Music

On this day, 35 years ago (Jan. 17, 1986), Reba McEntire fulfilled a lifelong dream by becoming a member of the Grand Ole Opry.McEntire's induction was part of a big milestone for the Opry: The Oklahoma native became an official member of the revered organization during a televised special honoring the Grand Ole Opry's 60th anniversary. But while most people were in a celebratory mood that evening, one country artist, Hank Snow, boycotted the show after producers limited him to one verse of his hit "I'm Moving On."Still, McEntire didn't let the off-screen...

Darlene Love never knew how she’d feel when Phil Spector died, but when the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation confirmed the producer’s death on Sunday, she mainly felt sorrow despite all the ways he mistreated her over the years. “My son called to tell me the news,” says the singer, who recorded classics like “He’s a Rebel,” “(Today I Met) the Boy I’m Gonna Marry” and “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” with Spector in the early Sixties. “I felt real bad. Then I thought about who he was and...

Twenty-one years ago today (Jan. 17, 2000), Garth Brooks kicked off the new millennium on a high note: It was on that date that the singer was named the Artist of the Decade for the 1990s at the American Music Awards, proving that his star power crossed all genres."I'd like to dedicate this award to my mom and to my dad. I love you guys very much," Brooks said from stage, as the cameras showed a picture of his emotional father, clutching a picture of Brooks' mother. "Dad's out in...

The War on Drugs returned to late-night to deliver a virtual performance of “Arms Like Boulders” on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. After premiering their new song “Ocean of Darkness” via a similar virtual setup on an October episode of The Tonight Show, the band dug deep into catalog for their latest appearance, playing a track from their 2008 debut album Wagonwheel Blues. The #PlayAtHome performance featured all six band members on stringed instruments, with five guitars and one mandolin. The War on Drugs’ Late Show visit was in...

Devin Dawson last released a single in 2018, but his voice hasn't been wholly absent from country radio since then. In 2019, "God's Country" — a song he wrote with Hardy and Jordan Schmidt — became a massive hit for Blake Shelton; in 2020, he, Hardy and Lauren Alaina celebrated a No. 1 single with "One Beer.""It kind of gave me a little bit more — or a different type — of affirmation," Dawson says of his successes as a songwriter and as a featured artist. "It just expands what I...

Rage Against the Machine detail the grim American history behind their 1991 anthem “Killing in the Name” in a new mini-documentary. The 15-minute film Killing in Thy Name, a collaboration with the arts collective the Ummah Chroma, features a teacher educating a small group of students about “the fiction known as whiteness” as well as the United States’ history of racial and social oppression. The mini-doc also features quotations from historians like Howard Zinn and live footage of Rage Against the Machine performing the track, which bizarrely became a pro-Trump...

Happy birthday to Ronnie Milsap! The singer was born on Jan. 16, 1943, in Robbinsville, N.C.While Milsap has led an extraordinary life, his humble beginnings were anything but promising. Almost completely blind since birth due to a congenital disorder, Milsap was abandoned by his biological mother and raised by his grandparents until the age of five, when he went to the Governor Morehead School for the Blind in Raleigh, N.C.Milsap's musical gifts were noticed when he was still a child, and he was learning to play the piano at an...

Flo Milli is on an impressive run right now, chewing up everything in her path and spitting it back with a double-time bar and an eye roll. The Alabama rapper’s debut mixtape, Ho, Why Is You Here?, was one of last year’s most fun releases in any genre, giving everything from a classic SWV ballad to Snoop Dogg’s immortal opening verse from “Gin & Juice” the Flo Milli makeover. Her quick, funny lyrics make her a natural for the TikTok era, but she also has a smart-alecky star quality that’s appealing to fans...

Morgan Wallen celebrated his new album, Dangerous, with a performance at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium on Tuesday night (Jan. 12). The full show is now available for fans to watch and relive.Wallen's 75-minute set opened with "Sand in My Boots," "Somebody's Problem" and other cuts from the 30-song double album, released on Jan. 8. The No. 1 and platinum-certified single "More Than My Hometown," the Top 25 single "7 Summers" and Wallen's acclaimed cover of Jason Isbell's "Cover Me Up" were also included in the setlist.Wallen's show even included a special guest:...

Duke Bootee, the pioneering rapper who co-wrote and appeared on Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five’s classic “The Message” — Number One on Rolling Stone’s list of the 100 Greatest Hip-Hop Songs of All Time — died Wednesday at the age of 69. Born Edward Fletcher, the rapper died at his home in Savannah, Georgia. The cause was end-stage congestive heart failure, his wife, Rosita, confirmed to Rolling Stone. Fletcher served as a member of Sugar Hill Records’ house band alongside fellow New Jersey funk veterans like bassist Doug Wimbish,...

They're three albums and a heap of trophies and awards nominations into their career now, but five years ago, Brothers Osborne were country up-and-comers releasing their debut album. The sibling duo's first full-length record, Pawn Shop, debuted on Jan. 15, 2016.Deale, Md., natives John and TJ Osborne were four singles deep into their career by the time they released Pawn Shop. Three of those songs, "Rum" (a gold-certified Top 30 single), "Stay a Little Longer" (platinum-certified, went to No. 2) and "21 Summer" (it peaked at No. 24), appear on the project,...

Juice WRLD and Young Thug reunite in the new “Bad Boy” video. According to a statement, the Cole Bennett-directed, Lyrical Lemonade-produced visual marks the final official music video Juice WRLD filmed before he died in December 2019. In the new visual for the Pierre B’ourne produced track, the rappers reference 1995 action film, Bad Boys, where Martin Lawrence and Will Smith portray narcotics detectives. In the music video, the pair cruise the streets and later meet up with a group of people whose identities are obscured with face paint. “Will...

Willie Nelson is among the many Americans who have received their first round of vaccination against COVID-19. While getting vaccinated, the 87-year-old country music legend posed for several pictures that Family Hospital Systems posted to Facebook on Wednesday (Jan. 13), encouraging the public, "Getting your COVID vaccine is Willie cool!"The pictures below show Nelson receiving his vaccination while sitting in a car at a drive-in site. The iconic singer-songwriter and guitarist gets a shot in the upper part of his left arm in one image, and he flashes the camera...

English singer-songwriter Passenger has shared a new mix of his track, “Sword From the Stone,” co-produced by Ed Sheeran. Sheeran and Joe Rubel helmed the so-called “Gingerbread Mix,” in which they transform the airy original with some extra punch in the piano, shuffle in the drums and other atmospheric touches that lend the song a pop sheen without sacrificing any feeling from the original. “Sword and the Stone” appears on Passenger’s new album, Songs for the Drunk and Broken Hearted, which arrived January 8th. A version of the album was...