Latest news with #LonelyIsland
Irish Independent
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Independent
Folk trio who became a viral sensation with expats deliver simple debut that gets under the skin
Both bands have grown their fan-bases so quickly thanks to the likes of TikTok that it will have come as a surprise to many that each are set to play headline shows at Dublin's 3Arena later this year. There are many, long-established household name acts here who will never be big enough to do that. Amble, a trio from Leitrim, Longford and Sligo, got together in Dublin in 2022 and found they had an easy rapport, especially when it comes to penning highly accessible, instantly hummable folk songs. Digital natives, teachers Robbie Cunningham and Ross McNerney and data scientist Oisín McCaffrey didn't need a marketeer to tell them about the power of social media. Soon, their songs were finding favour on TikTok, in particular, with one track, Lonely Island, favoured by Irish expats making videos about what they missed back home. Social media drove interest and they soon signed with Warner Music. Debut album Reverie is a likeable affair, stuffed with songs about love and belonging and the joys of being young. These aren't tracks that challenge the listener — such as those from Irish folk's leading lights Lankum — but they do get under the skin, easily, and it would take a churlish critic indeed not to appreciate the craft that's at play here. The songs are deceptively simple, mostly built around guitars and a mandolin and the vocals of Cunningham and McCaffrey, but it's easy to see why they work in the big arenas they now find themselves in. They toured with Hozier earlier this year. The bright, lovely Marlay Park celebrates new love with lyrics about summertime in Stephen's Green and a happy couple singing the Chili Peppers' Dani California 'walking down to Marlay Park'. Even songs with more sombre lyrical content, such as Ode to John, have a pleasing directness to them. 'The bundle in your arms I know/ It weighs the world… The moon can't face the sight/ Of our child alone.' Folk purists might argue that much of this album is more pop than folk, more redolent of the likes of the Coronas, for instance, than the sort of troubadours who cut their teeth in Dublin's Cobblestone. But a number of songs, including the quietly lovely title track and the more spirited Little White Chapel, underline their folk credentials. Rarely has a band's name been more suitable for the music they make. Reverie won't turn anyone's world on their head, but sometimes an amble through a well-made, sincere album is a pleasure in these fraught times.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Seth Meyers Once Vomited from Laughing So Hard About 'This' Lonely Island Song
Seth Meyers says he once laughed so hard from a Lonely Island song that he threw up The late-night host revealed this anecdote during the May 20 episode of The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast The song in question? "Mona Lisa," the diss track dedicated to the classic Renaissance paintingSeth Meyers thought this Lonely Island song was sick. During the May 20 episode of The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast, the talk show host chatted with The Lonely Island members Andy Samberg and Akiva Schaffer (Jorma Taccone was not present) about the satirical song "Mona Lisa" that was cut from the 2016 movie Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping. At the start of the episode, Meyers, 51, mentioned how bummed he was to miss out on Dennis Franz appearing on the previous podcast episode to chat about NYPD Blue. "I kinda couldn't believe you guys talked about Dennis Franz for that long and didn't mention that the Dennis Franz line is the hardest I've ever laughed at a Lonely Island [song]," Meyers said of "Mona Lisa," adding that he thinks about the song "all the time." "I'm really happy sometimes because the run of lyrics that starts, 'I'm an American,' is maybe my favorite series of lines," he continued. is now available in the Apple App Store! Download it now for the most binge-worthy celeb content, exclusive video clips, astrology updates and more! "I'm an American man/this is my native land/Where no one lies about paintings/But that's not the case in France/Where the naked ladies dance/And they look like Dennis Franz," Samberg's Conner4Real sings in the diss track dedicated to the Leonardo da Vinci painting. "You, I think, more than anyone I know like that song," Samberg, 46, said, "And people like that song but you like it — it maybe is your favorite of our songs." The late-night host also noted that his admiration of the song also ties into the first time he heard it with then-Saturday Night Live producer Mike Shoemaker. "The lore about 'Mona Lisa' is that you sent it to Shoemaker and I. We were in my office, and we laughed so hard that I threw up and he farted," Meyers said. "I literally started choking and threw up into my trash can, and he farted." Though Meyers' favorite Lonely Island track didn't make it to the movie itself, it is part of the soundtrack. The Lonely Island came to be during Samberg, Schaffer and Taccone's tenure on Saturday Night Live starting in 2005. The Grammy-nominated group is known for hits including "Motherlover," "Dick in a Box," "Lazy Sunday," "I'm on a Boat," "Like a Boss" and "I Just Had Sex." The PEOPLE Puzzler crossword is here! How quickly can you solve it? Play now! They won an Emmy Award in 2007 for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics for their video "Dick in a Box." Lady Gaga and Samberg sang a soulful rendition of the song during the SNL 50: The Homecoming Concert special at Radio City Music Hall in New York City in February. Read the original article on People
The Guardian
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Saturday Night Live: the 10 best sketches from the 50th season
This was a massive season for Saturday Night Live, which celebrated 50 years on air. Along with two huge specials – a musical celebration and the big primetime anniversary show – it was also an election year. The season was loaded from start to finish with returning cast members and huge guest stars. You'd think this would translate into a truly memorable run of episodes, but alas, that wasn't the case with a season that was as choppy as any over the past decade. Which isn't to say there was nothing good; as with every season, there were any number of sketches that got a lot of attention and laughs. Sometimes more the former than the latter – see the mega-popular Domingo sketches starring Marcello Hernández, which, let's face it, only went viral because each of them co-starred a pop princess with a huge stan army. But others were legitimately hilarious. The early part of the season saw the return of Andy Samberg, who was cast as would-be first dude Doug Emhoff. Those sketches are practically unwatchable now thanks to how the election shook out, but luckily, Samberg teamed up with his Lonely Island boys for a couple of brand-new digital shorts. The first and best was Sushi Glory Hole, in which he and Akiva Schaffer pitch their totally 'not weird' business idea for sushi-sized holes in bathroom walls where hungry subscribers can be fed 'shockingly high-grade fish', assuming they don't drunkenly stumble into the wrong stall and get a mouthful of something different, as Mikey Day's unsuspecting club-goer learns the hard way. The best election sketch saw the return of gleefully sadistic game show What's That Name?. A passionate liberal contestant (John Mulaney) warns that this is the most important election in American history, just as he did in 2020. Now, less than eight years later, he can't recall the name of Hillary Clinton's running mate Tim Kaine, who shows up in person to ask the titular question. Kaine is not only game for poking fun at himself (particularly his resemblance, in more ways than one, to then current Democratic VP nominee Tim Walz), he also plays a wonderful sad sack. I'd go so far to say that of all the major presidential and vice-presidential candidates of the last five election cycles, he's the most comedically gifted. Speaking of elections, Saturday Night Live had Kate McKinnon as Clinton come out and perform Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah during the post-election cold open in one of the most wretched and embarrassing moments in the series' history. They managed to avoid that this time around, although at the start of the post-inauguration episode, it seemed as though they were about to go down a similarly cringy path: dressed in his Hamilton garb, Lin-Manuel Miranda starts to rap about American democracy, only to be brutally cut off by a victorious Trump (James Austin Johnson). Everyone is forced to stand still and silent while Trump rambles on. The best bits are directed at Miranda: 'Look at Lin. He got tricked into coming here and now he's frozen on stage. Oh, he's furious … look how bad he wants to do a rap. He wrote a whole rap and he doesn't get to do it. Oh, the audience would have eaten that right up.' The rare case where modern SNL had its finger on the cultural pulse, recognizing that the age of liberal optimism as represented by Hamilton is dead as the man himself. The big 50th anniversary special brought out just about every cast member still living and gave a number of the big guns their own spotlight. Adam Sandler got to do a musical tribute to the show where he made his name and, in typical Sandler fashion, it was both funny and sweet. The best part of it was its conclusion, which included a moving tribute to the late Chris Farley and Norm Macdonald, two of the greatest cast members of all time. The segment also earns extra points for being introduced by none other than Jack Nicholson, making his first public appearance in years. If the Sandman's song was the most moving part of the 50th anniversary show, the funniest was, of all things, the in memoriam segment. Tom Hanks came out projecting serious gravitas, before pulling the rug out from everyone to reveal this wasn't a look back at departed cast and crew, but rather all the sketches, jokes and guest stars that 'have aged horribly'. The long list includes all manner of ethnic stereotypes, sexual harassment, child molestation, gay panic, problematic guests, racial slurs and whatever the hell Adrien Brody was doing with his Rasta Man getup. A great bit of self-skewering and a reminder that SNL is still able to push the envelope when it so chooses (see the final entry on this list for an example of such). When Elon Musk made himself into the second most important person in Trump's presidential campaign, it was clear Saturday Night Live would have to get someone to play him. At first, the job went to Dana Carvey, who was in just about every episode of the first half of the season. Despite his talent at celebrity impersonation, his Musk just didn't connect. This all changed post-anniversary show, when the big recurring guest spot, as well as the Musk character, was given to Carvey's Wayne's World co-star Mike Myers. Bringing a lot of personal anger to the part – owing mostly to Trump and Musk's proposed plan to annex his native Canada – his version of the tech oligarch is much more specific and, more importantly, meaner. Myers was unafraid to mock Musk's grating verbal and physical tics. The impression occasionally leans a little too much into Myers's Dr Evil persona (a character rumored to be modeled after Lorne Michaels), but regardless, what he nails is that, for all of his wealth and power, Musk is and always will be a try-hard loser. The fact that Musk immediately started crying publicly about the sketch was proof that Myers got it right. Ego Nwodim has been the most underrated member of SNL for years now. Her appearances on Weekend Update are especially strong examples of this, which is why it was so cathartic to watch her finally score a big viral hit with her performance as Miss Eggy, her stand-up persona in Def Jam mode. Auditioning to host the White House correspondents' dinner, her material revolves entirely around food and her sex life ('I see y'all got jicama on the menu – more like, here come another man with another excuse'). Things really get cooking when she invites the audience to shout out non-existent catchphrases, which leads to them yelling 'SHIT!' in unison (during Miss Eggy's return in the season finale, Colin Jost claims this earned an FCC fine). A bravura performance from Nwodim and the funniest the show has been all season. There were a few sketches from the Jon Hamm-hosted episode that might have made this list, including the popular White Lotus parody, but ultimately, this one is just too real to leave off. Hamm and Nwodim star as co-anchors of a business news program for regular Americans living check-to-check. The market turmoil caused by Trump's erratic economic policy means nothing to them, but they're feeling the hurt in other ways: 'Boxed mac and cheese is up 4.5% to $1.59 … big-ass box of Bisquick is up from $2.39 to too damn much … candy bars are up from 'sure, baby,' to 'put that back!'' This is the most relatable and casually brutal bit of political satire the show has done in ages. Also, Hamm and Nwodim have excellent chemistry together, as highlighted by their spontaneous and sarcastic rendition of En Vogue's My Lovin' (You're Never Gonna Get It). In comedy, simple is usually better. This is certainly a lesson current day SNL would do well to remember, as their sketches are often overlong and overstuffed. A great example of the opposite came late this season, courtesy of Day. The set up is extremely simple: he's supposed to join the update desk to discuss the Trump tariffs, but having just walked into a spider web, he thinks there's a spider on him ('I felt it on my skiiiin! On my skiiiin!') and violently freaks out. This feels like something from the early days of SNL. Kudos to Day for his ace pratfalling. As per recent tradition, Weekend Update hosts Jost and Michael Che had to blind read jokes written by one another during the go-home Christmas episode and the season finale. The former saw Jost go viral for delivering a joke about wife Scarlett Johansson's private parts. He extracts some revenge this time around, having Johansson – who hosted the finale – come over to the desk so that Che could apologize face to face, before explaining: 'Mainly, I'm just embarrassed about my own body. I can't even take my hoodie off during sex because I have more nipples than a pregnant dog.' It seems as if Jost has won this round of offensive one-upmanship, until Che gets him to basically say the N-word by way of a long-winded joke involving father-son basketball coaches Steve and Nick Kerr. It's a truly spit-take-worthy bit that would fit right in with that in memoriam bit from the anniversary special.
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Estonia's ‘Espresso' and the Swedish Lonely Island: Who Will Win Eurovision This Year?
Eurovision Song Contest 2025 has something for everyone, from the Netherland's dance floor-ready resilience anthem and Estonia's inspirational reminders about caffeine to Malta's Wendy Williams-inspired glam pop and Sweden's own version of the Lonely Island. On Saturday, May 17, these acts will be part of the finals, which include 21 total countries. Some places, like Malta, could win for the first time, while others have been waiting for another victory for years (the U.K., for example, last won in 1997.) Eurovision 2025 will be hosted in Basel, Switzerland, since the country won last year's song contest with Nemo's 'The Code.' More from Rolling Stone Will Ferrell Reveals Plan to Adapt His 'Eurovision Song Contest' Movie for Broadway Switzerland's Nemo Wins 2024 Eurovision Song Contest Netherlands' Eurovision Contestant Disqualified From Finals After Incident With Crew Member This year is another chance for the competing countries to have their own Celine Dion, ABBA, or Maneskin moment. Ahead of the finals, here are five of the top contestants who have a shot at winning Eurovision. Sweden has a gift for anyone who has ever thought to themselves, 'What if the Lonely Island were Swedish?' The Finnish music and comedy group KAJ is representing the country this year with a song all about saunas, performed entirely in Swedish. 'Bara Bada Bastu' is essentially their 'I'm on a Boat,' except they're, well, in a sauna. KAJ makes a strong case for just guys being dudes in their embrace of the type of comedic performances Eurovision viewers have come to expect from the contest. Sweden has won the contest seven times before. In the official music video for Miriana Conte's song contest entry 'Serving,' the Maltese drag performer Trihanna Wilde recites one of Wendy Williams' most iconic quotes: 'She's an icon, she's a legend, and she is the moment — now, come on now.' Conte lives up to the list of accolades. The musician goes full glam-pop with the confidence of a winner, singing: 'Why should we let other people decide, when we could be having the time of our lives?' She's serving, and looks, vocals, and choreo are all on the menu. Bon appétit. Malta has never won the contest before, but its luck could change this year. Sabrina Carpenter has 'Espresso' on lock, but Tommy Cash is making a case for 'Espresso Macchiato.' Representing Estonia in the song contest, the musician's upbeat entry is as spiritually rejuvenating as it is deeply caffeinated. 'No stresso, no stresso, no need to be depresso,' Cash offers in one reassuring verse. In another, he drops some more words of wisdom: 'Life is like spaghetti, it's hard until you make it.' It's that kind of confidence that could take Cash far in the contest to earn Estonia its first win since 2001. Girl groups are one of the United Kingdom's most notable exports. It makes sense, then, that pop trio Remember Monday are representing the country in this year's song contest. They mark the first girl group to compete for the U.K. since Precious in 1999. 'What the Hell Just Happened?' has all the chaos of a night out with the Spice Girls and the vocal prowess of a studio session with Little Mix — there's even a little edge of influence from Queen infused in their melodies. Remember Monday only reached the semi-finals of The Voice U.K., but they just might be able to bring it home at Eurovision for the sixth time overall and the first time since 1997. A few of this year's Eurovision Song Contest entities share a common thread of embracing resilience during dark times. It creates an intriguing dichotomy for an event known for its quirky and eccentric character. Representing the Netherlands, Claude finds an appealing middle ground on his song 'C'est La Vie.' The record is melodically fit for the dance floor, but lyrically apt for a journal entry. 'Sometimes in love, sometimes miserable/And I still hear my mama's voice inside of me/La melodie, la melodie,' he sings. 'Oh, this rollercoaster/And I will sing, until it's over.' The Netherlands last won the contest in 2019, which marked its fifth win. Best of Rolling Stone The 50 Greatest Eminem Songs All 274 of Taylor Swift's Songs, Ranked The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time
The Independent
07-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Andy Samberg apologizes to Backstreet Boy for awkward bathroom encounter at SNL50
Both the Brooklyn Nine-Nine star, 46, and the Nineties boy band were invited to perform as part of Saturday Night Live 's 50th-anniversary concert special, which celebrated the legendary artists that have graced the sketch show's stage over the years. 'I was being ushered around for rehearsal by a woman who was working for the show,' Samberg recalled on a recent episode of The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast that he co-hosts with Meyers and his Lonely Island comedy partners Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer. 'I was like, 'I really have to go to the bathroom' — number one, everybody relax — and she was like, 'You need to be on stage now! You need to be on stage now!' And I was like, 'Okay!'' he shared. The Hot Rod star was quickly escorted to the bathroom, where he ran into a member of the five-piece vocal group before they were supposed to take the stage for a performance of their hit song 'I Want It That Way.' 'Obviously it's a hit for them, but it was a big thing on Brooklyn Nine-Nine,' Samberg explained, referring to one of the sitcom's cold opens 'where we have the perps in a lineup singing that song.' 'One of the Backstreet Boys was about to go into the bathroom, and she was like, 'He needs to go! We need him on stage!'' he continued. 'And he was super nice, and he said hello, and he was like, 'Oh, we're doing your song!' 'cause he knew the thing about Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and I was like, 'Oh, that's so awesome.'' As it turns out, Samberg's bathroom emergency turned out to be for nothing. 'I went to the bathroom, quickly left, went out on stage, and then stood there for 45 minutes,' he said. 'And Backstreet Boys went on and rehearsed before us. And I was like, 'Aw, man, he must think I'm a piece of s***.' So anyways, I apologize for that.' The comedian later identified Kevin Richardson as the Backstreet Boy he cut in front of. SNL50: The Homecoming Concert, which premiered February 14, saw Samberg take the stage alongside Lady Gaga, Bad Bunny, T-Pain, and Eddie Vedder to perform a medley of his Lonely Island songs, including 'Dick In a Box' and 'I Just Had Sex.' The live special also featured a slew of musical icons, such as Dave Grohl, Chris Martin, Ms. Lauryn Hill, and Miley Cyrus.
