Phil Spector: Last News

SPECTOR, a four-part docuseries diving into the story behind late music producer and convicted murderer Phil Spector.First announced back in August, the four-part series will predominantly focus on Spector’s involvement in the murder of actress Lana Clarkson, of which he was convicted in 2009. It’ll feature archival footage of Spector himself – a voiceover in the trailer sees him argue that he “had nothing to do with [Clarkson’s] death” – as well as newly recorded interviews with figures close to both him and Clarkson.“He did not like to be alone – he had abandonment issues,” one voice in the trailer said of Spector’s personality, while another claimed that “Phil Spector enjoyed bringing people to his home and locking them inside”.An official synopsis for SPECTOR – directed by Sheena M.

Oscar-winning director Barry Jenkins will direct Zendaya in the biopic Be My Baby, about the life of music legend Ronnie Spector.The lead singer of The Ronettes passed away January 12 2022, following a battle with cancer. The singer’s legacy was felt for generations, with everyone from The Ramones to Amy Winehouse citing her as an influence.Zendaya has been in talks with A24 for years planning the biopic, but today (March 26) Deadline revealed that Jenkins, best known for his Best Picture winner Moonlight and the recent Mufasa: The Lion King, now on board as director.The article reads: “According to sources, the star and Jenkins, who’d been looking to work together for some time, agreed on a version of Spector’s story that could immerse audiences in what the singer’s life with the troubled producer Phil Spector felt like rather than a traditional cradle to the grave biopic”.David Kajganich, the writer of films Suspiria and Bones And All, will write an original screenplay drawing from Spector’s memoir, also titled Be My Baby.

Zendaya is taking on an iconic role.

EXCLUSIVE: A24 is adding to its partnership with megastar Zendaya and her film on the life of singer Ronnie Spector, with Barry Jenkins coming on board to direct with with Dave Kajganich tapped to write an original screenplay. Zendaya will play the legendary songstress and according to sources, the star and Jenkins, who’d been looking to work together for some time, agreed on a version of Spector’s story that could immerse audiences in what the singer’s life with the troubled producer Phil Spector felt like rather than a traditional cradle to the grave biopic.

Leonard Cohen has been announced to take place next month.Entitled “Leonard Cohen: The Collections of Aviva Layton, Anjani Thomas & More,” the auction is set to take place on February 28 in Los Angeles via Julien’s Auction. The lot is comprised of 164 items, with the majority of them coming from the collections of Cohen’s longtime friend Aviva Layton and romantic and creative partner Anjani Thomas.Among the items in the collection set to go under the hammer are various typed and handwritten works by Cohen including lyrics, letters, poems, postcards and manuscripts.

John Lennon‘s famous 1971 letter to Eric Clapton suggesting they form a new band is heading to auction soon – find out more below.The eight-page letter, dated September 29 1971, was drafted by Lennon and includes several deletions and markings – the final version that was sent to Clapton has not been seen by the public, and it is currently unknown how much the final differs from the draft.The letter is set to go on auction via International Autograph Auctions Europe SL on December 5. Registration for bids are now open, and bids are expected to €100,000 and €150,000.The 1971 letter – which also went on auction in 2012, though for a far less €22,728 – comes after Clapton had performed with Lennon and Yoko Ono for a short stint in the Plastic Ono Band in 1969 prior to The Beatle‘s official split.

second-degree murder in 2009.The “If I Could Turn Back Time” singer, 78, made the startling revelation in her newly released self-titled book, “Cher: The Memoir.” According to the Grammy winner, after she completed her 1974 album “Dark Lady,” Spector approached her about joining forces for new music. The pair were set up through Cher’s then-boyfriend David Geffen.She claimed that Spector asked her and Harry Nilsson to record a “guide vocal” on the Motown girl group Martha and the Vandellas’ song “A Love Like Yours.” He said he’d pass the music to John Lennon for review, as she and Nilsson sang back-up on the Beatles frontman’s “Rock ‘n’ Roll” album.But Cher said the music producer-turned-convicted murderer — who died in 2021 — misled them. Spector allegedly released the single illegally in Europe, infuriating Cher because it violated both her and Nilsson’s record contracts.

Cher’s late ex-husband Sonny Bono thought about killing her, the singer has said in her new book, Cher: The Memoir, Part One.In the memoir, which was released yesterday (November 19), the 78-year-old wrote that Bono “seriously thought” about killing her by throwing her off a balcony.According to TMZ, Bono, whose divorce from Cher was finalised in 1975, made the confession after Cher admitted to wanting to sleep with the duo’s guitarist, who she identifies only as ‘Bill’.Cher wrote: “He laughed a little at that and so did I. It was crazy that he was telling me.

Nation Of Language have shared a cover of Darlene Love’s festive classic “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)’ – check it out below.The Brooklyn indie synthpop trio – made up of Ian Devaney, Aidan Noell and Alex MacKay – have put a distinctive spin on the 1963 track that was famously part of Phil Spector’s A Christmas Gift For You compilation.Nation Of Language join the likes of U2, Cher, Mariah Carey and Death Cab For Cutie in covering the song, which Spector also wrote alongside Ellie Greenwich and Jeff Barry. In this version, the band infuse the track with eerie, spacious production and slower pacing, eking out the song’s bittersweet emotional inner life.Listen here:It is just the latest new Christmas-themed release in recent weeks: Laufey shared a cover of ‘Santa Baby’, complete with a video starring Bill Murray, Charlie Puth has put out a Wham!-inspired new single ‘December 25th’, while BTS’ V has teamed up with the Bing Crosby estate for a new version of ‘White Christmas’.Black Star Riders frontman Ricky Warwick has also given a heavier festive option with ‘All I Want For Christmas…Is Christmas!’, alongside The Cult’s Billy Duffy and Def Leppard’s Joe Elliott, while NFL star Jason Kelce is about to release an entire Christmas album, including collaborations with Stevie Nicks, Boyz II Men and his brother Travis.The single is the first new music from Nation Of Language since the release of their third studio album ‘Strange Disciple’ in September 2023.

Linda Deutsch, the Los Angeles-based special correspondent for The Associated Press whose 50-year career with the news service included covering many of the most attention-getting trials in Hollywood history, died Sunday of pancreatic cancer at her Los Angeles home surrounded by family and friends. She was 80.

Owen Gleiberman Chief Film Critic I first saw “Let It Be” when I was a kid, in the summer of 1970, just weeks after it was released. My family was coming off one of those “Vacation” road trips. During the miles of driving, we listened to Top 40 radio, which meant that several times a day I got to hear “The Long and Winding Road,” which I thought was the most beautiful song I’d ever heard.

Margot Robbie’s Barbie exposed all of his “blond fragility” on the big screen in the summer blockbuster that brought the iconic Mattel doll to life, it’s “the man behind the tan” — as memorably Kenoughed by Ryan Gosling — who is having the last laugh in 2023.“I’m Just Ken (Merry Kristmas Barbie)” — a new holiday rendition of his signature number in Greta Gerwig’s box-office smash — dropped from the hunky heavens on Wednesday.The Yuletide twist arrives just five days before Santa will be delivering Barbies and Kens to little girls and boys all around the (snow) globe.The “Kristmas” makeover of “I’m Just Ken” puts a sweeping, Phil Spector-esque spin on the song that was written by “Barbie” music supervisors Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt. And the string-laden setting decks the ditty in seasonal splendor as Gosling ever-so-earnestly sings lines such as “Am I not hot when I’m in my feelings?”Clearly still hopelessly devoted to his dream doll — who leaves him behind for the real world at the end of the film — Gosling ends with, “Merry Kristmas, Barbie / Wherever you are.”The “I’m Just Ken” revamp comes ringing in with a video of the song featuring Ronson and Wyatt.

Christmas has finally come home: In a sweet, new YouTube video, Darlene Love reunites with David Letterman and Paul Shaffer for the first time in nine years to resume a longtime holiday tradition that capped off the Christmas episodes of Letterman’s late night talk shows for 28 years.

Ellise Shafer SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for “Priscilla,” in theaters now. As the opening sequence of Sofia Coppola‘s biographical drama “Priscilla” unfolds, viewers meet a 14-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu (Cailee Spaeny) in 1959 West Germany to the tune of the Ramones’ 1980 hit “Baby, I Love You.” This time-bending choice may seem unexpected, but to those familiar with the work of Coppola — who famously soundtracked her 2006 historical film “Marie Antoinette” with the Strokes, Aphex Twin and the Cure — it won’t come as a surprise. After all, though the song is a subversion, it’s a cover of the Ronettes’ 1964 classic and carries much of the musical stylings of the period, courtesy of Phil Spector, who produced both versions.

the Rolling Stones was also releasing their new album, “Hackney Diamonds,” on Friday — the same day that she was dropping her first holiday LP, “Christmas.” “You know, I met them the first time they ever came to America,” the artist born Cherilyn Sarkisian — who was married to her late singing partner Sonny Bono at the time — told The Post. “They wanted to stay at our house, and we only had a living room and a bedroom, and we went, ‘You know, we can’t do it.’”Six decades later, Cher is as much of a living legend as the Stones.

EXCLUSIVE: Oscar winning filmmaker Barry Levinson is stepping in to direct the David Mamet scripted drama, Assassination, we hear, and is putting his own stamp on the project. Deadline first reported about the movie out of Cannes.

Jem Aswad Executive Editor, Music As someone who purchased “Tim,” the Replacements’ 1985 major label debut, on the day it arrived in my local record store, I can say the following with absolute certainty: If the remixed, significantly beefed-up version of the album that dropped last week had been released in 1985, the group would have been crucified by the indie-rock morality police, and it probably would have destroyed their career. Make no mistake, the new version sounds amazing: The original, produced by the late original Ramones drummer Tommy Erdelyi in a sort of homage to Phil Spector, was a muddled mess, with the instruments blurred together and an indistinct, heavily reverbed sound.

Jem Aswad Executive Editor, Music On the heels of the sale of their award-winning rock documentary “Immediate Family” to Magnolia Pictures, film producer-musicians Greg Richling and Jonathan Sheldon have announced the launch of their production company Pfonetic and are unveiling a slate of music-driven film and television projects. The roster includes a long-in-the-works authorized documentary on the enormously influential but unsung producer Tom Wilson, who produced Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone,” Simon & Garfunkel’s “Sounds of Silence” and the first Velvet Underground album and recordings by John Coltrane, Frank Zappa, Sun Ra and many more — which is now titled “Like a Rolling Stone,” fittingly enough.

Jem Aswad Executive Editor, Music Grammy-winning Songwriters Hall of Fame member Cynthia Weil — who co-wrote “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling,” “On Broadway,” “Make Your Own Kind of Music,” “Walking in the Rain,” “You’re My Soul and Inspiration,” “Uptown,” “He’s So Shy,” “Kicks,” “Here You Come Again,” “Through the Fire,” “Somewhere Out There” and many other hits, mostly with her husband and Brill Building colleague Barry Mann — died earlier this month at the age of 82. She was one of the top “Brill Building” songwriters that came out of the Midtown Manhattan building of the same name (although much of the work actually was done a couple of blocks uptown at 1650 Broadway) and spawned literally hundreds of hits throughout the 1960s for the Righteous Brothers, the Ronettes, the Drifters, the Monkees, the Animals, multiple Phil Spector productions and many others. Along with Mann — to whom Weil was married for some 62 years — the coterie included another young married couple, Carole King and the late Gerry Goffin.

Cynthia Weil, a Grammy-winning lyricist of notable range and endurance who enjoyed a decades-long partnership with husband Barry Mann and helped write “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling”, “On Broadway”, “Walking in the Rain” and dozens of other hits, has died at age 82.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Grammy-winning Songwriters Hall of Fame member Cynthia Weil — who co-wrote “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling,” “On Broadway,” “Make Your Own Kind of Music,” “On Broadway,” “Walking in the Rain,” “You’re My Soul and Inspiration,” “Uptown,” “Kicks,” “Here You Come Again,” “Through the Fire,” “Somewhere Out There” and many other hits with her husband and Brill Building colleague Barry Mann — has died, her daughter confirmed to TMZ on Friday morning. No cause of death was announced; she was 82. “My mother, Cynthia Weil, was the greatest mother, grandmother and wife our family could ever ask for,” Jenn Mann said. “She was my best friend, confidant, and my partner in crime and an idol and trailblazer for women in music.”

Beyoncé took time out to honour a legend.