News

Michael Stipe reveals in a new interview that he is slowly but surely working on a solo album, his first since the dissolution of R.E.M. over a dozen years ago.

The New York Times checked in on Stipe for over a year, where unsteady progress was made on the solo LP, which the singer was hoping to release in 2023 before life stuff — family emergencies, art exhibits, a bout with Covid, apartment moves, etc. — delayed the album’s completion.

At some point in the process, Stipe found himself at Electric Lady...

Mykki Blanco is sending dispatches from their summer vacation with a new EP called Postcards from Italia, arriving September 22nd via Transgressive. As a preview, they’ve shared the appropriately sunny single “Holidays in the Sun,” which you can listen to below.

Produced by FaltyDL, who also helmed last year’s Stay Close to Music, Blanco describes the six-track Postcards from Italia as the sound of their “Italian cowboy era.” In the case of their latest single, that means not acoustic guitar and steel pedal, but a slip-and-slide bass and a Eurodance beat. Still, the artist assumes a country drawl in the verses as they croon, “Took a pack of cigs and a couple of beers down to the levy/ I don’t gotta hurry, boy/ I don’t gotta worry/ It’s not that heavy.”

“‘Holidays in the Sun’ was created funnily enough in a basement in Portugal on Christmas Eve,...

Outfest Fusion, LA nonprofit Outfest‘s film festival dedicated to queer Bipoc storytelling, has unveiled the full lineup of films for its 20th anniversary festival.

10 features, 93 short films, and four TV presentations will screen during the March festival in Los Angeles, including Sundance documentaries “Little Richard: I Am Everything” and “The Stroll.” Documentary “Kenyatta: Do Not Wait Your Turn,” produced by Xpedition and Al Roker, and featuring Lee Daniels, will make its North American premiere during the festival; in total, 23 films will make world premieres, five will make their U.S. premiere, four their international premieres, and three their North American premieres. Over half of all films were directed by women, non-binary, two spirit, or gender-nonconforming filmmakers.

“We are at a moment where our industry is ready to have an honest dialogue about inclusion, investment and representation of people of color and yet our entire LGBTQ+ population is facing a...

The ever-inventive New Orleans no-wave outfit Special Interest has released a new song, “Midnight Legend,” from their upcoming third album, Endure, out Nov. 4 via Rough Trade.

Featuring a guest verse from Mykki Blanco, “Midnight Legend” straddles the line between euphoria and chaos as vocalist Alli Logout’s mesmerizing melodies drift over a down-tempo dance groove and a dissonant tangle of guitars and synths. Logout also directed the song’s music video, which traces the highs and lows of three “legends” during a night out, then follows them into the next morning,...

Mykki Blanco has dropped their first new music of 2022 with new song “Family Ties,” featuring an appearance from Michael Stipe. The single follows last year’s Broken Hearts & Beauty Sleep, and is expected to be included on Blanco’s upcoming new project.

The song’s accompanying black-and-white visual, directed by Kit Monteith and Krishna Muthurangu, traces a father and son’s contentious relationship, with Blanco playing the role of the son’s love interest. The couple is shown both comforting each other and arguing.

“‘Cause I hate to see you...

GLAAD, the queer (LGBTQ) media advocacy organization, announced that it will honor award-winning actress, singer and activist Michaela Jaé (Mj) Rodriguez with the Stephen F. Kolzak Award at the 33rd annual GLAAD Media Awards in Los Angeles. The ceremony is set for Saturday, April 2 at the Beverly Hilton.

The GLAAD Media Awards honor media for fair, accurate and inclusive representations of LGBTQ people and issues. Since its inception in 1990, the GLAAD Media Awards have grown to be the most visible annual LGBTQ awards show in the world, sending powerful messages of acceptance to audiences globally.

“Michaela Jaé Rodriguez is an undeniable talent who is changing the way audiences understand trans people while breaking down barriers for the trans community and LGBTQ people of color within the entertainment industry,” said GLAAD president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis. “Her performance as Blanca on Pose was one of the most important and impactful...

On “Free Ride,” the first single from Mykki Blanco’s new mini-lp Broken Hearts & Beauty Sleep, the musician constructs a tabernacle from which to worship the sensation of love. The accompanying video features Blanco refiguring tropes of family, community, and celebration to more inclusive ends. What might read as dysfunctional — multiple generations dwelling in a rickety Rv — is recast with gentle reverence. Blanco’s gift has always been the queering of perspective, refusing to stay fixed in any particular mode. Broken Hearts & Beauty Sleep brings that framework to notions of love and loss.

"I am strong because I have no choice . . . But I am fragile. I am fragile too."

Every year, June brings a sense of freedom. We're literally free from layers of cold-weather clothes, but we're also free to express our sexuality in whatever way we feel possible. This is (at least a piece of) what Pride Month is about. It's easy nowadays to forget that Pride stems back to a riot. Yes, a riot of bricks and broken glass and beaten bodies - a majority of those bodies being Black and brown.

Tajabone is just one part of Nowness's "Just Dance" series, "genre-busting" videos that seek to transform what dance can accomplish. Running three and a half minutes, the film, directed by Raphael Chatelaine and Nicolas Huchard, reminds us how both fragile and powerful the queer community of color is. Huchard, a young Black choreographer and performer from Paris, reached out to Chatelaine,...

Mykki Blanco has released a new song, “It’s Not My Choice,” featuring Blood Orange. The track will appear on Blanco’s upcoming mini-album, Broken Hearts and Beauty Sleep, out June 18th via Transgressive Records.

“It’s Not My Choice” opens with an eerie groan of strings, but quickly settles into a slick soul groove filled with punchy piano and the lonesome wail of a saxophone. On the verses, Blanco tries to navigate the pain of an imminent break-up, while Blood Orange’s Dev Hynes pops up to croon the hook.

Pride Live, a social advocacy and community engagement organization for the LGBTQ+ community, today announced its fourth annual Stonewall Day, a global campaign to elevate awareness and support for the Stonewall legacy and the continuing fight for full LGBTQ+ equality.

This year, Pride Live teams up with Outloud: Raising Voices, the award-winning Lgbtqia+ Pride artist series, to kick off Pride month with a three-day, one-of-a-kind global concert experience to be held at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in the heart of Los Angeles. June 4-6. Stonewall Day takes place on Sunday, June 6.

Tickets for the in-person event, which will closely follow all Los Angeles County health and safety protocols, are available at Ticketmaster. The event is also free to stream live each day from 4:00 p.m. Pacific time / 7:00 p.m. Eastern time – 10:00 p.m. Pacific time / 1:00 a.m. Eastern time, exclusively on Twitch @officiallyoutloud. For more up to date event information,...

Mykki Blanco will follow-up their 2016 debut with Broken Hearts & Beauty Sleep, a mini-album out June 18th via Transgressive Records.

To accompany the announcement, Blanco dropped the sultry “Love Me,” featuring Jamila Woods and Blanco’s brother Jay Cue. It follows “Free Ride,” released last month.

“‘Love Me’ is essentially about so many forms of love, patience, trust, time,” Blanco said. “It is about the potion that is created when you sift through the ingredients that create ‘love,’ the alchemy we as human beings take part in to convey these feelings deep inside of us.

Exclusive: Lbi Entertainment has signed award-winning Emmanuel Adjei for management. Adjei most recently co-directed Beyonce’s virtual album Black Is King, along with Beyonce, Ibra Ake and Blitz Bazawule. The special premiered on Disney Plus last month to critical acclaim.

Adjei is a Ghanaian-Dutch filmmaker whose work has traversed the realms of narrative film, music video, commercial and art installation. Adjei’s work interrogates traditional concepts of power, freedom, displacement, and inequality.

His career has been marked by collaborations with a variety of recording artists such as Madonna, Beyoncé, Mark Pritchard, and Mykki Blanco.

His mind-bending short film Shahmaran received widespread critical acclaim upon its release in 2018, numerous awards and nominations at the UK Music Video Awards, D&ad, Young Director Award, Camerimage, Ciclope Awards, Kinsale Shark Awards, Epica Awards, Shots Awards, Creative Circle Awards, and Le Club des Directeurs Artistiques.

In 2019, Adjei’s videos for Madonna’s Dark Ballet...

Formerly titled Boyz in the Wood, we have the trailer for Get Duked!, which will be making its way to Amazon Prime on August 28th:

Synopsis: "Dean, Duncan and DJ Beatroot are teenage pals from Glasgow who embark on the character-building camping trip — based on a real-life program — known as the Duke of Edinburgh Award, where foraging, teamwork and orienteering are the order of the day. Eager to cut loose and smoke weed in the Scottish Highlands, the trio finds themselves paired with straight-laced Ian, a fellow camper determined to play by the rules. After veering off-path into remote farmland that's worlds away from their urban comfort zone, the boys find themselves hunted down by a shadowy force hell-bent on extinguishing their futures. From writer-director Ninian Doff — making his feature debut after a slew of award-winning music videos and short films for artists including Run the Jewels, Miike Snow, Migos,...

Mention Teyana Taylor’s name, and it evokes kinetic experiences: aerobicized thrusts in Kanye West’s “Fade” clip, melting alongside Kehlani in a “Morning” homage to the 1998 camp-classic Wild Things, casually flexing in Jay-Z’s video for “Blue Magic.” As a dancer and model – she launched her career in her teens by choreographing Beyoncé’s “Ring the Alarm” video – Taylor leaves a visual imprint as distinct as anything by Rihanna, Ciara and other doyennes of black pop.

But as a musician, Teyana’s path has been less assured. An early...

Mykki Blanco enlisted Devendra Banhart for a spiritual odyssey on their new song, “You Will Find It.”

“You Will Find It” boasts twinkling guitar and an atmospheric aura, although Blanco ramps up the tension with a run of crackling verses peppered with periodic synth throbs and drums. In their lyrics, Blanco namechecks Lady Gaga and Alice Coltrane (plus Betty Rubble and Snow White) as they alternately mull deep existential questions and slip in a few clever clapbacks: “All Hail, her highness, La Dona Blanco,” Blanco spits, “I see some fakes,...

Madonna has unveiled her new video for “Dark Ballet.” It’s the fifth and final preview that will be released from her forthcoming Madame X, due June 14th. The cinematic clip stars Mykki Blanco, who portrays Joan of Arc.

In the visually arresting Emmanuel Adjei-directed video, Mykki Blanco is seen bravely facing adversity from various religious figures and onlookers and dancing despite the impending, inescapable doom to come.

The star mouths along to Madonna’s lyrics, “‘Cause your world is such a shame/’Cause your world’s obsessed with fame,...

GLAAD, the world’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (Lgbtq) media advocacy organization, announced recipients for the remaining 13 of this year’s 27 categories for the 30th Annual GLAAD Media Awards.

Madonna speaks onstage during the 30th Annual GLAAD Media Awards New York

Credit/Copyright: Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images for GLAAD

Madonna received the Advocate for Change Award from Anderson Cooper, while Andy Cohen received the Vito Russo Award from Golden Globe-winning actress Sarah Jessica Parker at the star-studded ceremony at the Hilton Midtown in New York. The 30th Annual GLAAD Media Awards in New York were hosted by drag superstar Shangela.

The New York City ceremony will air exclusively on Logo on Sunday, May 12 at 8pm Et/Pt.

In her remarks, Madonna said: “As soon as you really understand what it means to love, you understand what it takes to become a human being and that it is...

The second wave of GLAAD Media Awards winners were announced in New York City tonight at a ceremony hosted by RuPaul’s Drag Race superstar Shangela (who made a splash at the Los Angeles ceremony with her Beyonce performance). The East Coast edition of the awards unveiled Pose as the winner of Outstanding Drama Series; The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story as Outstanding TV Movie or Limited Series; and Boy Erased as Outstanding Film – Limited Release.

As previously reported Madonna was presented with the Advocacy for Change Award. She is is the second person and first woman to ever receive this honor, awarded to a person who, through their work, changed the game for Lgbtq people around the world. Andy Cohen was honored with the Vito Russo Award, which is presented to an openly Lgbtq media professional who has made a significant difference in accelerating Lgbtq acceptance.

Other...

Mø dropped by The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon to perform her Forever Neverland track “Blur.” The Danish pop star’s tour begins tonight. Mø and her band performed “Blur” in front of a large moon that was backlit by a red light. It matched the song’s opening lyrics: “Under the bad, bad moon tonight/Baby you should trust me.” From there, she danced and belted in front of the moon orb for an alluringly menacing performance.

Forever Neverland is the singer-songwriter’s sophomore LP, arriving four years after...

For the first time in her career, MØ is about to go all-out with the design of her latest tour. “I don’t want to say it’s a ‘real’ show because every show is a ‘real’ show,” the Danish pop singer explains excitedly, “but we created an actual set-up. We really thought hard about it and worked on it for a long time to make extra things.”

This tour, which launches on January 15th in Washington D.C. (with support from Abra and, later, Mykki Blanco), comes at a...