Latest news with #TheWhiteAlbum
Global News
02-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Global News
How ‘I Love the USA' Became the First Weezer Song in Space
Long before Katy Perry went to space, Weezer went to Jupiter. Back in 2016, lead singer Rivers Cuomo said, 'NASA contacted us through Apple and asked for a song for the Juno mission and we gave 'em I Love the USA and they dug it and there you go.' The Juno spacecraft traveled through the solar system for five years before reaching Jupiter's orbit on American Independence Day—July 4th, 2016. Cuomo says that when he wrote the song, he had been spending a lot of time away from home, touring and missing his home country. 'But there are all kinds of mixed feelings, I'm sure everyone has mixed feelings about where they are from, so, I tried to get all of it out into a song. I guess, I think of America, at least compared to the place I was at, at the time, as a place where there is respect for the individual and it seems like everyone's opinion counts and you're free to speak your mind. Of course, it's not perfect but, compared to some other places on earth…' Story continues below advertisement I Love the USA appeared on The White Album (2015), and it was written during a time when Cuomo spent a lot of time on the beach hanging out with strangers—meeting up with people he met on Tinder and X (formerly Twitter). At the time of this interview, he said it was hard to think back on that period because he was so focused on their next album, The Black Album, which had put him in a completely different mindset. Today, there's word of a Weezer movie in the works, with whispers of Keanu Reeves being cast as the villain.
Deccan Herald
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Deccan Herald
Breaking the surface calm
In her essay collection The White Album, Joan Didion writes that a pool is a symbol 'of order, of control over the uncontrollable.'
Metro
22-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Metro
The truth behind the five craziest theories about The Beatles
A band as culturally influential as The Beatles was bound to attract its share of wild theories, urban legends, and even bizarre-but-true stories. Formed in Liverpool in 1960 and made up of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, The Beatles are often regarded as the most eminent band of all time. Their music evolved dramatically over the decade following their formation – from catchy pop hits like I Want to Hold Your Hand to groundbreaking albums such as Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and The White Album – and their cultural position changed along with their sound. As psychedelia, mysticism, and countercultural movements swept the UK and US, The Beatles' reputation became somewhat edgier and more shrouded in intrigue. As a result, rumours swirled around the band, some of which have persisted and become part of legend. Here are five of the craziest theories – and an honest estimation of whether there's any truth to them. The Beatles' original drummer, Pete Best, was sacked in 1962, a month before the Beatles became the biggest phenomenon in the world. Ever since, there have been rumours that Ringo Starr replaced Pete because of concerns that Pete was too much better looking than Paul, and would therefore take away from his draw as lead singer. As Ringo himself later recalled, he first joined the band when: 'I was playing with Rory Storm and the Hurricanes about eighteen months, two years [before I joined the Beatles]…One morning, I was in bed, as usual. I don't like getting up in the day because I live at night. So a knock came at the door, and [Beatles manager] Brian Epstein said, 'Would you play a lunchtime session at the Cavern with the Beatles'? And I said, 'Okay, okay, I'll get out of bed,' and I went down and played. I thought the band was good, and it was great for me to play.' Metro has teamed up to give away 20 pairs of tickets to Polygon Live LDN, a unique new festival taking place in London's Crystal Palace Park from 2-4 May 2025. Blending light and spatial sound, the 360° immersive festival has a stellar lineup including popular artists such as Max Cooper, Jon Hopkins and Tinariwen, as well as the likes of Arooj Aftab and Photay. For a chance to win an incredible day out at this UK-first festival for you and a friend, simply enter your details here. You have until midnight on 18 April 2025 to enter. Good luck! *Open to GB (excluding N. Ireland) residents aged 18 or over. Promotion open from 12:01 on 02/04/2025 and closes at 23:59 on 18/04/2025. 1 entry per person. 20 prizes of 2x General Admission Single Day tickets to attend 1 day of Polygon Live LDN 2025 at Crystal Palace Park, valid for either Friday 2 May 2025, Saturday 3 May 2025 or Sunday 4 May 2025. 1 entry per person. Full T&Cs apply, see here. Full Polygon T&Cs apply to entry and attendance, see here. He went on to say that he ended up playing with the band again because 'Pete was sick or something.' It would eventually come out that while George Martin was thrilled with The Beatles' debut session for EMI, he didn't think Pete was a good fit for their sound. Many have since claimed that the rumour that Best was 'too good looking' arose when The Beatles' manager Brian Epstein asked Cavern DJ Bob Wooler if it was a good idea to get rid of Best, and Wooler told him it wasn't because female fans loved the handsome drummer. Other sources have claimed that the reason was much simpler, and Brian Epstein simply got tired of Best's mother's meddling in the group's gigs around Liverpool. It has long been claimed that one of the most famous songs of all time, Yesterday, appeared fully formed to Paul McCartney while he was asleep. As the legend goes, he woke up, rushed to his piano, and followed the tune in his head. The truth of the matter isn't quite so black-and-white. In reality, the tune for the song did come to Paul while he was asleep, but he wrote the lyrics later. Our new series on the history of rock and roll will dig into the stories, myths, dramas, songs, people, and legendary events that have shaped the greatest music genre over the last 50 years. From the inspirations behind songs everyone knows to the antics and little-known drama of iconic bands, Metro is excited to offer readers informative content that allows them to revisit the golden days of rock. Paul lived in attic rooms at the top of the family home of his girlfriend, the English actress Jane Asher, in 1965. He later said: 'I woke up with a lovely tune in my head. I thought, That's great, I wonder what that is? There was an upright piano next to me, to the right of the bed by the window. I got out of bed, sat at the piano, found G, found F sharp minor seventh – and that leads you through then to B to E minor, and finally back to G.' While the story goes that Paul then hurrid to the studio to immediately record the song, George Martin remembers it differently. He later said: 'I first heard 'Yesterday' when it was known as 'Scrambled Egg' – Paul's working title – at the George V Hotel in Paris in January 1964.' While this may sound far-fetched to some, it's actually 100% true. In 1971, shortly after John went to New York on a visa and met up with anti-war activists – something that did not sit right with Richard Nixon – the FBI began to tail him. A year later, the Immigration and Naturalization Service even tried to deport him from the country. The FBI originally refused to release many of the documents, saying their release would endanger national security. But historian Jon Wiener's Freedom of Information case went all the way to the Supreme Court before the FBI agreed to settle. Eventually, the FBI files released in 2007 revealed Lennon was followed by the Bureau for over a year. A legend has circulated among the conspiracy-minded for years that Paul McCartney actually died at the height of Beatle-mania and was replaced by a stand-in who has been pretending to be him ever since. The wild legend is based on a story written by Fred LaBour and published in The University of Michigan's Michigan Today in October 1969. According to the piece, Paul McCartney was not only dead, but he'd been dead for years, killed in a 1966 car accident and susbequently replaced by a person of John Lennon's choosing. LaBour created around 24 'clues' that many people actually believed, lending staying power to the wild idea. In reality, Labour himself has readily admitted it was only ever intended to be a creative project. 'I wanted to poke fun at over-zealous critics who try to find endless meaning in every nuance of an art project,' LaBour told True West Magazine in 2008. 'I thought then, and in fact still do, that this was funny. Almost everybody else took it seriously.' The Beatles famously set ratings records when they performed in front of more than 70million people watching The Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964. More Trending As history remembers it, they had been relative unknowns before appearing on the evening show. In reality, they had done several other American TV spots prior to making it onto the US Billboard pop chart in April 1963 with From Me to You. While that earlier success did not compare to April 1964, when they held the top five spots on the list of most popular singles in the country, they had been slowly growing a fan base in the US for over a year. In fact, I Want to Hold Your Hand was already climbing the charts when the band appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show. So while their appearance on the iconic program certainly cemented their stardom, they had already been on their way to the top. Got a story? If you've got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@ calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we'd love to hear from you. MORE: The Who re-hire drummer Zak Starkey after issuing statement on 'personal issues' MORE: Rock's most bitter break-ups as The Who axe key member MORE: How 'underground sex' book dumped on street inspired name of iconic 60s band
Irish Independent
22-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Independent
Joan Didion's therapy diaries reveal her doubts as a mother following her daughter's unravelling
Notes to John provides a valuable look behind the scenes of the late author's meetings with her psychiatrist and her own turmoil at the turn of the century It seems unlikely that Notes to John, a new and posthumous work by Joan Didion, was originally intended as a 'book'. Next to her other titles, it lacks the cohesion and ambition, the form and poetry that established her as a legendary essayist (The White Album), an influential novelist (Play It as It Lays) and a memoirist of grief (The Year of Magical Thinking). Instead, Notes to John is a record of Didion's meetings with her psychiatrist, Roger MacKinnon, beginning in December 1999 and ending in January 2002, with entries composed from memory after every session. These 150 pages, typewritten and chronologically ordered, were discovered by Didion's estate after her death in 2021, and are part of the Didion-Dunne Archive, made public at the New York Library last month.
San Francisco Chronicle
21-04-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Book Review: How would Joan Didion feel about her therapy session notes being published as a book?
What would Joan think? Reading the newly released 'Notes to John,' it's hard not to wonder how the late author Joan Didion would feel about having her personal notes from a series of painful therapy sessions converted into a book after her death. Discovered in a small filing cabinet in Didion's office after she died in 2021 at age 87, the 150 loose pages formed a kind of journal she kept for her husband, writer John Gregory Dunne, about her meetings starting in late 1999 with psychiatrist Roger MacKinnon. The writer of such cult favorites as 'The Book of Common Prayer' (1977) and 'The White Album' (1979) was an assiduous notetaker and recordkeeper who explained her lifelong compulsion to write things down in her well-known essay, 'On Keeping a Notebook,' to remember what certain moments had meant to her. Still, the pages weren't exactly a secret. They were included in papers that were placed by Didion's heirs, her late brother's children, without restrictions on access in the Didion/Dunne archive at the New York Public Library. Much of the writings in the book released by Knopf center on the couple's adult daughter, Quintana Roo Dunne, who was adopted as a baby and named after a Mexican territory that later became a state. In the notes to Dunne, the famously guarded Didion details her worries and guilt about Quintana's chronic alcoholism more openly than she did in the books she later wrote on that painful period. 'The Year of Magical Thinking' (2005) focused on Dunne's fatal heart attack in 2003, and 'Blue Nights' (2011) mourned her death just two years later at age 39 from acute pancreatitis. 'He wanted to know how old Quintana was when we got her, the details of the adoption,' Didion writes to Dunne about one session with MacKinnon. 'We talked at some length about that, and I said I had always been afraid we would lose her. Whale watching. The hypothetical rattlesnake in the ivy on Franklin Avenue.' The hopelessness and vulnerability she acknowledges belie Didion's cool and controlled public image. 'I told him about the dream I had this week in which Quintana and I were sharing a room and every time I woke during the night she wasn't in her bed, she was sitting by the window and she was getting drunker and drunker,' Didion writes. 'And there was nothing I could do about it. She couldn't see me watching her.'
