Categories
Movies

I was hoping to see CREED and THE NIGHT BEFORE this weekend but decided to binge watch THE WIRE at home instead.

Box office report: Mockingjay tops Thanksgiving weekend

A trio of new wide releases weren’t enough to take down Katniss Everdeen, as The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 led the Thanksgiving weekend box office.

Mockingjay – Part 2 raked in $51.6 million over Thanksgiving weekend for a five-day total of $75.8 million. Although Part 2 is still trailing behind the first Mockingjay, which earned $82.7 million over the five-day Thanksgiving weekend last year, Part 2 held up better in its second weekend than any other Hunger Games movie, falling only 50 percent. Mockingjay Part 2 also brought in $62 million internationally over the three-day weekend, bringing its global total to $440.7 million. To date, the entire Hunger Games film franchise has grossed $2.7 billion worldwide.

Pixar’s The Good Dinosaur led the new releases, becoming the second Pixar movie ever not to open at No. 1. Debuting to $39.2 million over three days and $55.6 million over five, The Good Dinosaur earned the fourth biggest five-day Thanksgiving opening of all time, but its debut was somewhat lackluster for a Pixar movie, as most of the studio’s releases open around $60 million or higher across three days. This was the first time that Pixar has ever released two films in the same year, and The Good Dinosaur couldn’t match the astronomical success of Inside Out, which earned the largest debut ever for a completely original film. Although The Good Dinosaur wasn’t met with the same critical adoration as Inside Out, it still earned an A CinemaScore. Plus, The Good Dinosaur’s debut means that Disney now holds all five of the biggest Thanksgiving five-day openings of all time.

But although Mockingjay – Part 2 and The Good Dinosaur both topped the charts this Thanksgiving, one of the biggest successes of the weekend was Creed, which knocked out expectations for a three-day debut of $30.1 million and a five-day total of $42.6 million. With a budget of about $37 million and an A CinemaScore, the Rocky follow-up has Sylvester Stallone reprising his role as the aging boxer and Michael B. Jordan starring as the illegitimate son of Rocky’s former opponent Apollo Creed.

And this weekend’s final new wide release, Victor Frankenstein, failed to, well, come alive, only earning $2.4 million over three days and $3.4 million over five. Starring James McAvoy as Dr. Frankenstein and Daniel Radcliffe as Igor, Victor Frankenstein didn’t even break into the top 10, and it only snagged a C CinemaScore. The retelling of Mary Shelley’s classic was originally scheduled to open in October 2014, and it was shuffled to January before finally opening this Thanksgiving.

Spectre and The Peanuts Movie rounded out the top five, with James Bond bringing in $12.8 million over three days and $18.2 million over five for a domestic total of $176.1 million. Charlie Brown raked in another $9.7 million over the three-day weekend and $13.6 million over five days, bringing its domestic total to $116.8 million.

Outside of the top five, The Danish Girl got off to a good start, opening to $185,000 in four locations. The drama, which stars Eddie Redmayne as transgender pioneer Lili Elbe, earned a per-theater average of $46,250. The romantic drama Carol also had a phenomenal weekend in just four theaters, earning $203,000 over five days for a domestic total of $588,000.

Spotlight and Brooklyn also had continued box office success as they each expanded their theater count, earning $4.5 million and $3.8 million respectively over the three-day frame. Spotlight’s domestic total is now at $12.3 million, and Brooklyn has brought in a total of $7.3 million.

Here are this weekend’s top five at the box office. (All numbers are for the five-day frame, Wednesday through Sunday.)

1. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 — $75.8 million
2. The Good Dinosaur — $55.6 million
3. Creed —$42.6 million
4. Spectre —$18.2 million
5. The Peanuts Movie —$13.6 million

Categories
People

I can’t wait to hear them all again!!

Classic Richard Pryor LPs Released Digitally for First Time

December 1st marks what would have been Richard Pryor’s 75th birthday, and to celebrate the occasion, six of the comedian’s landmark recordings have been reissued digitally for the first time. “I am thrilled to celebrate Richard’s upcoming 75th birthday with this great news. A wonderful gift to his fans, old and new alike,” the comedian’s widow Jennifer Lee Pryor said of the Rhino reissue in a statement.

Included in the batch of six of Pryor’s Warner Bros. LPs that are heading to digital outlets is his 1979 live recording Wanted: Live in Concert, the album for his standup film Live in Concert, which ranked Number One on Rolling Stone’s list of the 25 Best Stand-Up Specials and Movies. The reissue also includes four Best Comedy Album Grammy-winning LPs – 1974’s That Nigger’s Crazy, 1975’s …Is It Something I Said?, 1976’s Bicentennial Nigger and 1982’s Live on the Sunset Strip – as well as Pryor’s final standup album, 1983’s Here and Now.

A digital bundle of the six albums, The Warner Bros. Albums (1974-1983), and the best-of compilation Richard Pryor – The Anthology: 1968-1992 are also available to purchase now on digital retailers. The Pryor reissues are also accessible on all streaming services.

The digital reissues are just the beginning of what promises to be a busy year in remembrance of Pryor’s comedic legacy. A biopic about the late comedian is currently in the works with Mike Epps in the Pryor role. Additionally, Pryor will reportedly be among the legendary comedians whose routines will be revived via hologram at the National Comedy Center.

Categories
Toronto Blue Jays

Go Jays Go!!

J.A. Happ says Blue Jays playoff run helped bring him back

J.A. Happ had to watch from afar last season as his former team came within two wins of reaching the World Series.

Now that he’s back with the Blue Jays — signing a three-year, $36 million US deal Friday with the team that traded him to Seattle almost exactly one year ago — the 33-year-old left-handed pitcher is hoping Toronto can pick up where they left off last season.

“Seeing what this team did last year, it was fun to watch,” Happ said on a conference call Saturday afternoon. “It kind of [made me] want to come back and be a part of that.”

“I’m a baseball fan, too,” he added. “Watching the energy [in Toronto during the post-season] — the whole time I was there I was like, ‘if we could make it to the playoffs, this city would be nuts’ — and watching that, it was awesome … That’s what we’re hopefully trying to do these next few years is repeat that.”

Happ spent more than two seasons with the Blue Jays from 2012 to 2014 before being traded for outfielder and Victoria native Michael Saunders in December 2014. He was 19-20 with a 4.39 earned-run average in 58 appearances (50 starts) with Toronto.

While his stats with the Mariners were less than optimal — he was 4-6 with a 4.64 ERA through 20 starts — Happ improved drastically once he was traded to the Pirates at the deadline, lowering his ERA to 1.85 and striking out 69 batters over 63 1/3 innings.

Happ attributes his turnaround to a mechanical adjustment he made in Pittsburgh.

“My main goal going over there was to try to get back to throwing the way I was earlier in the year,” he said. “We just tried to correct my angle, use my momentum going towards home plate, not third base.

“I felt I had a better angle on the ball and it was coming out more free. That, mixed with some success, helped the confidence, too. So I think it was a combination of those things.”

Happ fills a rotation spot for the American League (AL) East champion Blue Jays, who figure to lose fellow left-handers David Price and Mark Buehrle in free agency. Price, the runner-up for this year’s AL Cy Young Award — which is handed out to the league’s best pitcher — is expected to command a huge deal.

While the Blue Jays appear to be out on Price after signing Happ, interim general manager Tony LaCava says he’s “not ruling anything out” — whether that means staying in on the Price sweepstakes or trying to lock up another front-of-the-line starter.

“Without being specific, we’ve had dialogue with any number of them,” LaCava said of the free-agent crop of arms. “We still have conversations with various free agents and their agents and also with other teams looking through the trade market as well.

“It’s still early … we’re going to continue to try to improve the club — always. I wouldn’t rule anything out right now but certainly we did address some of the bigger needs that we had coming in.”

Happ joins a rotation that is likely to include right-handers Marcus Stroman, R.A. Dickey and Marco Estrada — who re-signed with the Blue Jays on a two-year, $26-million free-agent deal earlier this month.

Jesse Chavez, acquired from the Oakland Athletics in exchange for reliever Liam Hendriks last week, could also figure into the starting five, as could Aaron Sanchez and Drew Hutchison.

“J.A. was a priority for us,” LaCava said. “When you look at our needs coming into off-season, obviously, we had lost quite a few starters and our starting depth was not great. J.A. was identified as a guy who could address that.

“Bringing back Marco Estrada was a big piece of that and then adding Jesse Chavez as well … That’s 85 starts we’ve added to our club and we haven’t lessened our offence, we haven’t given up any draft picks and we haven’t traded any prospects.

“We feel like we’re off to a good start this off-season.”

Categories
Music

Did you pay for it?

Who Is Really Paying for Adele?

The decision to withhold Adele’s new album, “25,” from streaming services seems to have worked out well so far. Not only have her first-week sales broken the previous and seemingly unassailable record, 2.4 million, set by ’N Sync, in 2000, Adele did so at a time when piracy is a simple alternative to buying, which was not the case fifteen years ago.

This is good news for Adele and her label, Columbia, and its parent, Sony. It’s also a boon for the album’s songwriters and producers, who get a much larger royalty rate for album sales than they do for streaming. For the record business as a whole, “25” feels like a welcome, if illusory, return to the glory day of the late nineties, when the industry created the Diamond Award for album sales in excess of ten million. Whether “25” ultimately goes diamond remains to be seen, and achieving those heights will depend in large part on how long the album remains off the streaming services.

Album sales are profitable, but they are not the future of the music business—streaming is. Could it be possible that the record business, pursuing a strategy of inflating sales by keeping an album off Spotify, Apple Music, or Deezer, is choosing short-term profits over long-term growth? (Perish the thought!) That would be consistent with the industry’s attitude toward its potential tech partners, going back to its failure to join forces with Napster in 2001 and killing Napster instead.

Will the record business also end up killing streaming, or at least the freemium model that Spotify is based on, by withholding the top acts? Just how many major artist withholdings can Spotify withstand? (The company is rumored to have had trouble raising capital in its last round of financing.) If Adele and Taylor Swift take Spotify down, they’re going to take the industry with it. The very fact that Adele is able to break ’N Sync’s record at all surely has much to do with the fact that streaming has helped to make her so immensely popular in the first place.

If you are an Apple or a Spotify subscriber (I am both), you are faced with a quandary over what to do about “25.” In the old days, you would have just gone out and bought the album. But streaming complicates the picture. You don’t want to buy the record because that would be giving in to what feels like a heavy-handed attempt to make us purchase the music twice—to pay another ten dollars on top of the ten-dollar monthly subscription (I have the Apple family plan, which is fifteen) for an album that will show up on streaming sooner or later. But how long do you have to wait? It could be a couple of weeks, it could be a year, or it might not be until Adele gets her diamond. How long can you wait? At least with DVD rentals, you have a pretty good idea of how long it’s going to be. But Adele and Taylor are making up the sales-to-streaming rules as they go along.

Why not make “25” available to the premium subscribers on streaming services? That would be a great incentive for people on the ad-supported tier to pony up some cash. In this scenario, maybe Adele doesn’t get the record for albums sold, but she would have significantly increased streaming subscriptions, which would benefit many artists. The way things are going now, only Adele wins.

Categories
Music

Wow! That is an impressive number!!

Adele’s ’25’ Official First Week U.S. Sales: 3.38 Million

It’s official: Adele’s 25 album sold 3.38 million copies in its first week in the U.S., according to Nielsen Music. That’s the largest single sales week for an album since Nielsen began tracking point-of-sale music purchases in 1991. 25 is the first album to sell more than 3 million copies in a week in Nielsen history, and only the second to surpass 2 million sold in a single frame.

Nielsen Music’s tracking week runs from Friday to Thursday each week, so 25’s opening frame ended at the close of business on Nov. 26. The new set, which is Adele’s third studio album, was released on Nov. 20 through XL Recordings/Columbia Records.

Earlier in the week, 25 beat the previous single-week sales record, held by *NSYNC’s No Strings Attached, when it launched with 2.42 million sold (in the week ending March 26, 2000). 25 is also just the 20th album to sell at least a million copies in a week. In addition, 25 is already the biggest selling album of 2015 (surpassing the 1.8 million sold of Taylor Swift’s 1989).

25 will debut atop the Billboard 200 albums chart dated Dec. 12, marking the singer/songwriter’s second No. 1. The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week based on multi-metric consumption, which includes traditional album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). The top 10 of the chart is scheduled to be announced on Nov. 29, along with 25’s total consumption figure for the week.

25 follows Adele’s 21, which racked up 24 nonconsecutive weeks atop the Billboard 200 (the longest run at No. 1 for a woman in the chart’s history) and has sold 11.2 million in the U.S. It’s the 10th-largest selling album in Nielsen history.

Categories
Television

It isn’t Christmas without Charlie Brown!!

50 years later, Charlie Brown turns out to be a ‘Christmas’ winner after all

When they finished making “A Charlie Brown Christmas” 50 years ago, the producers sat back and looked at their work. And they thought: Good grief.

“We just thought it was a little slow, and it was certainly not a traditional Christmas show,” said Lee Mendelson, the producer who persuaded “Peanuts” cartoonist Charles M. Schulz to adapt his popular strip about lovable loser Charlie Brown and his childhood friends into an animated holiday offering. “When you’re too close to something, you get a little worried.”

A week before the December 1965 premiere, they screened it in New York for CBS, where two executives watched in stony silence. When the lights came up, one of the bosses told Mendelson, “Well, you gave it a good try.”

That humbly received TV special is now marking an unbroken half-century of annual telecasts, becoming a leading part of pop culture’s holiday canon. In a world filled with memes, “Charlie Brown Christmas” offers a number of its own, from Linus’ blanket-improvised shepherd’s headpiece during the school play rehearsal to Snoopy’s gaudily decorated doghouse to the gang’s inimitable dance moves during the jazzy theme, “Linus and Lucy.”

ABC, which acquired the rights to “A Charlie Brown Christmas” in 2001, will precede this year’s golden anniversary telecast on Monday, Nov. 30 with an hourlong special, “It’s Your 50th Christmas, Charlie Brown,” hosted by Kristen Bell and including original music and guest appearances by Kristin Chenoweth, Matthew Morrison, Sarah McLachlan and others.

How has an animated special that looked as destined for failure as Charlie Brown himself wound up enduring so long?

“It became part of everybody’s Christmas holidays,” Mendelson, now 82, said in a recent phone interview from the Bay Area, where he still operates his production company. “It was just passed on from generation to generation. … We got this huge initial audience and never lost them.”

TV historian and researcher Tim Brooks said that the familiarity of the half-hour Peanuts special is what has helped it last, as boomer and GenX parents reintroduce the program to their own kids. And it hasn’t hurt this year that Fox’s “The Peanuts Movie” has scored at the box office, grossing more than $84 million since its Nov. 6 release.

“It’s comfort in a difficult world,” Brooks said of “Charlie Brown Christmas,” comparing the special to popular holiday music such as “White Christmas.” “I did a study once of the popular Christmas songs, and they’re almost all from the ’40s through to the ’60s. It’s something about their being traditional that makes them so appealing.”

But like many traditions that in retrospect seem obvious and preordained, the “Peanuts” special almost never happened.

The publicity-shy Schulz, a Midwesterner who had transplanted to Sebastopol, Calif., had previously spurned numerous TV offers to capitalize on his comic strip. “Peanuts,” which first appeared in newspapers in 1950, gradually became a cultural phenomenon, the most influential comic strip in history.

Mendelson, then a young documentary film producer, got the familiar brushoff when he called Schulz with a proposal to make a movie about his life and the creation of Peanuts. But at the end of the conversation, Mendelson mentioned that he had made a documentary about Willie Mays, the baseball great whom Schulz idolized. There was a pause.

“Well,” said Schulz, who died in 2000 at 77, “if Willie Mays can trust you with his life, maybe I can trust you with mine.”

Not long after they finished the documentary, the ad agency for Coca-Cola, which was looking for family-friendly TV shows to sponsor, called Mendelson and asked whether the team could create a Peanuts Christmas special in just six months. Mendelson replied yes, absolutely. He later said he didn’t even know at the time whether such a project would be feasible.

When he told Schulz, the cartoonist asked what the story would be. “Something you’re going to write tomorrow,” Mendelson replied.

Schulz quickly sketched a story line about Charlie Brown’s humiliating effort to direct the school Christmas play. According to David Michaelis’ 2007 biography “Schulz and Peanuts,” Mendelson, inspired by a Hans Christian Andersen short story, suggested a holiday tree be included as a plot point, and Schulz immediately warmed to the idea. Charlie Brown would adopt a sad little Christmas tree that everyone else ridiculed and try to make it the centerpiece of the school play.

At the cartoonist’s insistence, Mendelson hired Bill Melendez, a former Disney animator who had worked on the “Peanuts” characters in a series of Ford commercials. Schulz felt Melendez’s animations stayed true to the sprit and art of his creations. For music, Mendelson turned to Vince Guaraldi, an acclaimed Bay Area jazz pianist and composer. Schulz said OK even though he hated jazz. It was Guaraldi’s boogie-woogie romp “Linus and Lucy” that eventually became “Peanuts’ ” signature tune.

But two other major creative decisions led to disagreement — and also helped ensure that “Charlie Brown Christmas” remained unique in its approach to the holiday.

Schulz insisted that no laugh track be used. At the time, canned laughter was a virtual requirement for TV comedy. Mendelson pleaded that without it, the special would plod along. But Schulz detested laugh tracks and would not budge, according to the Michaelis biography.

The other standoff involved religion. The script included a climactic speech in which Linus delivered an onstage explanation of the “true meaning of Christmas” by reciting the story of Jesus’ birth according to St. Luke. Mendelson argued that religion had to be kept out of prime-time entertainment. Again, Schulz — who according to his biographer was engaged in a lifelong internal struggle over his own Christian beliefs — was insistent: “We can’t avoid it.”

Audiences quickly embraced “Charlie Brown Christmas” as a seasonal parable of redemption, well in keeping with “A Christmas Carol” and “It’s a Wonderful Life.” The premiere was seen by more than 15 million U.S. households, with 45% of TVs in use that night tuned in to the program, according to Nielsen.

CBS promptly ordered up more “Peanuts” specials, including “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown,” which premiered in 1966 and is now a Halloween staple.

ABC, a unit of the Walt Disney Co., sees the special as part of a long-term play.

“We value these ‘Peanuts’ specials as much as anything on our network,” said ABC Senior Vice President Robert Mills, who oversees specials for the network, adding that this year’s anniversary special underscores that commitment.

“We knew we had to do it,” he said of the new special hosted by Bell.

For Mendelson, who initially thought “Charlie Brown Christmas” was a holiday dud, the last five decades still seem surreal. But not everyone predicted that Charlie Brown would lose.

When Melendez and Mendelson confided their worries to Schulz before the 1965 premiere, he batted them away. “Don’t worry, it’s going to be fine,” he told them.

And he wasn’t the only one who thought so. “One of the animators stood up and said, ‘You guys are crazy. This is going to run for 100 years,’ ” Mendelson recalled.

“He knew better than I,” the producer added. “We’re halfway there.”

Categories
Movies

Poor Universal!!

Universal Backed ‘By The Sea’ Hoping Angelina Jolie Would Star In ‘Bride Of Frankenstein’ Or ‘Wanted 2′

Sometimes you gotta spend money to make money, or in the case of Universal, lose money to potentially make money. The studio is currently reeling from what will likely be a $40 million loss on Angelina Jolie’s vanity project “By The Sea.” The Euro-flavored drama costarring her husband Brad Pitt seemed like a slam dunk based on their names alone, but neither critics nor audiences warmed to the movie. But the studio hopes that by backing the picture, it will lead to one scenario that will pay off in the end.

THR reports that the studio rolled the dice on Jolie’s movie —including such indulgences as allowing Jolie’s team to cut the trailers and posters (which bizarrely didn’t even feature the faces of its two biggest stars)— in the hopes that she might return the favor by signing up for the long-developing “Wanted 2” or “Bride Of Frankenstein.”

Yep, it’s the ol’ “one for me, one for them” scenario, though it’s debatable whether or not anyone cares about a “Wanted” sequel at this point. Similarly, even though “Our Brand Is Crisis” flopped, Warner Bros. is still hoping to get Sandra Bullock to commit to the female led reboot/remake of “Ocean’s Eleven.”

Categories
Movies

I saw SPOTLIGHT this weekend and it is amazing!! Search it out!!

Box office report: Mockingjay – Part 2 earns lowest Hunger Games debut with $101 million

The saga of Katniss Everdeen came to a close this weekend as The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 opened to an estimated $101 million.

That’s the lowest debut of any of the Hunger Games movies and under initial predictions of $120 million. When the big-screen depiction of Suzanne Collins’ Panem debuted in March 2012, it brought in $152.5 million, the biggest opening ever for a movie with a female lead. The next year, Catching Fire beat its record and stretched to $158.1 million. Last year’s Mockingjay – Part 1 saw a slight dip, opening to $121.9 million, and early predictions had Part 2 debuting close to that.

While Mockingjay didn’t manage to soar as high as the earlier installments, the $160 million film still notched the fifth-biggest debut of the year, making it one of only five films to debut above $100 million. And although Mockingjay 2 wasn’t as critically adored as the first two films, it earned an A- CinemaScore. Globally, it reeled in $247 million, and even though Mockingjay couldn’t catch Catching Fire’s box office records, it bumped up the franchise’s worldwide total to a staggering $2.55 billion.

As far as films not set in Panem go, holdovers and newcomers alike fell to Katniss’ arrow, as no other movie in theaters managed to crack $15 million. The Christmas-themed comedy The Night Before, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Anthony Mackie, and Seth Rogen, hauled in $10.1 million. Thanks to positive word-of-mouth (it earned an A- CinemaScore) and a lack of other R-rated comedies, it could hold up well over the next few weeks.

The weekend’s final new wide release, the crime thriller Secret In Their Eyes, rounded out the top five with $6.6 million. With a star-studded cast including Julia Roberts, Nicole Kidman, and Chiwetel Ejiofor, Secret In Their Eyes earned a B- CinemaScore.

Spectre and The Peanuts Movie held second and third place, as 007 brought in $14.6 million and Charlie Brown made $12.8 million. Spectre’s domestic total is now at $153.7 million, while The Peanuts Movie has made $98.9 million.

At the specialty box office, the Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara-starring Carol had a standout debut, opening to $248,149 in only four theaters for a strong start of $62,037 per location. The gangster drama Legend, starring Tom Hardy and Tom Hardy, also debuted in four locations, earning $82,884 for an average just over $20,000.

Spotlight, another limited release, also had a strong weekend as it expanded to just shy of 600 locations, bringing in an estimated $3.6 million. Starring Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, and Rachel McAdams, the drama finally moved into the top 10, and after three weekends, its domestic total is now at $5.9 million.

Overall, box office receipts were down about 11 percent from last year, when the first Mockingjay opened. Here are this weekend’s top five at the box office:

1. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 — $101 million
2. Spectre — $14.6 million
3. The Peanuts Movie — $12.8 million
4. The Night Before — $10.1 million
5. Secret In Their Eyes — $6.6 million

Categories
Music

New Foo!! New Foo!! Free New Foo!!!

Foo Fighters release surprise new EP, Saint Cecilia, for free download

For the last month, Foo Fighters’ website has been counting down to Midnight on Monday, November 23rd. The clock has now struck 00:00:00:00, revealing news of a surprise new EP called Saint Cecilia that’s available to download right this very second.

Update: Foo Fighters are offering free downloads via their website. Pre-orders are also ongoing for a vinyl edition.

In an open letter, Dave Grohl said the EP has “taken on an entirely different tone” in the wake of the Paris terror attacks earlier this month, which forced Foo Fighters to cancel the remainder of their European tour. Grohl says the EP is dedicated to victims of the attacks.

“Tonight, Let me begin with a preface to a letter I wrote a few weeks ago from my hotel room in Berlin while on our final tour for this album. I felt the need to write this foreword in light of the heartbreaking tragedies of Nov. 13th, as this project has now taken on an entirely different tone. As has everything, it seems…

The Saint Cecilia EP was put into motion back in October of this year as a celebration of life and music. The concept being that, as our world tour drew to a close this week, we wanted to share our love of both with you in return for everything you have given us.

Now, there is a new, hopeful intention that, even in the smallest way, perhaps these songs can bring a little light into this sometimes dark world. To remind us that music is life, and that hope and healing go hand in hand with song. That much can never be taken away.

To all who were affected by the atrocities in Paris, loved ones and friends, our hearts go out to you and your families. We will return and celebrate life and love with you once again someday with our music. As it should be done.”

According to iTunes, “this five-song EP captures nearly forgotten moments from the band’s 20-year odyssey—a brilliant patchwork of pieced-together riffs and song fragments that were tracked in an impromptu studio at Austin’s Hotel Saint Cecilia. The road-tested band blasts through the set of scrappy guitar-driven rockers with high-volume fury. Polished? No way. But the rowdy performances and rough edges make Saint Cecilia pack a visceral punch.”

Saint Cecilia Tracklist:
01. Saint Cecilia
02. Sean
03. Savior Breath
04. Iron Rooster
05. The Neverending Sigh

Categories
Television

I still haven’t gotten comfortable with him as the host of this show yet. Maybe one day, but not yet.

Colbert’s ‘Late Show’ gets coveted post-Super Bowl spot

Stephen Colbert is about to make television history.

CBS will air a live edition of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” right after the network’s Super Bowl telecast on Sunday, Feb. 7 — the first time a late-night talk show has grabbed the coveted postgame time slot.

That means “The Late Show” will score whopping ratings — if it follows the established history of comedies and dramas the networks have aired after their Super Bowl coverage.

Last February, NBC aired its James Spader drama, “The Blacklist,” following Super Bowl XLIX.

That episode snared nearly 26 million viewers — an increase of more than 16 million from the show’s usual numbers.