Apparently the wait was worth it. After several delays, Usher's Raymond v. Raymond finally made it into stores last week, paving the way for a #1 debut on the Billboard 200 albums chart. The disc, which sold more than 329,000 copies, is the R&B singer's third #1 debut in a row, and it knocks last week's top dog, protégé Justin Bieber's My World 2.0, down a notch to #2. The Bieb has nothing to worry about, though, since, according to figures provided by Nielsen SoundScan, his second album in four months sold another 291,000 copies, putting him near the 600,000 mark in just two weeks.
The relentless hype over her slow striptease in the "Window Seat" video clearly helped soul sister Erykah Badu, as her New Amerykah Part Two:Return of the Ankh debuts at #4 on sales of 110,000. The only other debut in the top 10 is from country star Alan Jackson, whose Freight Train bows at #7 (72,000).
The rest of the top 10: Now 33 (#3, 123,000), Lady Antebellum, Need You Now (#5, 87,000), Monica, Still Standing (#6, 81,000), Justin Bieber, My World (#8, 63,000), Lady Gaga, The Fame (#9, 50,000) and Black Eyed Peas, The E.N.D. (Energy Never Dies) (#10, 43,000).
Wu-Tang compatriots Method Man, Raekwon and Ghostface Killah debut at #12 with their Wu-Massacre album (38,000), while Canadian popsters Barenaked Ladies pop in at #23 with All in Good Time (23,000), their first album without singer/guitarist Steven Page, who left the group last year after an arrest on cocaine possession charges. Veteran rapper E-40 lands two albums in the top 50, with Revenue Retrievin': Day Shift debuting at #47 (12,000) and the companion piece, Revenue Retrievin': Night Shift, just behind at #49 (12,000).
It was a short trip to the top for indie duo She & Him, whose second album of bubblegum pop, Vol. 2, drops 22 spots to #28 in week two on sales of 19,000.
Things should be relatively quiet next week, as the only major releases are the first solo album from former Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash and a live Madonna CD/DVD.
The world's greatest basketball player made an appearance on The Jimmy Kimmel Show last night.
Greeted by an enthusiastic crowd chanting MVP! Kobe Bryant talked to Jimmy about his new $84 million dollar contract extension that should keep him a Los Angeles Laker for the rest of his career.
The Lakers got a chance to meet President Obama after last year's championship. Kobe talked about bringing his family with him and his 7 year old daughter trying to sell The President Girls Scout Cookies.
Both Obama and Vice President Joe Biden cookies, lol.
Singer Nicole Scherzinger of The Pussycat Dolls kicked it with George Lopez last night (March 6).
They talked about the success she's having on this season's Dancing With The Stars, her family life, the future of The Pussycat Dolls who have lost a couple of members recently and her background in classical music.
There was a pretty funny moment for the crowd as Nicole warmed up her vocal chords before singing "Ava Maria". I don't think anyone knew what she was doing initially so there was some laughter.
Also check our her week 3 performance on Dancing With The Stars below
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“Who misses the greatest rapper of all time?” Drake asked a crowded Lantz Arena midway through his 70-minute performance at Eastern Illinois University on Tuesday. But the Canadian-born musician, getting his first solo headlining tour — a 23-city jaunt that runs through May 8th in Plymouth, New Hampshire — off the ground, wasn’t talking about heavily eulogized artists like Tupac or Biggie. The 23-year-old MC was talking about his dreadlocked mentor, Lil Wayne, who is currently serving a one-year sentence at Rikers Island on a gun charge. “I talk to Weezy every day,” he continued, before ripping off a Hulk-ish “I’m Going In” and leading the crowd in raucous chants of “Free Weezy!”
It’s a small bit of irony that Drake’s long-awaited return to the stage, which follows August 2009 surgery to repair a torn ACL, coincides with Wayne’s much-delayed incarceration. The rapper made no mention of his injury, which he sustained in a fall while performing with Lil Wayne in Camden, New Jersey, last July, though his normally high-energy stage show did seem somewhat muted. Backed by a DJ and a four-piece band, Drake worked through a number of cuts from his breakthrough mixtape, So Far Gone, and previewed a verse from “Fireworks,” a dark, synth-heavy diatribe off his forthcoming full-length, Thank Me Later, which the rapper said to expect on June 15th (though, as frequently as the album’s been pushed back, it’s wholly possible he meant June 2011).
Throughout the evening, Drake balanced two seemingly conflicting personas: the über-cocky ladies’ man and the emotionally vulnerable dweeb. One verse he’d exude supreme confidence, the next he’d erode into self-doubt — James Brown giving way to Charlie Brown. Even the set list played up this parallel, Drake following the money-cash-hoes boasts of “Successful” with the weirdly introspective “Fear.” “Now security follow me everywhere, so I never actually am alone/I just always feel alone,” he rhymed over synths that chimed like a chandelier in a gentle breeze.
But if Drake felt most comfortable embracing his inner-Steve Urkel (the MC called “Fear” his “favorite song,” and delivered a stripped-down “Lust For Life” like a beat poet seeking transcendence), the largely female audience preferred when he channeled the far-suaver Stefan Urquelle. On “Best I Ever Had” the singer sounded like a particularly seductive cyborg as he crooned one-liners both PG (”Sweatpants, hair tied, chillin’ with no makeup on/That’s when you’re your prettiest”) and X-rated (”My shirt ain’t got no stripes, but I can make your pussy whistle”). And when Drake asked, “Who’s coming home with me?” during a sensual, heaving “Invented Sex,” virtually every lady — and a few zealous gents — reacted with shrieks and spastic fits unseen since the heyday of The Price Is Right.
Set List:
“Forever”
“Unstoppable”
“Uptown”
“Lust For Life”
“Houstatlantavegas”
“November 18th”
“Fireworks”
“Killers”
“Money to Blow”
“Big Tymers/I’m Still Fly”
“I’m Going In”
“Every Girl/Bedrock”
“Throw It In the Bag”
“Unthinkable” (instrumental)
“A Night Off”
“Successful”
“Fear”
“Say Something”
“Invented Sex”
“Best I Ever Had”
“Over”
Cincinatti Bengals star wide receiver Chad Ocho Cinco is obviously fond of his Dancing With The Stars partner Cheryl Burke.
So much so, he put a $10,000 ring designed by Jason The Jeweler on her finger as a show of appreciation for all the hard work she's puts in.
Known for his eccentric ways and elaborate touchdown celebrations, Chad gave the ring to Cheryl on one knee.
He told UsMagazine, "she has to deal with me nine hours a day. It's like a marriage, so why not give marriage gifts? I don't spend time with anyone like this -- ever!"
For her part, Cheryl seems to be in shock.
She Told ETOnline, "I fainted a little. A little concussion. [He] gave it to me in the trailer on one knee. And it's on my ring finger."
"Not even any of my boyfriends have given me anything like this!"
When asked if there was a future romance in the making Cheryl says, "You never know."
On the heels of releasing their ninth group project, this time featuring all five members together, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony realized the endurance that kept them together all these years was exactly what they needed to deliver their new album.
Singer Robin Thicke and actress Paula Patton welcomed their first child into the world Tuesday (April 6).
The couple named the baby Julien. Robin recently told Rap-Up.com how he and his wife chose that name.
“My brother didn’t ever hang out with me when we were teenagers, so I kind of always dreamed of having a little brother or a son,” he said. “I came up with the name Julian when I was like 14 years old. So when I told my wife the idea, she loved the name and it stuck.”
The plot thickens when it comes to the record "Afrika Bambaataa." Weeks ago, before he went to prison, Wayne revealed on his "Nino Brown: The Road To Rikers" DVD that he was shooting a video to a song called "Afrika Bambaataa" for Drake. Everyone speculated that the song in question would be part of Weezy's contribution to Drizzy's Thank Me Later album. On Monday in Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania, before the start of his Away From Home Tour, Drake told us "Afrika Bambaataa" isn't his record.
In a match between UK's Portsmouth vs The Blackburn Rovers the entire crowd witnesses Anthony Vanden Borre's red card except for Soccer Saturday's sideline reporter Chris Kamara.
When Jeff Stelling went live to him pure comedy ensues as Chris is totally clueless as to what just happened.
For those who aren't soccer fans this would be the equivalent of a sideline reporter missing a players's ejection during an NFL game.
FAYETTEVILLE, NC (WTVD) -- The North Carolina Medical Board says doctors and interns at Cape Fear Valley Medical Center attempted to induce labor on a patient, but when that didn't work, they performed a cesarean section only to find out there was no baby.
The incident happened in November 2008, but the state medical board spent the past year reviewing the case. In January, they issued the two doctors involved letters of concern.
ABC11 Eyewitness News spoke with one of the doctors involved who explained how something so bizarre could have happened.
Doctor Gerianne Geszler was in charge of the doctors on duty at Cape Fear Valley Medical Center the night of the incident.
Geszler says several doctors had examined and attempted to induce labor on the patient for several days before the C-section incident.
"They did an epidural on her and when they opened up and made the incision, they saw a non-pregnant uterus," Geszler said.
At that point the doctors "closed her back up."
Doctor Dorette Grant is the physician who performed the C-section.
The NC Medical Board issued her a letter of concern that said in part, "you attempted to perform a cesarean section delivery on Patient A after a failed attempt at induction of labor."
"At the time of surgery, it was discovered that Patient A was not pregnant," Board President Donald E. Jablonski said in the letter.
Dr. Geszler says an intern made the original diagnosis.
"And so she said she did an ultrasound and she said no heart beat," Geszler said. "So [the patient] convinced the resident that she wanted to be induced at Cape Fear Valley, so the resident said can I induce here and I said okay."
According to the medical board, the initial diagnosis was made by healthcare providers without the necessary experience to make the appropriate diagnosis.
"Your inappropriate reliance on their diagnosis and the failure to conduct your own examination were contributing factors in the unnecessary attempt at a caesarian delivery," said Jablonski in a letter to Geszler.
The patient was actually suffering from pseudocyesis, symptoms associated with pregnancy even though they are not pregnant. The false pregnancy can be caused by changes in the body and hormones, emotional distress or an endocrine disorder.
The hospital administration didn't want to comment on the incident.
Meanwhile, both doctors continue to practice in Fayetteville. Dr. Geszler is still a gynecologist, but doesn't deliver babies anymore.
Doctor Grant is still an OBGYN, but she was unable to speak with ABC11 Wednesday, because she was busy delivering two babies
LOS ANGELES – The tan Armani suit, white shirt and gold tie that O.J. Simpson wore on the day he was acquitted of murder have been acquired by the Newseum in Washington, D.C., for a display exhibit on the "trial of the century", the curator of the museum of news said Tuesday.
"For us, it's a piece of news history that we will include in our collection of objects relating to the trial," said Carrie Christofferson, the curator who was involved in negotiations to obtain the suit.
Mike Gilbert, Simpson's former manager who has had possession of it, said he will fly to Washington and hand deliver the ensemble to the Newseum next week.
"I hope it will be displayed in a way that will help people ponder the legal system and celebrity," said Gilbert. "I'm happy that it will go somewhere where people can see it and remember where they were that day in history."
The acquisition ends a 13-year legal battle between Gilbert and Fred Goldman, the father of the man Simpson was charged with killing in 1994.
Both men claimed the right to the clothing Simpson was wearing Oct. 3, 1995, when he was acquitted of killing ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, Ronald Goldman, after a televised trial that riveted the nation. The acquittal was viewed by millions on live TV.
Gilbert came up with the idea of a donation to a museum. He has kept the suit, shirt and tie in storage since shortly after Simpson's acquittal.
The suit was first offered to the Smithsonian Institution, but the museum said it was not appropriate for its collection. Gilbert said the Museum of Crime and Punishment in Washington also had been trying to acquire the suit, but the parties decided the appropriate venue was the Newseum.
Christofferson said it will be shown along with a collection of newspaper headlines, press passes, reporters' notebooks and equipment used to televise the notorious trial.
"It will help us tell the story of this massive trial of the last century," she said.
Goldman's attorney, David Cook, said he was pleased with the resolution in which no one will profit from the suit.
"People will ask me what Fred Goldman gets from this," Cook said. "It's not money, it's not vengeance. It's the enshrinement of the painfully inexplicable.
"It does further Fred Goldman's goals because it keeps the story in front of America and, to that degree, it's a success, as much as one can find any success in this terrible story," Cook said.
Simpson attorney Ronald P. Slates said the former football star and actor, who is in prison in Nevada, was kept informed and agreed to the donation.
"We are very happy to have participated in this amicable resolution of this lawsuit," said Slates. "This is an important part of the history of American jurisprudence. This way, nobody profits and the American public gets to view a centerpiece of this historic event."
Ironically, Simpson, 62, is serving a minimum nine-year prison sentence in a case indirectly involving the suit. He was convicted of robbery and kidnapping in Las Vegas in October 2008 after a botched heist to retrieve his memorabilia he said was stolen by dealers. Witnesses said Simpson believed the suit was among the items offered for sale in a hotel room but it was not there.
Fans of Drake's are going to be treated to a preview of yet another track off of his Thank Me Later LP, dropping June 15, when they go to his Away From Home Tour this spring. The 23-year-old is performing the first verse of the much-anticipated new song "Fireworks" at his concerts.
The recently freed T.I. said his next album (due August 24) will be more about "feelings" than his last project, Paper Trail, which he described as driven by "thoughts." The Atlanta rapper has said fans can expect "classic T.I."
CHICAGO — When the body of Chicago's school board president was found partially submerged in a river last fall, a bullet wound to the head, cameras helped prove it was a suicide.
Friends had speculated someone forced Michael Scott to drive to the river before shooting him — and maybe even wrapped his fingers around the trigger.
But within days, police recreated Scott's 20-minute drive through the city using high-tech equipment that singled out his car on a succession of surveillance cameras, handing the image from camera to camera. The video didn't capture Scott's final moments, but it helped convince police his death was a suicide: He wasn't followed. He wasn't following anyone. He never picked up a passenger.
The investigation offered a riveting demonstration of the most extensive and sophisticated video surveillance system in the United States, and one that is transforming what it means to be in public in Chicago.
In less than a decade and with little opposition, the city has linked thousands of cameras — on street poles and skyscrapers, aboard buses and in train tunnels — in a network covering most of the city. Officials can watch video live at a sprawling emergency command center, police stations and even some squad cars.
"I don't think there is another city in the U.S. that has as an extensive and integrated camera network as Chicago has," said Michael Chertoff, the former Homeland Security secretary.
New York has plenty of cameras, but about half of the 4,300 installed along the city's subways don't work. Other cities haven't been able to link networks like Chicago. Baltimore, for example, doesn't integrate school cameras with its emergency system and it can't immediately send 911 dispatchers video from the camera nearest to a call like Chicago can.
Even London — widely considered the world's most closely watched city with an estimated 500,000 cameras — doesn't incorporate private cameras in its system as Chicago does.
While critics decry the network as the biggest of Big Brother invasions of privacy, most Chicago residents accept them as a fact of life in a city that has always had a powerful local government and police force.
And authorities say the system helps them respond to emergencies in a way never before possible. A dispatcher can tell those racing to the scene how big a fire is or what a gunman looks like. If a package is left sitting next to a building for more than a few minutes, a camera can send an alert.
Cameras have recorded drug deals, bike thefts and a holiday bell ringer dipping his hand into a pot outside a downtown store. Footage from a camera on a city bus helped convince a suspected gang member to plead guilty to shooting a 16-year-old high school student in 2007.
In the death of the school board president, the cameras helped diffuse mounting suspicion and anger.
"It really closed that piece of the puzzle," police Superintendent Jody Weis said. "We don't know what was going through his head, but we definitely know he was alone."
The network began less than a decade ago with a dozen cameras installed in Grant Park to deter violence during the annual Taste of Chicago festival. It now includes private cameras as well as those installed by a variety of public agencies.
While authorities won't say exactly how many cameras are included, with 1,500 installed by emergency officials, 6,500 in city schools and many more at public and private facilities, nobody disputes an estimate of 10,000 and growing. Weis said he would like to add "covert" cameras, perhaps as small as matchboxes.
City officials from around the world have visited Chicago to see the system and how effective it is.
Chicago police point to 4,000 arrests made since 2006 with the help of cameras. And, an unpublished study by the Washington-based Urban Institute found crime in one neighborhood — including drug sales, robberies and weapons offenses — decreased significantly after cameras were installed, said Nancy La Vigne, director of the institute's Justice Policy Center.
"It does stop people from coming out and acting the fool," observed Larry Scott, who lives in one of the city's last remaining public housing high rises.
He said residents rarely complain, unless they get caught for a minor offense or the cameras fail to record a violent attack.
"People were upset when that boy was killed by the 2-by-4 and there were no pictures," he said, referring to the beating death of a high school student that was recorded by cell phone but not city cameras last year.
Police say they usually hear from Chicago residents about the cameras only when they want one installed in their neighborhood or worry one will be removed. Such a claim is supported by an unlikely source: The American Civil Liberties Union, which has criticized the use of cameras as an invasion of privacy and ineffective crime fighting tool.
"It does appear that people only object is when they get a ticket (because of a camera) for running a red light," ACLU spokesman Edwin Yohnka said.
Although courts have generally found surveillance cameras placed in public don't violate individuals' privacy, Yohnka said they could too easily be misused.
"What protections are in place to stop a rogue officer from taking a highly powerful camera and aim it in a way to find or track someone who is perhaps a former love interest or something like that?" he asked.
Aric Roush, director of information services at the city's 911 center, responded that dispatchers see nothing officers wouldn't see if they were on the scene.
"You can't afford to put a police officer on every single corner (and) it is a lot more cost effective and efficient to put a camera where you don't have eyes," he said.
Chicago residents tend to be tough on crime and are likely to support any tool police use, said Paul Green, a Roosevelt University political science professor. Many literally applauded the officers who swung billy clubs at protesters during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, he recalled.
Mayor Richard Daley, he said, "could put 10,000 more cameras up and nobody would say anything."
Former Playboy centerfold Tanya Beyer is no longer the fugitive kind.
Beyer, now 38, faces felony charges for trafficking in the powerful prescription painkiller Oxycodone, according to documents obtained by The Smoking Gun.
Miss February of 1992 was nabbed in Florida on March 24 after being on the lam for six months. She is presently jailed in Palm Beach.
Beyer was caught after investigators received tips that the former pinup was “doctor shopping,” or illegally withholding information from physicians in order to obtain medication from multiple sources.
In an affidavit, cops allege she was filling prescriptions for Oxycodone at least three Florida pharmacies from different doctors. The police report noted Beyer’s history of lying to doctors in order to get a hold of the prescription pills.
The aged brunette beauty, still lithe at 5’9 and 125 pounds, was arrested after the police declared her a fugitive last October following her failure to make a court date. Authorities reached out to the public to held Beyter to justice via the Palm Beach Crime Stoppers program.
Beyer has also appeared in numerous Playboy videos in the mid 1990s including “Playboy”: Wet & Wild IV” and “Playboy Playmate Private Pleasures.”
PHARRELL WILLIAMS scrapped 27 songs before coming up with the right sound for N.E.R.D's latest album - because none of the new material was "good enough".
The group is preparing to release its first album since 2008's Seeing Sounds, and Williams admits the studio process left the band with a mountain of work they didn't want to use.
After dumping a staggering 27 tracks, the hip-hop trio started afresh - and focused on creating a sound tailored specifically for women.
Williams says,"We scrapped 27 records because they weren't good enough, they sounded great - but what were they saying? So we went back in (to the studio) and just focused on feeling. It's almost like we did this whole entire album with our eyes closed, not because it was that easy but because it was that important to reconnect to what we feel and I would say this album is like scrapping everything and starting with nothing.
"The music has been especially tuned in frequencies to speak to women. Women will literally feel this. We are doing some other next level experimentation with this music... and it's the sexiest thing that I could ever give to a woman."
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