Sunday November 17th, 2002
New CD's this past week:
- TLC - 3D
- Jene - Jene's reign
- Vivian Green - A love story
Short news stories this week:
Jacko's Big Day In Court
Michael Jackson held a surgical mask over
his face as a throng of cops
escorted him into a courthouse in Santa Maria, California yesterday.
Jackson was called as a hostile witness in a $21 million
breach-of-contract lawsuit filed by a promoter who claims Michael
reneged on a deal to perform two Millennium Eve concerts. The King of
Pop testified that concert promoter Marcel Avram is actually the one who
canceled the concerts. Michael told the court that he had every
intention to do the shows - he even rehearsed his dance moves in front
of a mirror in his bathroom. Michael was on the witness stand for three
hours but he didn't seem to mind. He smiled and laughed several times,
and even bopped around in his seat between questions as if he was
dancing to a song in his head. Michael's due to testify some more
today. Michael rolled up to the courthouse in a chauffeur-driven van
escorted by police on motorcycles. About 100 fans screamed and chanted
Jackson's name from behind police barricades.
Beyonce Maps Out Destiny's Child Schedule:
Tour, More Solo LPs, Hit
Studio
They may be independent women, but
Destiny's Child can't stay away from
each other for too long.
After spending the year working on solo material and acting projects,
Beyoncé Knowles, Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams will reunite in
December for a short holiday tour, Beyoncé revealed recently on the set
of her upcoming movie "The Fighting Temptations." The outing will kick
off December 5 in Houston and end December 21 in Seattle, according to a
Columbia Records spokesperson for the group. Venues and other dates will
be announced soon.
The ladies will not gather in the studio, however, until Williams
releases her second gospel album next spring.
In the meantime, Beyoncé will finish her first solo project, which was
originally due in the fall, but has been pushed back to early February.
"Right now I'm thinking about what producers I'm gonna work with and
which direction I'm gonna go with," Beyoncé said. "I'm still trying
to
figure out who exactly I want to collaborate with. I actually just did a
duet with Luther Vandross ... I was so honored to work with him. Every
day when I come to the set I listen to the oldies station and they play
Luther and then I was like singing in the studio with this man. He's so
great and so nice and I had a great time."
The Vandross collaboration could also end up on "The Fighting
Temptations" soundtrack, which will feature gospel music produced by
Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis.
Beyoncé said both Kelly and Michelle will contribute to the soundtrack,
along with Lil' Zane, Angie Stone and Faith Evans, who appears in the
movie.
"The great things about the songs are they're not preachy," Beyoncé
said. "They don't sound like the traditional gospel songs, even though
we have some really traditional songs. And I'm getting a chance to sing
with the O'Jays and with all these people I wouldn't normally get a
chance to sing with ... I've been doing some funky stuff, some different
things."
When Destiny's Child do convene to record again, Beyoncé expects the
group to sound better than ever.
"All of us individually have grown so much this year," she explained.
"[In a group] you become dependent on your group members, which is
great, but when you get to a certain age you need to mature by yourself.
And [doing solo projects has] done that. It's also brought us a lot
closer."
As if her album, movie, the tour and her appearance on Jay-Z's new " '03
Bonnie & Clyde" single weren't enough, Beyoncé has also lent a hand to
her sister Solange on her debut album, due January 21
Rowland's Simply Deep, released in late October, featured Solange, but
not Beyoncé.
K-Ci & JoJo Talk New LP, Explain Pants-Dropping Incident
There's no hidden meaning in the title of
K-Ci & JoJo's upcoming album,
Emotional.
"We have a lot of songs dealing with a lot of emotions," K-Ci
explained
of the duo's fourth record, due November 26. "K-Ci & JoJo do songs
about
what goes on in relationships, it don't necessarily have to be about our
personal experiences. We just want to write songs people can relate to."
For instance, Emotional's Rodney Jerkins-produced mid-tempo first
single, "It's Me," is about discovering your lover is a gold digger.
Nzingha Stewart (Bilal, Common) directed the video.
One subject that didn't come up in writing material for the album is
K-Ci's arrest last year for indecent exposure (see "K-Ci To Serve
Probation, Pay $945 Fine For 'Jingle Ball' Incident"). The singer said
the incident was a misunderstanding and he hasn't thought about it much
since.
"What happened was, if you know K-Ci & JoJo, you know I love to go into
the audience," he explained. "And what happened was I jumped in and
got
back onstage, and without my knowledge they had ripped my belt off. My
pants were soaking wet and falling down and I don't know what happened,
but I would never do anything like that. There wasn't nothing but kids
in the audience. I'm a proud father of two children and I would never
disrespect someone else's children."
"This Very Moment," a ballad K-Ci likened to their hit "All My
Life,"
will be the second single. Written and produced by backup singer Tim
Owens, the song will also appear on the soundtrack to the LL Cool J film
"All About Eva."
Other producers on Emotional include Mike "Smoove" Bell, Babyboy and
Babyface, who collaborated on "Down for Life."
"Face respects our talent, that's why I love working with him," JoJo
said. "He'll put you on that street, but you need to know when to stop
and when to go and how fast to drive. He lets you get involved and be
yourself."
K-Ci & JoJo will promote the follow-up to 2000's X with a tour set to
kick off next year with Gerald Levert and Dave Hollister. "We're going
to call it Ladies Night or Ladies Only," JoJo said.
The duo, brothers Cedric and Joel Hailey, have also written more than
100 songs with Dalvin DeGrate and DeVante Swing for the first album from
Jodeci in seven years, due next spring.
"It's going to sound like [classic] Jodeci," K-Ci said. "We don't
want
no outside producers, nothing but ourselves."
Ashanti Makes Her Debut As An Author
Ashanti's new book, Foolish/Unfoolish:
Reflections Of Love, is a
collection of the singer's poetry and thoughts about love and life.
Ashanti has written down her ideas and poetry in journals since she was
13, and in her debut book she displays her formidable skills as both a
creative and entertaining writer.
Ashanti told us that she's always had a love for writing: "Being that I
wrote all the records on my album, you know, I really, really have a
passion and, I guess, a niche for writing. Like, if the whole music
thing didn't work out I kind of wanted to go into writing children's
books because I used to work at a daycare center before I started doing
everything, so I always kind of wanted to write."
It is that same writing ability that helped Ashanti to sell more than 2
million copies of her self-titled debut album. Ashanti penned all of the
tracks on the album, including the hit singles "Foolish,"
"Happy," and
her current single, "Baby."
"With all of the success of the album, and everybody just being to
relate to so many of the records, you know, what better way then to put
it in poetry," Ashanti said. If some the poems in the book read much
like Ashanti's song lyrics, it's not by accident. "Actually, some of the
poems were lyrics that just didn't make the album," she explained.
Ashanti is also credited with penning Jennifer Lopez's hit single,
"Ain't It Funny (Murder Remix)" featuring Ja Rule, and she wrote a
track
that will appear on J. Lo's upcoming album, This Is Me...Then, which is
due out November 26.
Meanwhile, Ashanti's next album is due out in May 2003 via Def Jam's
Murder Inc. label, but before then Murder Inc. will squeeze a fourth and
final single out from her debut set. The title of that next single is
"Dreams."
Ashanti autographed copies of Foolish/Unfoolish at Borders Books &
Music in the Garden State Plaza mall in Paramus, New Jersey, on Thursday
(November 14), and at Borders Books & Music in White Plains, New York,
on Friday (November 15).
Rick James Under Investigation…..Again
Rick James was sentenced to two years in
prison back in 1993 for
sexually assaulting two women. Now, Rick's being investigated on very
similar, new charges. A 26-year-old woman claims that the 50-year-old
James sexually assaulted her at his home in Woodland Hills, California.
Rick James was convicted in two sexual assault cases back in 1993. The
first attack occurred in '91; James restrained a woman and burned her
with a hot crack pipe during a cocaine binge at his house in West
Hollywood. James was free on bail when the second assault occurred in
1992 in James' hotel room. James was sentenced to more than two years in
state prison. A jury acquitted him on a torture charge
Bobby Brown Case To Go To Trial
Bobby Brown will face trial following his
arrest on an outstanding bench
warrant in Georgia last Thursday (November 7), when Brown was arrested
in Atlanta after police pulled him over for a speeding infraction. A
subsequent search of Brown and his vehicle turned up a small amount of
marijuana. While he was being processed in Atlanta, neighboring DeKalb
County executed an arrest warrant issued after the singer failed to
appear at a hearing stemming from a 1996 traffic infraction.
Brown has now been ordered to remain in the state of Georgia until his
November 25 hearing on the 1996 arrests. Brown's lawyer Xavier Dicks
tells Reuters, "I'm confident that we'll resolve this case." If found
guilty of all charges, Brown could spend up to a year in jail. Brown is
scheduled to appear in yet another Georgia courtroom in December to
answer to the new charges filed in Atlanta last week.
TLC's 'Girltalk' Causes Traffic Jam
TLC members Tionne "T-Boz"
Watkins and Rozanda "Chilli" Thomas caused a
traffic jam in New York Wednesday (November 6) when more than 1,500 fans
showed up to watch the world premiere of the group's "Girltalk" video
on
the Time Square Jumbotron monitor.
Many of the fans showed support for late group member Lisa "Left Eye"
Lopes by wearing a black line underneath their left eye, Lopes's
trademark.
The video held up traffic for nearly 15 minutes. Watkins offered thanks
to the fans. "We were so excited and deeply moved by all the fans who
came out to support TLC and our new video and CD," Watkins said.
TLC's fourth album, 3D, was realeased Tuesday (November 12) on Arista
Records. The song "Girltalk" is Number 27 on Billboard's Hot
R&B/Hip-Hop
Singles & Tracks chart.