how do you cope with them?’ And she said, ‘I know what you’re thinking. If I can wipe my ass, then I can do anything with it.’ Her nails are always amazing.

Do you have a go-to nail artist?

I love nail artists. I love the creation process. My nail artist is a very nice man called Ben Meir. And he actually took the song to heart so much that he tattooed the lyrics on his arm.

You start off the music video for ‘I Love My Nails’ actually using your nails to make sounds. How did that come about?

I played my nails. They make like a cool sound. The minute I started, I realized that they make this sound and I was jamming. And, uh, the minute I uploaded the video, people have swamped me with what Dolly Parton did 40 years ago. She put the sound into the ‘Nine to Five’ song. You are never gonna be the first [to do something], no matter what you do.

How far back to you remember being into music?

I hate myself saying it, but it’s from the moment I can remember. I grew up in Nigeria [for four years] that celebrated all of the cultures of the pupils who were going there. It was an international school. I was in a classroom with a girl from Japan and two boys from Nigeria and a girl from Australia and a girl from Mexico. They all had accents, so nobody had an accent. And they taught us a lot about where people come from and their music. And my mother would take us to see African gospel every Sunday and this became my musical bed which I grew from. And when I came back to Israel, I was seven years old and it was first grade and it was 40 white kids in a classroom telling me I’m the fat unibrow kid with the accent.

How hard was that for you?

When kids label you, it sticks and it’s a hard thing to bounce back from. My mother was very miserable as a parent, watching her kids come back from school crying, and she was thinking of ways to make me happy. And a good tip for parents is to get your kid kids in places besides school that empower them and makes them feel good. And my mother sent me to choir. Whenever I came back from there, it was the first smiles my mother saw since we came back from Nigeria.

What happened as you grew older?

My brother was drumming and he’s one of the most successful drummers in Israel today. I learned how to beatbox from him. Then when I finished high school, I went to the military because in Israel, we all have to go serve our country. And I was in an army band and we were singers in the navy on battle ships. It was like the best school for performance because usually soldiers they’re told to go. So you have to really fight for good attention. It was difficult and humiliating and amazing. After that, I moved to Tel Aviv and started to work in a bar selling tickets to shows happening there. And there was this open-mic stand. Nobody was singing. And then I drank like thee glasses of beer and I went up there and I sang for three minutes with a lot of improvisation. And the crowd loved it. They asked me to come the next week and I started doing this thing where I, I get drunk, I go on stage and do kind of a cabaret without understanding what I was doing. I was 21. I was eating fries out of people’s tables. I was singing to them. I would take the snare drum and I would go on the bar. People heard what was happening in this bar. And the line went from half a block to very long. I wasn’t making any living, but I was having the time of my life.

What happened next after working at that bar?

My musical director [Avshalom Ariel] discovered me. He, he was looking for singers for a play that he wrote. There was a character in the play who was a singer and she needed to be very, very aggressive. He searched and searched and he found a video of me drunk yelling at some guy to get away from the bar. I was, was really screaming. He said, ‘Okay.’ And he started to train me and work with me.

In 2017 then, you auditioned for the show HaKokhav HaBa, which chooses Israel’s entry in Eurovision. What was that like?

I was so afraid because I was so peculiar my whole life and I never thought that people in the mainstream could understand what I am doing, especially with the looping [machine]. It’s kind of like a toy. And when I came to the audition, I brought six sets of headphones because I wanted everybody to hear what I am doing. And when I came with my looper and I sang the audition song, they were all looking at me, very, very surprised. And the director said ‘Okay, you can win Eurovision. You can actually win Eurovision. And I need to think how to make this visual.’ And I learned how to play the looper like a guitar. It blew up on television. It worked. And I usually don’t think and don’t believe that good things could happen to me and it did and it was one of the happiest moments.

How did your Eurovision single ‘Toy’ come about?

I had a song written for me by someone who is the biggest hitmaker here in Israel. He wrote ‘Toy’ together with a very talented producer. And as a songwriter, I didn’t want the song written for me. So I wrote ‘Bassa Sababa’, which was my second single. We submitted both songs to the committed and [they chose] ‘Toy’. And when the song came out, I realized that I’m part of something that is bigger than me. And I came to realize that I am doing what I am doing and staying me is shocking. And I don’t know if it’s a song anymore. At that point it was a campaign, a campaign of power. It wasn’t my dream but I was so much more than I could have ever imagined.

What are some of the ways that you stayed creative during the pandemic?

I was creating through the screen, I was performing through the screen, I was meeting my fans through the screen. It was very depressing, but a lot happened. I started a YouTube series called Netta’s Office, which every week I would sit in my office with my looping devices and I would take suggestions from my fans to improvise and maybe [do] covers that they would like my take on. And it grew into a mini-cover album called Netta’s Office.

How would you categorize yourself as an artist?

Where would you put me in? What genre? In what space? I’m half drag queen, half Powerpuff girl and half Jacob Collier.

This article originally appeared in THR.com.

/by

Stevie Nicks Calls for Gun Control & ‘Empathy’ Following Uvalde Elementary School Shooting

Stevie Nicks joined the countless Democratic politicians, gun control advocates and fellow musicians in the fight to end gun violence and strengthen gun laws in the United States on Wednesday (June 1), sharing a statement in response to the devastating mass shooting at an Uvalde, Texas, elementary school that killed 19 children and 2 adults.

“My hope for this country is that the lawmakers just find a way to make buying an assault rifle ~ more difficult,” the Fleetwood Mac singer wrote in a lengthy message posted to Twitter. “There is just no reason to have a gun that would disintegrate a deer~ or a small animal, if you are, indeed, an honorable hunter. When those guns go into the hands of obviously disturbed people, it gives them a sense of unbelievable power that they have never felt before. Power, used in a bad way, is the opposite of ‘power’ used in a good way. Once people have felt the power of those guns, they are never the same. They are addicted. And then there is no turning back.”

She urged lawmakers to “make it really hard for them to get that gun,” adding, “No one is trying to take away guns from people who get them for a good reason. Guns are not toys. Background checks are not that hard.”

Nicks went on to share that she’s “dying inside” for the victims of the Robb Elementary School shooting. “So, I ask you; do you want to go down in the history books as being responsible for these school shootings that will inevitably continue, or do you want to be remembered as the people who finally gathered together in unity and empathy ~ as the people who stopped it,” she wrote.

The “Edge of Seventeen” singer then revealed her father’s favorite quote, which was “Sometimes the hardest thing to do is the right thing to do~ and sometimes the right thing to do ~ is the hardest thing to do.”

“And then he would say~ Be brave, Stevie, always. Do the right thing. Never compromise your beliefs,” she wrote. “If I had gone to school one day when I was ten~ and been shot; my little body destroyed, I think my father would have done the same thing that that lovely teacher’s husband did. Gone home, sat down in a chair~ and died… of a broken heart.”

“I am just so sad….” Nicks concluded.

The massacre of innocent children on May 24 came 10 days after an heavily armed 18-year-old white supremacist opened fire and allegedly killed 10 people in a Buffalo, New York supermarket where he reportedly went to specifically target and murder Black shoppers.

On the same day as Nicks’ post, multiple people were killed in a shooting on a hospital campus in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Authorities responded to a call about a man who was armed with a rifle at the Natalie Medical Building, according to a Facebook post from the Tulsa Police Department and as reported by CNN.

/by