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Paul McCartney’s two volume set of “The Lyrics” was released today officially and went straight to the top 10 on amazon.
“The Lyrics” has a $100 price tag, but it’s done so well on amazon that they’ve discounted it to 60 bucks. This is beyond a bargain because it was worth the 100 clams.
I’ve already told you several stories from “The Lyrics,” including McCartney citing “Here, There, and Everywhere” as the favorite of all his songs.
In “The Lyrics,” McCartney talks about 154 of his songs. One song I always loved was called “Dear Friend.” It was part of the Wings “Wild Life” album, his third post-Beatles release and his first with that new group’s name. “Dear Friend” is a sad song, a response to the ongoing split between Lennon and McCartney.
McCartney observes that even though the Beatles were in the throes of a painful “divorce,” he went into the studio to help Lennon record “The Ballad of John and Yoko.”
“In the end, I think playing on that session with him and Yoko contributed to our having quite a few friendly meetings and conversations later.”
Paul says “Dear Friend” may have also helped, too. “I would imagine he heard it,” he writes. “I was very glad of how we got along in those last few years, and that I had some really good times with him before he was murdered. Without question it would have been the worst thing for me, had he been killed when we still had a bad relationship. I would’ve thought, ‘Oh I should’ve, I should’ve, I should’ve…’It would have been a big guilt trip for me. But luckily our last meeting was very friendly. We talked about how to bake bread.”
Tickets have gone on sale for ABBA’s avatar show “Voyage.” And so far, it may be the group’s Waterloo.
The show begins on May 27th, and as things stand right now, no one will have trouble getting in. The first few days are sold pretty well, and the month of June is spotty. But there are no actual sell outs.
Beginning in July, things get worrisome. Londoners head to France, Italy and Spain for the summer. The weekend shows for July and August are all open, with much of the house available.
The situation doesn’t improve for the fall of 2022. The ABBA Arena, a theater specially built for this occasion outside London, is wide open. On Ticketmaster, it’s a sea of blue dots.
The show consists of not exactly holograms but avatars of the group as they appeared in 1979. The four members of the group, Benny, Bjorn, Frida, and whoever, won’t be there. But they came in acted like themselves so modelers could create their likenesses.
But fans aren’t flocking to this idea, it seems. The big issue? Lack of tourists planning to visit London. We have the same problem here in New York with Broadway. Without the Asians, Indians, Arabs, Europeans all traveling, theaters are sorely undersold. ABBA has a huge international audience. But if they can’t cross borders, the ABBA Voyage Theater will be very windy inside.
So stay tuned. And on Friday ABBA releases its first album in 900 years, also called “Voyage.” We’ll see what the response is to that right away.
Needing a ratings boost, he’s booked Taylor Swift to follow Ed Sheeran as musical guest on November 13th. Swift is releasing her “Red” album re-recorded the day before, on the 12th.
Sheeran is on this weekend, and has the number 1 album.
Following Swift comes Saweetie, the new sensation, on the 20th.
Actor Jonathan Majors, star of Netflix’s “The Harder They Fall,” will host Swift’s show. Simu Liu, star of Disney-Marvel’s mega hit “Shang Chi,” will host for Saweetie.
Kieran Culkin of “Succession” hosts this Saturday with Sheeran.
Those three consecutive shows, all in sweeps, will do a lot to boost “SNL” in the ratings.
Freda Payne, looking sensational, did come to the Cutting Room in New York last night to celebrate publication of her memoir, “Band of Gold.” (She wrote it with Mark Bego.)
Even though her hits were mostly in the 70s, Freda has never stopped working for a minute. She has a new album out that should be nominated for a Grammy in Traditional R&B called “Let There Be Love.” (See the video below.) The album includes a duet with Johnny Mathis!
I asked Freda about her most important and political song, “Bring the Boys Home,” released in 1971 at the height of the Vietnam War. Even though it wasn’t written explicitly to be an anti war song it became one overnight.
“Richard Nixon sent Armed Forces Radio a letter telling them to play it, and they didn’t for a long time,” Freda recalled. “Ironically, the soldiers did hear it. And you can’t believe how many have come to me and said it the was song that got them through the Vietnam War.”
Some people feared the song would be the end of Freda’s career, but she continued making albums and touring without a break. She’ll appear at New York’s famed Birdland on November 22nd. If you listen to the new record, you’ll hear, she hasn’t missed a beat.
Ed Sheeran will still be musical guest this weekend on “Saturday Night Live.” Sheeran was diagnosed with COVID and quarantined for some amount of time. But I guess he’s feeling better, and it’s ratings sweeps, and he has a new album out, so “SNL” is a must.
Sheeran’s new album is called “Equals,” it’s part of his New Math trilogy and came out last Friday. It shot straight to the top of the iTunes Album chart based on two hit singles over the summer.
Here’s the thing about Ed Sheeran. He hasn’t got a thought in his head. He writes light bubblegum music that wants to be Van Morrison or Cat Stevens, but can’t be, so becomes a lot of Hallmark greeting cards set to music.
In the last week I’ve gone to hear Elvis Costello and then Graham Parker, two lads with 40 plus year careers. Their songs are composed of words made from ideas and personal sentiments, observations, story telling, and so on. They are literate and passionate. None of their songs, not one, starts off with a recollection of being a star or singing at Wembley Stadium. There’s also nothing about being a father and how it’s changed their life, perhaps the great cliche in modern culture.
Listening to Costello and Parker, you realize how far we’ve fallen in 40 years. Pop music now is just a junk bin of platitudes and self-awareness about commercial success. It’s very sad. Parker’s songs last night were not even his “best of.” In fact, he cheekily played what he called the worst song he ever wrote and never recorded. That song was more original than anything Ed Sheeran has even thought of.
Anyway, Parker I don’t think has ever been on “SNL” and Costello, of course, had a famous appearance there in the late 70s but is now considered too old to return. So buy their records, listen to them, revel in their songs, and try not to take what’s happening now seriously.
Adele has released a tracklist for new album, “30.”
There are no duets– though fans kept speculating– but Adele does the only singing on the album. There is, however, a bonus track with Chris Stapleton, of all people. Go figure. She’s trying to reach the country market, obviously. It’s a duet on her current hit, “Easy On Me.”
The real surprise is a credited performance by late great jazz pianist Erroll Garner. It’s on a track called “All Night Parking (Interlude) featuring Garner. Now, that should be interesting.
She does have a song called “I Drink Wine,” which could be humorous. Watch the third and fourth tracks for singles. “Cry Your Heart Out” does not sound like much fun, just more hankies. And “Oh My God” may be something we’re hearing all year.
Update: “To Be Loved” is not the famous song. It’s one cooked up Adele’s writers.
One big question will be about the song listed here, “To Be Loved.” Jackie Wilson, of course, had such a famous song that Berry Gordy wrote. If Adele has covered it, it will be on my playlists forever.
01 “Strangers By Nature”
02 “Easy On Me”
03 “Cry Your Heart Out”
04 “Oh My God”
06 “Can I Get It”
07 “I Drink Wine”
08 “All Night Parking (Interlude)” (With Erroll Garner)
09 “Woman Like Me”
10 “Hold On”
11 “To Be Loved”
12 “Love Is A Game”
13 “Wild Wild West” (Bonus Track)
14 “Can’t Be Together” (Bonus Track)
15 “Easy On Me” (With Chris Stapleton) (Bonus Track)
Yes, it’s that time of year again. The annual Mariah Carey Christmas cash in campaign.
Mariah is being sued by both siblings for her memoir, published a year ago, called “The Meaning of Mariah Carey.”
According to reports she’s tossed her mom into a senior citizen home in Florida and sold her house.
So it’s time to get warm and fuzzy as Mariah launches the 27th year of her single, “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” the Phil Spector soundalike co-written by the very forgotten Walter Afanasieff.
Every year, an assault on iTunes begins to get “All I Want” back to the top of the charts. And now streaming, as well. Come, all ye faithful, to the PR onslaught Mariah kicked off last night as Halloween ends and MariahMass begins.
And all this is fairly necessary since, though Mariah is rich rich rich, her annual income is lot lower without the ability to perform in Vegas. And she sells no records during the year, just dribs and drabs of old singles here and there. But not enough to maintain homes and lifestyles.
No, “All I Want for Christmas” is a product, like other holiday baubles, and this is the season of giving. To Mariah.
Merry Xmas! Now we have two months of this cynicism to look forward to!
Hilaria Baldwin, Alec’s wife, lives in some kind of disconnect world, a fantasy land.
She’s posted pictures not only of her kids, but of her and Alec in full Halloween regalia, some matching costumes, from their Manchester, Vermont getaway. There’s even a video of their two youngest kids dancing in costume. So cute.
It’s only ten days ago that Alec accidentally shot and killed a woman, a mother, and a wife. He also injured a man. They were respectively the cinematographer and director of his movie, “Rust,” on location in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Over the weekend, Alec and Hilaria, whose real name is Hilary, gave an impromptu press conference on the street in Manchester while shopping. During the interview, Alex swatted Hilaria away not once but twice for getting in between him and the interviewer.
Hilaria gave a separate statement, explaining how they got to Manchester, Vermont. It’s a surprise turn of events since the family lives in Greenwich Village in a massive apartment, and also has a huge home in the Hamptons. Hilaria said when news broke of the Santa Fe shooting she threw her kids in the car and just drove as fae away as she could, winding up in Manchester by accident.
But truth be told, Hilaria– er, Hilary’s– family has had a home in near East Arlington for years. Her grandfather, John Thomas Sr., lived there. The house was sold when he died. But the Thomases have deep roots there. They are indeed, not Spanish in away. They are blue blood, red-blooded Americans.
According to his obituary, Thomas was a trustee for the Bennington Museum and of the Vermont Historical Society. He and his wife spent time “preserving, building, and curating the Russell Vermontiana Collection,” which is now at the Martha Canfield Library. He was one of the founders of the Arlington Townscape Association, which, according to the obituary, was responsible for a book about the history of Arlington.
So Hilaria is essentially lying when she makes it seem like their arrival in Manchester is by chance. And the pictures on her Instagram account indicate they are in a local home, no doubt owned by them or relatives.
No one is denying the Baldwin six pack of kids a Halloween, or even trick or treating. But it’s the posting of the photos that’s galling. You can imagine that the child of the woman who was killed, Halyna Hutchins, did not have such a swell Halloween. His father and family must have been desperate to give him one. But his mom is dead and not coming back. And 3,000 miles away, the family of the man who was involved in her death is having a grand time, and telling everyone about it.
You would have to guess that singer of “Band of Gold,” one of the great pop singles of all time, had a good romantic secret. After all, the story sung in “Band of Gold” is almost more debated than the one in Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain.” Is the bride turning down her groom on their wedding night, or is he impotent or gay? Or all of the above!
I always remember that in Lillian Roxon’s “Rock Encyclopedia,” the bible of rock and roll, a reviewer wrote of “Band of Gold”: “Freda Payne could sing the Yellow Pages.” Or something to that effect.
The song was written by Eddie and Brian Holland, and Lamont Dozier, authors of dozens of Motown hits for the Supremes and Four Tops. They couldn’t use their real names because they were locked in a lawsuit with Motown’s Berry Gordy after leaving the label over a money dispute. (Everyone is friends now, 50 years later.)
Freda was from Detroit, also, and grew up with the Motowners. I’m sure I met her years and years ago through the late Mary Wilson. They were great friends, as were Mary and I.
I was 13 when “Band of Gold” came out. I didn’t know what was going on in it, but I loved the arrangement and Freda Payne’s voice. I played it over and over summer of 1970 at the Camp Greylock radio station. Freda had a bunch more hits including “Deeper and Deeper” and the anti-Vietnam war single, “Bring the Boys Home.” The latter was very controversial and banned on radio at first. It was good publicity.
Later in the 70s, Freda would marry singer Gregory Abbott. She divorced him right before he had his mega hit, “Shake You Down.” (They have a son.) She also had a relationship with Edmund Sylvers, lead singer of his family group. (His hit was “Boogie Fever.”)
There’s a lot more, but here’s the secret. Before the marriages, Freda writes that she had an affair with US Senator John Tunney. He was a big deal then, the son of boxer Gene Tunney. He was also married. But she met him through Frank Sinatra at a charity event. When Holland-Dozier-Holland didn’t pay Freda for her hits, Tunney helped get her a top Hollywood lawyer who came, guns blazing, and got her a big settlement.
It was Sinatra who pointed out to Freda that Tunney was head over heels for her. He was good looking and had just been elected to the Senate from California after six years as a Congressman. Freda, who’d become a star, moved to Los Angeles and took up residence in the former home of Movie Star Maureen O’Hara. She was living the life.
Freda writes that she fell in love with Tunney, which was a mistake. But she had other loves, too. :I was in love with Quincy Jones too. I was so in love with him. Those were my three big love affairs: Quincy Jones, Eddie Holland, and John Tunney.” She was playing in the Big Time.
She writes of the affair:
It was starting to unravel at that point. When this happened, Tunney and I had to take a break from seeing each other. After that, our affair just started to fizzle and dissolve. I assumed he had been approached about the knowledge of our love affair, and he figured the relationship was way too risky, and could destroy his political career. Later on he had an affair with the actress Elizabeth Ashley, and I became insanely jealous. I remember thinking to myself, “What does he want with that old bitch? She’s six years older than me!” Ah, to be 30 again! Years later, when John Tunney’s re-election came up, he lost. So, he didn’t stay in office too long as a Senator.
There’s more, lots of it, Mark Bego helped Freda put it together, he’s an expert at these things. I like this new world of people like Elton John, Demi Moore, Katie Couric, all telling the real stories in their books. After 50 years of this pop culture, we deserve some answers!
So welcome Freda to New York on Monday! She still looks like a million bucks, and the voice is better than ever!
Most movies, if they made $69 million in two weeks studio executives would be popping open Champagne.
But with “Dune,” Denis Villeneuve’s epic, it’s a much different story. “Dune” is a glacier at the box office.
Costing somewhere between $150 and $200 million, “Dune” is a slow starter out of the gate.
So far, through today, “Dune” has earned $69 million in the US. Most epics in wide release would have done that in 1 week, or faster.
But “Dune” is long, three hours almost, and it’s also available on HBO Max. Those two things are slowing it down.
This past weekend, “Dune” made $15 million. It’s not a disaster yet. But it’s plodding along to the $100 million mark. So it’s break even point is way in the distance.
Warner Bros. was smart in releasing “Dune” internationally before letting it hit here. The result is a foreign box office so far of $222.7 million. They’re close to $300 million worldwide.
But fear not: “Dune 2” is coming in two years, and there will be HBO Max spin off series, so way down the line– way, way, down the line — they will break even and maybe turn a profit. We will all be long gone. But we’ll read about in the clouds, I’m sure!
Hilaria Baldwin, Alec’s wife, lives in some kind of disconnect world, a fantasy land.
