I didn’t want this headline to be Melissa McCarthy Shows “Batman v Superman” who’s “The Boss.” But she did, kinda. “The Boss” nosed out the superheroes by $100,000 and finished the weekend with $23.5 million v “BvS” with $23.4 million.
It was “thisclose.”
But “BvS” edged closer to $300 million– which it should pass on Tuesday night. The caped crusaders are also close to crossing the $800 worldwide total, which was their goal. Whew! They made it!
More to come…
The White Shadow, Lou Grant, Patty Duke (and her TV father William Schallert) and even Ronald Reagan have all been president at one or another of the Screen Actors Guild.
Now ‘Andrea Zuckerman’, bespectacled and dull, from “Beverly Hills 92010,” editor of the student newspaper, has been elected by acclamation as the new president of SAG-AFTRA. Gabrielle Carteris succeeds Ken Howard, who sadly passed away last month. Carteris will fill out Howard’s two year term, moving up from Executive Vice President.
“I am deeply honored to be chosen by the SAG-AFTRA National Board to serve the union and its members as president,” said Carteris. “Ken was a great union leader, friend and mentor. He left big shoes to fill, but with the support of the national board of directors and the membership, I am committed to improving the lives of all SAG-AFTRA members.”
Rebecca Damon was elected Executive Vice President, which means women now run the actors’ unions.
So how long before the rest of the gang takes? Dylan? Brandon? Brenda? Donna? I’ll bet Steve, Kelly, and David already have plans for the prom, er, the SAG Awards.
Steve Miller did the right thing last night. He spoke up about the shabby treatment of the inductees at the Rock Hall of Fame, the licensing agreements, etc.
The reason former inductees NEVER return to the Rock Hall induction ceremony is because there are no free tickets. Well, there are SOME free tickets– for big rock stars who are friends of Jann Wenner like ex Beatles or Stones, if Bob Dylan wanted to come, and so on.
But for regular musicians who’ve somehow been inducted, they must pay and pay and pay.
If you perform on the show, the Rock Hall expects you to sign over the rights to the performance gratis, in perpetuity. This was a big issue from the 25th anniversary show at Madison Square Garden. Those performances were turned into a DVD box set. Many of the artists held up the release so they could get their royalties.
The Rock Hall Foundation puts on that concert every year– not the museum in Cleveland. The Foundation pays it CEO Joel Peresman over $400,000 every year. It gives no money to indigent artists, doesn’t help anyone, doesn’t even donate money to MusiCares. They are loathed by other music foundations.
This year no women, no R&B (black) stars from music’s legacy, no instrumentalists or sidemen or producers were inducted except for Bert Berns. The only black people inducted were from NWA. They may not have performed when they were told the licensing would be turned over to the Rock Hall. Dr. Dre and Ice Cube are too smart, and they don’t care about the repercussions.
That the members of the Steve Miller Band and their spouses, nor any other Steve Miller guests were given tickets is typical. There are countless stories every year of people being snubbed, or treated like dirt, by Wenner, or Peresman. There was some control over this when Ahmet Ertegun was alive. But since he died, Wenner has just run it the way he wants to. There are no checks or balances.
So bravo Steve Miller. He did the right thing. He told the truth about what goes on. And just think: he’s been eligible since 1990. He had to wait 26 years. Chicago waited 21 years at least. Deep Purple, too. Cheap Trick, since 2005. They watched Wenner’s pets leapfrog over them. How can they take this seriously?
Still not in the Rock Hall– oh forget, you know, you’ve been told a thousand times.
Welcome to New York, Paris Jackson!
For her 18th birthday, Michael Jackson’s sharp-as-a-tack daughter has arrived in Gotham with two gal pals from L.A. One of them is Prudence Brando, granddaughter of Marlon and daughter of Miko (a great guy and dear friend of Michael’s).
Girls just want to have fun, but they’re 18 so they have to be careful. This is the big city, girls.
I’m told they’re staying with a family friend of the Jacksons. Paris may have meetings with her new manager, Rick Yorn, who also manages Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese. She signed with him a few weeks ago.
Yes, Paris’s friends and family were unhappy she’d gotten close to a sketchy guy in L.A. named Michael Snoddy. The 26 year old sports Confederate flag tattoos. But I think it’s a good sign she’s here with girlfriends. Paris is too smart to get involved with real craziness. She’s a smart kid with a lot of potential.
Paris, get over to Serendipity and get some frozen hot chocolate. Try and see “Hamilton.” I’m sure they’ll let you in!
Zayn, we hardly knew ye.
The former boy bander’s album sales went in One Direction for its second week on the charts– down. “Mind of Mine” dropped 86% in hard sales, from number 1 to number 8 in week 2.
On hitsdailydouble’s Streaming Plus Sales chart, the drop was “only” 72%. Zayn’s hard sales were a mere 16,493. Streaming boosted him to 43,140.
What does it mean? Around 100,000 fans dropped off from week one to week two. Problem is, Zayn — who looks constipated in most of his close-ups– hasn’t produced a hit single to go along with the album. The first single, “PillowTalk,” did so-so. Nothing followed.
What’s happened here should be of interest to the other members of One Direction who were hoping for solo careers.
God bless Steve Miller. At the press conference after his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction tonight he told the truth about “unpleasant” the people there are — including Joel Peresman, who’s paid $400,000 a year plus, and Jann Wenner. They only gave him a ticket for himself and his wife, and told him if he wanted more he’d have to pay $10,000. (I wish I could actually curse right here.)
Read this: 
Kanye West must be going crazy. “The Life of Pablo” debuts at number 1 with 90,000 streams in its first week of actual availability.
To put this in perspective: The number 1 physical CD-digital download was Chris Stapleton’s “Traveller” with just 59,000 copies. Even combined with his streaming number, STapleton finished second to Kanye. Stapleton’s total total was just 72,877.
Hitsdailydouble explains that 100 million “streams” equals 65,000 “stream equivalent albums.”
Kanye’s 90,000 included 25,000 downloads of “Pablo” from his website. Imagine if “Pablo” were available in a normal way– for download on amazon and iTunes. But these are impressive numbers.
Without Kanye and “The Life of Pablo,” the business was silent.
Zayn Malik dropped a whopping 86% in his second week. He was a flash in the pan with “Mind of Mine.” Pop goes the weasel.
Here is Bruce’s statement:
As you, my fans, know I’m scheduled to play in Greensboro, North Carolina this Sunday. As we also know, North Carolina has just passed HB2, which the media are referring to as the “bathroom” law. HB2 — known officially as the Public Facilities Privacy and Security Act — dictates which bathrooms transgender people are permitted to use. Just as important, the law also attacks the rights of LGBT citizens to sue when their human rights are violated in the workplace. No other group of North Carolinians faces such a burden. To my mind, it’s an attempt by people who cannot stand the progress our country has made in recognizing the human rights of all of our citizens to overturn that progress. Right now, there are many groups, businesses, and individuals in North Carolina working to oppose and overcome these negative developments. Taking all of this into account, I feel that this is a time for me and the band to show solidarity for those freedom fighters. As a result, and with deepest apologies to our dedicated fans in Greensboro, we have canceled our show scheduled for Sunday, April 10th. Some things are more important than a rock show and this fight against prejudice and bigotry — which is happening as I write — is one of them. It is the strongest means I have for raising my voice in opposition to those who continue to push us backwards instead of forwards.
This is sort of poetic justice. The number 1 streamed Beatles song on Spotify is George Harrison’s “Here Comes the Sun.” The classic song from “Abbey Road” has 18 million plus streams in the short time the Beatles have been streaming.
The runners up are “Yesterday,” “Come Together,” “Let it Be,” “Hey Jude,” and “I want to Hold Your Hand.”
Spotify’s UK office sent out some stats this morning quickly picked up around the interwebs.
The top four albums are “1”– the greatest hits, “Abbey Road,” “The Beatles” (white album), and “Let it Be.”
Isn’t it interesting that the album considered most important– “Sgt. Pepper”– isn’t at the top of the list, nor any of its songs? I’m surprised.
Harrison’s frustration with being part of the Beatles was not getting enough of his songs on albums. As it turns out, quality overrules quantity as his achievements– “Something,” “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” “Here Comes the Sun” — are standouts in the Beatles’ repertoire.
Rock on, George!
Here’s a little bit of rock trivia on the eve of Steve Miller being inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Whatever.
Paul McCartney co-wrote and played on a 1969 Miller track called “My Dark Hour.”
Paul was listed as “Paul Ramon,” and the track has remained a deep secret in rock history except to very knowledgeable McCartney fanatics.
Produced by Glyn Johns, “My Dark Hour” came about when Johns happened into the studio right after a big fight among the Beatles. The subject was Allen Klein, who McCartney didn’t want mixed up in their business. But John Lennon did, and had convinced George Harrison and Ringo Starr to let Klein be their manager.
When Johns arrived, the others (including Klein) had left. McCartney was fuming. He told bis friend and biographer Barry Miles:
Steve Miller happened to be there recording, late at night, and he just breezed in. ‘Hey, what’s happening, man? Can I use the studio?’ ‘Yeah!’ I said. ‘Can I drum for you? I just had a fucking unholy argument with the guys there.’ I explained it to him, took ten minutes to get it off my chest. So I did a track, he and I stayed that night and did a track of his called My Dark Hour. I thrashed everything out on the drums. There’s a surfeit of aggressive drum fills, that’s all I can say about that. We stayed up until late. I played bass, guitar and drums and sang backing vocals. It’s actually a pretty good track.
It was a very strange time in my life and I swear I got my first grey hairs that month. I saw them appearing. I looked in the mirror, I thought, I can see you. You’re all coming now. Welcome.
The song sounds a lot like would become “Fly Like An Eagle” about six years later. It also sounds a lot like would become Wings type music in the interim. This is the kind of thing that should be on a McCartney historical box set. Alas, the set we’re getting soon from McCartney is just a rehash of prior greatest hits. Macca really needs a curator!