Rumors of Mariah Carey's demise have been greatly exaggerated, she proved last night during the first of six sold-out, Christmas-themed concerts at New York's Beacon Theater. For much of the show, she was in as good of a voice as you could expect from a diva who's in her 25th year of wailing for the public's consumption.
Happy Kate Bush Day! What did you get me? A remastered deluxe edition of The Dreaming? You shouldn't have! (But really, someone should.) In just a few hours, the real elusive chanteuse, singer/songwriter/producer/interpretive dancer/small boy/occasional bat Kate Bush will play the first show of her 22-night residency in London's Hammersmith Apollo in a production titled Before the Dawn. These will be her first proper concerts in about 35 years. What will she play?! (Will she play "Suspended in Gaffa?" She better play "Suspended in Gaffa.") How will she move? Will there be banter? Will there be monsters? This is so exciting.
I made my husband a birthday party and invited his friends and colleagues. I prepared a bunch of my best dishes including a chocolate cake I have perfected for the past 4 years from various recipes. Now let me tell you about the cake: It's perfection, moist, rich and the frosting achieved the delicate balance for it to be delicious to chocoholics and those of us that aren't. Everyone went crazy for it and now my husband asked me to give him my recipe to pass it to the wife of a colleague. Normally I wouldn't mind—I've given my recipes to people in his office—but this lady rubs me off the wrong way. Ever since I met her there's something about her I can't explain that makes me dislike her very much and I can't imagine she cares that much about me given that we have barely spoken and are not even Facebook friends. So now I don't want to give her my recipe since she didn't even bother asking me personally, but my husband says I'm being childish and should just share it. Is that okay?
Kate Bush has announced a string of concerts that she will play in London in August and September. This may not sound like a huge deal, but not doing shows is Bush's thing — she hasn't played a concert in almost 35 years. After all these years, she's still able to conjure up new ways to be weird. May she never stop.
Here is a comprehensive list of topics discussed in the pit at Brooklyn's Barclays Center during Thursday night's Beyoncé concert:
On Wednesday night, Danzig headlined the Cuban Club in Ybor City, Florida. During the opening of doom-rock ballad "Blood and Tears," the eponymous gloom-metal god noticed someone in the audience recording the performance and demanded, "Somebody punch that fucking asshole right there."
On Saturday, August 3rd at approximately 9:20 p.m., the physical embodiment of the Beyoncé concept, Beyoncé, took the stage for the first of three consecutive performances at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. On Saturday, August 3rd at approximately 8:20 p.m., two Gawker bloggers covered in body glitter (in hindsight: why?) concocted an iffy plan to make it onto the floor of the area, without purchasing floor passes for a thousand dollars.
In case you missed it: Just-left-of-mainstream rapper Danny Brown received oral sex onstage at his show on Friday at Minneapolis's West Bank. This has scandalized social media for most of the week. An early account of the incident on Reddit, titled "I just saw Danny brown get his dick sucked on stage mpls" went like this:
As one might expect, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to fans ruining the show for other fans by insisting on watching the entire performance in the glowing light of their smartphone screens.
Kanye West concluded his Sunday concert at London's Hammersmith Apollo by repeatedly howling, so you know it was a great show. He was performing 2006's formerly breezy single "Touch the Sky" when he unleashed and then threw down his mic. Apparently, this made as little sense within context as it does without. Says GQ UK:
Last week, Justin Bieber puked onstage. This week, it was Lady Gaga's turn. The pop star ralphed during her performance in Barcelona yesterday. Like a true pro, she kept on performing and even tried to blend the retching into her choreography. More of a pro, though, was her dancing partner, who admirably showed no fear of being puked on.
If you couldn't make it past Dave Grohl's nails-on-chalkboard screams, here's the Foo Fighters frontman's statement on the future of the band.
During a show in Glendale, Arizona last night, Justin Bieber walked on stage, "sang" and danced for a second, then turned his back to the crowd and puked everywhere. To his credit, Bieber handled it pretty well:
