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Sly Stone Finally Awarded Millions Stolen from Him By Managers in Jury Trial

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KEEP REFRESHING One of the longest and worst cases in music history may finally have a happy ending. A jury in Los Angeles Superior Court today awarded Sly Stone (Sylvester Stewart) $5 million in lost royalties from his former manager and Svengali, Jerry Goldstein, and Goldstein’s lawyer, Glenn Stone.

Stone signed a management contract with Goldstein’s company, Even Street, in 1989. But Goldstein, the jury found today, proceeded to rip Stone off for the last 25 years. It’s an astounding story.

Stone, long a recluse and drug addict, fell into personal chaos. For the last few years he’s been living in an RV in front of his old house.

The amazing part is that he’s a genius– and the influence for Prince, and nearly every funk and R&B artist since the 1960s– among others. Stewart’s huge number of hits, from “Thank You Falettin Me Be Myself Again” to “Dance to the Music” and “Hot Fun in the Summertime,” “Everyday People,” and “Hot Fun in the Summertime” are still played and covered regularly.

Goldstein has not only screwed around with Stone all these years among famous rock stars. He’s also been part of the divisiveness that killed War, the famed R&B group responsible for “Low Rider” and “The World is A Ghetto.” Goldstein has been at the center of lawsuits concerning their music for years.

But he’s hung onto Stone for dear life even as Stone accused him of stealing money. When Stone played ill fated shows at BB King’s in New York a few years ago, it was Goldstein who was standing in the shadows and controlling access.

In 2010, Stone filed suit in Los Angeles, almost five years ago exactly. A week ago, stipulations for settlement appeared in the court record, with Goldstein still walking away with Stone’s money. Now Sly gets his money, although it’s just a fraction of what’s been squandered and pissed away over the last quarter century.

Read my 2007 story:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/2007/12/08/sly-stone-stage-debacle/

Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Scientology and How Their 10 Year Marriage Ended

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One of the big revelations about “Going Clear,” Alex Gibney’s documentary about Scientology: the cult ended Nicole Kidman’s marriage to Tom Cruise. This will all come out when “Going Clear” airs in March on HBO. Gibney has former Scientologists on the record talking about how Cruise, persuaded by Scientology’s David Miscavige, authorized the wire tapping of Kidman’s phone. This was in 2000-2001. You may recall that just a couple of years earlier, Cruise and Kidman’s phones were tapped by a photographer who ultimately went to jail.

But I digress.

You may also recall that Cruise’s private investigator, Anthony Pellicano, is currently serving a long prison term for illegal wiretapping. Pellicano worked for Cruise’s attorney, Bert Fields. A Fields associate, and Cruise attorney, is one Ricardo P. Cestero, former Pellicano aide.

As I wrote in 2006: “But what most people don’t know is that before he went to law school and came to work for Fields, Cestero labored in the office of Anthony Pellicano as a private investigator. In fact, he was schooled at Pellicano’s very knee. Ricardo P. Cestero graduated from Oberlin College in 1991. According to the Greenberg Glusker Web site, he got his law degree in 1997 from the University of California Los Angeles School of Law. This differs from the Martindale.com Web site, which has biographical info for all attorneys. Cestero graduated from law school there in 1999. Either way, in the years between graduating college and getting his law degree, according to sources and reports, Cestero worked exclusively for Pellicano, who in turn worked for attorney Bert Fields. Fields has maintained throughout the Pellicano investigation that he knew nothing of the private detective’s activities and sanctioned nothing illegal.”

Just so we have that all in the same place.

Kidman was gobsmacked when Cruise filed for divorce in February 2001. Six weeks earlier, on Christmas Eve 2000, Cruise and Kidman had renewed their vows after ten years of marriage. While Cruise filed, he checked off a box on his divorce form indicating he and Kidman had not made the decade mark. Kidman, as I reported back then, had been observed with Cruise and family at the Hotel Carlyle in New York in October 2000, happy as clams.

When Cruise filed, she was dumbfounded. She went through a bad period. But the happy ending is that Kidman remarried (happily, to Keith Urban), they have two children, and she is close to her older son and daughter. When she mentions them, she lights up.

And Cruise? Katie Holmes and her daughter, Suri, escaped, mostly unharmed. Now Gibney and co. are calling for Cruise to denounce Scientology publicly. It’s not going to happen. For better or worse, they are his family.

“Fifty Shades of Grey” Soundtrack Includes Obvious Rolling Stones Song

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The “Fifty Shades of Grey” soundtrack listing came out today. And mixed in with current performers are the Rolling Stones and Frank Sinatra. The Stones song is so obvious: “Beast of Burden.” How could it not be here? Surprised no “Whip It” by Devo.

Tracklisting:

1 “I Put A Spell On You (Fifty Shades of Grey)” – Annie Lennox
2. “Undiscovered” – Laura Welsh
3. “Earned It (Fifty Shades Of Grey)” – The Weeknd
4. “Meet Me In The Middle” – Jessie Ware
5. “Love Me Like You Do” – Ellie Goulding
6. “Haunted (Michael Diamond Remix)” – Beyoncé
7. “Salted Wound” – Sia
8. “Beast Of Burden” – The Rolling Stones
9. “I’m On Fire” – AWOLNATION
10. “Crazy In Love (2014 Remix)” – Beyoncé
11. “Witchcraft” – Frank Sinatra
12. “One Last Night” – Vaults
13. “Where You Belong” – The Weeknd
14. “I Know You” – Skylar Grey
15. “Ana And Christian” – Danny Elfman
16. “Did That Hurt?” – Danny Elfman

Adam Levine, John Legend, Common All Set to Perform at Oscars

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Sort of not a scoop or a secret. But my two favorite Best Song nominees are going to be performed on the Academy Awards show by their originators.

Adam Levine is set to sing “Lost Stars” from “Begin Again,” the one movie you should rent during a blizzard. Gregg Alexander and Danielle Brisebois wrote it. They were once the New Radicals, of “You Get What You Give” fame. The pair is considering a New Radicals second album. The first was in 1998.

And then of course Common and John Legend will perform “Glory” from “Selma,” the woefully under-nominated five star Best Picture nominee.

Host Neil Patrick Harris is also going to be singing his heart out. The writers of “Let it Go” from “Frozen” are penning him a new song. NPH is going to make for a very entertaining show, no doubt.

Rupert Murdoch Doesn’t Want Mitt Romney, Slags off Gawker Over Drunk Tweeting Allegation

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Rupert Murdoch very busy Tweeting. He just told Mitt Romney to forget it for 2016:

Murdoch also slagged off Gawker for suggesting he drunk-tweets. Murdoch had left an enigmatic Tweet up that read just “Po.” No one knows what it means. It’s possible he doesn’t realize he can delete a tweet. Or Po could be a plug for a restaurant that is/was on Cornelia Street. It’s not likely he’s drinking and Tweeting.

New 16 Year Old Bieber-Like Pop Star Will Offer $40 Special Edition of 1st Album

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This is our youth: Shawn Mendes is 16 and his first album is being released in April. Today he announced the release of the album, called “Handwritten,” on the Today show. On his website, you can pre-order a $40 special edition with a 60 page book and three bonus tracks.

I guess it would one thing if “Handwritten” had already come out, been a hit, and there was some clamor for a souvenir. But isn’t a little avaricious to offer this before anything’s actually happened? I guess parents will buy this thing for their daughters the same way they get them $200 Beats headphones and $400 iPhones. Shawn’s people are probably smart in their marketing.

I’ve seen Shawn Mendes live, twice– once at his own show at the Best Buy Theater, and then again at the Jingle Ball. He has the potential to be a break out star. Tall and good looking, with a lot of acoustic songs and an earnest demeanor, Mendes is the anti-Bieber. Plus, the girls love him. He also has smart parents from Toronto who aren’t going to wind up with a kid constantly settling criminal complaints.

Music Exclusive: Jamie Foxx’s Return Single Will Feature Chris Brown, Album Due in Spring

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Jamie Foxx is almost back on the radio. I am told that sometime in the next week a surprise single will drop featuring Chris Brown. A new Foxx album is due this spring from RCA. The Oscar winning actor surprised everyone a few years ago when it turned out he was a proficient musician, pianist, and singer. Of course, Johnny Depp may not like him now that he’s declared all actors off limits from second careers in music.

Foxx scored a number of hit after being signed by Clive Davis and his team to J Records after Jamie stole the show at Clive’s 2005 pre Grammy show at the Beverly Hills Hotel. He released three albums with J, the last in 2010, all debuting in the top 3 on the charts.

I’m told that the new Foxx album, like the others, was exec produced by Breyon Prescott, the hot-as-a-pistol new chief of urban music at Epic Records under L.A. Reid. Prescott is also said to be nurturing a soon to be released comeback album for 90s supergroup Jodeci.

Alan Ladd Jr’s Wife Says Bill Cosby Raped Her, She Doesn’t Want Money, Fame, Press Conference

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Cindra Ladd is the wife of Alan Ladd, Jr., respected movie exec and producer, son of the great star who also bore that name. Cindra says in the Huffington Post that Bill Cosby drugged and raped her 45 years ago. She wants nothing– no money, trial, press conference or fame. She says she was 21, and Cosby was 32. She was working for famed producer Ray Stark. It was 1969. This is pretty devastating news. Even with 15 or 20 women, Cosby still could cling to all kinds of defenses– the women were crazy, money motivated, etc. But this is from the Hollywood Establishment itself. Very very bad.

Ladd writes: “One night we were going out to a movie. We agreed to meet at an apartment that he said belonged to a friend of his. I had a terrible headache but didn’t want to cancel the evening. He told me he had a miracle cure his doctor had given him that would get rid of the headache. He went into another room and came back with a capsule. I asked a couple of times what it was. Each time he reassured me, asking, “Don’t you trust me?” Of course I did. This was Bill Cosby.

“For more than 45 years I have tried to recall exactly what happened that night. To this day it remains a blur. I have a vague recollection of feeling like I was floating while walking through Times Square and watching some kind of Japanese samurai movie with him. I don’t remember where the theater was nor very much of the evening.

What I do recall, vividly and clearly, is waking up the next morning nude in the bed of his friend’s apartment and seeing Cosby wearing a white terrycloth bathrobe and acting as if there was nothing unusual. It was obvious to me that he had had sex with me. I was horrified, embarrassed and ashamed. There was a mirror above the bed, which shocked me further.”

Ladd says this is it, the one and only time she will speak on the subject. (No doubt every TV Booker in the world is outside her door right now. Barbara Walters is probably making pancakes in the Ladd kitchen.)

Ladd concludes: “Having come of age in the late 1960s and early 1970s before marrying in the mid 1980s at 37, I certainly have a history. The difference is that any other relationships were consensual … my encounter with Bill Cosby was most certainly not.

In the years since that night I have crossed paths with Cosby only once, when my husband, a highly successful Oscar-winning film executive and producer, introduced me to him. I was shaking, wondering if he would recognize me by my unusual first name. His reaction spoke volumes. To Bill Cosby, I was just another stranger.”

Sam Smith Grammy Chances Nullified: Concedes Royalty and Credit to Tom Petty Over “Stay with Me”

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“Stay with Me” was such a great summer single. Sam Smith wrote it with two pals, and the song had a gospel feel. Smith’s soulful rendition was solo, and he also offered a cool duet with Mary J. Blige. The song felt like a throwback.

Indeed, it was. Smith has just settled, according to reports, with Tom Petty and Jeff Lynne over a copyright protest. “Stay with Me” sounded so great because we already knew it: it’s very similar to Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down.” Whoops!

Reports say that Smith et al conceded that it was a coincidence– a lot like George Harrison grafting “My Sweet Lord”
from “He’s so Fine.” It was in his head. Michael McDonald (of Doobie Brothers fame) did the same thing once. He wrote and recorded a whole song called “I Keep Forgettin’.” After it was done, someone had the presence of mind to tell him it was Chuck Jackson’s old hit of the same name. He’d just forgotten.

Smith agrees that it’s a “coincidence.”

So now, “Stay with Me” is credited on ASCAP’s website to Smith and co., as well as to Petty and Lynne. No word on retroactive financial arrangements, but going forward, Petty and Lynne will probably get the lion’s share of the dough.

As for the song’s Grammy chances, I’d say they are over. And it’s too bad, because everyone likes the record so much. But Petty and Lynne wouldn’t back down, and Grammy voters probably won’t either.

Some people pursue these things. Sting–who’s been ripped off at least three times in the last couple of years– has declined. And of course, a lot of contemporary songs that we all love– like Alicia Keys’s “Empire State of Mind”– are sampled from other material (in that case, “Love on a Two Way Street”).

I do remember when Mariah Carey took the Emotions song “Best of My Love” and made it into a note for note version of s a new song called “Emotions.” Maurice White of Earth Wind & Fire, who wrote “Best of My Love,” told me: “I’ve heard of sampling, but this was the whole buffet!”

A more recent example would be Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready” lurking inside John Mayer’s “Waiting for the World to Change.” I don’t think the Mayfield estate has ever been paid.

Birdman Wins SAG: Redmayne, Moore, Arquette, Simmons Take Acting Awards

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“Birdman” has won the SAG Best Ensemble Award. The acting awards went to Eddie Redmayne, Julianne Moore, Patricia Arquette, and JK Simmons. Redmayne was the surprise, beating Michael Keaton for Best Actor. “Birdman” has now won the Golden Globe for drama, and the Producers Guild Award. The Alejando Inniritu directed dramedy had the edge for the Oscars. But “Boyhood” is still looming large. The TV Awards went to Downton Abbey, and Orange is the New Black, meaning the broadcast networks were shut out again. Only Viola Davis from ABC’s “How to Get Away with Murder” was a network winner.