Willie Colón Gone
R.I.P. Willie Colón: Salsa legend dead at 75
“His music was not just heard; it was lived,” Fania Records shared in a statement.
Innovative composer, vibrant trombonist, bandleader, and salsa visionary Willie Colón has died. On social media yesterday (February 21), his family confirmed the news. “It is with profound sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved husband, father, and renowned musician, Willie Colón,” their statement read. “He passed away peacefully this morning, surrounded by his loving family.” Colón was 75 years old.
Colón’s Puerto Rican grandmother exposed him to Latin sounds at a young age. In the Bronx, he heard guaracha, jíbaro, tango, and Cuban music and, by 1961, he learned the flute, trumpet, and bugle before eventually settling on the trombone. It was Barry Rogers’ playing on Mon Rivera and Joe Cotto’s “Dolores” that nudged him in the instrument’s direction. At 15, after gigging at weddings under the stewardship of Rivera, the Fania label signed Colón to a record deal. His first album, 1967’s El Malo, sold over 300,000 copies, and Colón later became one of the best-selling salsa artists of all time. His work combined funk, jazz, R&B, Latin rhythms, and the political teachings of figures like Martin Luther King Jr. together. “It was rebellious music,” he told the Miami Herald 20 years ago. “The music wasn’t explicitly political yet, but the music was a magnet that would bring people together.”
Gold Fever Pandemic Surging
The gold rush is back in California’s Inland Empire
In San Bernardino County, gold and silver mining companies are pushing to expand
By Erin Rode, Contributing LA Outdoors Editor
Calico Ghost Town Regional Park certainly did not feel like a ghost town last weekend. The line just to pay entrance fees at the San Bernardino County-managed attraction was at least a dozen cars deep, and neon-vested parking attendants tried to quell the sudden rush of traffic at the remote park as a shuttle ferried visitors from far-flung corners of the dirt parking lot to the town’s entrance. Once inside, visitors had their pick of a jam-packed schedule of events that included live bands, historical reenactments, pony rides and gun-draw competitions. Cold beers were poured at Lil’s Saloon at a nearly proportional rate to the number of parents buying prop guns for their kids as souvenirs.
Thousands of people descended on the tiny ghost town north of Barstow last weekend for the fifth annual Calico California Days, an event advertised as a celebration of California’s early history. Visitors stepped back in time, panning for fake gold nuggets and touring long-abandoned mining tunnels. Performers in 19th century garb played banjos and staged gunfights. But while the event offered a glimpse of California’s past, the giant mining corporations that sponsored the festivities are already hard at work excavating the region’s future.
Venusians, maybe?
Something Was Making Stone Tools In China 600,000 Years Before Homo Erectus Showed Up
Reviewed by John Anderer
In A Nutshell
- Ancient skulls found in Hubei Province, China, have been redated to 1.77 million years old, making them the oldest confirmed Homo erectus fossils found in place anywhere in eastern Asia.
- The new age pushes the site back by 700,000 to nearly a million years from its previous estimate.
- Stone tools at other Chinese sites predate these fossils by hundreds of thousands of years, leaving the identity of their makers an open mystery.
- The findings support the idea that early human relatives spread across Asia quickly after leaving Africa, reaching central China at nearly the same time they appeared on the far western edge of the continent.
Stone tools discovered in China date back as far as 2.4 million years. The oldest confirmed human fossils from the same region? Only 1.77 million years old. That gap, now significantly narrowed by new research, leaves one question stubbornly unanswered: who, or what, was already there?
Jesse Jackson Gone
Jesse Jackson Still Provides Light in These Dark Times
We would be wise to follow the path he forged.
“Jesse Jackson is one of the very most significant political leaders in this country in the last 100 years,” declared Senator Bernie Sanders, summarizing the importance of Jackson’s remarkable life and his historic 1984 and 1988 presidential campaigns.
His historic journey began in the humblest of circumstances. He was born the son of a single, teenage mother in Greenville, South Carolina, deep in the Jim Crow segregated South. He rose to be in the public eye for over six decades, a globally recognized warrior for justice. He became the youngest of Dr. Martin Luther King’s SCLC leadership group, organizing Operation Breadbasket, which mobilized African Americans to apply economic pressure on corporations to open their jobs, contracts, and boards to minorities. After King’s tragic assassination, he rapidly rose to be a leading voice of the civil rights movement as the head of People United to Save Humanity (PUSH), which he founded in Chicago.
Social Silent Reading
A different party scene: How Books & Books is building community through silent reading
WLRN Public Media | By Sofia Zarran
The party scene in Miami is not just changing, it’s rewinding. In some cases, it’s going analog. The kids are turning to yoga, retro cameras and, at one local bookstore, silently reading with a group of strangers.
Since last June, Books & Books in Coral Gables has opened its doors — once a month on Wednesdays — to those looking for a brief refuge from an often noisy, digital world. Instead of loud music, dark rooms and flashing lights, the store offers a quiet space with chairs, a carpet, some hummus and wine, and a collection of books at your disposal for at least an hour.
At the Books & Books Silent Reading Party, all are welcome. From fiction to romance to biographies, the reading party comes prepared with prompts for readers to share their responses to when the party ends.
Robert Duvall Gone
Robert Duvall, Star of ‘The Godfather’ and ‘The Great Santini,’ Dies at 95
By Carmel Dagan
Robert Duvall, who won an Oscar for “Tender Mercies” and was nominated for his roles in films including “The Godfather,” “Apocalypse Now,” and “The Great Santini,” has died. He was 95.
Duvall’s gruff naturalism came to define the acting style of a generation that included Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman and Gene Hackman in such films as “Network” and “The Apostle,” which he also directed.
And while he may never have been as big a star as DeNiro, his unshowy ability to fully embrace the characters he played earned him respect both from his peers and from critics. As Francis Ford Coppola once told the New York Times, at a certain point, it’s “hard to say the difference between leading men and great character actors.”
Odd Thinking
3 Unique Ways Smart People Think
Three ‘odd’ thinking patterns are consistently linked to higher intelligence.
People often picture intelligence as mental efficiency. We tend to imagine a smart person as someone who responds quickly, has strong opinions, and sees things clearly. However, highly intelligent people are not always faster, calmer, or more decisive. Sometimes, their minds are busier, slower, and more conflicted.
In my work as a psychologist, I’ve noticed that people with higher cognitive ability are often misunderstood simply because their mental habits don’t always look the way we expect intelligence to look. These tendencies get labeled as overthinking, indecision, or hesitation when, in reality, they reflect deeper cognitive processing.
Bud Cort Gone
Bud Cort Dies: ‘Harold And Maude’ Actor Was 77
By Greg Evans
Bud Cort, whose indelible portrayal of the gawky, death-obsessed young man barely out of his teens who falls in love with a spirited 79-year-old Holocaust survivor played by Ruth Gordon in 1971’s Harold and Maude, died Wednesday in Connecticut following a lengthy illness. He was 77.
Born Walter Edward Cox on March 29, 1948, in Rye, NY, the young actor — instantly recognizable with his owlish looks and rail-thin frame — was discovered and cast by director Robert Altman in two 1970 hit films MASH and Brewster McCloud. He would go on to play character roles in such films as Heat (1995), Dogma (1999) and The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004) among others, but it was his co-starring role in Hal Ashby’s midnight movie classic Harold and Maude that would establish his place in the cinema of the 1970s.
To The Moon Again!
Astronauts Are Going Back to the Moon For The First Time in Half a Century
Humanity has changed an awful lot in the past 58 Years. The moon? Not so much. It was in 1968 that astronauts first drew near the moon, and it will be early this year, if all goes as planned, that a crew will return, representing a species with gadgets and abilities—and yes, problems—that didn’t exist that half-century-plus ago.
Back then, the darkest concern was that to visit the moon would be to ruin the moon. That was the way Susan Borman put it to Chris Kraft, NASA’s then-director of flight operations, a few months before the Dec. 21 launch of Apollo 8. Borman was married to Frank Borman, the commander of the mission, who would lead a crew that for the first time would leave Earth orbit and venture moonward.
Apollo 8 had two possible mission profiles: the safer one and the scary one. The safer one involved whipping once around the moon’s far side and then relying on lunar gravity to slingshot the spacecraft back to Earth. The scary one involved reaching the moon and using Apollo 8’s howitzer of a main engine to slow the ship down and settle into lunar orbit, circling the moon 10 times before coming home.
Sly Dunbar Gone
Sly Dunbar Dies: Drummer Of Celebrated Reggae Rhythm Duo Sly & Robbie Was 73
By Greg Evans
Sly Dunbar, whose drumming with bassist Robbie Shakespeare made for an all-but-unrivaled reggae rhythm section utilized by such greats as Bob Marley, Bob Dylan and Mick Jagger, has died. He was 73.
Born Lowell Fillmore Dunbar on May 10, 1952, in Kingston, Jamaica, Dunbar began playing drums at a young age, joining his first band at 15 and, in 1972, becoming friends with bassist Shakespeare. Through early gigs with the band The Revolutionaries (also known as the Aggrovators) Sly & Robbie, as they became known, laid a foundation for the Jamaican reggae that would soon explode in worldwide popularity.
Aethelmaer’s Comet
Halley’s comet may need a new, medieval name
Astronomers suggest the honor should go to an 11th century monk known for a disastrous flying attempt.
by ANDREW PAUL
One of most recognizable comets in astronomy may require rebranding. But even if everyone continues to call the famed space rock Halley’s comet, some researchers say an eccentric 11th century monk deserves at least some credit. According to a review of historical materials including the famous Bayeux tapestry, a team from Leiden University in the Netherlands believes it makes more sense to name the icy space rock in honor of Aethelmaer of Malmesbury—a member of the Order of Saint Benedict who also lived with an ill-fated fascination with flying.
Every 76 years, a comet from the depths of our solar system reaches its nearest point to Earth. Its orbit is anything but new, however. Chinese observers recorded the appearance of a bright light traveling from east to north in the night sky as far back as 240 BCE, while Roman historian Cassius Dio described a similar sounding event in 12 BCE. It wasn’t until 1705 that the English astronomer Edmond Halley concluded that these regularly returning sights weren’t different objects, but a single comet traveling along a predictable trajectory. Today, his discovery is reflected in both the comet’s everyday name as well as its official classification, 1P/Halley.
Lessons From The Dead
What the Grateful Dead Can Show a Fractured America
COMMENTARY by J. Peder Zane
After the last key member of the Grateful Dead, guitarist Bob Weir, died last week at the age of 78, the cascade of loving tributes published far and wide underscored how he and his fellow band of misfits had created a new form of music that personified America.
In our melting pot nation, the Dead uniquely wove together the many strands of music brought to and developed on our shores. You could hear English and Scottish ballads and hymns, African rhythms, classical music, the avant-garde in their songs and jams, as well as blues, gospel, country, jazz, and rock. While clearly drawing on all these sources, they produced music that was identifiably their own. They were deeply traditional and truly original.
A rare dynamic informed their distinctive sound. In many rock groups, the instruments usually back the lead guitar. In the Dead, every instrument seemed to be soloing at once, like a Dixieland band. In their commitment to improvisation, each player pushed their own vision and creative powers. Yet, those “solos” worked because they were part of a conversation as the musicians listened and responded to one another; each individual effort served the collective sound. They were alone and together at once.
Celebrating Mel
‘Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!’ chronicles the comedic genius of a living legend
by Robert Lloyd
Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio have made a two-part, four-hour documentary about a comedy idol, “Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!,” premiering Thursday on HBO and HBO Max. It follows Apatow’s “The Zen Diaries of Garry Shandling” and “George Carlin’s American Dream,” also directed with Bonfiglio, in a growing library of comic biographies; a film on Norm Macdonald is in the works.
It’s a basically chronological telling of the life and work of a man who helped shape the comedy of the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s, and as an influence, of the ‘80s and ‘90s and beyond — there is perhaps no “Airplane!,” no “Austin Powers,” without the trail blazed by “Blazing Saddles” and “Young Frankenstein.” When I told my friend Jack, 33, that a “Spaceballs” sequel is coming, co-starring and co-written by Brooks, he could not have been more excited.
Valentino Gone
Valentino Garavani, Legendary Italian Fashion Designer, Dies at 93
Valentino Garavani — the legendary designer of the signature red dress and founder of the Valentino brand — has died
By Hedy Phillips and Jill Menze
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Valentino Garavani, the Italian fashion designer and founder of the celebrated Valentino brand, has died. He was 93.
Valentino was a favorite of stars such as Jennifer Aniston, Gwyneth Paltrow, Nicole Kidman and Anne Hathaway.
Born Valentino Clemente Ludovico Garavani on May 11, 1932, in Voghera, Italy, Valentino — famously mononymous — studied fashion at the École des Beaux-Arts and the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne in Paris before serving apprenticeships with Jacques Fath and Balenciaga.
The Airlines On Ozempic
The latest winner from weight-loss drugs? Airlines
One in eight U.S adults have used GLP-1s for weight loss or chronic conditions, according to a recent survey
by Katie Hawkinson in Washington, D.C.
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Weight-loss drugs could save U.S. airlines millions in fuel costs this year, according to a new report.
The increased popularity of weight loss drugs, such as GLP-1s, means airlines are carrying slimmer passengers, which in turn reduces their fuel costs, Bloomberg reports, citing a report by the Wall Street firm Jefferies. These drugs could save the airline industry up to $580 million this year alone, the report says.
A 10 percent reduction in passenger weight could save top U.S. airlines — such as United and Delta — up to 1.5 percent in fuel costs and boost earning per share by 4 percent, according to the analysis. The top four airlines in the country are expected to spend $38.6 billion on jet fuel between them this year.
Galactic Resource Utilization Space – Booking Now
Start-up unveils plans for lunar resort on the moon with hotel rooms advertised for $1m
Galactic Resource Utilization Space – aka GRU – plans to open the resort on the lunar surface by 2032. The start-up firm hopes building work will begin in 2029
By Jerry Lawton Chief Reporter
Adventurers can book a hotel room on the Moon for an out-of-this-world deposit of one million bucks.
Galactic Resource Utilization Space – aka GRU – has just launched its booking website including details of the hotel’s architecture. The company said it would use a ‘proprietary habitation modules system and automated process for transforming lunar soil into durable structures’ to meet the construction deadline.Galactic Resource Utilization Space – aka GRU – has just launched its booking website including details of the hotel’s architecture. The company said it would use a ‘proprietary habitation modules system and automated process for transforming lunar soil into durable structures’ to meet the construction deadline.
Baby Brawlers
After hockey brawl among 8-year-olds, investigations are underway
Youth hockey organizations said they were looking into the incident. The host Hershey Bears expressed disapproval of “conduct that puts participants at risk.”
By Des Bieler
Youth hockey organizations said they are looking into a brawl involving an 8-and-under squad from Pennsylvania that was playing an intrasquad scrimmage Saturday between periods of an American Hockey League game.
The competition was presented as a “Mites on Ice” segment at the home arena of the Hershey Bears, the top minor league affiliate of the NHL’s Washington Capitals. Video of the episode showed youngsters — clad in skates, helmets and other hockey gear — throwing punches at one another and spilling onto the ice.
Bobby Gone
Bob Weir, guitarist and founding member of the Grateful Dead, has died at 78
By Felix Contreras, Isabella Gomez Sarmiento
Bob Weir, the guitarist and songwriter who was a founding member of the popular and massively influential American rock band the Grateful Dead, has died. According to a statement from his family posted on his website and social media pages, Weir died from underlying lung issues after recently beating cancer. He was 78.
A member of the Dead for its first three decades, and a keeper of the flame of the band’s legacy for three more, Weir helped to write a new chapter of American popular music that influenced countless other musicians and brought together an enormous and loyal audience. The Grateful Dead’s touring, bootlegging and merchandising set an example that helped initiate the jam-band scene. Its concerts created a community that brought together generations of followers.
Known to fans as “Bobby,” he was born in San Francisco as Robert Hall Parber, but was given up for adoption and raised by Frederick and Eleanor Weir. In 1964, when he was still a teenager, Weir joined guitarist Jerry Garcia in a folk music band, Mother Mcree’s Uptown Jug Band.
Bookstore Rebound
Editorial: The bookstore comeback is good news for readers
The Editorial Board, Chicago Tribune
As winter settles in and daylight fades early, Americans long have turned to books for comfort, curiosity and company. The good news this holiday season is that the bookstores which make that habit possible are rebounding, too.
In the late 1990s, many book lovers often looked with scorn upon the likes of Barnes & Noble and the now-defunct Borders, favoring the dusty shelves of their preferred independent book haunt.
Fast-forward to now and bookstores of any kind have been harder to come by in many communities. The old bookstore wars are over. In an age of Amazon dominance, readers have learned to root for anyone selling physical books, and that enthusiasm appears to be paying off.
Barnes & Noble is leading the charge, opening nearly 70 new stores this year with plans to add another 60 in the new year.
Tinseltown Fortune-telling
Predicting Hollywood in 2026
Educated guesses, smart takes and back-of-the napkin math on what entertainment industry insiders will be talking about in the next 12 months.
BY ERIK HAYDEN, PAMELA MCCLINTOCK, RICK PORTER, ALEX WEPRIN, SETH ABRAMOVITCH, GARY BAUM, WINSTON CHO, CAITLIN HUSTON, KATIE KILKENNY, MIKEY O’CONNELL, TONY MAGLIO, STEVEN ZEITCHIK
YouTube decimates TV. Netflix buys Warner Bros. Bob Iger ties Disney to a boundary-pushing AI startup. Donald Trump picks which media moguls rule, gets broadcast newsrooms to pay him massive legal settlements and strong-arms studios to drop inclusion and diversity efforts. Given the truth-is-stranger-than-fiction year we just lived through, forecasting 2026 may be a fool’s errand. But, below, The Hollywood Reporter‘s journalists have a few educated guesses and smart takes about what the next year may have in store for the entertainment industry.
Edited AI
Man over Machine: Why AI Firms Are Hiring Writers
AI may eventually render writers obsolete, but for now, tech companies prefer man-made words to chatbots.
By Maya Sulkin
When I graduated college in 2023, I was told by English professors that I should pursue writing only if I couldn’t see myself doing anything else. You’ll be broke, eating canned tuna, and writing listicles for BuzzFeed, I was warned. Meanwhile, within hours of graduating, the computer science majors were hopping flights to San Francisco for jobs at Google, where they’d go on to make more than their parents.
In other words: Not too long ago, the most powerful language in the world was code. Good writing—human writing, that is—was thought to be a relic.
The Sanctuary of Sound
The Church Studio; The Sanctuary Of Sound
by G.H. Harding
“For music fans who habitually and meticulously study the liner notes of record albums and CDs for the names of players and studios … this book is full of dates, times, and locations. Finally, a detailed, definitive, organized and thorough look at the historic Church Studio in Tulsa, which illustrates what made Leon Russell tick. Russell was indeed a master of time and space.” (Mark Bego; author of JOE COCKER With a Lot of Help from His Friends)
Leon Russell was one of the most prolific artists ever: He wrote “A Song for You” which has been recorded by over 200 artists, including Aretha Franklin; Michael Buble; Whitney Houston; Neil Diamond; Cher; Amy Winehouse; and Joe Cocker. He also assembled with Joe Cocker the infamous Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour in March of 1970.
The tour featured Cocker and Russell and spanned 48 cities over 60 days. The performances in New York City on March 27 and 28 were recorded and later released as a live double album.
Barbarians no Bibliotheca!
Niall Ferguson: Without Books We Will Be Barbarians
It is not the road to serfdom that awaits—but the steep downward slope to the status of a peasant in ancient Egypt.
“WHAT RAY BRADBURY FAILED TO ANTICIPATE IS THAT HIS NATIVE AMERICA—AND INDEED THE WESTERN WORLD—MIGHT TURN AWAY FROM LITERACY VOLUNTARILY,” WRITES NIALL FERGUSON. (BFA VIA ALAMY)
He wanted above all . . . to shove a marshmallow on a stick in the furnace, while the flapping pigeon-winged books died on the porch and lawn of the house. While the books went up in sparkling whirls and blew away on a wind turned dark with burning.” —Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
It’s hard not to be impressed by Ray Bradbury’s prescience.
CEASEFIRE on C-SPAN
C-SPAN’s ‘Ceasefire’ Tries To Show Cooler Heads Can Prevail At A Time Of Hyper-Polarization
By Ted Johnson
C-SPAN‘s Ceasefire, the new series designed for civil conversations among partisan opposites, is landing at a moment when there is a real ceasefire, a first phase of a peace agreement reached to end hostilities in Gaza, while there are few signs of an end to the political discord at home amid the government shutdown.
The show is one of the major initiatives from Sam Feist, the longtime CNN executive who once oversaw a highly successful series, Crossfire, that, by its very title, sounds like the polar opposite.
The intent of Ceasefire, Feist said, is to show that “Republicans and Democrats can have a civil conversation. We don’t have to hate each other because we have a friend or family member who voted differently. That is at the heart of the show.”
He added, “Conflict is not the goal. It is just the opposite. Conversation is the goal, and if there is the opportunity for compromise, great.”
I AM NUMBER FOUR Redux
I Am Number Four Could Quietly Become Netflix’s Next YA Reboot Hit
By Katrina Yang
Timothy Olyphant is most known for playing two TV lawmen in addition to starring as Cobb Vanth in the Star Wars series The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett. The actor also took part in Alien: Earth by lending his voice. As prolific as Olyphant is, a few movies are bound to be overlooked. The star played a father figure in a 2011 sci-fi flick, in which he was tasked to protect and guide one of the last remaining Lorien, who escaped their home planet to Earth. Based on the No.1 New York Times bestseller of the same name, I Am Number Four tells an angsty coming-of-age story.
The movie follows an alien named John Smith as he becomes attached to life on Earth while trying to figure out his own destiny. Budding romance meets bigger-than-life problems and emerging friendships; the movie has all the right markings to start a successful YA movie franchise. However, it didn’t receive the level of attention required to launch a franchise when it was released.
I Am Number Four didn’t seem like the kind of movie that would secure a cult status in 2011, but over the years, fans kept coming back, asking for a sequel. In fact, the movie has all the markings to start a successful YA sci-fi franchise. Alex Pettyfer’s John Smith (Number Four) is an alien on the run, having lived among humans for most of his life and having to run from those hunting him and his kind. The film revolves around the experience of being an outsider, different from everyone else. As a hunted alien, John Smith wasn’t allowed to be fully integrated into a community. He struggled with growing powers and a deeper desire for connection. I Am Number Four is a film that can easily resonate with young audiences today. Not to mention, the movie perfectly sets up a sequel. Unlike humans, who can fall in love multiple times in life, a Lorien mates for life. While on the run, John Smith falls in love with Sarah, a local photographer in Paradise, Ohio, and has no choice but to stay to face the threats. Teaming up with an unexpected ally, Number Six, John Smith is on the verge of discovering the true extent of his power. Teaming up with his new friend Sam, a shape-shifting dog, and another legacy like him, the team is on a mission to locate other legacies to defend the last bloodline.
Bawdy Buscemi
Steve Buscemi leaves Austin Butler in stitches with naughty ‘fart-filled’ erotic letter
By Carlos Greer
The “Wednesday” star had a crowd at a sexy Brooklyn event, including Austin Butler and various “voyeurs, submissives on chains, daddies in leather and sex workers,” cackling out loud at an erotic “fart-filled” poem by James Joyce.
Buscemi stepped to the podium at Laura Desiree’s Eros Unbound night at the Red Pavillion in Bushwick, and, after thunderous applause, read one of Joyce’s love letters to his “dirty little f–kbird,” a.k.a., “my sweet little whorish Nora.”
The onlookers were “a true mix of actors, writers, voyeurs, submissives on chains, daddies in leather and sex workers,” according to our source.
We’re told Butler arrived solo and hung out in a banquette with Buscemi’s girlfriend, Karen Ho, the entire night. Author James Frey, who has also participated in the naughty event, was among the sold-out crowd and was seated near Ho and Butler.
ALIEN Reluctantly Revisited by Sir RIDLEY
Ridley Scott Says Hollywood Is So “Drowning In Mediocrity” He’s Been Forced To Watch His Old Films
By Jake Kanter
Ridley Scott, a filmmaker not known for pulling his punches, has issued a withering assessment on the health of Hollywood output right now.
The Gladiator and Blade Runner director argued that the industry is “drowning in mediocrity.” So much so, Scott revealed that he has taken to re-watching his old films.
Scott made the comments during an interview reflecting on his career at BFI Southbank in London on Sunday. Metro and Yahoo! were among those reporting the Oscar-nominated director’s remarks.
“The quantity of movies that are made today, literally globally – millions. Not thousands, millions… and most of it is s**t,” he said. Scott added that films are too often “saved” by digital effects because they haven’t got a “great thing on paper first.”
Wow! Rush Hires An Incredible New Drummer… carries on.
Who Is RUSH’s New Drummer Anika Nilles?
The 42-year-old German drummer has been prolific both as a recording artist and instructor
by Jon Hadusek
Anika Nilles has been announced as RUSH’s drummer for their upcoming reunion tour, which will mark the band’s first shows in 11 years, and first concerts since the passing of the legendary Neil Peart in 2020.
Rather than tap a well-known name to fill Peart’s shoes, RUSH opted for a relative unknown in Nilles, a 42-year-old German virtuoso who comes from a family of drummers. Add it to the long list of major bands touring with new people behind the kit.
The RUSH gig is undoubtedly her most notable professional drumming endeavor to date, following a stint in Jeff Beck’s live band for his European tour in 2022.
Meanwhile, Nilles has been a prolific YouTuber since the early 2010s, garnering millions of plays on her content, which includes clinical instructional videos, as well as her own original music with her backing band Nevell. She has released two full-length albums, Pikalar (2017) and For a Colorful Soul (2020), appearing on the cover of Modern Drummer in June 2017 to promote the former.
Exsistitne Deus?
Does God exist? Modern science shows he must, bestseller argues
A book by two French authors that challenges a longstanding academic consensus is being published in Britain next week
by Ben Spencer, Science Editor
Science and religion have never been easy bedfellows. As Thomas Jefferson put it in 1820, priests “dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight”. Five centuries of scientific breakthroughs — from Galileo to Darwin to Crick and Watson — have eroded our belief in the divine.
But now, according to a new book, a “great reversal” is under way. Science, its authors argue over 580 pages, has come full circle and “forcefully put the question of the existence of a creator God back on the table”.
In a striking challenge to the academic consensus, two French authors, Michel-Yves Bolloré and Olivier Bonnassies, argue that the latest scientific theories lead to only one logical conclusion: an all-powerful deity created the universe and all life within it.
Yes! No! Stop asking me!
Are Humans More Stressed Now Than Ever Before?
By Ross Pomeroy
It’s a common refrain: the world is more stressful, and humans are more stressed, than ever before. Commentators implicate a variety of causes: political instability, economic uncertainty, social media, inequality, declining religion, and splintering family dynamics.
And this isn’t just armchair pathologizing. Based on the Negative Experience Index from their World Poll, analytics firm Gallup in 2022 declared the “World Unhappier, More Stressed Out Than Ever.”
Ever? Can this possibly be true? Over the two-decade life of the World Poll, sure. But the human race has endured world wars, famine, and plague in the past thousand years. Tens of thousands of years prior, humans scraped out an existence as nomadic hunter-gathers. Food, shelter, and health were rarely guaranteed. Surely such a life must have been more stressful than today’s…