Categories
Month: August 2023
Another BTS solo single is in the books! V, who previously announced that he will release his debut solo album at the end of the summer, released the project’s first track “Love Me Again” in tandem with a music video on Wednesday (Aug. 9).
The intimate visual for the song never strays too far away from V’s face — the BTS member takes the stage to sing the soothing R&B track, as if crooning to the object of his affections in the audience (hidden from view). “I think about you all the time/ Where you are, who you’re with/ Lost without you, baby/ I wish you would love me again/ No, I don’t want nobody else,” he sings, his sequined shirts glimmering from stage lighting.
“Love Me Again” is the first taste BTS ARMY has heard of V’s debut solo effort, Layover. Big Hit Entertainment announced Tuesday that the album will drop Sept. 8. The set will include a total of six tracks: “Rainy Days,” “Blue,” “Love Me Again,” “Slow Dancing,” “For Us” and a bonus track piano version of “Slow Dancing.” “Slow Dancing” will be the lead single for the project, which Big Hit described as a “1970s romantic soul style track [that] exudes a laid-back and free-spirited feeling.”
V’s solo efforts come after releases from his fellow BTS members: Jung Kook released “Seven” featuring Latto — which crowned the Billboard Hot 100 — last month, while Suga’s D-Day arrived in April and Jimin’s FACE (including the Hot 100 No. 1 “Like Crazy”) in March.
Watch the video for “Love Me Again” above.
Categories
Snake from the DPZoo
Categories
Marijuana Tax Passes
Springfield voters have approved a sales tax on marijuana.
Unofficial results show almost 70 percent of voters said yes to the proposal. Greene County Clerk Shane Schoeller says turnout was low, with only 4.5% of voters going to the polls.
The sales tax will be 3% on recreational marijuana sales.
This article is provided by Ozarks News – 93.3 KWTO
A historic building in Downtown Springfield has been purchased by the Ozarks Regional YMCA.
The building at 323 North Patton in Springfield is sometimes referred to as the “yellow bonnet” building.
The building will be the administrative offices for the YMCA’s branches in Buffalo, Cassville, Hollister, and Lebanon.
It will also house the center for youth development.
This article is provided by Ozarks News – 93.3 KWTO
Hundreds of R&B and hip-hop executives helped Billboard honor key power players across both genres and celebrate 50 historic years of the genre on Tuesday (Aug. 8). Held at Novo in downtown Los Angeles, Billboard’s 2023 R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players Event featured appearances from a slew of hip-hop’s biggest and brightest stars, including recent Billboard cover stars Lil Wayne and Nas.
Weezy, who has earned five Grammy awards and 185 Billboard Hot 100 entries to date, graciously accepted his induction into Billboard’s Hip-Hop Hall of Fame, saying, “You already know I gotta give thanks to the man up above.”
Fellow hip-hop icon Nas, who recently released fifth Hit-Boy-produced album in three years, also received the Hip-Hop Hall of Fame Inductee Award at the event. Other honorees included Larry Jackson, this year’s Executive of the Year Award winner, and Ice Spice, who was crowned 2023’s R&B/Hip-Hop Rookie of the Year. Quality Control CEO Pierre Thomas took home Billboard’s first-ever peer-voted R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players’ Choice Award.
Billboard’s 2023 R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players event was a history lesson as much as it was a celebration. From Jackson’s rousing speech — during which he read a 1997 letter from Clive Davis to Billboard that blasted the publication for “a personal crusade against the genre of rap albums” — to Gail Mitchell — Billboard executive director, R&B/Hip-Hop — reminding attendees that 50 years ago, hip-hop was being dismissed as a fad, the event commemorated the longevity and persistence of one of the world’s most powerful and influential art forms.
Check out Billboard’s 2023 R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players event in the photos below:
Drag shows in Branson will now be allowed only in the downtown district after the city’s Board of Alderman handed down a ruling on Tuesday.
The board voted 4-2 to pass the resolution, limiting drag shows to the downtown district after public outrage in recent months.
The law also bans drag shows from occurring within 600 feet of a school, religious institution, or park.
Event planners conducting drag shows must also secure a special permit, and businesses must cover their windows to prevent people outside from viewing the performances.
Branson Mayor Larry Milton says that the ordinance is not a ban of drag shows, but rather protects children against viewing these types of shows.
This article is provided by Ozarks News – 93.3 KWTO
Travis Scott storms to No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart as “Meltdown,” featuring Drake, launches atop the list dated Aug. 12. The track leads a parade of all 19 songs the streaming edition of Scott’s new Utopia album on the chart. The long-awaited parent set, first teased in 2020, debuts at No. 1 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart with the biggest week for any rap album in 2023, and gives Scott his third champ.
“Meltdown,” released on Cactus Jack/Epic Records, traces its chart-topping start to 32.2 million official U.S. streams in the week ending Aug. 3, according to Luminate, more than enough to secure its No. 1 entrance on the R&B/Hip-Hop Streaming Songs chart. The tune also sold 2,000 copies in its debut week, prompting a No. 5 bow on the R&B/Hip-Hop Digital Song Sales list. For the third and final metric that informs Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs – radio airplay – the collaboration registered 8,000 audience impressions – well below the threshold of any R&B/hip-hop radio chart, though the song is not being promoted as a single for radio airplay. (“K-POP,” the pre-release track with Bad Bunny and The Weeknd, is the current radio focus.)
Thanks to “Meltdown,” Travis Scott achieves his sixth No. 1 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. Here’s a recap of his now half-dozen leaders:
Song Title, Artist (if other than Travis Scott), Weeks at No. 1, Date Reached No. 1
- “ZEZE,” Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset, one, Oct. 27, 2018
- “Sicko Mode,” 10, Nov. 3, 2018
- “Highest in the Room,” one, Oct. 19, 2019
- “The Scotts,” with The Scotts & Kid Cudi, one, May 9, 2020
- “Franchise,” featuring Young Thug & M.I.A., one, Oct. 10, 2020
Featured artist Drake, meanwhile, adds a record-extending 28th Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs No. 1 to his account. It’s his second visit to the summit in 2023, after his one-week champ “Search & Rescue,” likewise debuted at No. 1 in April. As Drake further distances himself from the competition, here’s a review of the acts with the most No. 1s on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs since the chart became an all-encompassing genre survey in 1958:
- 28, Drake
- 20, Aretha Franklin
- 20, Stevie Wonder
- 17, James Brown
- 16, Janet Jackson
- 15, The Temptations
- 13, Marvin Gaye
- 13, Michael Jackson
- 13, Usher
- 11, Lil Wayne
- 11, R. Kelly
Behind “Meltdown,” Scott floods Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart as the entire 19-track Utopia album lands on the list, including five additional tracks in the top 10. Seventeen of the ranks go to debuts, with the lone exception being “K-POP,” which debuted at No. 2 last week.
Here’s the full Utopia recap on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs this week:
- No. 1, “Meltdown,” featuring Drake
- No. 2, “FE!N,” featuring Playboi Carti
- No. 5, “I Know ?”
- No. 7, “Hyaena”
- No. 9, “Thank God”
- No. 10, “Topia Twins,” featuring Rob49 & 21 Savage
- No. 11, “K-POP,” with Bad Bunny & The Weeknd
- No. 12, “My Eyes”
- No. 13, “Modern Jam,” featuring Teezo Touchdown
- No. 14, “Delresto (Echoes),” with Beyoncé
- No. 15, “Telekenesis,” featuring SZA & Future
- No. 16, “Sirens”
- No. 17, “God’s Country”
- No. 18, “Skitzo,” featuring Young Thug
- No. 19, “Circus Maximus,” featuring The Weeknd & Swae Lee
- No. 20, “Til Futher Notice,” featuring James Blake & 21 Savage
- No. 22, “Lost Forever,” featuring Westside Gunn
- No. 23, “Looove,” featuring Kid Cudi
- No. 24, “Parasail,” featuring Yung Lean & Dave Chappelle
The Scott show is much of the same on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100, where “Meltdown” opens at No. 3 as the highest Utopia track of the week. All 19 Utopia songs are present on the list as well, pushing Scott into the rare triple-digits club as he becomes the 15th act to surpass 100 career hits on the chart.
Enigmatic singer-songwriter Sixto Diaz Rodriguez — commonly referred to as just Rodriguez — has died at 81. The Detroit musician whose slow boil rise to international acclaim was chronicled in the Oscar-winning 2012 documentary Searching for Sugar Man, died on Tuesday night (Aug. 8) according to a statement on his official website.
“It is with great sadness that we at Sugarman.org announce that Sixto Diaz Rodriguez has passed away earlier today,” read the note. “We extend our most heartfelt condolences to his daughters – Sandra, Eva and Regan – and to all his family.” According to the Detroit News, Rodriguez had been in declining health but at press time a cause of death had not been revealed.
The Dylan-esque folk singer recorded two albums in the early 1970s that were released to little notice, Cold Fact (1970) and Coming From Reality (1971), leading the aspiring troubadour to give up on his musical dream, start a family and pursue a philosophy degree as he unsuccessfully ran for a series of local poltical offices.
The News said after failed bids at mayor and state senate, Rodriguez could often be seen walking in Detroit’s Cass Corridor neighborhood with a guitar slung over his shoulder, with most onlookers unaware of his former musical aspirations. That changed in 1979 when he was invited to perform in Australia to celebrate the re-release of his albums; he toured there again in 1981. At the time, it was rumored that he had taken his life by shooting himself on stage (another false story claimed he’d died of a drug overdose) after releasing Coming From Reality on Detroit’s Sussex record label, a false report his absence only served to feed amid a bubbling popularity Down Under.
A decade later, he discovered that his music was even more influential in South Africa, where, unbeknownst to him, his psychedelic-tinged, wistful folk ruminations had become wildly popular among South African youth, who embraced them as anthems against the repressive, racist apartheid government. Though long retired from touring, Rodriguez booked some arena gigs in the nation in 1998 to rabid response and later saw his music re-discovered by artists such as DJ/producer David Holmes, who used Cold Shot‘s opening track, “Sugar Man” for his 2002 Come Get It, I Got It compilation alongside songs by Muddy Waters, The Staples Singers, Cyril Neville and Betty Adams. Nas sampled Rodriguez singing the chorus from “Sugar Man” on his 2001 Stillmatic song “You’re Da Man.”
The uptick in interest led to the re-issues of the albums and a world tour, a renaissance that was capped by the best documentary feature Oscar-winning 2012 film Searching for Sugar Man, which chronicled two fans’ journey to find out what happened to their favorite singer. In fact, it was those two Cape Town diehards, rock journalist Craig Bartholomew and Stephen “Sugar” Segerman, who would become the focus of the film thanks to their dogged search to find out what happened to their favorite musician.
“Like a lot of people here, I discovered Rodriguez while I was in the army, which every 18-year-old used to have to do,” Segerman told the Detroit paper in 2008. “He was on everyone’s cassette tapes. It’s great pop music. But you start to realize this is raw, brutally honest ― and that’s the chord it struck. I was in the army, but I didn’t want to be a soldier. I didn’t support apartheid. Raw, brutal honest had lots of appeal… I told him, ‘In South Africa, you’re bigger than Elvis.’”
Dave Matthews, who was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, met Rodriguez before playing Pine Knob in Clarkston, MI in 2022 and later praised him from the stage, telling the crowd that the singer was “one of my heroes growing up” in South Africa.
Rodriguez was born on July 10, 1942 in Detroit as the sixth child of Mexican immigrants. He began his career in 1967 with his debut single, “I’ll Slip Away,” followed by his signing to Sussex — a division of Buddah Records (Isley Brothers, Melanie, The Five Stairsteps) — which released his two albums.
His music earned comparisons to Dylan and Cat Stevens, who gentle 1970s folk anthems of love and understanding were tame compared to Rodriguez’s often more politically leaning lyrics. “Talking about the rich folks/ Rich folks have the same jokes/ And they park in basic places/ The priest is preaching/ From a shallow grave/ He counts his money/ Then he paints you saved,” he sang on the acid-tongue acoustic anthem “Rich Folks Hoax” from Cold Fact.
Both of his studio albums were re-issued by Light int he Attic in 2009 and the upswell in interest thanks to the film led him to perform with a full orchestra on The Late Show With David Letterman in 2012, as well as at the Coachella, Montreaux Jazz and Glastonbury festivals in 2013.
Listen to “Rich Folks Hoax” and watch Rodriguez on Letterman below.
Two rounds of thunderstorms are expected in the Ozarks Wednesday, with severe weather likely.
Much of southwest Missouri is under a level three “enhanced risk” for severe thunderstorms.
The first round of storms, moving from west to east in the morning hours, poses a large hail and damaging wind threat across the area.
Late afternoon and evening storms will affect areas primarily along and south of I-44. This round could be the most severe, with hail up to the size of ping pong balls, damaging wind gusts up to 70 miles per hour, and tornadoes.
Remain weather aware and have multiple ways to receive warnings.
We’ll have all the watches and warnings, along with damage reports as they come in to the National Weather Service on 93-3 and A-M 560 KWTO.
This article is provided by Ozarks News – 93.3 KWTO