Pastor Adam Tyson revealed during a podcast last week that musical talent Kanye West told him he almost stopped rapping soon after being save by God because he thought rap was “the devil’s music.” 
Tyson, the pastor at the California-based Placerita Bible Church that West began attending in mid-May, encouraged the pro-Trump performer to continue with the genre, but to do so in a way that glorifies God. 
“One time, he (West) told me that he wasn’t going to rap,” Tyson told Christian outlet <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&amp;v=YDUmbkdQksU">Apologia</a>, <a href="https://www.xxlmag.com/news/2019/10/kanye-west-considered-quitting-rap-devil-music/">XXL</a> magazine reported. “I said, ‘Why not?’ He said, ‘Well, that’s the devil’s music.’ I said, ‘Hey, man. Rap is a genre. You can rap for God.’ I think he was already thinking about it a little bit, but I just definitely said, ‘Hey, bro. I think you need to use your talents that God’s given you and use that platform for God.’”
West announced Monday that his highly-anticipated “Jesus is King” album is set for release on October 25. 
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“JESUS IS KING” OCT 25th <a href="https://t.co/Ug4ghlQYk7">pic.twitter.com/Ug4ghlQYk7</a>
&mdash; ye (@kanyewest) <a href="https://twitter.com/kanyewest/status/1186149413846052864?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 21, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Tyson told Apologia that West was connected to his church through a young couple who knows the rapper and his wife Kim Kardashian. The young man who knows West told Tyson that the artist kept asking him questions about God, some of which he couldn’t answer. Tyson and others at the church prayed for West and suggested the couple invite him to the church, knowing it was a long shot. 
But in May, West started attending Placerita Bible Church and soon revealed to Tyson that he had recently been “radically saved.”
“[Kanye] said, ‘About five weeks ago, I got radically saved,&#8217;” Tyson said, according to XXL. “He just started telling me a little about his testimony.”
According to Tyson, West told him that he was raised as a Christian but began “chasing all the things of this world” after hitting it big in the music industry. “He would say the devil basically brought him to a place where he just felt like he was in bondage to his sin. So he said, ‘I got delivered,'&#8221; Tyson recalled.
As reported by <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-kanye-confronts-kim-over-her-sexy-outfits-hurting-his-soul-and-spirit">The Daily Wire</a> last week, West confronted Kardashian over her sexy outfits during a recent episode of E!’s “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.” West explained to Kardashian that while he used to think his wife should look like other girls who constantly show off their bodies, he now realizes that Kardashian’s revealing looks are negatively “affecting” his “soul and &#8230; spirit.”
“The corset, underwear, all of that vibe,” West said of Kardashian’s Met Gala dress, “I just feel like I went through this transition from being a rapper, looking at all these girls, and then looking at my wife like, ‘Oh, my girl needs to be just like these other girls, showing her body off, showing this, showing that.’”
“I didn’t realize that that was affecting my soul and my spirit as someone that’s married and loved, the father of what’s about to be four kids,” he continued. “A corset is a form of underwear. It’s hot. It’s like, it’s hot for who though?”
“You are my wife, and it affects me when pictures are too sexy,” West added after Kardashian protested. 
As reported by The Daily Wire in July, West said that his “radical obedience to Christ” helped stabilize his mental health. Moreover, earlier this year, the rap icon created “Sunday Service” events that include gospel music.
“It’s honestly more like a healing experience for my husband. It’s just music; there’s no sermon. It’s definitely something he believes in – Jesus – and there’s a Christian vibe. But there’s no preaching. It’s just a very spiritual Christian experience,” Kardashian told Elle magazine of the services.
WATCH (relevant comments begin at the 23:40 mark): 
<iframe title="Special Event: Interview w/ Kanye&#039;s Pastor" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YDUmbkdQksU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Kanye West

&#8216;Radically Saved&#8217; Kanye Called Rap &#8216;The Devil&#8217;s Music,&#8217; Almost Quit Industry, Pastor Reveals

Christianity

Kim Kardashian

Music

Musician Pharrell Williams recently expressed regret over his 2013 &#8220;rapey&#8221; hit song &#8220;Blurred Lines,&#8221; which he collaborated on with singer Robin Thicke and rapper T.I.
Sitting down with <a href="https://www.gq.com/story/pharrell-new-masculinity-cover-interview">GQ</a> for an interview published on Monday, the singer claimed he didn&#8217;t understand that the song&#8217;s lyrics could have an adverse affect on women until well after the song took off. According to the 46-year-old, he now realizes that we have a &#8220;chauvinist culture in our country.&#8221;
While discussing the &#8220;new conversation&#8221; surrounding masculinity, Williams explained that things that used to be kosher in society &#8220;would never fly today,&#8221; such as &#8220;[a]dvertisements that objectify women,&#8221; and &#8220;song content&#8221; &#8212; including some of his own. 
&#8220;Some of my old songs, I would never write or sing today,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I get embarrassed by some of that stuff. It just took a lot of time and growth to get to that place.&#8221;
&#8220;I think &#8216;Blurred Lines&#8217; opened me up,&#8221; Williams said. At first, the artist explained, he didn&#8217;t see the issue with the song due to how much women seemed to enjoy the hit.
&#8220;I didn&#8217;t get it at first. Because there were older white women who, when that song came on, they would behave in some of the most surprising ways ever. And I would be like, wow. They would have me blushing,&#8221; the musician explained. &#8220;So when there started to be an issue with it, lyrically, I was, like, What are you talking about? There are women who really like the song and connect to the energy that just gets you up. And I know you want it – women sing those kinds of lyrics all the time. So it&#8217;s like, What&#8217;s rapey about that?&#8221;
&#8220;And then I realized that there are men who use that same language when taking advantage of a woman, and it doesn&#8217;t matter that that&#8217;s not my behavior,&#8221; he continued. &#8220;Or the way I think about things. It just matters how it affects women. And I was like, Got it. I get it. Cool. My mind opened up to what was actually being said in the song and how it could make someone feel. Even though it wasn&#8217;t the majority, it didn&#8217;t matter. I cared what they were feeling too.&#8221;
&#8220;I realized that we live in a chauvinist culture in our country,&#8221; Williams told the magazine. &#8220;Hadn&#8217;t realized that. Didn&#8217;t realize that some of my songs catered to that. So that blew my mind.&#8221;
Williams also spoke of masculinity, which he claimed &#8220;is the essence of you that understands and respects that which isn&#8217;t masculine.&#8221;
&#8220;If you ask me,&#8221; he said, &#8220;when we talk about masculinity, it&#8217;s also very racial, this conversation. Because the dominant force on this planet right now is the older straight white male. And there&#8217;s a particular portion of them that senses a tanning effect. They sense a feminizing effect. They sense a nonbinary effect when it comes to gender.&#8221;
One song Williams certainly doesn&#8217;t regret is &#8220;Happy.&#8221;
&#8220;And then here comes &#8216;Happy,&#8217; a record that I didn&#8217;t write for myself, that I ended up being on, that made people feel happy,&#8221; he said, noting that the song &#8220;made me cry. It literally made me cry. Like, I was on the Oprah show for my birthday, and she showed me a video of people around the world singing that song, and that s*** f***ed me up. Bad. I was never the same. So I don&#8217;t beat on my chest. I haven&#8217;t been the same since any of that music.&#8221;

Pharrell Williams

Pharrell Williams Expresses Regret Over &#8216;Rapey&#8217; &#8216;Blurred Lines&#8217; Hit: &#8216;We Live In A Chauvinist Society&#8217;

Hollywood

Sexism

Grammy-winning electronic music superstar Zedd says he&#8217;s been &#8220;permanently banned&#8221; from China after liking a single Tweet from &#8220;South Park&#8217;s&#8221; official account.
DJ Zedd, who is German, tweeted about the incident on Saturday, noting on the social media platform that, &#8220;I just got permanently banned from China because I liked a <a class="PrettyLink profile customisable h-card" dir="ltr" href="https://twitter.com/SouthPark" data-mentioned-user-id="23504870" data-scribe="element:mention">@SouthPark</a> tweet.&#8221;
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I just got permanently banned from China because I liked a <a href="https://twitter.com/SouthPark?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@SouthPark</a> tweet.
&mdash; Zedd (@Zedd) <a href="https://twitter.com/Zedd/status/1182376966495838208?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 10, 2019</a></blockquote>
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The Tweet in question was this one, promoting &#8220;South Park&#8217;s&#8221; 300th episode.
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🎉 It&#39;s our 300th episode tonight! Which is your favorite episode and why? <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/southpark300?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#southpark300</a> <a href="https://t.co/OH25s1qAFr">pic.twitter.com/OH25s1qAFr</a>
&mdash; South Park (@SouthPark) <a href="https://twitter.com/SouthPark/status/1181966500246278144?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 9, 2019</a></blockquote>
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&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/grammy-winner-zedd-permanently-banned-from-china-after-liking-south-park-tweet-musician-claims">Fox News reports</a> that the DJ&#8217;s publicist confirmed the permanent ban on Saturday night; “This is true, yes, but we don’t have any more info to give you at this time,&#8221; he told CNBC.
Zedd, whose real name is Anton Zaslavski, did not immediately elaborate on what a &#8220;permanent ban&#8221; from China entails, but following a &#8220;South Park&#8221; episode where the main characters flout Chinese censorship laws, the cartoon&#8217;s creators found that &#8220;South Park&#8221; was essentially scrubbed from the internet in China. Clips of the show were removed from the country&#8217;s YouTube clone site, discussions about the show were shut down on internet message boards, and the show&#8217;s Chinese social media presence vanished overnight.
Fox News reports that Zedd&#8217;s music is, at least, still available in China as of Saturday night, and that his catalog of music hasn&#8217;t been pulled down from Chinese streaming services. <a href="https://edm.com/news/zedd-china-travel-ban-confirmed">EDM.com</a>, which tracks electronic music acts as they travel the globe, reports that concert promoters have been forced to cancel Zedd&#8217;s upcoming performances in China.
Zedd confirmed that report in an Instagram post, adding that his &#8220;permanent ban&#8221; is &#8220;not a joke:&#8221; &#8220;&#8230; this is NOT a joke. The government informed our promoters that if they don&#8217;t cancel my scheduled shows in China, they would pull their cultural permits.&#8221;
&#8220;South Park&#8221; creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, took aim at China in the show&#8217;s most recent season premiere, targeting China over reports that the Communist country is holding more than one million ethnic Chinese Muslims in concentration camps, and skewering major corporations like Disney for accepting Chinese censorship in exchange for access to the Chinese market.
One of the show&#8217;s main characters ends up on a Chinese &#8220;re-education&#8221; camp for selling marijuana while on a business trip. At the same time, the South Park kids form a band that becomes an overnight global sensation; their musical act breaks up after members are told they must rewrite their songs in order to gain access to Chinese audiences.
&#8220;South Park&#8217;s&#8221; 300th episode, which airs this week, will take aim at the anti-vaccination movement, not necessarily Chinese censors, but the show&#8217;s creators, Parker and Stone, promise the episode will have more to say on the issue of Chinese meddling in American art.
The episodes could not have come at a better time, of course. The NBA recently issued a groveling apology to China after the general manager of the Houston Rockets tweeted support for pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong. NBA players and coaches — and the league&#8217;s commissioner, Adam Silver — have since avoided making any strong statements on China, apparently at the behest of Chinese censors who have threatened an economic boycott of the NBA.

Zedd

Electronic Music Superstar Zedd Claims He&#8217;s Been &#8216;Banned&#8217; From China Over &#8216;South Park&#8217; Tweet

China

&#8220;Ladies and Gentlemen: The Rolling Stones.&#8221; These thundering words precede a pantheon of rock and roll that takes its place on stage as tens of thousands of fans, whose ages span several generations, look on in anticipation and joy.
It all started for the big, bad progenitors of rock and roll back in 1962. At London&#8217;s Marquee Jazz Club where, one summer night, the Rolling Stones played their first ever gig. At the time, their roster featured founder and multi-instrumentalist extraordinaire, Brian Jones; vocalist Mick Jagger; guitarist Keith Richards; and keyboardist, Ian Stewart. United by their passion for American blues, the unparalleled ensemble set off to bring the music of Chuck Berry, Muddy Mutters, et al. to Europe. As Richards explains in his autobiography, Life, &#8220;the British invasion was really an invasion of American music into Europe.&#8221; The four were joined a few months later, in January, by bassist Bill Wyman and jazz drummer Charlie Watts, thus completing the lineup.
In May of 1963, with a producer on board, the Rolling Stones were signed by Decca, the record label notorious for passing on The Beatles. In June, the Stones released their first single, &#8220;Come On,&#8221; a Chuck Berry cover.
They have been at it ever since, performing more than 2,000 concerts around the world, with grueling, nearly nonstop touring through the 1960s and early 1970s. They have claimed the title of top-grossing tour four separate times and amassed the world&#8217;s highest-grossing tours in both the 1990s and 2000s.
Now, showing no signs of stopping, the Stones are in the last stretch of their latest tour, &#8220;No Filter,&#8221; spanning two continents, and 45 shows. But the tour has not been without turbulence. A brief scare postponed the last set of shows, as Jagger had to undergo emergency heart surgery. However, Jagger — who just celebrated his 76th birthday — recovered from heart surgery at around the same rate that most adolescents recover from having their wisdom teeth pulled out. Within mere weeks, he announced he was back to his usual exercise routine and had a clean bill of health from his doctor. The tour was back on.
I, myself, saw the Rolling Stones play in their one Canadian show, and suffice it to say, every minute of the six hours spent standing still against the stage-front barricade was worth it for the spectacle that followed. The Stones regaled spectators with fan favorites, the majority of the set-list being drawn from the band’s famed, four sequential chef d&#8217;oeuvres: Beggars Banquet (1968), Let it Bleed (1969), Sticky Fingers (1971), and Exile on Main St. (1972).
Lesser-known records were played as well, especially thanks to the audience having a say in the set-list via online voting. Contenders were picked from a bag of forgotten hits and esoteric cuts off earlier albums: &#8220;Mercy Mercy&#8221; from 1965&#8217;s Out of our Heads – played for the first time in 50 years; &#8220;Under My Thumb&#8221; from 1966&#8217;s Aftermath; and the one I got to see, &#8220;She’s a Rainbow.&#8221; It was a welcome revival of a colorful, pop-ballad from the Stones&#8217; oft-overlooked, early-era Pink Floyd inspired album, Their Satanic Majesties Request.
The Stones opened the show with the energetic, lively paean to protest: &#8220;Street Fighting Man.&#8221; Jagger emerged, draped in glam and glitter, his bellowing vocals filling the field, Richards in his usual debonair, driving the main riff, Ronnie Wood and Darryl Jones commanding the band&#8217;s tight rhythm, and Watts keeping the beat, as a bona fide human metronome. Any remaining qualms concerning the Stones&#8217; ability to perform at peak performance were henceforth quashed.
As the evening went on, the syndicate of septuagenarians showed no signs of slowing down. Tearing through bread-and-butter staples like the twangy &#8220;Tumbling Dice,&#8221; and demonstrating their range by beautifully elevating the mellow, &#8220;You Can&#8217;t Always Get What You Want&#8221; to its grandiose proportions, the Rolling Stones of 2019 have remained largely unchanged from their disheveled adolescence in the epoch of the 1960s. They still run like a well-oiled machine, engineered to play the blues. A lead guitarist amongst the members is rarely identifiable, as Richards and Wood interweave their instruments while playing off Watts&#8217; drums and Jones’ bass to create a cohesive, unified sound. It&#8217;s a product far greater than the sum of its parts, and it&#8217;s the magic behind the Rolling Stones&#8217; sound.
Midway through the show, seeking to recreate the more intimate aura from the band&#8217;s early days playing in smaller clubs – like Toronto&#8217;s El Mocambo Tavern in 1977 – Jagger and company moved to a smaller stage, set amidst the crowd. From here they played their acoustic love ballad, &#8220;Angie&#8221; — though a more fitting track would have been &#8220;Salt of the Earth,&#8221; their stirring — and some might argue, sardonic — salute to the working class; the commoners who surrounded their stage. &#8220;Say a prayer for the common foot soldier; Spare a thought for his back breaking work.&#8221;
As the Stones made their way back to the main stage, an orchestral arrangement of a snare drum, maracas, and congas began to play. The field filled with the haunting echoes of &#8220;woo-woo!,&#8221; scenes of fire and brimstone were projected above, creating the macabre backdrop to &#8220;Sympathy for the Devil.&#8221; I have heard this song more times than I can count, every beat and guitar note is forever etched into my memory, but hearing it live, for the first time, as soon as Mick Jagger opened with those iconic introductory pleasantries, &#8220;Please allow me to introduce myself, I&#8217;m a man of wealth and taste,&#8221; I just couldn’t help but smile in awe. &#8220;Woo-woo!&#8221;
Jagger then handed the reigns to Richards, to front his 1989 ode to old age, &#8220;Slipping Away&#8221; from the album Steel Wheels. Wrinkled but not withered, like a finely aged wine, Richards&#8217; performance was imbued with layers of complexity.
A highlight of the show came in the encore: &#8220;Gimme Shelter.&#8221; What other songs can perfectly capture and recreate the atmosphere of the late 1960s in four-and-a-half minutes? Everything from the Kennedy assassination, to the draft and Vietnam War, is encapsulated in this record.
But what makes this song shine is the chorus. Backup singer Sasha Allen (perfectly filling Mary Clayton&#8217;s shoes from the original recording) delivered the best vocal performance of the night, a duet with Jagger. Her soulful, gospel cries and screams of &#8220;RAPE! MURDER!&#8221; elevated the song to its epic proportions, draping the audience in its creepy, ghastly ambiance.
The Rolling Stones could have retired a long time ago, in the early &#8217;70s, and have still enjoyed heaps of accolades, lauding their legacy. But touring until today — in their 70s — they refuse to rest on their laurels. Jagger, when asked in a <a href="https://youtu.be/iiF-DRdGfnk">1965 interview</a> how much more fuel the Rolling Stones had to burn, replied, with a sanguine smirk, &#8220;I think we&#8217;re pretty well set up for at least another year.&#8221; Fifty-four years later, in 2019, the Rolling Stones &#8220;No Filter&#8221; world tour rolls on with concert dates scheduled through the end of August. Is this the last tour of the last true remnant of rock and roll&#8217;s heyday? Well, this could be the last time; this could be the last time; maybe the last time; I don&#8217;t know, oh no, oh no.
Follow Harry Khachatrian on <a href="https://twitter.com/Harry1T6">Twitter</a>
Writer&#8217;s note – Here is my personal, comprehensive ranking of the Rolling Stones&#8217; UK studio discography:
1. Let It Bleed (1969)
2. Beggars Banquet (1968)
3. Exile on Main St. (1972)
4. Sticky Fingers (1971)
5. Some Girls (1978)
6. The Rolling Stones No. 2 (1965) (UK)
7. Between the Buttons (1967) (UK)
8. Aftermath (1966) (UK)
9. Black and Blue (1976)
10. Tattoo You (1981)
11. Goats Head Soup (1973)
12. Their Satanic Majesties Request (1967)
13. The Rolling Stones (1964) (UK)
14. Blue and Lonesome (2016)
15. Out of Our Heads (1965) (UK)
16. It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll (1974)
17. Emotional Rescue (1980)
18. Voodoo Lounge (1994)
19. A Bigger Bang (2005)
20. Steel Wheels (1989)
21. Bridges to Babylon (1997)
22. Dirty Work (1986)
23. Undercover (1983)

The Rolling Stones

KHACHATRIAN: The Rolling Stones: Still The Greatest Live Rock And Roll Act In The World​

The &#8220;woke culture&#8221; of the 2010s has finally come for its biggest target yet: the hippie culture of the 1960s and its all star cast of outspoken leftists, including legendary folk singer Woody Guthrie.
Oddly enough, the &#8220;hippie movement&#8221; and its counter-cultural push is the natural predecessor of today&#8217;s &#8220;woke&#8221; progressives, who believe they&#8217;re only continuing the work begun by Vietnam War-era feminists, cultural agitators, anti-war protesters, change agents, and the occasional domestic terrorist (the ones who were just blowing things up to make a point, of course).
But there comes a point when children begin to recognize the limits of their parents&#8217; and grandparents&#8217; progressivism, and <a href="https://folklife.si.edu/magazine/this-land-is-whose-land-indian-country-settler-protest">according to the Smithsonian publication, Folklife</a>, that moment has finally come for Guthrie over his classic song, &#8220;This Land is Your Land.&#8221;
Guthrie penned the song back in 1940, as a way of deliberately countering more theistic, less &#8220;inclusive&#8221; patriotic songs, like &#8220;God Bless America.&#8221; He abandoned it after composing a few verses, took it back up in the mid-1940s, then passed it on to prominent folk singers of the 1960s, like Bob Dylan and the group, Peter, Paul &amp; Mary, who sang the most famous rendition.
It&#8217;s widely recognized as a protest song. Just&#8230;not the right kind. At least, not anymore.
In a grueling 3,000-word article for Folklife, Native rights activist Mali Obomsawin calls the song an embarrassment for liberal culture, and admits to being &#8220;shaken up like a soda can&#8221; every time she hears the lyrics &#8212; to the degree that she believes the song itself should either never be played again, or come with a trigger warning about Guthrie&#8217;s limited, mid-20th century view of American culture.
&#8220;These lyrics shake me up like a soda can every time I hear them. As an activist, folk musician, and songwriter (in Lula Wiles), and recent label-mate of Woody Guthrie on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings,&#8221; she says, &#8220;my social circles tend to worship Guthrie as the father of all musical protest. But as a Native person, I believe &#8216;This Land Is Your Land&#8217; falls flat.&#8221;
The problem is that Guthrie simply wasn&#8217;t woke enough about &#8220;this land.&#8221; Although one of the founding fathers of protest music, Guthrie somehow missed that the land he was singing about &#8212; the United States &#8212; was, in fact, land stolen from Native Americans, so it wasn&#8217;t really &#8220;his land&#8221; at all.
&#8220;In the context of America, a nation-state built by settler colonialism, Woody Guthrie&#8217;s protest anthem exemplifies the particular blind spot that Americans have in regard to Natives: American patriotism erases us, even if it comes in the form of a leftist protest song,&#8221; Obomsawin says.
&#8220;This land &#8216;was&#8217; our land,&#8221; she continues. &#8220;Through genocide, broken treaties, and a legal system created by and for the colonial interest, this land &#8216;became&#8217; American land. But to question the legitimacy of American land control today instantly makes one the most radical person in the room&#8211;even in leftist circles. And because Indigenous critiques of this country are so fundamental, our voices are often marginalized to the point of invisibility.&#8221;
Guthrie, she says, can almost be forgiven. After all, he was raised in a less woke era and inculcated in an American culture that he may have resented, but which brainwashed him with certain values, anyway, like imperialism and, yes, white supremacy and white nationalism.
That&#8217;s right, by penning one of the earliest and most famous protest songs in history, Woody Guthrie inadvertently contributed to the spread of white nationalism. And it&#8217;s not only up to modern leftists to reject &#8220;This Land is Your Land,&#8221; out of concern for their Native bretheren, it&#8217;s required that they make amends and alter their outlook so that they don&#8217;t repeat Guthrie&#8217;s crimes.
&#8220;By critiquing &#8216;This Land Is Your Land,&#8217; I don&#8217;t mean to imply that Guthrie himself promoted conquest, but the song is indicative of American leftists&#8217; role in Native invisibility,&#8221; Obomsawin says, &#8220;The lyrics as they are embraced today evoke Manifest Destiny and expansionism (&#8216;this land was made for you and me&#8217;). When sung as a political act, the gathering or demonstration is infused with anti-Nativism and reinforces the blind spot.&#8221;
Sure.

This Land Is NOT Your Land: Woke Culture Now Demanding Woody Guthrie Be Canceled Over Folk Music Faux Pas

Native Americans

Smithsonian Museum

Bruce Springsteen&#8217;s &#8220;Born in the U.S.A.&#8221; marks its 35th anniversary this June. The American rock icon&#8217;s seventh studio album was met with massive commercial success upon release, featuring seven top-ten singles; it was certified as a three-times platinum record within a year of its release, and has sold over 30 million copies just since 2012.
Working with remnant recordings from sessions off of his then-previous record release, &#8220;Nebraska,&#8221; Springsteen reunited with the E-Street Band and producer Jon Landau to assemble his most pop-infused album since &#8220;Born to Run.&#8221;
In &#8220;Born in the U.S.A.,&#8221; Springsteen pooled a flourishing gamut of themes and ideas explored in previous records: The poignant depths of the human spirit on the verge of collapse from &#8220;Nebraska&#8221; (1982); the hardship of lost love and heartbreak from &#8220;The River&#8221; (1980); and the eminence of one&#8217;s roots and upbringing in &#8220;Born to Run&#8221; (1975).
In honor of the album&#8217;s anniversary, here&#8217;s a deeper dive into a few key songs that, 35 years later, have stood the test of time, and carry themes as relevant today as they were in 1984.
Born in the U.S.A.
The eponymous opening track, &#8220;Born in the U.S.A.&#8221; sets the tone for the album, kicking off as the most anthemic rocker in Springsteen&#8217;s discography since &#8220;Born to Run.&#8221; Set against a backdrop of red, white, and blue, it&#8217;s easy to see why the album&#8217;s title track is oft misinterpreted as either a paean to patriotism and America or as an anti-war harangue.
In fact, it&#8217;s neither of the two. If anything, it leans closer to the upbeat celebration of Americana than its browbeating. In standard Springsteen style, the song is a story, telling the tale of a wounded combatant who, at no choosing of his own, was sent off to fight in Vietnam and then returns home to find his town left hung out to dry.
<blockquote>
Come back home to the refinery
Hiring man said &#8220;son if it was up to me&#8221;
Went down to see my V.A. man
He said &#8220;son, don&#8217;t you understand&#8221;
</blockquote>
There&#8217;s a widespread consensus now that the Vietnam War was largely a tragic boondoggle. It isn&#8217;t a controversial position. And Springsteen, in his lyrics, doesn&#8217;t focus on the vagaries of Vietnam; he instead lends his voice to the neglected and abandoned veterans of the conflict.
No Surrender
Springsteen&#8217;s affection for the downtrodden veterans of Vietnam has its reprise on the opening track of the record&#8217;s B-Side (the flip-side of the record), &#8220;No Surrender.&#8221; The track ties the album back to its namesake theme.
<blockquote>
Well, we made a promise we swore we&#8217;d always remember
No retreat, baby, no surrender
Like soldiers in the winter&#8217;s night
With a vow to defend
No retreat, baby, no surrender
</blockquote>
The song &#8220;No Surrender&#8221; is about camaraderie and staying true to oneself in the face of adversity. Springsteen communicates this idea soulfully:
<blockquote>
Now on the street tonight the lights grow dim
The walls of my room are closing in
There&#8217;s a war outside still raging
You say it ain&#8217;t ours anymore to win
I want to sleep beneath
Peaceful skies in my lover&#8217;s bed
With a wide open country in my eyes
And these romantic dreams in my head
Once we made a promise we swore we&#8217;d always remember
No retreat, baby, no surrender
Blood brothers in a stormy night
With a vow to defend
No retreat, baby, no surrender
</blockquote>
Life is unpredictable. But even in the thick of battle, amid raging war when all one wants to do is go to sleep and dream of a more idyllic era, one has to stay true to himself and to those around him. No retreat, baby, no surrender.
Downbound Train
Toward the end of the album&#8217;s A-Side is one of Springsteen&#8217;s darkest and most melancholy tunes: &#8220;Downbound Train.&#8221; A drumbeat to deprivation and hardship, the song&#8217;s lyrics paint a bleak picture of economic anxiety.
<blockquote>
I had a job, I had a girl
I had something going, mister, in this world
I got laid off down at the lumber yard
Our love went bad, times got hard
Now I work down at the car wash
Where all it ever does is rain
Don&#8217;t you feel like you&#8217;re a rider on a downbound train
</blockquote>
The song follows a middle-class worker who loses his job and watches his life spiral down into penury &#8212; on-board, as Springsteen dubbed it, a downbound train.
Bobby Jean
Bruce Springsteen&#8217;s retrospective on life fills the grooves of the album&#8217;s B-side. With &#8220;Bobby Jean,&#8221; Springsteen tackles heartbreak and loss of friendship. The song&#8217;s malleable lyrics lend themselves to a slew of settings. Recovering from the slums of a breakup with your high school sweetheart? The song&#8217;s first verse channels this cliché.
<blockquote>
Well, I came to your house the other day
Your mother said you went away
She said there was nothing that I could have done
There was nothing nobody could say
Me and you, we&#8217;ve known each other ever since we were sixteen
I wished I could have known
I wished I could have called you
Just to say goodbye, Bobby Jean
</blockquote>
Growing up, if you had a childhood friend you felt was the only one who truly understood you and shared your interests, then the grief of losing such a friend is immeasurable. Springsteen captures that sorrow seamlessly in the latter verses.
<blockquote>
Now, you hung with me when all the others
Turned away, turned up their nose
We liked the same music, we liked the same bands 
&#8230;
Now, we went walking in the rain,
Talking about the pain that from the world we hid
Now there ain&#8217;t nobody, nowhere, nohow
Gonna ever understand me the way you did
Maybe you&#8217;ll be out there on that road somewhere
In some bus or train traveling along
In some motel room there&#8217;ll be a radio playing
And you&#8217;ll hear me sing this song
Well, if you do, you&#8217;ll know I&#8217;m thinking of you
And all the miles in between
And I&#8217;m just calling you one last time
Not to change your mind, but just to say I miss you, baby
Good luck, goodbye, Bobby Jean
</blockquote>
Glory Days
Of the next song, &#8220;Glory Days,&#8221; Springsteen said, &#8220;The first verse actually happened. The second verse mostly happened, and the third verse, of course, is happening now.&#8221; Springsteen&#8217;s lyrics transport the listener back to his halcyon high school days. Most importantly, the lyrics serve as a reminder that nostalgia is a powerful drug that blunts the painful realities of the present.
<blockquote>
Well there&#8217;s a girl that lives up the block
Back in school she could turn all the boy&#8217;s heads
Sometimes on a Friday I&#8217;ll stop by
And have a few drinks after she put her kids to bed
Her and her husband Bobby well they split up
I guess it&#8217;s two years gone by now
We just sit around talking about the old times
She says when she feels like crying
She starts laughing thinking bout
Glory days, well they&#8217;ll pass you by
Glory days, in the wink of a young girl&#8217;s eye
Glory days, glory days
</blockquote>
My Hometown
The album&#8217;s coda is among Springsteen&#8217;s finest compositions: A wistful ballad you can listen to with your eyes closed, as the transcendent lyrics transport the listener to his childhood town. Springsteen masterfully alludes to the treasured childhood memory of most: The first time being hoisted behind a seemingly giant steering wheel of a car.
<blockquote>
I was eight years old and running with a dime in my hand
Into the bus stop to pick up a paper for my old man
I&#8217;d sit on his lap in that big old Buick
And steer as we drove through town
He&#8217;d tousle my hair and say &#8220;Son, take a good look around
This is your hometown.
</blockquote>
In &#8220;My Hometown,&#8221; Springsteen circles back to his roots which he fervently fought to flee in &#8220;Born to Run.&#8221; &#8220;This town rips the bones from your back; it&#8217;s a death trap, a suicide rap. We gotta get out while we&#8217;re young; cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run.&#8221; But he doesn&#8217;t stop there. In the same song, Springsteen tackles racial tensions and conflict, before returning to another of the album&#8217;s key themes: Economic anxiety.
<blockquote>
In &#8217;65 tension was running high at my high school
There was a lot of fights &#8216;tween the black and white
There was nothing you could do
Two cars at a light on a Saturday night
In the back seat there was a gun
Words were passed, then a shotgun blast
Troubled times had come to my hometown
To my hometown
Now Main Street&#8217;s whitewashed windows and vacant stores
Seems like there ain&#8217;t nobody wants to come down here no more
They&#8217;re closing down the textile mill across the railroad tracks
Foreman says &#8220;These jobs are going, boys
And they ain&#8217;t coming back
To your hometown.&#8221;
</blockquote>
With &#8220;Born in the U.S.A.,&#8221; Bruce Springsteen crafted a cohesive, unified pop-rock album. Though not his best album (that spot is forever reserved for the venerable &#8220;Born to Run&#8221;), &#8220;Born in the U.S.A.&#8221; made &#8220;The Boss&#8221; a worldwide superstar, sending Springsteen to the summit of his commercial success. Though no other album of his would ever reach such stardom, Springsteen can always look back to 1984, smiling, and thinking &#8216;bout glory days.
Follow Harry Khachatrian on <a href="https://twitter.com/Harry1T6">Twitter</a>.
Writer&#8217;s note:
Here is the writer&#8217;s personal comprehensive ranking of the top 10 Bruce Springsteen studio albums:
1. Born to Run (1975)
2. Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978)
3. The Wild the Innocent &amp; the E Street Shuffle (1973)
4. Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. (1973)
5. Nebraska (1982)
6. The River (1980)
7. Born in the USA (1984)
8. The Rising (2002)
9. Tunnel of Love (1987)
10. The Ghost of Tom Joad (1995)

Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Born in the U.S.A.’ Turns 35

Bruce Springsteen

Legendary musician Sir Elton John has come to the defense of the straight actor who plays him in the forthcoming film &#8220;Rocketman.&#8221;
Taron Egerton was chosen to play the musical icon despite being heterosexual, and many people are complaining that John, who is gay, should have been played by someone from the LGBT community. John himself pushed back on such criticism in an <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/9100258/elton-john-rocketman-taron-egerton-straight-gay/">exclusive interview</a> with The Sun&#8217;s Dan Wootton.
John, when asked about the criticism Egerton received, apparently waved his hand &#8220;dismissively&#8221; and told Wootton: &#8220;That&#8217;s all bulls***, I&#8217;m sorry.&#8221;
&#8220;If people don&#8217;t like it, review-wise, or it doesn&#8217;t make one dollar, it&#8217;s the movie I wanted to make and that&#8217;s all that counts,&#8221; John added. &#8220;I can look back and say, &#8216;You know what, I love it. I can live with it.&#8217;&#8221;
Before being asked about the criticism, John had praised Egerton.
&#8220;I was very emotional just now as well. The movie floored me. But I&#8217;m very high. Taron is beyond belief. It&#8217;s like watching me. It&#8217;s quite extraordinary, he&#8217;s so me-like. He&#8217;s a megastar,&#8221; the famed singer said. &#8220;He was schooled by George Martin&#8217;s son Giles and he&#8217;s done the most amazing job. I wanted it to be a movie where the actor sang &#8212; and he sings.&#8221;
The film takes a hard look into John&#8217;s meteoric rise and battles with alcoholism, drugs, and sex addiction. It premiered at the Cannes Film Festival Thursday night.
John told Wootton he wasn&#8217;t nervous about a film which highlighted some of the &#8220;darkest moments&#8221; &#8211; Wootton&#8217;s phrase &#8211; of his life.
&#8220;No, I&#8217;m pretty open about things like that,&#8221; he said. &#8220;When Tantrums And Tiaras came out, it was the most honest documentary you could watch.
&#8220;Tantrums and Tiaras&#8221; is a 1997 documentary directed by John&#8217;s husband David Furnish. It contains footage from John&#8217;s 1995 world tour and behind-the-scenes footage.
In another <a href="https://variety.com/2019/film/news/elton-john-sobriety-rocketman-cannes-1203218427/">interview</a>, with Variety, John said it was difficult to watch the parts of that film that dealt with his family life.
&#8220;It&#8217;s hard to watch the family stuff. The drugs stuff I can handle because I did it, but the family stuff is touching,&#8221; he said.
In that same interview, John opened up about the self-doubt that he has even though he is an international superstar.
&#8220;I think every artist does [have self-doubt],&#8221; he said. &#8220;Every creative artist does have doubt and has moments of, &#8216;Am I doing the right thing? Am I good enough?&#8217; And that&#8217;s what turns us into monsters as well because I think you become unreasonable and of course the chemical substances and the alcohol doesn&#8217;t help anything, and you lose touch with reality.&#8221;

Elton John: It’s ‘Bulls***’ To Criticize A Heterosexual Man For Playing A Homosexual Man In A Film

LGBT

Green Day, apparently still around and making music, announced Wednesday that it&#8217;s issuing its first &#8220;graphic novel,&#8221; a &#8220;handbook&#8221; for the modern American woman and &#8220;every woman who refuses to capitulate&#8221; &#8212; and feminists aren&#8217;t amused.
The graphic novel, titled &#8220;Last of the American Girls,&#8221; will hit store shelves in October and is billing itself as an indispensible guide for women looking to maintain and cultivate that punk rock edge in a decreasingly punk rock world, <a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062964106/last-of-the-american-girls/">according to the novel&#8217;s publisher, Harper Collins</a>. It is &#8220;a rallying cry for all rebel girls.&#8221;
The team behind the novel is, of course, entirely male. Green Day&#8217;s lead vocalist and guitarist is Billie Joe Armstrong, joined on bass by Mike Dirnt, and drums by the aptly named Tre Cool, who has been with the band since the early 1990s, before they hit it big with their 1994 rock-and-punk album, &#8220;Dookie.&#8221; The band hired a male illustrator, cartoonist Frank Caruso, to do the inkwork.
It&#8217;s not clear exactly what &#8220;advice&#8221; the book will give today&#8217;s liberated woman, but &#8220;Last of the American Girls&#8221; is the title of one of the band&#8217;s songs, off their most recent album, &#8220;21st Century Breakdown.&#8221; It could just be the song lyrics with illustrations, or it could be a comprehensive guide to third wave feminism written by a team of men.
Feminists, of course, not typically ones to give the benefit of the doubt, immediately assumed &#8220;Last of the American Girls&#8221; will be the latter, and, accordingly, took to social media to voice their concern.
&#8220;What rebellious everywoman among us has not longed for an inspiring handbook authored and illustrated by four men and zero women,&#8221; wrote one.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
What rebellious everywoman among us has not longed for an inspiring handbook authored and illustrated by &lt;checks notes&gt; four men and zero women <a href="https://t.co/tWNHpnpZZK">https://t.co/tWNHpnpZZK</a>
&#8212; andi zeisler (@andizeisler) <a href="https://twitter.com/andizeisler/status/1113221611950301184?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 2, 2019</a></blockquote>
&#8220;Yeah that&#8217;s what we need, a handbook for female rebellion&#8230;written by men,&#8221; wrote another.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Yeah that&#8217;s what we need, a handbook for female rebellion&#8230;written by men.
&#8212; Maddy Rizzo (@maddydrizzo) <a href="https://twitter.com/maddydrizzo/status/1113148291150176256?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 2, 2019</a></blockquote>
&#8220;boys i love u with all of my heart and would happily take SEVERAL bullets for you but dont you think the main &#8221;rule&#8221; to being an independent woman in punk should be to, well, not be told how to live their lives by men who have no experience in what its like to live as a woman??&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
boys i love u with all of my heart and would happily take SEVERAL bullets for you but dont you think the main &#8221;rule&#8221; to being an independent woman in punk should be to, well, not be told how to live their lives by men who have no experience in what its like to live as a woman??
&#8212; lina (@wedrovenorth) <a href="https://twitter.com/wedrovenorth/status/1113122377028775936?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 2, 2019</a></blockquote>
Although several outlets reached out to Green Day for clarification on the subject of whether they are dropping a graphc novel about feminism written entirely by men, neither the band nor their publicist have responded.
Being on the wrong side of the &#8220;woke&#8221; is likely a new experience for Green Day, whether the criticism is warranted or not. The band has hailed itself as something of a punk rock protest band in recent years, after penning their &#8220;rock opera&#8221; titled &#8220;American Idiot&#8221; as a way of fighting back against the Afghanistan and Iraq wars back during the George W. Bush years.
The trio eventually turned &#8220;American Idiot&#8221; into a successful Broadway musical, and after staying largely silent during the Obama Administration, which continued to prosecute both the Afghanistan and Iraq war and expand the American role in conflict across the globe, often turning to questionably ethical drone warfare, resurfaced recently to protest President Donald Trump.
At one point, lead singer Armstrong even <a href="https://www.nme.com/news/music/billie-joe-armstrong-tells-trump-supporting-fan-to-stop-listening-to-green-day-2204587">demanded that Trump supporters stop listening to Green Day&#8217;s music</a> after a fan noted that Armstrong&#8217;s virulent anti-Trump tweets would do little to change the mind of fans who support the president. They even included an anti-Trump protest song, &#8220;<a href="https://consequenceofsound.net/2017/11/donald-trump-is-a-terrifying-zombie-in-green-days-new-song-video-back-in-the-usa-watch/">Back in the USA</a>,&#8221; as a bonus feature on their 2017 greatest hits album.
But even the wokest among us are not wokest for long.

&#8216;Woke&#8217; Band Green Day Is Writing A Handbook For Feminists. Feminists Are NOT Having It

Feminism

Oprah Winfrey is leading the cultural shift in the wake of &#8220;Leaving Neverland,&#8221; an explosive documentary that alleges pop icon Michael Jackson sexually abused young boys throughout his long and fruitful career as an entertainer.
Speaking with Jackson&#8217;s two main accusers on her OWN network &#8212; Wade Robson and James Safechuck &#8212; Winfrey said that the fallout over the documentary &#8220;transcends Michael Jackson&#8221; and she hoped it will open a broader conversation about sexual abuse. The interview, &#8220;Oprah Winfrey Presents: After Neverland,&#8221; also featured other sexual abuse survivors, like actor Anthony Edwards of &#8220;ER.&#8221;
&#8220;I know people all over the world are going to be in an uproar and debating whether or not Michael Jackson did these things and whether these two men are lying or not lying. But for me, this moment transcends Michael Jackson,&#8221; Winfrey said. &#8220;It is much bigger than any one person. This is a moment in time that allows us to see this societal corruption. It&#8217;s like a scourge on humanity. . . . If it gets you, our audience, to see how it happens, then some good would have come of it.&#8221;
&#8220;Here&#8217;s the reason why I am here: In 25 years of &#8216;The Oprah [Winfrey] Show, I taped 217 episodes on sexual abuse,&#8221; Winfrey said, according to <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/oprah-winfrey-on-explosive-documentary-leaving-neverland-this-moment-transcends-michael-jackson">Fox News</a>. &#8220;I tried and tried and tried to get the message across to people that sexual abuse was not just abuse, it was also sexual seduction.&#8221;
&#8220;And it&#8217;s happening right now and it&#8217;s happening with families. We know it&#8217;s happening in churches and in schools and sports teams everywhere. So, if it gets you, our audience, to see how it happens, then some good would have come of it,&#8221; she concluded. &#8220;I hope we can get past Michael Jackson, the icon. Stop staring into the sun and do what is necessary to heal our children and heal ourselves.&#8221;
At one point in the interview, Oprah asked Michael Jackson&#8217;s accuser, Wade Robson, if he thought what he experienced was abuse when Michael Jackson molested him.
&#8220;As young boys, these two men did not feel abuse until much later on in life,&#8221; Winfrey explained. &#8220;Were you thinking about it as abuse then? Did you know you were being abused, and you were just defending Michael?&#8221;
&#8220;From night one of the abuse, of the sexual stuff that Michael did to me, he told me it was love,&#8221; Robson said. &#8220;He told me that he loved me and God brought us together. &#8230; Anything Michael would say to me was gospel.&#8221;
Safechuck echoed that sentiment: &#8220;Michael drilled in you, &#8216;If you&#8217;re caught, we&#8217;re caught, your life is over, my life is over.&#8217; It&#8217;s repeated over and over again, it&#8217;s drilled into your nervous system. It takes a lot of work to sort through that.&#8221;
Oprah received significant criticism from some of Jackson&#8217;s die-hard fans on social media for agreeing to interview Safechuck and Robson.
&#8220;So many in media, inc <a data-mentioned-user-id="19397785" data-scribe="element:mention" href="https://twitter.com/Oprah">@Oprah</a>, blindly taking <a data-query-source="hashtag_click" data-scribe="element:hashtag" href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/LeavingNeverland?src=hash">#LeavingNeverland</a> at face value, shaping a narrative uninterested in facts, proof, credibility,&#8221; wrote Jermaine Jackson on Twitter. &#8220;We faced similar &#8216;graphic&#8217; claims + trial-by-media in &#8217;05. Jury saw through it all. Trial-by-law proved Michael&#8217;s innocence long ago. Fact.&#8221;
Another Twitter user said: &#8220;I&#8217;m done with Oprah but she&#8217;s going to get dragged internationally. I&#8217;ll worry about Queen Sugar and Greenleaf later. I can&#8217;t believe this is happening, I never thought I would <a data-query-source="hashtag_click" data-scribe="element:hashtag" href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/muteoprah?src=hash">#muteoprah</a>.&#8221;
<div class="embed video fluid-video"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/6ag39V0qCSo" width="560"></iframe></div>

Oprah Winfrey On ‘Leaving Neverland’: ‘This Moment Transcends Michael Jackson’

Michael Jackson

Oprah Winfrey

Pedophilia

Sexual Abuse

The fallout from the explosive HBO documentary, &#8220;Leaving Neverland,&#8221; has led three major radio stations in Montreal, Canada to entirely blacklist pop icon Michael Jackson&#8217;s music due to the documentary having raised serious allegations of pedophilia.
According to <a href="https://variety.com/2019/biz/news/michael-jackson-leaving-neverland-canadian-radio-ban-abuse-1203155232/">Variety</a>, Cogeco Media, which owns the three radio stations &#8212; CKOI, Rythme, and The Beat &#8212; announced this week that Michael Jackson&#8217;s music will no longer be available due to sensitivity to their listeners.
&#8220;We are attentive to the comments of our listeners, and the documentary released on Sunday evening created reactions,&#8221; a spokesperson for Cogeco Media told Variety on Tuesday. &#8220;We prefer to observe the situation by removing the songs from our stations, for the time being.&#8221;
The spokesperson told Variety the decision extends to smaller markets in Quebec that Cogeco also services. No other Quebec station has made any such announcement to ban Michael Jackson from the airwaves.
A spokesperson for Corus Radio said in an email to <a href="https://www.citynews1130.com/2019/03/04/quebec-stations-stop-playing-michael-jackson-citing-abuse-allegations/">The Canadian Press</a> on Sunday that the station will be &#8220;monitoring&#8221; the situation. &#8220;We currently have no plans to pull the songs but are monitoring the situation closely,&#8221; said the email.
Upon the documentary&#8217;s release, rumors swirled that England&#8217;s BBC2 &#8220;quietly&#8221; blacklisted Jackson&#8217;s music &#8212; but a BBC <a href="https://variety.com/2019/music/news/michael-jackson-music-not-banned-bbc-1203154258/">representative disputed that in a statement to Variety</a>. &#8220;The BBC does not ban artists,&#8221; the representative said. &#8220;We consider each piece of music on its merits and decisions on what we play on different networks are always made with relevant audiences and context in mind.&#8221;
The second largest radio network in the United States, Cumulus, said that decisions to blacklist Michael Jackson&#8217;s music will be at the discretion of local markets.
&#8220;Cumulus Media is never in favor of censorship,&#8221; a rep told Variety. &#8220;This is a local market decision where the company is allowing local Program Directors to make the right decision regarding airplay for their communities.&#8221;
iHeartRadio, Spotify, and Apple Music all issued no comment to Variety on the matter of banning Jackson&#8217;s music.
As <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44189/bombshell-documentary-premieres-detailing-michael-hank-berrien">reported</a> by The Daily Wire&#8217;s Hank Berrien on Monday, the two-part documentary &#8220;Leaving Neverland&#8221; accuses the &#8220;Thriller&#8221; singer of sexually abusing young boys, often in his own home.
<blockquote>
As <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6767701/Michael-Jackson-accuser-James-Safechuck-says-singer-bought-Neverland-Ranch-him.html">The Daily Mail</a> reports, James Safechuck, who claims he was 10 years old when the alleged abuse began, and Wade Robson, who claims he was seven when he was abused, have come forth with allegations that Jackson abused them.
Safechuck was nine years old when he worked with Jackson on a Pepsi commercial, prompting trips around the world with Jackson. He said he and Jackson had a marriage ceremony in a hotel room when he was 10; Safechuck&#8217;s mother said that she had no qualms at the time about the trips because she also traveled with them.
In the film, Safechuck, who stated that he kept the brochure about Neverland from when Jackson was debating whether to buy it, said that before Jackson purchased the estate he told the boy the purchase was for him. Safechuck stated, &#8220;He said I am going to purchase this house. It&#8217;s gonna be yours, like this place is for you.&#8221; He added, &#8220;Me and Michael would be there a lot together, we would go for like a week at a time.&#8221;
</blockquote>
On Monday, the documentary sent a shockwave across social media, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44191/fallout-over-michael-jackson-documentary-music-paul-bois">dividing people into two camps</a>: Fierce defenders of Jackson and ex-fans too sickened by the allegations to hear him sing again.
&#8220;He is properly dead to me now,&#8221; said Suzanne Moore of The Guardian.

FALLOUT: Three Quebec Radio Stations Blacklist Michael Jackson&#8217;s Music

We all remember the Fyre Festival, right? Nearly two years ago, rapper Ja Rule and a bunch of social media celebrities <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/15869/7-things-know-about-fyre-festival-debacle-aaron-bandler">promised rich millennials a luxury Coachella</a> in the Bahamas with gourmet meals and private cabanas.
What concert goers actually received was closer to disaster relief than luxury living. The &#8220;gourmet food&#8221; was just bread, cheese, and a salad. The private cabanas were tents with little-to-no electricity. Participants were provided private lockers, but apparently not told they needed to bring their own locks.
The whole episode was a disaster and perfect chance for social media mockery. It has since spawned two documentaries &#8212; one on Hulu and the other on Netflix &#8212; and now one of the festival&#8217;s producers, who became famous in one of the documentaries for offering blow jobs for water, might get his own TV show.
Andy King, an event producer, was featured in the Netflix documentary on Fyre Festival, titled &#8220;Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened.&#8221; Here&#8217;s how the Decider describes King&#8217;s involvement in the festival:
&#8220;During the SVOD feature, King revealed that founder Billy McFarland asked him to handle the negotiation of a fine from customs in the amount of $175,000, which if paid, would allow trucks full of Evian water to flow through customs.
When sh*t hits the fan, McFarland asks King to visit the Head of Customs and&#8230; &#8220;suck [his] dick&#8221; if he has to. King, who felt that there was no other solution, headed to the office prepared to perform the act of felatio, but was luckily spared the embarrassment by the customs official.
&#8220;I got into my car to drive across the island to take one for the team. And I got to [the customs officer&#8217;s] office, fully prepared to suck his dick,&#8221; he noted during the film, before revealing that the officer &#8220;couldn&#8217;t have been nicer&#8221; and literally just wanted the fine to be paid.&#8221;
For this, King, according to King, was offered his own TV show by three different &#8220;notable networks.&#8221;
King, in an interview with Vanity Fair, appears humbled and embarrassed by the inclusion of this story.
&#8220;When my great cameo came up, everybody just started clapping and cheering. And I just shrunk down in my seat, thinking, &#8216;Oh my word, is this what I&#8217;m going to be famous for?&#8217;&#8221; <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/02/fyre-festival-netflix-documentary-andy-king">he told VF</a>.
King also said that his story in the documentary was not meant to reflect an acceptance of sexual harassment in the workplace, but as an example of &#8220;just how crazy it was down there.&#8221; He emphasized that he is &#8220;a very conservative New Englander.&#8221;
He said his short cameo has gotten him offers from various water companies looking to cash in on the guy that would do literally anything for water, and from three networks.
&#8220;You see the attractiveness of HGTV today. People love Flip or Flop or Fixer Upper. Let&#8217;s just say it&#8217;s going to be a show about hosting crazy events&#8212;what it takes to make them happen. There will be cliff-hangers, and you&#8217;ll get to follow me around and see how I pull them off,&#8221; King said.

FAILING UP: Fyre Festival Producer Might Get His Own TV Show

Vanity Fair

Although the high-profile, star-studded music festival has been going on for years, it seems leftists only just realized &#8212; this week &#8212; that Coachella, which draws decidedly liberal headliners like Beyonce and Eminem, is owned and managed by &#8230; a Republican.
The story itself isn&#8217;t new. <a href="https://www.thefader.com/2018/01/03/coachella-philip-anschutz-anti-gay-abortion">Fader and other music-centric publications</a> have routinely reported that Philip Anschutz, the CEO of AEG and owner of Golden Voice/Coachella, which puts on the yearly festival, donates regularly to conservative causes, and dropped more than a million dollars during the 2016 election.
This year, the same outlets report that Anschutz gave nearly $200,000 to Republicans, as if they expected Anschutz to suddenly stop making political contributions when his preferred targets were revealed. Those donations went to everyone from Colorado Senator Cory Gardner (R-CO) to the National Republican Senate Committee (or NRSC), and were, of course, used to defeat Democratic candidates (something Fader seems unduly shocked by).
Spin Magazine reportedly breathlessly on Anschutz&#8217;s donations, laying them out by line item.
<blockquote>
According to records retrieved from the Federal Election Commission and the website Open Secrets, the recipients of Anschutz&#8217;s 2017 political donations included $5,400 apiece to Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, Senator Cory Gardner (R-CO), and Rep. Mike Coffman (R-CO). Rep. Scott Tipton (R-CO) received $2,700, while Paul Ryan&#8217;s Prosperity Action PAC received an additional $5,000 &#8230;
Anschutz&#8217;s biggest donations of 2017 went to the National Republican Senatorial Committee ($104,600) and the National Republican Congressional Committee ($33,400), which aim to protect conservative majorities in their respective houses of Congress.
</blockquote>
<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/donor-lookup/results?name=Philip+Anschutz">Open Secrets is clea</a>r that Anschutz&#8217;s giving goes back more than a decade, and that he&#8217;s rarely wavered from his commitment to electing conservative politicians. His record features donations to Bob Dole in 1990, Orrin Hatch in 1994, John McCain in 1998, Elizabeth Dole in 1999, John Ashcroft in 1999, George W. Bush in 2000, and so on. He&#8217;s hardly a &#8220;new kid on the block.&#8221;
But perhaps what drives leftists and entertainment journalists crazy about Anschutz is that his company, Goldenvoice, which produces Coachella (and several other high-profile music festivals), earns millions from millennials and other decidedly progressive demographics. In 2017 alone, Coachella hauled in a &#8220;record&#8221; $114 million in profits, <a href="https://www.grammy.com/grammys/news/music-festivals-2017-coachella-hauls-record-114-million-profit">according to the GRAMMY foundation</a>, and it&#8217;s consistently among the top-earning recurring music festivals, easily clearing $40 million in profit every year since it became a two-weekend event in 2012.
The event is so well attended, thanks to its popularity among Hollywood starlets, top models, Instagram influencers, and the music glitterati, that in 2018, it could afford to <a href="https://www.grammy.com/grammys/news/music-festivals-2017-coachella-hauls-record-114-million-profit">shell out more than $3 million</a> to have Beyonce headline the event.
For some reason, this year the panic has caught on among possible festival-goers, perhaps because the lineup for 2019&#8217;s Coachella isn&#8217;t as strong as it has been in recent years. Fader&#8217;s follow up article, which was published late last week, sent leftists on social media into fits of depression, punctuated by the occasional rage spiral kickoff.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Philip Anschutz, the owner of Golden Voice/Coachella, was a Republican mega-donor who gave over $1,000,000 to conservatives during the 2016 election and close to $200,000 to Republican politicians in 2017.
I&#8217;m glad no metal bands are playing. No band with any integrity should. <a href="https://t.co/nXR3pL7FNT">https://t.co/nXR3pL7FNT</a>
&#8212; Kim &#8220;Union Goth&#8221; Kelly (@GrimKim) <a href="https://twitter.com/GrimKim/status/1081979003706265601?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 6, 2019</a></blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Going to Coachella? Hope you feel good about helping fund anti-LGBT anti-abortion and Republican campaigns. <a href="https://t.co/enEpoS7z9E">pic.twitter.com/enEpoS7z9E</a>
&#8212; Your Local Shawty (@_decadentjayy) <a href="https://twitter.com/_decadentjayy/status/1080985095861809152?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 4, 2019</a></blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Coachella doesn&#8217;t seem so festive&#8230; <a href="https://t.co/N6edXOjxwF">https://t.co/N6edXOjxwF</a>
&#8212; popdefined (@popdefined) <a href="https://twitter.com/popdefined/status/1081207823827173376?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 4, 2019</a></blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
I&#8217;m torn because I think it&#8217;s awesome that BLACKPINK is playing at a music festival as well known as Coachella but unfortunately its owner continues to be anti-LGBTQ, pro-gun and anti-abortion.<a href="https://t.co/cgugwovl5B">https://t.co/cgugwovl5B</a>
&#8212; tella (@SonexStella) <a href="https://twitter.com/SonexStella/status/1080700737741414400?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 3, 2019</a></blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Why should <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Coachella?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Coachella</a> attendees give their hard earned money to the people funding a divisive <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Republican?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Republican</a> agenda? 
Lineup artists be informed &amp; consider <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/facts?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#facts</a>. Stand for something before you fall for anything! <a href="https://twitter.com/ArianaGrande?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@ArianaGrande</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/donaldglover?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@donaldglover</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/tameimpala?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@tameimpala</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Integrity?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Integrity</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Resist?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Resist</a> <a href="https://t.co/p6rkyLKU0t">https://t.co/p6rkyLKU0t</a>
&#8212; Shifali (@Shifali) <a href="https://twitter.com/Shifali/status/1081813106894856193?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 6, 2019</a></blockquote>
Poor kids.
Just wait until they find out that Urban Outfitters, where they no doubt go to compile their Coachella wardrobes, is also <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/4014166/republican-leaning-urban-outfitters-ceo-profits-from-democrat-leaning-shoppers">owned by a Republican</a>.

Leftists PANIC After Discovering Coachella Owner Donates Thousands To Republicans

Beyonce

Republican Party

The far left is having trouble fighting wars on two fronts. With President Donald Trump in office, it&#8217;s fair to say that there hasn&#8217;t been much of a &#8220;War on Christmas&#8221; this year, since the War on Trump is never-ending. But it&#8217;s more than that. The left has become so radicalized in its deconstructionist ways that it is making a fool of itself in the court of public opinion.
Oh, sure, there were a few of the usual stories about cowardly school officials issuing edicts that no choir can sing &#8220;Jesus songs&#8221; at the annual &#8220;winter concert.&#8221; But this year we were introduced to a new wrinkle: Christmas vs. #MeToo. And #MeToo is upset at the 1940s Frank Loesser standard &#8220;Baby, It&#8217;s Cold Outside.&#8221; A radio station in Cleveland got the ball rolling by banning its airplay for being outside the #MeToo spirit of consensual sex. Others have joined in, a chorus of nameless, faceless shrews out there who must, must, must voice their unhappiness at all times. The New York Times asked, &#8220;Prelude to Date Rape?&#8221;
Thinking people &#8212; which is to say everyone but the crazy fringes of the #MeToo movement &#8212; are shaking their heads in disbelief. Any scan of the lyrics shows you this is not a Christmas song in any way. It&#8217;s a sly little song about how the woman shouldn&#8217;t stay overnight because her relatives will be scandalized, and the man tries to get her to stay. Other than the woman asking &#8220;What&#8217;s in this drink?&#8221; there is no issue of the woman&#8217;s consent. It&#8217;s just a flirty late-night dialogue.
It&#8217;s been a seasonal staple for 70 years. But in 2018, it became offensive. What makes this controversy hilarious is how tame this is when compared to the tone of current hip-hop music. When one of these &#8220;songs&#8221; does not include lyrics about &#8220;hos&#8221; and &#8220;b&#8212;&#8212;es,&#8221; something is amiss.
Take, for just one example, a No. 1 hit song from earlier this year &#8212; &#8220;Psycho&#8221; by rappers Post Malone and Ty Dolla Sign. There are no sly allusions in these lyrics, although older folks won&#8217;t get the slang at all. &#8220;You should see the whip, promise I can take yo&#8217; b&#8212;&#8212;. Dolla ridin&#8217; in an old-school Chevy, it&#8217;s a drop-top. Boolin&#8217; with a thot-thot, she gon&#8217; give me top-top.&#8221;
Rough translation: My Chevy is so nifty I can steal your woman, who is a whore. (&#8220;Thot&#8221; stands for &#8220;that ho over there,&#8221; in the event you care.) Your whore is going to perform oral sex (&#8220;top-top&#8221;) because she&#8217;s a slut.
How is all this showing respect for women? They performed this song on national TV, including at the American Music Awards and on &#8220;The Tonight Show&#8221; with Jimmy Fallon.
The #MeToo movement must have turned in early. They never said a word.
Or take the song &#8220;King&#8217;s Dead,&#8221; released as the second single from the soundtrack of the year&#8217;s biggest movie, &#8220;Black Panther.&#8221; The rapper, Future, boasts about taking another man&#8217;s &#8220;baby mama&#8221; and insisting she perform oral sex, and then suggests that laws should be broken and people murdered.
The only &#8220;benefit&#8221; of this rapper&#8217;s &#8220;performance&#8221; is you can barely make out these stupid lyrics without an interpreter. Pitchfork magazine called it &#8220;fun and swaggering,&#8221; even as the reviewer poked at Future&#8217;s &#8220;helium-induced falsetto.&#8221;
Again, the #MeToo movement was nowhere to be found.
So this is the very confused culture we live in. People organize to ban old songs with lyrics like &#8220;So really, I&#8217;d better scurry (Beautiful, please don&#8217;t hurry),&#8221; while they approve the &#8220;fun and swaggering&#8221; lyrics like &#8220;Chitty chitty bang, murder everything.&#8221;
There was a seriousness of purpose when the #MeToo movement was launched. It has become a joke.
L. Brent Bozell III is the president of the Media Research Center. Tim Graham is director of media analysis at the Media Research Center and executive editor of the blog NewsBusters.org. To find out more about Brent Bozell III and Tim Graham, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

BOZELL &#038; GRAHAM: Baby, It&#8217;s Crazy Outside

Progressivism

Is playing the flute similar to playing the oboe? A Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) flutist believes so &#8211; at least as far as pay is concerned.
Daily Wire Senior Editor Ashe Schow appeared on Martha MacCallum&#8217;s Fox News program, &#8220;The Story,&#8221; Monday night to discuss <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/39313/woman-sues-orchestra-pay-discrimination-theres-ashe-schow">the legal battle</a> happening over Massachusetts&#8217; new equal pay law, which flutist Elizabeth Rowe says requires the BSO to pay her at least as much as the orchestra&#8217;s prize oboist, John Ferrillo. MacCallum asked if Rowe had a case, to which Schow responded:
<blockquote>
I don&#8217;t believe she has an argument. This is not a case of unequal pay for equal work. These are two very different instruments, the oboe &#8212; trying to find a principal oboist is a much more difficult process than finding a flutist. The Boston Symphony Orchestra pointed out that it&#8217;s a much more difficult process. John Ferrillo was lured away from the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and promised to be paid twice as much as the rank-and-file members while Rowe went through the blind audition process.
</blockquote>
MacCallum then asked if there were other examples within the orchestra of men and women receiving different pay, which of course there were, Schow said:
<blockquote>
Absolutely. So, Ferrillo might be the highest paid principal in this orchestra, and there are four other principals &#8211;all men &#8211; who are paid more than Elizabeth Rowe and there are nine other principals including one woman, a harpist, who is paid less than Rowe. So, unless she&#8217;s trying to say that all principals should be [paid] the same, or that other instruments should be paid equally&#8230; If she&#8217;s trying to say the oboe and the flute are the same then should the clarinet player be paid the same, should the bassoonist? These are big questions.
</blockquote>
MacCallum brought up a study that showed the average male orchestra member earns $254,000 a year while the average female member earns $202,000. As with all &#8220;wage&#8221; disputes, Schow noted that a variety of factors could be at play:
<blockquote>
The Washington Post put one together and they found that 18% of the top earners in various symphonies are women. So, only 18%. What isn&#8217;t looked at is what instruments are making the most money. Perhaps women are flocking to the same instruments while men are taking over all of the others so that there is a huge pool of women vying for a small number of positions versus men who are applying for multiple instruments. This might be a supply and demand situation rather than a gender situation.
</blockquote>
MacCallum then asked how this orchestra pay dispute fit into the larger issue of men and women earning different amounts in the broader workplace, to which Schow responded:
<blockquote>
There are still situations, there&#8217;s still different factors that are going into why Elizabeth Rowe is paid less than John Ferrillo, and it has connotations outside of just the orchestra, in the main business world. Women make choices, in this case, deciding to play an instrument that a lot of other people also play versus Ferrillo choosing to play an instrument that not as many people play. We see that in the business world, where men go into more difficult, more dangerous, higher-paying jobs where women tend to do what they like which gravitates towards jobs that don&#8217;t need as much education and don&#8217;t command as high a salary.
</blockquote>
MacCallum acknowledged that many women still feel that they are being paid less than a man, and asked if this meant there was no disparity based on gender. Schow said the examples are few and far between:
<blockquote>
Absolutely not, but most of those disparities do come from factors such as hours worked, such as the jobs that you go into, such as taking time off to raise a child, or taking time out of the workforce to care for a child. These are all factors. But sometimes, sometimes, yes, a man and a woman may be paid unequally and it is unfair, but those are rare instances and very difficult to find in an actual case.
</blockquote>
You can watch the full clip below:
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Watch the latest video at <a data-scayt-word="href" data-wsc-lang="en_US">href=&#8221;https://www.foxnews.com&#8221;&gt;foxnews.com</a>
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Schow On Orchestra Wage Dispute: ‘This Is Not A Case Of Unequal Pay For Equal Work’

Fox News

Gender Wage Gap

Martha MacCallum

Massachusetts

The first chair flutist for the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) is suing the organization, claiming she receives $70,000 less than her male counterpart because she is a woman.
Elizabeth Rowe joined the BSO when she was 29 after a blind audition, which, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/entertainment/music/orchestra-gender-pay-gap/?utm_term=.5dc19f6e2ac2">according to The Washington Post</a> involved playing &#8220;behind a brown, 33-foot polyester screen&#8221; so no one knew her gender or race. Rowe is now 44, and knows that John Ferrillo, a 63-year-old man, makes nearly $70,000 more than her, because his salary was disclosed in a tax filing since the BSO is a nonprofit organization.
Ferrillo has been with the BSO since 2001. Rowe has been with the orchestra since 2004. Ferrillo was also lured away from the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, the Post reported, by offering to pay him &#8220;twice what the orchestra&#8217;s rank-and-file-make.&#8221;
But the biggest difference between the two? Rowe plays the flute, while Ferrillo plays the oboe. Two very different instruments. So, this is not a case of unequal pay for equal work. The BSO provided the Post with a statement in which it &#8220;defended its pay structure, saying that the flute and oboe are not comparable because, in part, the oboe is more difficult to play and there is a larger pool of flutists.&#8221;
The BSO insisted gender plays no role in compensating players.
There you have it. Ferrillo is a prized oboist, which is much rarer than a prized flutist.
The Post went through the average pay (that&#8217;s how people claim wage discrepancy, rather than comparing apples to apples) of America&#8217;s largest orchestras, and found that only 18% of the top earners are women, and that the &#8220;top male earner makes $535,789, while the top female earner makes $410,912.&#8221; The Post does not say what instruments these top earners play or for which orchestras they play.
There&#8217;s more:
&#8220;Although four other principal BSO players &#8212; all men &#8212; earn more than Rowe, the orchestra notes that she is paid more than nine other principals, of which only one, harpist Jessica Zhou, is a woman. Rowe has been given occasional raises, and her current salary is $250,149 a year.&#8221;
To be fair to Rowe, she didn&#8217;t want her lawsuit to become public. The Post reports that she only wanted her bosses to know about the lawsuit, but the Boston Herald <a href="https://www.bostonherald.com/2018/07/04/boston-symphony-orchestra-flute-player-takes-equal-pay-fight-to-court/">discovered the suit and spoke to Rowe</a>. Her lawsuit will test the Massachusetts Equal Pay Law which her lawsuit claims requires the orchestra to pay her the same or more than a male in a comparable position. She contends lead oboist is comparable. The BSO says otherwise.
The Boston Herald reported that Rowe was used as the &#8220;face of the BSO&#8221; and retaliated against her when she brought up the pay issue previously.
&#8220;In December 2017, the BSO asked her to be interviewed by Katie Couric for a National Geographic segment on the orchestra&#8217;s longtime practice of using blind auditions &#8212; a procedure of screening auditioning musicians from their evaluators to combat race and gender bias,&#8221; the Herald reported. &#8220;Rowe told the orchestra&#8217;s public relations staff she&#8217;d love to be interviewed and mentioned her concerns of salary discrimination at the BSO. The invitation was rescinded.&#8221;

Woman Sues Orchestra For Pay Discrimination. There’s Just One Problem.

Boston

The internet went wild Monday with <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/37142/michael-bubl%C3%A9-quitting-music-after-sons-cancer-paul-bois">reports</a> that famed singer Michael Bublé would be retiring from music following his son&#8217;s cancer battle. The news stemmed from an interview he gave to the Daily Mail in which he appeared to announce his exit from the spotlight.
&#8220;This is my last interview. I&#8217;m retiring,&#8221; Bublé told <a data-rapid-parsed="slk" data-rapid_p="2" data-v9y="1" data-ylk="subsec:paragraph;cpos:1;elm:context_link;itc:0" href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6271069/My-three-year-old-sons-cancer-want-die-says-Michael-Buble.html">the Daily Mail</a>. &#8220;I&#8217;ve made the perfect record and now I can leave at the very top.&#8221;
Bublé said his son&#8217;s battle with liver cancel changed his whole perspective on life, asserting he could no longer stomach the culture of &#8220;celebrity narcissism.&#8221;
According to the singer&#8217;s publicist, however, the Daily Mail ran with a sensationalized report that did not reflect Bublé&#8217;s actual intent and even told E! News the rumors of his retirement are &#8220;<a href="https://www.eonline.com/news/977510/michael-buble-laughs-off-retirement-rumors-consider-the-source">not true at all</a>.&#8221;
The 43-year-old singer further reassured his fans in a recent interview with SiriusXM&#8217;s Fantasy Sports Radio, where he took a not-so-subtle jab at the Daily Mail.
&#8220;Just consider the source &#8212; that&#8217;s all I say to people,&#8221; he said. &#8220;My buddies wrote me. I said, &#8216;Look at who said it.&#8217; C&#8217;mon, are you kidding me? I need the money. I&#8217;m not going anywhere.&#8221;
Bublé&#8217;s latest album &#8220;Love&#8221; will hit stores on November 16 of this year.

UPDATE: Michael Bublé Says He&#8217;s Actually Not Quitting Music

CORRECTION: The author wrote this piece based on a Daily Mail <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6271069/My-three-year-old-sons-cancer-want-die-says-Michael-Buble.html">story</a> quoting Michael Bublé that circulated widely around the Internet. When Bublé&#8217;s publicist <a href="https://www.eonline.com/news/977510/michael-buble-laughs-off-retirement-rumors-consider-the-source">said</a> that The Daily Mail mischaracterized the singer&#8217;s remarks, the author published an <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/37199/update-michael-bubl%C3%A9-says-hes-actually-not-paul-bois">updated story</a> noting that Bublé is not retiring, and linked to that updated story at the bottom of the original story. 
The Daily Wire editorial team is writing this update at the top of the page so that readers who come to this story are fully aware that Michael Bublé is not retiring.
-DW EDITORIAL STAFF, 12.10.18

Famed singer <a data-rapid-parsed="slk" data-rapid_p="1" data-v9y="1" data-ylk="subsec:paragraph;cpos:1;elm:context_link;itc:0" href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/topic/michael-buble">Michael Bublé</a>, whose pleasantly smooth voice delights the airwaves every year around Christmas, says he will be quitting following his son&#8217;s cancer battle, professing he no longer has the stomach for the culture of &#8220;celebrity narcissism.&#8221;
&#8220;This is my last interview. I&#8217;m retiring,&#8221; Bublé told The <a data-rapid-parsed="slk" data-rapid_p="2" data-v9y="1" data-ylk="subsec:paragraph;cpos:1;elm:context_link;itc:0" href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6271069/My-three-year-old-sons-cancer-want-die-says-Michael-Buble.html">The Daily Mail</a> in an interview. &#8220;I&#8217;ve made the perfect record and now I can leave at the very top.&#8221;
The 43-year-old singer described how his &#8220;perception of life&#8221; completely changed while helping his 5-year-old son Noah battle liver cancer.
&#8220;My whole being&#8217;s changed. My perception of life,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I don&#8217;t know if I can even get through this conversation without crying. And I&#8217;ve never lost control of my emotions in public.&#8221;
Fortunately, after being diagnosed in 2016, Noah&#8217;s cancer has been deemed in remission. Bublé says it has forced him to question everything.
&#8220;Going through this with Noah, I didn&#8217;t question who I was, I just questioned everything else. Why are we here?&#8221; he said. &#8220;Is this all there is? Because if this is all there is, there has to be something bigger.&#8221;
The singer said that this culture of &#8220;celebrity narcissism&#8221; made him a person who cared about &#8220;stupid&#8221; things like &#8220;ticket sales for my tours, what the critics said, what the perception of me might be.&#8221;
&#8220;I was embarrassed by my ego, that it had allowed this insecurity,&#8221; he said. &#8220;And I&#8217;d decided I&#8217;d never read my name again in print, never read a review, and I never have. I decided I&#8217;d never use social media again, and I never have.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/37199/update-michael-bubl%C3%A9-says-hes-actually-not-paul-bois">UPDATE: Michael Bublé Says He&#8217;s Actually Not Quitting Music</a>

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<a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BCkfKKdpSyf/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_medium=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">I hate posting just anything , so Instead ,Im posting my everything. We&#8217;re on the best vacation ever. Lots of sunshine with my sunshine. #family #vacation #meandmyshadow</a>
A post shared by <a href="https://www.instagram.com/michaelbuble/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_medium=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"> Michael Bublé</a> (@michaelbuble) on Mar 5, 2016 at 3:43am PST
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<div><a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BLoIek9jPFg/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_medium=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">View this post on Instagram</a></div>
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<a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BLoIek9jPFg/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_medium=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Feliz día de la madre !! Happy Mother&#8217;s Day @luisanalopilato !! #myhero #bestmommy #bestfriend</a>
A post shared by <a href="https://www.instagram.com/michaelbuble/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_medium=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"> Michael Bublé</a> (@michaelbuble) on Oct 16, 2016 at 7:25am PDT
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Michael Bublé Quitting Music After Son’s Cancer Battle. UPDATE: Not Really.

Charles Aznavour (Shahnour Vaghinag Aznavourian), the Paris-born Armenian singer-songwriter, actor, and diplomat, who was known as &#8220;France&#8217;s Frank Sinatra&#8221;, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2018/10/01/world/europe/ap-eu-france-aznavour-a-life.html">died this month</a>, on October 1st, 2018.
Born in 1924 to Armenian immigrants who&#8217;d fled to France amid Turkey&#8217;s perpetration of ethnic cleansing and genocide against Armenians in the early 20th century, Aznavour was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Aznavour">raised by a family of artists</a>. His father was a singer, performing in French restaurants prior to opening his own.
Aznavour dropped out of school at a young age of nine to pursue his career as an entertainer &#8212; before his 10th birthday, he&#8217;d already starred in a movie and a theater production. Despite his young age, Aznavour insisted that he was never pressured or forced to become a performer. To him, it was a natural calling. &#8220;People say that they put me on the stage, but I put myself there. It was natural. It was what I wanted to do.&#8221; 
Aznavour later shifted his focus to professional dancing. He didn&#8217;t write his first song until the age of 24 in 1950.
He got his big break when he began opening for the legendary French singer, Edith Piaf. After his distinctive rich, mellow voice caught her attention, <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/%C3dith-piaf-mn0000150629/biography">Piaf took Aznavour under her wing</a>, mentoring the young virtuoso. Piaf advised Aznavour to pursue a singing career.
Aznavour went on to command a career lasting 80 years. He wrote a whopping 1000 songs, sold 180 million albums, and dazzled audiences in sold-out auditoriums well into his 90&#8217;s. He sang in an astounding 8 different languages: French, English, Italian, Spanish, German, Russian, Armenian, and Neapolitan.
Aznavour&#8217;s music knew no boundaries, touching upon an eclectic range of themes.
He wrote songs that by any <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jun/19/charles-aznavour-i-wanted-to-break-every-taboo">standard were ahead of their time</a>. In &#8220;What Makes a Man&#8221; (1972), Aznavour sang about a gay transvestite. The lyrics are overall great but especially outstanding are the lines, &#8220;Nobody has the right to be; the judge of what is right for me; tell me if you can; what make a man a man.&#8221;
In 1974, Aznavour topped UK charts with his number one hit, &#8220;She&#8221;. One of the most beautiful love ballads ever written, with lyrics like, &#8220;She may be the beauty or the beast; may be the famine or the feast; may turn each day into a Heaven or a Hell&#8221;.
The following year, in 1975, he wrote a song dedicated to the victims of the Armenian Genocide titled &#8220;Ils Sont Tombes&#8221; (They Fell). 
Despite being born in France, Aznavour always remained true to his Armenian identity. In 1979 he <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/charles-aznavour-dead-french-singer-frank-sinatra-edith-piaf-armenian-a8564646.html">proudly proclaimed</a>, &#8220;I am Armenian. Everybody figures that I am a Frenchman because I sing in French. I act like a Frenchman and I have all the symptoms of a Frenchman, but my parents are Armenian.&#8221;
Aznavour founded the charitable organization Aznavour for Armenia following the tragic earthquake that shook Armenia in 1988. In 1989 Aznavour wrote and dedicated the song &#8220;Pour toi Arménie&#8221; (For You, Armenia) to the estimated 50,000 victims of the earthquake.
Following Armenia&#8217;s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, Aznavour began traveling to his homeland of which he was named the ambassador to Switzerland in 2009. The following year he was granted Armenian citizenship by presidential decree.
In 1998, Aznavour was named <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/1998/nov/19/entertainment/ca-44290">Entertainer of the Century</a> by CNN &#8211; now that wasn&#8217;t fake news.
Through most of Aznavour&#8217;s childhood, Europe was immersed in war. Amid the German occupation of France, Aznavour and his family rescued and hid Jews from the Nazis. His selfless, altruistic actions awarded him the Raoul Wallenberg Award in 2017. Israeli president Reuven Rivlin extolled Aznavour&#8217;s music, calling Aznavour&#8217;s 1965 hit song La Boheme &#8211; a beautiful ballad about a nostalgic artist &#8211; his favorite song.
Receiving his award, <a href="http://www.raoulwallenberg.net/press/2017-2/charles-aznavour-receives-the-raoul-wallenberg-award-in-israel/">Aznavour said</a>, &#8220;We have so many things in common, the Jews and the Armenians, in misfortune, in happiness, in work, in music, in the arts and in the ease of learning different languages and becoming important people in the countries where they have been received.&#8221;
In August of 2017, Aznavour joined the reams of distinguished entertainers from around the globe on Hollywood&#8217;s Walk of Fame when he was awarded his own star.
Eschewing early retirement (or even, retirement at 90 years old), Aznavour lived doing what he loved to his last day. This past summer, months before his death, he&#8217;d already <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Culture/Charles-Aznavour-to-return-to-Israel-on-95th-birthday-tour-561247">announced a world tour</a> for his 95th birthday including stops in Ukraine, Israel, and Switzerland.
Through his poetic prose and velvety tenor tone, Aznavour touched countless lives. For nearly a full century, he lent his voice to the voiceless and fought for the persecuted. From hiding Jews from the Nazis in WWII to his unyielding fight for the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, Aznavour made the world a better place.
Charles Aznavour is survived by his sons Charles, Patrick, Misha, Nicolas, and daughters, Seda and Katia.
<a href="http://twitter.com/Harry1T6">Follow Harry Khachatrian on Twitter @Harry1T6</a>

KHACHATRIAN: Farewell Charles Aznavour, Master Of Song

Pop diva and left-wing political activist Barbara Streisand has a new song out and it should be a surprise to no one that she unapologetically bashes President Trump in it.
When Streisand set out to write her new political song, &#8220;Don&#8217;t Lie to Me,&#8221; she aimed to create something &#8220;very subtle&#8221; and instead let herself launch into a rant.
&#8220;I just went ballistic,&#8221; she told the <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/barbra-streisand-trump-song-dont-lie-102049471.html">AP</a> on Wednesday. &#8220;I just can&#8217;t stand what&#8217;s going on. His assault on our democracy, our institutions, our founders &#8212; I think we&#8217;re in a fight. &#8230; We&#8217;re in a war for the soul of America.&#8221;
The lyrics of &#8220;Don&#8217;t Lie To Me&#8221; accuse President Trump of essentially not caring at all &#8220;when the world is burning.&#8221;
&#8220;How do you sleep when the world keeps turning?&#8221; she asks in the song. &#8220;All that we built has come undone/How do you sleep when the world is burning?/Everyone answers to someone.&#8221;
&#8220;Don&#8217;t Lie to Me&#8221; appears on her new album, &#8220;Walls,&#8221; her first project of mainly original tracks since 2005. It will be released November 2.
Streisand felt inspired to write the song &#8220;Don&#8217;t Lie To Me&#8221; when she was listening to the news, which &#8220;was making me sick, listening to lies, listening to things that are such craziness.&#8221;
&#8220;I wanted to talk about the things that were making me feel so sad, heartbroken,&#8221; she said. &#8220;I&#8217;m a kind of fierce American. I don&#8217;t know who we are anymore as a country. Are we embracing people who flee oppression? Or are we separating children from parents, putting them in cages? I don&#8217;t know if people care about the planet, the survival of the planet. Do they care about clean air? Clean water? Clean food? If they do, how could they vote for somebody like Trump, who believes it&#8217;s a hoax? I&#8217;m frightened for this country. And yet, I have hope.&#8221;
Streisand said she also dedicated her album to all the young people speaking out in protest.
&#8220;It&#8217;s important that people vote. It&#8217;s important that people believe in the power of their own voice and how much that changes things. It&#8217;s like the kids speaking out, the Parkland kids,&#8221; she said. &#8220;It&#8217;s easy to feel powerless now but we&#8217;re not if each of us speak up and get out and vote.&#8221;

Streisand Has A New Song. Guess Whom She Bashes?

Donald Trump

Music legend Paul McCartney is being a little less Paul McCartney and a little more like his former bandmate John Lennon as of late. From his recent TMI revelation that he once <a href="https://people.com/music/paul-mccartney-john-lennon-masturbated-together/">masturbated</a> alongside the &#8220;I am the Walrus&#8221; singer to his calling climate change deniers &#8220;stupid,&#8221; McCartney is sailing close to &#8220;Imagine&#8221; territory.
According to <a href="https://people.com/music/paul-mccartney-talks-trump-and-riding-subway/">People</a>, in an interview with BBC News, McCartney commented on his newest album &#8220;Egypt Station&#8221; that features a few knocks at President Trump, which he claims were spurred by the stupidity of denying climate change. The song, &#8220;Despite Repeated Warnings,&#8221; likens President Trump to a &#8220;mad captain&#8221; on a ship while blasting climate change deniers for talking a big game without any evidence. &#8220;Those who shout the loudest/May not always be the smartest,&#8221; go the lyrics.
&#8220;People who deny climate change &#8230; I just think it&#8217;s the most stupid thing ever,&#8221; McCartney told the BBC. &#8220;So, I just wanted to make a song that would talk about that and basically say, &#8216;Occasionally, we&#8217;ve got a mad captain sailing this boat we&#8217;re all on and he is just going to take us to the iceberg [despite] being warned it&#8217;s not a cool idea.'&#8221;
Just so people would not be mistaken as to who that &#8220;Mad Captain&#8221; might be, McCartney clarified that it is President Trump.
&#8220;Obviously it&#8217;s Trump,&#8221; McCartney said before adding, &#8220;but there&#8217;s plenty of them about. He&#8217;s not the only one.&#8221;
As stated above, McCartney did recently indulge in John Lennon&#8217;s penchant for letting people in on private secrets nobody asked to hear about. He claims that they both once masturbated together while yelling the name of then-sex symbol Brigitte Bardot.
&#8220;What it was was over at John&#8217;s house, and it was just a group of us. And instead of just getting roaring drunk and partying &#8212; I don&#8217;t even know if we were staying over or anything &#8212; we were all just in these chairs, and the lights were out, and somebody started masturbating, so we all did,&#8221; he told GQ magazine. &#8220;We were just, &#8216;Brigitte Bardot!&#8217; &#8216;Whoo!&#8217; And then everyone would thrash a bit more.&#8221;
McCartney also claims to have <a href="https://people.com/music/paul-mccartney-saw-god-on-drug-trip/">seen God during a drug trip</a>.
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‘Radically Saved’ Kanye Called Rap ‘The Devil’s Music,’ Almost Quit Industry, Pastor Reveals

Pharrell Williams Expresses Regret Over ‘Rapey’ ‘Blurred Lines’ Hit: ‘We Live In A Chauvinist Society’

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This Land Is NOT Your Land: Woke Culture Now Demanding Woody Guthrie Be Canceled Over Folk Music Faux Pas

Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Born in the U.S.A.’ Turns 35

Elton John: It’s ‘Bulls***’ To Criticize A Heterosexual Man For Playing A Homosexual Man In A Film

‘Woke’ Band Green Day Is Writing A Handbook For Feminists. Feminists Are NOT Having It

Oprah Winfrey On ‘Leaving Neverland’: ‘This Moment Transcends Michael Jackson’

FALLOUT: Three Quebec Radio Stations Blacklist Michael Jackson’s Music

FAILING UP: Fyre Festival Producer Might Get His Own TV Show

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BOZELL & GRAHAM: Baby, It’s Crazy Outside

Schow On Orchestra Wage Dispute: ‘This Is Not A Case Of Unequal Pay For Equal Work’

Woman Sues Orchestra For Pay Discrimination. There’s Just One Problem.

UPDATE: Michael Bublé Says He’s Actually Not Quitting Music

Michael Bublé Quitting Music After Son’s Cancer Battle. UPDATE: Not Really.

KHACHATRIAN: Farewell Charles Aznavour, Master Of Song

Streisand Has A New Song. Guess Whom She Bashes?

Paul McCartney Goes Full John Lennon: Trump Is A ‘Mad Captain,’ Climate Change Deniers Are ‘Stupid’

Music

Articles tagged with Music

‘Radically Saved’ Kanye Called Rap ‘The Devil’s Music,’ Almost Quit Industry, Pastor Reveals

Pharrell Williams Expresses Regret Over ‘Rapey’ ‘Blurred Lines’ Hit: ‘We Live In A Chauvinist Society’

Electronic Music Superstar Zedd Claims He’s Been ‘Banned’ From China Over ‘South Park’ Tweet

KHACHATRIAN: The Rolling Stones: Still The Greatest Live Rock And Roll Act In The World​

This Land Is NOT Your Land: Woke Culture Now Demanding Woody Guthrie Be Canceled Over Folk Music Faux Pas

Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Born in the U.S.A.’ Turns 35

Elton John: It’s ‘Bulls***’ To Criticize A Heterosexual Man For Playing A Homosexual Man In A Film

‘Woke’ Band Green Day Is Writing A Handbook For Feminists. Feminists Are NOT Having It

Oprah Winfrey On ‘Leaving Neverland’: ‘This Moment Transcends Michael Jackson’

FALLOUT: Three Quebec Radio Stations Blacklist Michael Jackson’s Music

FAILING UP: Fyre Festival Producer Might Get His Own TV Show

Leftists PANIC After Discovering Coachella Owner Donates Thousands To Republicans

BOZELL & GRAHAM: Baby, It’s Crazy Outside

Schow On Orchestra Wage Dispute: ‘This Is Not A Case Of Unequal Pay For Equal Work’

Woman Sues Orchestra For Pay Discrimination. There’s Just One Problem.

UPDATE: Michael Bublé Says He’s Actually Not Quitting Music

Michael Bublé Quitting Music After Son’s Cancer Battle. UPDATE: Not Really.

KHACHATRIAN: Farewell Charles Aznavour, Master Of Song

Streisand Has A New Song. Guess Whom She Bashes?

Paul McCartney Goes Full John Lennon: Trump Is A ‘Mad Captain,’ Climate Change Deniers Are ‘Stupid’

KHACHATRIAN: The Rolling Stones: Still The Greatest Live Rock And Roll Act In The World