Chris Willman-Senior Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Bonnie Raitt, Billy Strings, Tyler Childers, the duo the War and Treaty and S.S. Goodman were among the winners as trophies were handed out at the 22nd annual Americana Honors & Awards show Wednesday night at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium. Raitt won the award for song of the year for her (literally) heart-rending number “Just Like That” — just like she did at the most recent Grammys, in a very rare example of overlap between the two shows.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Attentive music fans have had some time now to become familiar with who and what the singer Laufey is: a young Icelandic-Asian-American woman whose traditional balladry often recalls the pre-rock era. Still, for a few of us, it might have come as a very slight surprise to see her step onto the outdoor stage of the Ford in Hollywood over the weekend and be reminded that she is 24 and not 124.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic When the lineup for the 2024 Stagecoach Festival was announced earlier this month, Bailey Zimmerman’s name was up there on the second line, right beneath Morgan Wallen’s. It represented a heady move up into the big leagues (and big fonts) for a 23-year-old who had only the most scant awareness that there was such a thing as a country music industry a few short years ago.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic U2 will begin its two-residency at Las Vegas’ Sphere with at least one new song to perform: “Atomic City,” a Vegas-themed tune that is expected to be released on or before the band’s Sept. 29 opening-night show. Filming a music video, the foursome repeatedly played through the song Saturday while positioned on a flatbed trailer that had come to a halt on Fremont Street in the city’s neon-filled downtown area.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Director Sam Jones won plaudits earlier this year for his HBO documentary “Jason Isbell: Running With Our Eyes Closed,” one of the best-regarded music docs since his own “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart: A Film About Wilco” back in 2001. He also got attention this year for his HBO documentary series “Smartless: On the Road,” with Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic It’s been a challenging time lately for Maren Morris in the country music world, as her views on key issues of the day have been in conflict with those of some of country’s more right-leaning artists or fans. She addresses the toll this has taken on her in a music video that came out Friday morning for a new song, “The Tree,” that makes it clear she’s feeling some estrangement from the genre, or even ready to think about moving on — although, ironically, the style of the song couldn’t be more country.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic The 75th anniversary of Atlantic Records is being celebrated by that label and its sister catalog imprint, Rhino Records, with a year-long rollout of 90 vinyl releases and re-releases, covering the gamut from Led Zeppelin to Lizzo and John Coltrane to Coldplay. Most — not all — of the titles are being pressed on clear vinyl and are described in the label’s product descriptions as one-time pressings. Most have previously been released on vinyl, although three modern albums, Gayle’s “A Study in the Human Experience,” Christina Perry’s “Lovestrong” and Kehlani’s “Cloud 19,” are getting their first-time LP iterations as part of the campaign.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Jazz and animation make for strong bedfellows in “They Shot the Piano Player,” a film from Spanish directors Fernando Treuba and Javier Mariscal that represents an intriguing hybrid in all sorts of ways. It’s a love letter to the bossa nova movement that peaked in the 1960s, while at the same time it’s a sobering procedural that looks into the state murder of a musician that occurred as fascistic regimes rose to power in Latin America in the ’70s.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic In the year 2023, Allison Russell has come as close as anyone is to being the face of Americana music, even though there are any rock-solid artists who’ve been in the limelight longer than she has — like Jason Isbell, Lucinda Williams and her friend and mentor Brandi Carlile — who certainly count as poster boys and girls. She might even be the front-runner for the artist of the year prize at the upcoming Americana Honors & Awards show, which takes place in Nashville Sept. 20, notwithstanding that Billy Strings has been nominated again to defend his title.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic On the eve of heading up to Canada this week to attend the Toronto Film Festival, where his documentary “Lil Nas X: Long Live Montero” has its world debut Saturday night, pop superstar Lil Nas X was playing it nonchalant about stepping outside the music realm a bit to be the center of a splashy event in the movie world. “Not really,” he answers, when asked whether it means anything special to him to have a gala premiere at North America’s biggest film event. “I mean, I’m excited to go there and to see what people think, and also, I’ve never been to a film festival, so maybe I’ll meet people and and build some future relationships.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic “I don’t know when we decided to let people write songs about things that they don’t do,” says country star Ashley McBryde. “As far as the singer-songwriter sentiment, I don’t know when we stopped demanding that of ourselves.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic The album Jimmy Buffett was known to have worked on earlier this year has been announced for a fall release. The 14-song “Equal Strain on All Parts” will be out Nov. 3 via the Sun label, with guests including Paul McCartney, Emmylou Harris, Angelique Kidjo and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Before she issues her memoir this November, Barbra Streisand will be giving fans a couple of soundtracks for all that reading, in the form of two music releases due shortly beforehand on Oct. 27.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic A sophomore jinx would be a terrible thing to suffer before you’re old enough to have a legal drink to slug down the disappointment. It’s not something Olivia Rodrigo has to worry about. “Guts,” her second album, does feel at times like “Sour, Too” — a picking-up-right-where-we-left-off extension of her Grammy-winning 2021 debut — but that can only be counted as a good thing, if the spark is still there.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic The lineup for the 2024 Stagecoach Festival in California has been announced, with Morgan Wallen set to be a first-time headliner and Eric Church and Miranda Lambert making their returns in that role over the course of April 26-28. Post Malone may be the most surprising name on the bill, as, although his affection for country has been well-known, he has not made appearances at country fests in the past.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic CMA Awards voters love Lainey Wilson. The singer ran far ahead of the pack as nominations for the 57th annual Country Music Association Awards were announced Thursday, picking up nine nods, nearly twice as many as the nearest finisher, Jelly Roll, who got five.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Bruce Springsteen has canceled all the remaining dates on his touring calendar for the month of September, with a statement on his social media saying he is suffering from peptic ulcer disease and has been advised by doctors to take the rest of the month off for treatment. “Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band have postponed all performances currently scheduled for September 2023, beginning with tomorrow’s show scheduled for the JMA Wireless Dome in Syracuse, NY,” the statement said. “Mr.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Following the auction in 2022 of a new version of “Blowin’ in the Wind” that sold to a bidder for $1.8 million, three more re-recordings Bob Dylan has made of his classic songs with producer T Bone Burnett are also now being put up for sale via Christie’s: “A Simple Twist of Fate,” “Masters of War” and “Gotta Serve Somebody.” But this time, the purchase of the unique discs containing the songs will happen via a private sale, rather than a public auction. As with “Blowin’ in the Wind,” the three songs being offered to prospective buyers of means as one-of-a-kind Iconic discs come from a recording session Dylan did in 2021 with Burnett.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Jimmy Buffett had long planned to be a surprise guest at the Telluride Film Festival over Labor Day weekend. “He was going to be part of (the festival), as of two weeks ago,” said the esteemed novelist Tom McGuane, Buffett’s friend of 50 years and brother-in-law for nearly that long.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic “Be kind, because everyone you meet is fighting a great battle” — that popular maxim (or some variation thereof) is often brought up in the context of remembering to have some sympathy for jerks. But it could also be applied to people whose lives seem too charmed to be true.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Did the Algonquin round table somehow spiritually relocate itself in the early 1970s to Key West, Florida? The idea that the small, remote island city was a hotbed for one of the last great counterculture arts scenes — particularly for prose writers, but also with some music mixed in — is the focus of a new short film about the Key West scene of 50 years ago, “All That Is Sacred.” The 34-minute movie, which stars the famous novelist Tom McGuane and writer-musician Jimmy Buffett, has its premiere at the Telluride Film Festival this weekend. Variety has an exclusive premiere for a trailer for the film, which does not yet have distribution; check it out below.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Anyone who couldn’t procure tickets for Taylor Swift’s record-breaking stadium tour in the U.S. may be about to have their wounded feelings assuaged, a little — and everyone who did can get primed for some instant nostalgia. A filmed rendering, “Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour,” will hit movie theaters nationwide this fall, with opening day set for Friday the (of course) 13th of October.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Zach Bryan has a fair amount of Bruce Springsteen in him. But not just a single Bruce. When the newly minted superstar headlined L.A.’s Crypto.com Arena last week (in a single sold-out gig at a venue he probably could have filled several times over), it felt like he is veering toward having his own “Born in the USA” moment, reviving that familiar mixture of populism and substance and making a new generation of fans scramble to get a scarce ticket.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Having just wrapped up a short tour of U.S. arenas, Zach Bryan has plans to go much bigger in 2024, both in tour length and, in several cases, venue size.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Substitute “ears” for “eyes,” and “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” still applies for much of the world when it comes to the music of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. It’s a dozen major hits from the ‘60s and ‘70s that remain foremost in the thoughts of pop fans, but the catalog of group and solo material goes much deeper than almost anyone who’s not a truly seasoned Valli fanatic would guess.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic The classic Harold Lloyd comedy “Safety Last” is turning 100 years old this year. But with its heavy dollops of action and a superstar’s real-life derring-do, it doesn’t seem a day over 10, even if it does date back to the silent era. The film screens this Sunday as the climax of the Academy Museum’s “Silent Sundays” series, with a live score from a 24-piece orchestra helping heighten the suspense in the ultimate fear-of-heights movie.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Even though he is through with mathematical album titles, Ed Sheeran is still practicing the art of addition. The suddenly prolific recording artist will soon be adding to his catalog the second new album he’s released in 2023… the second in six months, in fact. Sheeran announced Thursday that “Autumn Variations,” a collection he’s been teasing on social media, will be out Sept.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic The Loretta Lynn estate has a new manager — Sandbox Succession, a division of Sandbox Entertainment, the Jason Owen-led Nashville company that oversees the careers of such living stars as Kacey Musgraves, Dan + Shay and Kelsea Ballerini. “Loretta Lynn is the original queen of country music, and it is a true privilege that her family has entrusted Sandbox Succession to preserve her precious legacy,” Owen, Sandbox Entertainment’s CEO, said in a statement.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Given that Taylor Swift is the most popular pop star on the planet — or maybe because of that — there’s been a surprising paucity of covers of her hundreds of tunes by other name-brand artists over the years. Making a dent in that dearth, now, is Soccer Mommy, who has just released her version of a deep cut that is a fan favorite among hardcore Swifties, “I’m Only Me When I’m With You.” “I really wanted to cover this song because it’s one of my favorites from Taylor’s first album,” Soccer Mommy — aka Sophie Allison — said in releasing the tune.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic If you look at Billboard’s latest charts, there’s an anomaly: Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men North of Richmond” is No. 1 on the Hot Country Songs chart … but nowhere to be found on the Country Airplay chart, or Mediabase’s radio rankings.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic “Peter Pan Goes Wrong,” now playing at L.A.’s Ahmanson Theatre, has its roots partly in silent-film slapstick, partly in British pantomime and partly in Python. But maybe the best shorthand way to describe it would be as a recapitulation of “Noises Off” by way of “This Is Spinal Tap.” It’s the comedy of incompetence in its most frantic state, taking any sense of slow-burn ineptitude and turning it up to a full, hyper-farcical 11. As with its highly popular parent production, “The Play That Goes Wrong,” the idea here is to present a show-within-a-show-within-a-show in which everything that could go haywire will.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Ray Hildebrand, who topped the pop charts in the 1960s as half of the duo Paul & Paula, died Friday in Kansas City at age 82. No cause of death has been given. Paul & Paula reached No.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Hozier’s third album, the just-released “Unreal Unearth,” has serious conceptual underpinnings that include references to literary and even mythic tropes like Dante’s “Inferno.” Even with that time spent in the underworld, though, fans can assume that the Irish singer-songwriter will take them somewhere closer to heaven — and, for sure, “Church” — when he mounts a major U.S. tour this fall, including a sold-out stop at the Hollywood Bowl Nov. 4.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Zach Bryan’s upcoming self-titled album, due out Sept. 25, looks to be shorter than his 2022 blockbuster breakout “American Heartbreak” — it will be a manageable 16 tracks, compared to the previous release’s juggernaut 24.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic It’s been a few years since Rhiannon Giddens did anything remotely in the ballpark of a “pop” album, and it’s not hard to come up with reasons for that: Besides her having a full dance card, you could almost argue she’s overqualified for the job. The recipient of both a MacArthur “genius grant” and a Pulitzer, the banjo-wielding balladeer has sustained herself for a while at the intersection of earthy and highbrow, most recently winning acclaim for her opera, “Omar,” and she looks at least at much at home fronting the LA Phil as she used to leading the old-fashioned string band the Carolina Chocolate Drops.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Viral sensation Oliver Anthony has spoken — or rather written — at length for the first time since his song “Rich Men North of Richmond” became a nearly overnight national phenomenon, going into his circumstances and background and saying he has no intention of rushing into any record deal. “People in the music industry give me blank stares when I brush off 8 million dollar offers,” he wrote in a 730-word message posted to his Facebook account Thursday morning. “I don’t want 6 tour buses, 15 tractor trailers and a jet.