An animated short film inspired by John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s classic holiday tune, “Happy Christmas (War Is Over),” is officially in the running for an Oscar nomination.
The 11-minute film, executive-produced by Yoko and the couple’s son, Sean Ono Lennon, follows a game of chess, with a heroic carrier pigeon helping the game continue across enemy lines. It ends with the classic tune playing over the closing credits.
The final nominees for the 2024 Academy Awards will be announced on January 23. The ceremony airs March 10 on ABC.
While the bells may be ringing out for Christmas Day, The Pogues‘ “Fairytale of New York” won’t be the #1 Christmas single in the U.K.
The beloved 1987 tune came in at #6 on the latest edition of the U.K.’s Official Singles Chart, which will cover the week of Christmas. The #1 spot went to the Wham! holiday classic “Last Christmas” — a journey which took 39 years.
Getting the #1 single on the Official Singles Chart for Christmas is a coveted accomplishment in the U.K., and fans often organize campaigns to get their favorite songs to the top. You may recall such a campaign successfully made Rage Against the Machine‘s “Killing in the Name” the #1 Christmas single in 2009.
Several fan initiatives for “Fairytale of New York” to be the Christmas #1 have been launched over the years, but the closest it came was #2 in 1987. With the death of Pogues frontman Shane MacGowan on November 30, fans hoped 2023 would finally be the year, and the Irish band even supported the campaign with a reissued vinyl single, which raised money for charity.
There had also been a fan campaign to get AC/DC‘s “Thunderstruck” the Christmas #1 this year, but organizers ended up postponing the initiative so that “Fairytale of New York” could have a better chance of securing the top spot, in honor of MacGowan.
While some people are lucky enough to have a fireplace to gather around on Christmas, others have to settle for watching the televised Yule log for that warm and toasty holiday feeling. But not everyone likes to listen to Christmas music on a loop, and if you’re a Deadhead, there’s another option.
The Grateful Dead has just gone live with their annual holiday Yule log, a tradition they started in 2021. This year’s Yule log is labeled PNW ’74, and features concerts that appeared on the group’s Pacific Northwest 73-74: The Complete Recordings box set, which was released in 2018.
Last year’s Yule log featured music from their three-night stand at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, California, which took place November 9-11, 1973. The inaugural Yule log featured recordings of their 1972 shows at London’s Lyceum Theatre.
British singer Joe Cocker died of lung cancer in Colorado at the age of 70.
Known for his raspy voice and expressive body movements while performing, Cocker first gained commercial success thanks to his soulful cover of The Beatles’ “With A Little Help From My Friends,” which appeared on his debut album. His performance of the song at the 1969 Woodstock festival is often cited as a highlight of the subsequent 1970 Woodstock film.
The song, which featured Jimmy Page on guitar, hit #1 in the U.K. and was later used as the theme song for the ABC series The Wonder Years. In 2001, the track was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Cocker’s best-selling tune was “Up Where We Belong,” a duet with Jennifer Warnes that the two recorded for the Richard Gere movie An Officer and a Gentleman. The song hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, and earned the pair a Grammy for Best Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals. The song also won the Golden Globe and Academy Awards for Best Original Song.
Other Cocker hits include covers of Billy Preston‘s “You Are So Beautiful,” which peaked at #5 in the U.S.; Dave Mason‘s “Feelin’ Alright?;” the Ray Charles hit “Unchain My Heart;” Leon Russell‘s “Delta Lady;” and Randy Newman‘s “You Can Leave Your Hat On.”
Paul McCartney had a busy year, and he’s wrapping up his 2023 by answering 23 questions from fans.
The Rock & Roll Hall of Famer responded to questions posted to his Official Fan Group on Facebook, sharing insights into the new Beatles tune “Now and Then,” Christmas, his Got Back tour and more.
When it comes to “Now and Then,” McCartney says he was “very emotional” the first time he heard John Lennon’s clear voice on the track, adding that his favorite part of the video was “John goofing around.”
He reveals that “Hey Jude” was his favorite song to play live — “Just to see all those thousands of people singing in harmony with each other,” he says — and teases a possible release of covers he performs during soundcheck.
“It’s a thought!,” he replies. “We have the ‘jams’ — we always start the soundcheck with a made-up piece, and there’s a lot of them. So, we might go through those and do something someday.”
McCartney also shares that he’d love to collaborate with Bob Dylan one day, noting, “But I don’t know if we’ll ever get around to it.”
As for Christmas, McCartney’s favorite gift was a 1956 Telecaster guitar from his wife Nancy Shevell, and says the smell of cigars is something gives him a feeling of Christmas.
“My dad didn’t smoke them except at Christmas, and my brother and I used to buy him a little pack each,” he says. “Then one year our dad said, ‘Don’t buy me the pack, just get me one really good one.’”
Finally, McCartney reveals there’s hope fans may one day hear the songs he wrote for a planned It’s a Wonderful Life musical, sharing, “Musicals are difficult things to put together, but I think it may be shaping up at last.”
Music fans are about to gain some new insight into the late Fleetwood Mac star Christine McVie, whopassed away November 30, 2022, at the age of 79.
A new book, Perfect: An Intimate Biography of Christine McVie, is due out June 20, written by Lesley-Ann Jones, who was a friend of the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer.
According to the description, the book “offers a true insider’s view, and deep psychological insight into Christine as a both a woman and a musician,” sharing that it’s “the first, the only, the ultimate picture of a rock legend and a national treasure.”
It promises to delve into McVie’s career with Fleetwood Mac, noting she was the “strong, constant figure whom they dubbed ‘the mother’ of the band.” It will also explore her personal life, including affairs, divorce, addiction and more.
There were a lot of great concerts in 2023, and USA Today has chosen their favorites, with U2 topping the list thanks to their Las Vegas residency, U2: UV Achtung Baby Live at Sphere.
“It’s not a concert. It’s an experience,” they write about the shows, which kicked off September 29 at the new high-tech theater, noting, “the perfect band merged with the perfect venue to create an unquestionable marvel.”
They loved the U2 residency so much that it actually beat out the Taylor Swift Eras tour for the top spot, with the paper calling the residency “worth the hype.”
Also making USA Today’s top concerts of 2023 list is Billy Joel and Stevie Nicks, who landed at eight for their co-headlining trek. The paper notes, “the sardonic New Yorker and the mystical muse of ethereal pop proved an endearing double shot.”
Timothée Chalamet has been listening to a lot of Bob Dylan as he gets ready to play the iconic musician in the film A Complete Unknown, but he’s not just limiting himself to your typical Dylan hits.
In an interview with MTV, Chalamet says that Dylan is probably the artist he listened to most in 2023 and got some help with his playlist from the rocker’s manager Jeff Rosen.
“This might earn the ire and wrath of a lot of Bob fans, rightfully,” Chalamet says. “He sent me like a 12-hour playlist of unreleased Bob stuff from like 1959 to ’64.”
Chalamet says some of the music can actually be found online, but there are others songs that don’t seem to be available.
“I feel like I’m holding onto gold or something,” he says, adding, “some of it I’d love to sneak in the movie.”
A Complete Unknown, to be directed by James Mangold, has been in the works for four years, but in all that time, Chalamet hasn’t met or sung for Dylan and he’s not necessarily sure he wants that to change.
“I would love to meet him now but my feeling for the last four years was God forbid I met him and he was like ‘No,’” he says. “All this hard work will go down the drain.”
Spencer Elden, who was photographed as a baby for the cover of Nirvana‘s Nevermind, has successfully appealed his lawsuit against the band after it was dismissed.
As previously reported, Elden first sued the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” outfit in 2021, alleging that the Nevermind cover constituted child pornography. The famed artwork for the 1991 album features a photo of a four-month-old Elden swimming underwater naked while reaching for a dollar bill.
Surviving Nirvana members Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic were named as defendants, as was Courtney Love as the executor of the late Kurt Cobain‘s estate. Defendants also include various record labels, as well as the Nevermind cover photographer.
In filing to dismiss the suit, lawyers for Nirvana argued that Elden’s claims were “not serious” and “absurd,” and that Elden has “spent three decades profiting from his celebrity as the self-anointed ‘Nirvana Baby.'”
The suit was eventually dismissed in 2022 by the United States District Court for the Central District of California, citing the expired statute of limitations. Elden then appealed once more, and his argument was heard by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in October 2023.
An opinion filed on Thursday, December 21, reads, “the district court erred in granting Defendants’ motion to dismiss on statute of limitations grounds,” and thus reverses and remands the decision.
“We hold that, because each republication of child pornography may constitute a new personal injury, Elden’s complaint alleging republication of the album cover within the ten years preceding his action is not barred by the statute of limitations,” the opinion continues.
The opinion only addresses the argument over the statute of limitations, and notes, “The question whether the Nevermind album cover meets the definition of child pornography is not at issue in this appeal.”
It’s taken “The Longest Time,” but Billy Joel is now on TikTok — and he’s using the social media platform to tease … something.
Billy’s first post shows him onstage at Madison Square Garden, talking to the audience at what presumably is an early point at one of his shows. “I have good news and bad news,” the Piano Man begins.
“The bad news first: We don’t have anything new to play for you. The good news is, you don’t have to sit through something you have no idea what it is,” he said, as the audience cheered.
“Although,” he added. “We got a little somethin’ we’re working on you might hear sometime.”
Considering Billy has released exactly two new pop songs since 1993, any kind of new music from the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer would be a huge deal.
Meanwhile, Billy will ring in 2024 with a New Year’s Eve concert at UBS Arena in Elmont, New York, the home of the New York Islanders. Next year, he’ll wind down his Madison Square Garden residency and do a few concerts with his pal Sting.
