Tinie Tempah breaks US record. Collaborates with Wiz Khalifa and Adele

One of my favourite new UK rappers Tinie Tempah has broken a U.S. record. It was confirmed that his latest single, “Written In The Stars”, has been certified platinum and has hit the top 15 of the Billboard Hot 100 with a peak of #12.

This makes Tinie the first British rapper to have a platinum single in the U.S., selling over a million copies. The single also peaked at #1 in the UK last year September, with his album reaching #1 and attaining double platinum status. His U.S. debut has been revised and will feature Wiz Khalifa, Bei Maejor and Ester Dean.

Speaking of which, his second U.S. single is about to be released. “Till I’m Gone” will feature the new radio rapper Wiz Khalifa. Speaking of the collaboration, Tinie told the Daily Star: "I feel like we're in the same kind of situation but in reverse. He's really huge in the US and I have a lot of presence in the Europe and UK, so if there was ever a time to collaborate now would be the time."

To comment on the song, it is another Stargate-produced track. However, this sounds refreshing and will undoubtedly be getting good spins on the radio. It’s really catchy but not really that ground-breaking.

Meanwhile, Tinie has also decided to jump onto the Adele bandwagon as he has stated that he has been in the recording studio with her. Tinie Tempah reportedly met up with Adele in Los Angeles and told the Daily Star: "We're working on something together. It's going to be something amazing. You'll all hear about it very soon."

I’m not sure about how I feel about this collaboration. They are both big in the UK but they differentiate from different musical genres. I’m hoping that he takes something inline with her sound, as she is slaying worldwide right now. This would surely give Tinie exposure and allow the world to see his greatness.

Sources: [1] [2] [3]

Pirates of the Caribbean SMASHES Box Office Records

 

Jack Sparrow is coming for pirate’s parrot-made wigs!

Seems like the public only cares about Johnny Depp, as ‘Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides’ seems to be breaking records worldwide. The movie is the fourth installment in the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ series.

The film opened up in the US with $35 million on Friday, beating ‘Fast Five’ $34.4 million to have the biggest opening of 2011. The film was estimated to open up with the years biggest opening of $88 million over the weekend, marking a decline in the film’s trend in the US, as ‘Dead Mans Chest’ opened up with $55 million on its first day and ‘At Worlds End’ took in $42.9 million the first day. However, the filmed opened up overseas with $92.1 million earned in three days. Now reports are saying that the film has grossed $104.4 million up until Tuesday in the U.S., beating industry expectations 

Thanks to the release on Wednesday, ‘On Stranger Tides’ managed to gain the biggest opening of 2011 and Disney’s fourth-biggest opening ever in the UK. The $11 million gross is more than the rest of the UK’s box office’s top ten combined! It also broke records in Russia and China, grossing $25 million (an industry record and outpacing ‘At Worlds End’ entire run) and $20 million respectively (outpacing the entire run of the previous ‘Pirates’ installment).

Wig-snatching mates!

It also manages to break the record of ‘Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince’ in 2009 by pulling in a massive, record-breaking $256.3 to $260.4 million overseas for the biggest weekend opening for a film. ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ ($236 million), ‘Spider-Man 3’ ($230.5 million) and the previous Pirates film, ‘At World’s End’ ($216 million) grossed lower over the weekend compared to ‘On Stranger Tides’. 

It pulled in $346.4 to $350.6 million worldwide, becoming the fourth-highest international bow of all time at the worldwide box office. It was beaten by openings from ‘Half-Blood Prince’, which opened up with $393 million, Spider-Man 3 with $381 million and ‘At World’s End’ with $357 million. However, new reports state that up until Tuesday the film had grossed $310.8 million overseas, brining it's total revenue to $415.2 million in less than a week!

‘On Stranger Tides’ also broke Imax theater records, becoming the top global opening of all time for the large-format exhibitor. It grossed $16.7 million. In the U.S., the movie played in a record 256 Imax theaters. “For Disney and the Pirates franchise, this is a huge global phenomenon, and we're thrilled that Imax produced a worldwide record, as well,” said Greg Foster, who is the chairman and president of film entertainment at Imax. “This shows that moviegoers around the world continue to embrace Imax as the place to see their blockbusters.  We're particularly excited about the powerful $61k per screen average internationally.”

Disney president of worldwide distribution Chick Viane also had a few positive words to say about the movie. “I think Rob Marshall obviously made one hell of a movie, and when you team Jerry Bruckheimer and Johnny Depp, it’s dynamite,” he says. “And for me, I will never look $90 million in the face and say it’s not a successful opening. Tracking had always aimed at this number, but everybody tried to make it more than the realty of tracking was. And there’s no doubt but that the international box office is becoming more and more important.” At least he realised that. Now record labels and artists should realise that America is not the only market in the music world.

Scores for the film have been sinking to low levels as film critics have been less-than-enthusiastic about the film as it has a rating of 45% based on 36 critics on Metacritic, the worst out of all the franchise’s films.. Over at Rotten Tomatoes the reviews faired worse, with a rating of 33%. Users, however, were more positive with a rating of 6.8 out of 10 at both websites.

It seems like the critics are the only fools trying to sink your ship Jack Sparrow. Too bad you and Disney are leaving with all that pile of gold…

Source: [Digital Spy] [Entertainment Weekly] [Hollywood Reporter] [Box Office Mojo]

Behind The Scenes: Jason Derulo on the set of 'Don't Wanna Go Home'

Jason Derulo gets soaked and flashy in his music video for his brand new single ‘Don’t Wanna Go Home’, off of his sophomore studio album, “Future History”. The single is has been released on Monday, May 23 with a video premiere on Wednesday, May 25.

The various scenes include dancers lying over Jason on a coach, dancing in the rain in a warehouse, and brilliantly creating a dance shoot with actual flash lights.

As expected, the song has tremendously grown onto me and I can easily play it if I want to have a great time, although it heavily lacks creativity. Let’s hope that he won’t suffer the dreaded sophomore slump, as I feel that he is underrated and can utilize his talents more if he uses less auto tune and learns that less is more when it comes to performing.

You can watch the video below, as it is one of his best videos to date.

Beyonce premieres the "Run The World (Girls)" music video

Alas, Beyonce has finally premiered the much-anticipated and delayed Francis Lawrence video for her single “Run The World (Girls)”. The single is off of her upcoming studio album, “4”, which sees a release date of June 28.

Strutting her stuff on the apocalyptic video, we see Mrs. Knowles riding on her horse before showing us who’s coming for the throne. The camera then focuses on a close-up of Beyonce’s face, before she and her clan of female dancers declares war. We see her doing ‘intense’ choreography, such as the Irish River Dance and some African-inspired dancing, unraveling inspiration from the ‘Lion King’ by contacting Scar to allow Shenzi and Banzai to make a cameo as she holds them together with straps (she used Ed as her fur coat to cover up her assets: see album cover here), and pursues world domination by battling it out against the male specimen.  

Although it was entertaining to see Bey shake and pop her kangaroo jelly, the video falls short of amazing. The dancing was uninspiring and looked as if she took a few cultural dances, clustered them up together, and performed it. However, in the end, I do feel that she nailed the choreography.

Certain parts of the video also seemed to be out of place, as the camera placed its attention on solo shots of Beyonce, when it should have been focusing more on the choreography scenes, thus breaking the cohesiveness of the video. The female empowerment concept also made this very predictable and has been used more than Lil Kim’s Pay-Pal account to pay for her amazing transformation. The song is still an audible beating to my ears, but I know that Beyonce will have stronger tracks on her album.

Overall, if this is Beyonce’s best then the only female pop stars that will be running the world are Adele, Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Gaga and Katy Perry. I didn’t expect the video to mind-blowing, but for what its worth I am pleased. Let’s just hope that the second single blows us away.

Beyonce unveils "4" album cover with release date

Fresh off the release of her apocalyptic music video for ‘Run The World (Girls)’, Beyonce Knowles is ready to ravish our eyes with her new album cover for “4” (Look out for the video’s review later on).

Bare-chested and all, you can clearly see that her presence is blocking her name just to show off a new vintage 80’s-Stockolm hooker image that has finished off her ‘duties’. I cannot deny that the cover screams Rihanna “Rated R” era; in actual fact, I love it! It’s my second favourite album cover of hers, not succeeding the cover of “Dangerously In Love”.

The release date has been confirmed for June 28, two days after her 90-minute performance at the prestigious Glastonbury event, which will push those first week sales up. Lets hope that the album has plenty of tunes to offer up and that it won’t disappoint us. I know that she has really strong songs, but has yet to deliver the iconic album.

Lady Gaga releases new song ‘Marry The Night’

In less than 24 hours, Lady Gaga has premiered another song off of her upcoming album, ‘Born This Way’. The song, which goes by the name of ‘Marry The Night’, premiered on the Facebook game Farmville.

The song falls into the same realm as any 80’s-inspired club song. The song starts off with a melodic synth riff, which is played throughout most of the song, before blowing up into a generic club song. During the bridge, the song’s synths appear to become stronger, however fails to scream ‘single-worthy’.

Although the song might be a bit stronger than its predecessors, the chorus lacks that extra push that could transform it into a dance floor killer. This era has been more disappointing by the minute.

Listen to the track below and let me know what you think.

Lady Gaga lets her ‘Hair’ loose on new song

Lady Gaga continues her streak of promotional singles from her upcoming album, ‘Born This Way’. The single is the second promotional single ahead of the album’s release, which is a week from now. The individualism “anthem” features an appearance from Clarence Clemons, who is a longtime saxophonist for Bruce Springsteen’s E Street.

Take a listen below and let me know what you think about the RedOne-produced track.

Beyonce releases ‘Run The World (Girls)’ extended trailer

In order to keep her new single afloat, Beyonce has debuted a longer trailer for her new video ‘‘Run The World (Girls)’’. Watch as Beyonce stands in front of a burning car, riding a black horse like she owns the throne, and making sure her army troopers of females prepare for Chart and world domination.

The video will premiere on Friday May 13 and will be sure to overshadow Rebecca Black or any artist hoping to show themselves on Friday. These teasers are probably being released to build up the non-existent hype left for this project, as the song has been dropping down the charts.

I’m sure the video will slay my life and build up my anticipation for her new album, titled “4”.

Rihanna unveils ‘Man Down’ single cover

Rihanna has unveiled the single to her next single ‘Man Down’. The reggae-tinged tune will serve as a dual single along with 'California King Bed' from her four million-selling album, “Loud”.  

While I feel that they could have at least been more creative and added a little va va voom to the cover art, the cover is still cohesive with the album’s theme.

I’m sure this song will do well on the urban charts. We’ll have to see whether it can crossover to the pop charts and if it could be another top ten song for Rihanna.

‘Final Destination 5’ trailer debuts

As if the fantastic ‘Final Destination’ series could not be any more predictable, New Line Cinema has released a new trailer for ‘Final Destination 5’. The movie will be directed Steven Quale and written by ‘Nightmare on Elm Street’ writer Eric Heisseser.

The film stars Nicholas D'Agosto, Emma Bell, David Koechner, and Candyman legend Tony Todd, who plays William Bludworth in the first three installments of the series, as they hope to avoid Death. This untimely event is seen when Sam Lawton (Nicholas D’Agosto) has a premonition about a bridge he is on collapsing, killing him and everyone around him. However, as in the previous films, when this premonition becomes a reality, he manages to save himself and a few other people. Like the other delusional victims, Sam thinks that it’s over, before realizing that Death is after him and all the remaining survivors.

To wet fans’ pants even more, Tony Todd stated that if ‘Final Destination 5’ is a box office success, then ‘Final Destination 6’ and ‘Final Destination 7’ will be filmed back-to-back. I pray that they come up with more creative ideas, since I don’t want this franchise to go down the way the ‘Saw’ franchise did.

Watch how the latest victims will be tortured by Death. ‘Final Destination 5’ will be released to theatres August 12, 2011.

Source: [Geektyrant] [Digital Spy]