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      Wu-Tang Clan Announces Las Vegas Residency

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      The first four concert dates will begin with Super Bowl weekend in February.Wu-Tang Clan will begin a Las Vegas residency in February as the city hosts its first Super Bowl, the Grammy-nominated rap collective announced on Tuesday.Though rap stars frequently perform in Las Vegas for concerts and appearances at nightclubs, it is unclear if a hip-hop group has held a traditional residency, which became popular in the city around the 1940s.“Wu-Tang Clan: The Saga Continues … The Las Vegas Residency” will begin next year at the Theater at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas, starting with concerts on Feb. 9-10, Super Bowl weekend, and March 22-23, when fans flock to the city to bet on the N.C.A.A. college basketball tournaments. Tickets go on sale on Friday, and more dates will be released in the coming months.Known for hits like “C.R.E.A.M. (Cash Rules Everything Around Me)” and “Protect Ya Neck,” Wu-Tang Clan recently concluded a tour with the rapper Nas. The group’s leader, Robert Diggs, known as RZA, said the residency had been in the works for about five years and was meant in part to elevate the genre, which has been celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.“Hip-hop is rich in its content and what it offers creatively to an audience,” he said, adding that the nine-member group, which was founded in New York in the early 1990s, wants “to put it on flagpoles to show that hip-hop can go where any other art form has gone before.”“I think the art form has evolved,” he added.Residencies in Las Vegas this year included the pop artists Adele and Katy Perry. The band U2 will conclude its residency at the Sphere, the video-screen-wrapped orb-like venue built by the Knicks owner James Dolan, in March. Usher Raymond, the R&B star who will headline the Super Bowl halftime show, recently completed a residency in the city.Las Vegas, which has long been known for hosting boxing and mixed martial arts fights, has also expanded its reputation as a destination for other top-caliber sporting events. In addition to hosting the upcoming Super Bowl, the city held its first Formula 1 race in November and saw its professional hockey and women’s basketball teams win championships this past season.RZA said he was hopeful that Wu-Tang Clan’s residency would inspire other rap artists to inject themselves into Las Vegas’s entertainment scene.“I’m in that spirit of loving where there’s a hub of art and then loving that I — in my talent and the Wu-Tang brothers — can add to that hub and of course eventually invite more hip-hop artists to come and play in this sandbox with us,” RZA said. More

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      Ye, Formerly Kanye West, Previews ‘Vultures’ With Ty Dolla Sign

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      For months, the rapper has teased “Vultures,” his first album since he made a string of antisemitic comments last year. He said the LP will be released Friday.Kanye West, the contentious artist and provocateur now known as Ye, appeared onstage in Miami after midnight on Tuesday wearing a pointed black hood that resembled a Ku Klux Klan robe — and the 10-year-old artwork for his song “Black Skinhead” — as the musician previewed his first new album since a string of incendiary and antisemitic comments threatened to tank his career in music and fashion last year.The listening event, which was dubbed a “rave” and streamed online amid technical difficulties, teased “Vultures,” an album that Ye has been plugging intermittently for months alongside the R&B singer Ty Dolla Sign, a frequent collaborator.In various appearances around the Miami area in the last week, Ye has played songs from the album and said that it would be released on Friday, Dec. 15, although false starts, delays and missed deadlines have long been a feature of Ye’s process and marketing prowess. Billboard reported in October that Ye and Ty Dolla Sign were considering label distribution partners for the release, since Ye’s longtime record company, Def Jam, distanced itself from him amid the controversies last fall.The two musicians had previously attempted to stage a concert or listening event at an arena in Italy for up to 100,000 people, then pivoted to teasing a “multi stadium listening event” last month, similar to the events Ye used to promote his album “Donda” in 2021. Both plans fizzled.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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      YSL Defendant Shannon Stillwell Is Stabbed, Delaying Young Thug Trial

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      Mr. Stillwell, known as SB or Shannon Jackson, is among the six defendants currently on trial in the racketeering and gang conspiracy case underway in Atlanta.Shannon Stillwell, a co-defendant of the superstar rapper Young Thug in the racketeering and gang conspiracy case currently underway in Atlanta, was stabbed in jail on Sunday night, a lawyer for Mr. Stillwell said, delaying the blockbuster trial.Mr. Stillwell was being held at the Fulton County Jail, known as Rice Street, a facility that has faced criticism for its disorder and a recent spate of violence.“He is with us — he is alive,” Max Schardt, a lawyer for Mr. Stillwell, said in an interview on Monday. “But I fear that it was serious.”Mr. Schardt said that he was still gathering details about the circumstances of the attack, and that he had arranged to speak with his client this afternoon.Natalie L. Ammons, the director of communications for Fulton County Sheriff’s Office, confirmed that Mr. Stillwell was stabbed but did not immediately provide additional details. Jeff DiSantis, a spokesman for the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office, declined to comment.Mr. Stillwell, known as SB or Shannon Jackson, is among the five defendants currently on trial alongside the popular Atlanta rapper Young Thug, born Jeffery Williams, who stands accused of being the leader of a violent criminal street gang known as YSL, or Young Slime Life. Mr. Williams, who has pleaded not guilty, has said that his gangster persona is fictional and that YSL is simply his record label.In addition to being charged with conspiracy to violate the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, and participation in criminal street gang activity, Mr. Stillwell faces two counts of murder, including involvement in the 2015 drive-by shooting of a rival gang member that prosecutors say set off a yearslong war that terrorized the area. Mr. Stillwell has pleaded not guilty to all charges.The case also includes claims that other members of YSL attempted to kill a rival, Rayshawn Bennett, known as the rapper YFN Lucci, by stabbing him at the Fulton County Jail. (Mr. Bennett is awaiting trial following a 2021 RICO indictment against YFN in Fulton County.)On Monday, the judge in the YSL case, Ural Glanville, called for a recess, citing a “medical issue” involving one of the trial participants. He called for the lawyers to return to court on Tuesday morning to decide how they would proceed.After court adjourned on Monday, Judge Glanville filed two orders in the case related to Mr. Stillwell. One stated that Mr. Schardt and his colleagues could visit Mr. Stillwell at Atlanta’s Grady Hospital, where he was being treated, “to the extent that it is medically cleared.” The other ordered that Mr. Stillwell, upon his recovery, be “kept separate from the other defendants in this case at all times,” including in jail, during transport and at the courthouse.The complex RICO case from the office of the prosecutor Fani T. Willis originally included 28 defendants, many of whom have pleaded guilty or had their cases severed. Since the initial indictments in May 2022, the case has seen disruptions from all sides, including nearly 10 months of jury selection.Opening arguments began on Nov. 27; the trial could last up to six months or more.“We’ve invested a large amount of time in this case to prepare for trial,” Mr. Schardt, the lawyer for Mr. Stillwell, said. “Quite frankly, we want Shannon to have his day in court because we believe that he is innocent. We don’t want unnecessary delays, but we’re going to defer to the doctors.” More

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      Bad Blood: A Timeline of the Taylor Swift-Kanye West-Kim Kardashian Feud

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      After 14 years, a new interview suggests this dispute may keep giving us new chapters.Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr. Joan Crawford and Bette Davis. Optimus Prime and Megatron.And Taylor Swift and Kanye West.Feuds don’t get more colossal than the one between two of the biggest stars in music. (And the reality TV star Kim Kardashian, who was married to West for a time, has been involved too.) There has been a leaked tape, diss tracks and videos, and a naked wax figure. The latest salvo came in Swift’s interview with Time magazine after the publication chose her as Person of the Year.The story has bubbled up even more as fans await the expected rerelease of Swift’s album “Reputation,” which was particularly focused on the dispute.Here’s the decade-long story of how the feud has progressed.Sept. 13, 2009West interrupts Swift.West interrupts Swift as she accepts the award for best female video at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2009.Jason Decrow/Associated PressThe incident that started it all. Swift, 19, goes onstage at Radio City Music Hall to accept the MTV Video Music Award for best female video for “You Belong With Me,” after defeating Beyoncé, among others.She has barely said thank you when West, 32, bum rushes the stage, takes her microphone and declares: “I’m really happy for you; I’m going to let you finish. But Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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      Ateez Is the Fourth K-Pop Group With a No. 1 Album in 2023

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      The eight-member boy band debuts atop the Billboard 200 this week, following Tomorrow X Together, NewJeans and Stray Kids.This week on the music charts, Ateez becomes the latest K-pop act to score the top album with a menu of collectible packages, while Brenda Lee’s 65-year-old chestnut “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” holds as the No. 1 single on her 79th birthday.Ateez, an eight-member boy band from South Korea, notches its first No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart with “The World EP.Fin: Will,” which had the equivalent of 152,000 sales in the United States, according to the tracking service Luminate. The vast majority were for physical copies of the 12-track release, which was available in 33 collectible variations, including 26 on CD and seven on vinyl.Ateez’s album is the fifth one by a K-pop group to top the LP chart this year, after releases by Tomorrow X Together, NewJeans and Stray Kids, which had two titles reach No. 1. In each case, physical copies were key to their success, but Ateez had notably low popularity on streaming services, with just 7.6 million clicks — the least for any No. 1 album this year.Also this week, Taylor Swift’s “1989 (Taylor’s Version),” which topped last week’s chart, falls to No. 2; Drake’s “For All the Dogs” is No. 3; Morgan Wallen’s “One Thing at a Time” is No. 4; and Michael Bublé’s “Christmas” — a chart hit each holiday season since 2011 — is in fifth place.On the Hot 100 singles chart, Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” holds at No. 1 for a second week, while Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” remains at second place. More

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      Whamageddon Is the Christmas Game to Save You From Tears

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      Are you in need of another Christmas tradition, and a bit of fun? Enter: “Whamageddon.”Last Christmas I gave you my heartListening to Christmas music can bring people together. Not listening to a particular Christmas song, it turns out, can have the same effect.Please allow us to introduce a December tradition you may not know about: “Whamageddon.”The goal: To go as long as possible without hearing the 1984 Wham! song “Last Christmas” before Christmas Day.But the very next day you gave it awayIn Britain this month, a D.J. at a soccer stadium in Northamptonshire played the song during halftime of a match and faced a bit of (lighthearted) backlash.“I never knew people took it so seriously,” Matt Facer, the D.J., told BBC Radio. “I gave it a spin, thinking it would be quite funny to wipe out 7,000 people who couldn’t avoid it, but clearly it isn’t funny.”“I think it’s funny,” said Thomas Mertz, 42, who runs a Whamageddon website. “I sincerely hope that people aren’t too mad at D.J. Matt for playing the song.”This year, to save me from tearsThe game started about 18 years ago when Mertz and some friends in Denmark noticed how ubiquitous the song was and started telling each other when they had been “hit” with it, he said.Whamageddon has a Facebook page with more than 16,000 followers and a website that got more than 500,000 visitors last year, according to Mertz.“It’s just a funny little thing that a couple of idiots from Denmark did to entertain themselves during Christmas,” Mertz said.But the game is also about adding levity to a season that can be stressful or lonely.“It’s just not a good time of year to a lot of people,” Mertz said. “If we can add a little bit of fun to that, I think it’s worthwhile.”Are you ready to lose the game? Click above. I’ll give it to someone specialMertz emphasized that the game is not about disliking the song or its genre.“It’s a common misconception that people think we do this because we somehow hate Christmas music, or Wham!, or pop,” Mertz said.In fact, that could not be further from the truth.“You wouldn’t know it from looking at me. I am a 6-foot-5 bearded bald guy,” Mertz said, “but pop music is my guilty pleasure.” More

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      Review: This ‘Magic Flute’ at the Met Lacks Some Luster

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      Mozart’s opera, tailored to families in this staging, is big on spectacle and let’s-put-on-a-show verve. What shines? Kathryn Lewek as Queen of the Night.The evolution of Julie Taymor’s production of “Die Zauberflöte” from long-running hit to children’s-theater show at the Metropolitan Opera is now complete.Since the premiere of Taymor’s staging in 2004, her diaphanous puppets and George Tsypin’s translucent set pieces have brought a welcome weightlessness to Mozart’s hard-to-stage singspiel, which wraps fairy-tale monsters, young love and a Masonic quest in melodies of direct and abundant charm. This abridged version, in English, followed a few years later as a holiday show for families (though, at nearly two hours without intermission, it doesn’t exactly fly by).When the Met introduced a new production of the work by Simon McBurney last May that sees the world with a brand of childlike wonder that’s really meant for adults, it decided to keep Taymor’s puppets-and-plexiglass version as a separate, family-friendly entertainment that can be trotted out this time of year.This season’s run of the Taymor version, dubbed “The Magic Flute — Holiday Presentation,” opened on Friday with a rough let’s-put-on-a-show energy. The cast played broadly to its young audience. The orchestra, conducted by Patrick Furrer, sounded thin and tinny, lacking the mellow-gold shine that conveys nobility and transcendence in this score.On paper, it made sense to cast the tenor Rolando Villazón in the comic baritone role of Papageno. Now a stage director as well as a singer, he has largely given up the lyric tenor roles that catapulted him to the top of the opera world two decades ago. Still, he has charisma to burn, and Papageno is more or less the main character of this adaptation. Unfortunately, Villazón struggled with the low-for-him tessitura; his voice, tired and frayed, often floated around the center of the pitch when he wasn’t tweaking melodies to suit his range.It was sad to see an artist who was once capable of rare musical insight funnel his considerable creative energy into a frenetic, always-on physicality. Mimicking Woody Woodpecker’s laugh and Road Runner’s “meep meep!” he practically morphed into a cartoon. His improvisations and sprinklings of Spanish into the dialogue won over the audience, and his genuine rapport with the priest portrayed by Scott Scully, perhaps the Met’s funniest comprimario, was a joy.Kathryn Lewek, a scintillating Queen of the Night in McBurney’s production last season, returned to the role for this holiday run.Evan ZimmermanJanai Brugger (Pamina) and Brindley Sherratt (Sarastro) sounded a bit colorless in the first half, but their voices ripened as the show progressed. As the opera’s hero Tamino, the tenor Piotr Buszewski could be sensitive, but too often his singing came across as overcooked.Kathryn Lewek, a scintillating Queen of the Night in McBurney’s production last season, returned to the role for this holiday run. Regardless of what was going on around her, she sang like she was on the stage of one of the world’s foremost lyric theaters. “O zittre nicht,” in particular, was captivating with its soft tone, graceful lyricism and sharply etched coloratura. Putting aside a dry note here and there, “Der Hölle Rache” had impressive point, and the triplets tumbled seamlessly.Chuckles and puppets make for a fun night with the kids, but singing like Lewek’s is what the magic of opera is all about.The Magic FluteThrough Dec. 30 at the Metropolitan Opera, Manhattan; metopera.org. More

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      David Byrne Isn’t Himself. Or Any Self, Really.

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      Every year is probably an interesting one for an artist as restless and inquisitive as David Byrne, but I’m willing to bet that 2023 was especially so. In September, a newly restored edition of “Stop Making Sense,” the landmark 1984 concert film by Byrne’s former band, Talking Heads, returned to theaters to much (richly deserved) […] More