In his latest movie, The Woman In Black, Dan traded his Hogwarts uniform for a totally new role as a Dad.
Natalia brings you the latest news on Adele’s interview with Anderson Cooper, Kristen Bell’s interview on Ellen is auto tuned, Ladyhawke’s latest music video and much more!
Natalia discusses what’s new with Pharrell Williams and her thoughts on Karl Lagerfeld’s mean comments towards Adele’s weight. She also shows a roster of animals behaving like humans and, wait until you see the new size of coffee available at Starbucks!
Natalia dishes the latest news on the Juno Awards nominees, the upcoming Spiderman 3D film starring Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield and is Katy Perry hooking up with Tim Tebow? Watch today’s episode to find out.
When The Kooks are in the studio they’re focused and most importantly, sober. Watch Hugh and Luke explain their reasoning below.
The Kooks released a new album called “Junk of the Heart,” and you would think Hugh and Luke would be very excited about it. Well, they seemed rather indifferent to be honest. We spoke about that and why they don’t care about critics.
Natalia dishes the latest in entertainment news on Joan Rivers, Lana Del Rey and a brand new trailer for the movie Hunger Games.
Natalia talks about how Snooki might be pregnant, Nicolas Cage’s Cage Rage, Elisabetta Canalis is dating Steve-O and more for Feb 1, 2012.
Natalia dishes the news on Miley Cyrus breaking her tailbone, a 100 year old woman who plays the Nintendo DS to stay young and Houston, Texas contemplating a statute of Beyonce.
David Beckham debuts a new line of underwear, the worst dressed celebrity – Shy’m and Matthew Broderick is back as Ferris Bueller with a brand new commercial airing during the Super Bowl on Feb 5th 2012.
Daniel Radcliffe is back with his new movie The Woman In Black. It’s a bone chilling remake of a film from the ’80s. Ironically, Daniel actually scares very easily but he’s not afraid of ghosts. In this interview he tells us what really gives him the creeps.
Next time you’re struggling to make conversation, try asking this question: “If you could invite anyone (living or dead) to the perfect house party, who would it be?”
Graffiti6 is starting to make their North American invasion, and they are hitting up the Tonight Show. Does this sound familiar? Well the Beatles made the exact same journey over 40 years ago. Naturally, @jordans_life had to make some comparisons.
Nick plays World of Warcraft. Not only that, he’s the head of his guild, demonstrating that it IS possible to juggle being a hardcore gamer with being a top-selling recording artist.
During a LIVE interview on andPOP.com Nick Carter gave out a number and took phone calls from his fans. These were real phone calls from real fans who we gave exclusive access to one of the biggest recording artists of our generation.
There were great questions about music, fitness, the backstreet boys but the most popular question, however, was about his underwear. In this clip Nick talks about his his ‘Haynes’ and covering his fans with glow in the dark paint.
When releasing new music today, half the battle is online promotion. However, contests, signed merch and giveaways aren’t always the best solutions. When working on their latest album, Hedley came up with a brilliant idea, they decided to make trailers.
It’s hard to prepare for an interview with Hedley. So in this interview, we threw caution to the wind, got a 24 of beer and broadcast the interview live on our USTREAM (andPOP.tv). Eventually Jacob, Dave and @jordans_life ended up talking about hairy legs, their newest music video and more.
Diamandis from Marina and The Diamonds talks to us about her very serious disease. It’s called synaesthetic. And we lied, it’s not a disease. More like a cool condition. Diamandis explains further.
Would you be embarrassed if someone scrolled through your iPod? We sit down with Spee and Brendan to talk about the diverse music on their playlist.
Stupid girl, stupid girls, stupid girls/Maybe if I act like that, that guy will call me back/Porno Paparazzi girl, I don’t wanna be a stupid girl/Go to Fred Segal, you’ll find them there/Laughing loud so all the little people stare/Looking for a daddy to pay for the champagne/(Drop a name)/What happened to the dreams of a girl president/She’s dancing in the video next to 50 Cent/They travel in packs of two or three/With their itsy bitsy doggies and their teeny-weeny tees/Where, oh where, have the smart people gone?/Oh where, oh where could they be?
-”Stupid Girls” by Pink, written by Pink and Billy Mann
After the release of Pink’s first single, “Stupid Girls,” of her fourth album, “I’m Not Dead,” people started to debate the issues raised in Pink’s song. Were the media darlings we so idolize right now just stupid girls? Where did all the smart people go? Have we gone backwards in the music industry to before feminism, when women were just a piece of meat and glorified for their bodies and not their music?
Pink says she wasn’t taking aim at anyone in particular, but all you have to do is read between the lines of the song or watch the music video to pick out those “stupid girls.” Jessica. Paris. Lindsay. Mary-Kate and Ashley. They’re all there. And they’re what is all the rage with the tweens and teens of today.
In fact, the more I watch MuchMusic or pick up a magazine or flip on the TV, the more I wonder what happened to the image of the girls I idolized as a tween? Have we evolved so much in 20 years that my daughter will idolize a Britney over Tiffany? And is this having an effect on young girls? Are they being sexualized too young?
To get the answers, I went to Larry LeBlanc, Canadian bureau chief of Billboard Magazine. What he had to say surprised me.
“I actually don?t think its changed that much. I think if anything, it’s gone back to a 1950s, ’60 type of thing,” LeBlanc says, pointing out that what is most similar between the female artists of the ’50s and ’60s and the female artists of today is that men are writing their music.
“Like Connie Francis, who had a slew of hits; ‘Who’s Sorry Now.’ I mean there were all of these love songs that were supposed to be from a female perspective, but they weren’t. Today it’s the same thing essentially. If you take a look at say, Britney Spears, the majority of her writing, except for more recently because she’s trying for some publishing, were written by other people,” he says.
LeBlanc says the generation of female teen idols my generation grew up with and dressed like ? Tiffany, Debbie Gibson ? are not the rule, but the exception to the rule.
“Tiffany was a bit of the same because she wrote a bit of her stuff, but I think the person who was the real renegade and the maverick, say 20 years ago, was Debbie Gibson. Debbie wrote her own material and wrote about her own themes in her own songs,” he says, adding that there are still successful female singer-songwriters that tweens and teens admire, but they tend not to fall into the pop genre of music.
Oh baby, baby/The reason I breathe is you/Boy you got me blinded/Oh baby, baby/There’s nothing that I wouldn’t do/That’s not the way I planned it/Show me, how you want it to be/Tell me baby/’Cause I need to know now what we’ve got/My loneliness is killing me/I must confess, I still believe/When I’m not with you I lose my mind/Give me a sign/Hit me baby one more time
-”Baby ? One More Time” by Britney Spears, written by Max Martin
According to LeBlanc, who has been with Billboard for 16 years, even if a female artist writes her own music, there is still a heavy male presence on everything she does with her work. Usually the producer is male, the engineer is male, the members of the band are male and so forth. However, he agrees that where things are different now than they were in the 1950s and ’60s is the focus on celebrity.
“What came into being in the ’50s? Television. The music industry met the TV industry. The MTV-ing of the world today is not that much different from saying back then the American Bandstands of the world, or females who were on various television shows,” he says.
“Same thing today, whether we look at Lindsay Lohan, Jessica or even Kelly Clarkson. Are they really part of the music world or are they really part of the entertainment world? I’d argue they’re part of the entertainment world.”
He says even the term celebrity has been broadened so that people with no conceivable talent can be famous for anything. The obvious example is Paris Hilton, who has written a book and is coming out with an album soon.
“I mean she, quite frankly, is known for having unsavory sex in a hotel room in Paris. I mean, that’s really her claim to fame. I mean above anything else, that is what she is really known for. Can she sing? No. Can she act? Hell no. Has she got the same brain power as Madonna? No,” he says. Madonna, he points out, isn?t regarded as being the best singer, dancer or actor, but is a woman who is in charge of her career and what happens to it.
You don’t own me/I’m not just one of your many toys/You don’t own me,
don’t say I can’t go with other boys/And don’t tell me what to do/And don’t tell me what to say/And please, when I go out with you/Don’t put me on display”
-”You Don?t Own Me” by Lesley Gore, written by John Madara and David White
LeBlanc has seen a shift in the way a woman’s looks or size has been perceived over the last 20 years or so. He says he knows female artists who have talent, but record executives won’t even listen to them if they don’t conform to the current standard ? being young, thin and beautiful. He cites Canadian singer Jann Arden, who is a huge success in Canada, as an example and wonders if she tried to get her career started today if the record industry or the general public would accept her.
“I can almost tell you for sure, a heavy, female singer will not get signed by a record company in most cases. I would say 99 out of 100 times.”
But then why the sudden onslaught of “stupid girls” for young girls to aspire to? Why are teenagers asking their parents to buy them the latest designer duds so they can look just like the idols they so admire?
“I think the high school period of time is such a mixed time, I guess on both sides ? male and female ? but particularly for females where. If they look on TV or they look in magazines ? (they) are told to look this way (or) that way,” he says.
Amanda Arnini, a 15-year-old Toronto high school student, is one of those kids. She likes “Stupid Girls” by Pink, but also feels the pressures to be more like Britney than Pink. And so does her mom, Teresa.
“I feel that these female images are so insulting and degrading. They place the image to their fans that sex is cool, rubbing and gyrating against one another is how to dance, bouncing around in a bikini and washing yourself with car wash soap are the way to do day-to-day activities and of course misleading them to state that this is true pleasure and happiness,” Teresa says, adding that although she has raised her daughter to be independent and strive for what she wants in life, she still worries the images she is seeing in the media are leading her another way.
Everyone’ll try to put you down/Everyone’ll try to tell you no/If you’ve got a dream inside/You’re the only one who can know/Don’t let nobody own ya/Just say “One day I’ll show ya”/Revenge’ll sure feel nice/If inside you’ve paid the price/You know it and you’ve gotta stand your ground/You’ve earned it – no one can cut you down/They’ll try to get what they can/When you’re strong, everyone’s your friend/Guard the jewel you’ve found/You’ve gotta stand your ground”
-”Gotta Stand Your Ground” By Debbie Gibson, written by Debbie Gibson
Teresa also has seen how the female role model has changed compared to when she was a kid. She says she loved listening to Blondie and seeing her lead a band was very cool. But she doesn’t see the same thing with the female artists who are gaining popularity with her daughter’s generation today.
“The role models in the ’70s and ’80s seemed to have a reason for their voice. They didn’t sell merchandise, their body, nor their sexuality. Nowadays everything we see or hear is all based on who they are with, what are they wearing and how bad they should hurt someone else. It seems some times that these new artists are fighting issues that they haven’t even experienced, or discussing issues ? like sex and love ? when they are only 16. These images are attracting a much younger audience, and I really don’t believe they realize what they are doing, nor do they care,” she says.
Her daughter seems more upbeat, saying that she likes Pink’s song, and also realizes a truth about Britney that even she may not have even realized yet.
“Britney Spears dropped out of school at Grade 10, has no education and has nowhere to go or anything to do once her career is over,” Amanda says.
Hmm. Maybe the kids are going to be fine after all.
