Results tagged “beyonce”

Jay-Z and Beyonce are spreading the wealth. The Daily News reports that the couple "ran up a $1,200 bill at the Upper East Side Italian restaurant Nello's last week" after savoring their Dom Perignon, white truffles and lobster salad. If they liked it so much why didn't they just put a ring on it! (Sorry.) They were so pleased with the service and food, however, that they dropped a $500 tip. That's over 40%! The News calls out another Nello's diner, a Russian billionaire, for being relatively stingy with a 15% tip of $7,328 tip on a $47,221.09 lunch.

     

Last night, the MTV Video Music Awards returned to New York City with its usual mix of spectacle and a heavy dose of nostalgia (mostly Michael Jackson-related, with a remembrance from Madonna, then a performance of Scream by Janet Jackson). However, the whole thing was upstaged by Kanye West's antics—the rapper decided to storm the stage when Taylor Swift was the surprise winner for Best Female Video with her song "You Belong With Me." He took the microphone from the 19-year-old to declare Beyonce's "Single Ladies" "one of the best videos of all time." Here's video:

Sigh, as today's weather hints at: summer is nearly over. This means that the outdoor concerts are coming to an end, with the Pool Parties having their last hurrah on the waterfront yesterday afternoon. Brooklyn band Grizzly Bear helped send off the season, providing a soundtrack with sounds from their latest release Veckatimest as well as their previous effort Yellow House.

Is a big May wedding just around the corner? People is reporting that Beyoncé Knowles and Jay-Z have taken out a marriage license in Scarsdale, New York this morning. The happy couple hasn't commented on the incident, but since the document is only valid for 60 days, time will tell.

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a pedestrian was fatally struck on East 4th and Bowery in Manhattan, a child was shot on Blake Ave. in Brooklyn, and a shooting/homicide on Fish Ave and East Gunhill Rd. in the Bronx.
• The oldest living inmate in New York State is a Long Island surgeon convicted in 1978 of killing his wife. He'll turn 89 this week and concedes that divorce might have been a better choice.
• Thousands of participants retraced the steps of fireman Stephen Stiller in the Tunnel to Towers run today. Stiller died on 9/11 after running through the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel to fight the WTC fire.
• The Head of the Harlem Regatta was held Saturday, and crew teams raced from Yankee Stadium to Swindler's Cove on the Harlem River.
• The Broadway stagehands union and show producers have agreed to extend negotiations through this week, keeping the lights on along the Great White Way.
• We wonder if Beyonce Knowles feels that Nolita in Manhattan is getting more dangerous lately. She was sporting brass knuckles on her boots while dining at La Esquina last night.
• Seven people were injured when a car slammed into the front of a Staten Island city bus
• The French company that contracted with the MTA to produce 400 new subway cars is five months behind schedule on its deliveries without incurring any penalties, and even won a $700 million contract extension.

Unfortunately, what happens in Vegas doesn't always stay in Vegas. Last night MTV took over the Strip and filled it with up and comers, the standard rock, rollers and rappers and of course...the token has beens.

Stephen Colbert (busy taking over the world) adds one more notch on the "celebrities are clumsy, too" bedpost. Before filming a recent episode the faux-news anchor broke his left wrist while running around the studio of The Colbert Report to pump up the audience before taping. He really does hate the left!

With all that went down this week, we thought we thought we'd cheer everyone up by giving everyone a double dose of dogs.

As we sat down to write this week's Best of the -ists post, a car blaring "21 Questions'" passed by our house. And that started us thinking about how some of the best -ist posts out there have at their hearts questions, some of which are answered, and some of which are left open. Check out the Best of the -ists from this week, and see if you agree.

Breaking Beverage News: Rap star, entrepreneur and Beyonce's boyfriend Jay-Z is boycotting Cristal champagne after some remarks Cristal management made about the rap world. Jay-Z is going to stop drinking Cristal in his personal life (note to all musicians about to appear on Cribs - get the Cristal out of the fridge!) and remove it from the bars of all 40/40 club locations. Here's a summary of what caused the boycott from the AP:

In a special summer issue of The Economist magazine, Frederic Rouzaud, managing director of Louis Roederer, said the company viewed the affection for his company's champagne from rappers and their fans with "curiosity and serenity."

Continue reading "Jay Z Puts the Cap Back on Cristal"

- It's American Apparel that has popped into the old Flatbush Pavilion, says Curbed

MTV is going to broadcast the 2006 awards. Now, Gothamist will use our cranky and cliche cards: We don't remember the last time we saw a video on MTV! And we're kind of upset at MTV for making stars out of people who are worthless, although the horrifying pleasure we get when we watch My Sweet 16 almost balances that out. But the show itself is usually trippy fun to watch - whether it's a lesbian kiss or Kiss playing under the Brooklyn Bridge - and the hosting is good (we heart you, Chris Rock). The president of MTV, Christina Norman explained, "New York City is our hometown, and we are really looking to showcase the music, culture, and people from every borough of this amazing city on TV, online, broadband, and wireless to fans around the globe." Translation: You can watch the show on TV, watch clips on your TV, get messages sent to your phone - basically drown yourself in knowing what Beyonce is wearing or if James Blunt will falsetto. What would be brilliant is for musical acts to perform in all five boroughs (yes, even Staten Island). This year, the event will be on August 31 (we think the show was moved up for distance between the show's excess and September 11 - we definitely remember that in 1999, the show was on September 9), and similar to the way the city handled the Country Music Awards this year, there will be many concerts and events leading up to the show.

A few times a week, Gothamist publishes music reviews by our contributor Jeff Baum. The opinions below belong entirely to the author.

You know it's the Oscars when P. Diddy busts out the velvet suit! Gothamist loves the Oscars, and we're going to attempt to do a little liveblogging. We might need to order a vat of caffeine and an EMT team at the ready; not because Chris Rock will be boring, but because we think that Gil Cates might kill us with his newfangled ideas and because we're meh about this year's nominees in the big categories. Anyway, onto the show.

After their third one-point loss in seven days on Friday night, Lenny Wilkens decided he had seen enough. He met with Isiah Thomas after the game, then announced his resignation on Saturday.

Macy's in New York has welcomed "big-bottomed mannequins" to show off fashions, and this warrants a Reuters story. In the photograph above, Ecko Red jeans are one of quite a few brands that are part of this "serious sociological trend that is positive for retailers and customers in that the tyranny of the undernourished perfect model is over" (quote from Rich Rollison, whose company Lifestyle Forms and Display created the mannequins). Of course, there are obligatory mentions of J.Lo, Beyonce, and Sir Mix-A-Lot, yet none of Big Bottom from Spinal Tap. At any rate, Gothamist is very supportive of more realistic mannequins. We're still upset with Toccara's loss on America's Next Top Model.

And Sting, Dave Matthews, and Vince Gill were like the bad Beatles cover bad at the crappy bar mitzvah. The best moment was Andre 3000's short and sweet acceptance speech for best rap album.

One of the requirements to perform at the Super Bowl: Jazz hands!; as demonstrated by Beyonce and Steven Tyler of Aerosmith.

Mayor Bloomberg, don't just hold the jersey, wear it! You should go to the Atlantic Avenue mall and buy yourself some Enyce sweats, Pumas, and a Sean John hat and let it ride. Just ask Jay-Z for help; we're sure that he'd be happy to take you shopping. Maybe Beyonce could help you pick out some eye creams.

It's two games into the Stephon Marbury–as–a–Knick era, and though it might be premature to say, it's looking bleak. Eight points his first game, six points last night (though he did get 10 assists). Even though everyone is talking about how a team can't click immediately, Marbury said, "I would never think that it would happen this bad."

Scratchy voiced Alan Light and John Rollins (Gothamist doesn't know anything about Rollins' voice, only Light's because he'dcomment on ANYTHING on VH1) bring a new music magazine offering with Tracks, oriented to more adult readers. The Times' David Carr looks at this venture, which seems to follow the music industry's realization that older consumers will buy, versus download, music, but the older consumers are simply not being spoken to. One doubtful industry expert, wondering if there are adults obsessive enough to shell out some change for a magazine about the music they like, says, "My experience has been that the people who like to listen to Bonnie Raitt and Phil Collins do not have music as a primary interest." Well, duh. If any magazine had a editorial mission to simply cover Phil Collins, it would only be good as a money laundering scheme. But this sounds just like the original business plan for VH1, so expect a couple issues down the road for it to be all about the 80s. Or the Fabulous Life of Sharon Osbourne.

Recently, the best thing on VH1 has been their in-house promo: A montage of various musicians (Beyonce, Chris Martin, Justin, etc.), with animation over it, against the Flaming Lips' song, Do You Realize. Slate's Scott Metcalf noted that the song is "lush and trippy and infallibly alluring." There is indeed something hypnotic about Wayne Coyne singing, "Do you realize...that you have the most beautiful face?" with the fluttering animated flowers rising and swelling to the music. In fact, Gothamist can do without annoying Jason Mraz (Jason, huge trucker hats just make you look like you have a tiny head and therefore a tiny noggin) and would just like this commercial to be run on a loop, if VH1 isn't going to air the Flaming Lips video to the song.

When you've read the eighteenth interview with Renee Zellweger and realized you've learned nothing about her, except that she loves her dog, you know that celebrity interviews are a smokescreen. Jeanette Wells asks various interviewers who the boringest interviewees are, and besides Renee, here are three:

The Post lets us know where the hot post-MTV Video Music Awards parties are going to be, who is expected to be there, and how to crash. Venues include the Four Seasons (Madonna, Fatboy Slim, Fred Durst), Show (P. Diddy's bash, Justin Timberlake, Beyonce Ed Burns, the Hilton girls), Tao (Avril, Tim Robbins, Rosario Dawson, Tony Hawk), Splashlight Studios (The Donnas, Drew & Fabrizio, Iggy Pop), and we're sure enterprising kids will be photoblogging the festivites. Or check out the celebrity A-, B-, and C-list yourself from the streets that will be closed off (bottom of page).

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I love the Neptunes and N.E.R.D., and they do have a very hot sound, but the over-Pharell-ization of music today makes things a bit...boring? The Neptunes are the hottest producers these days, but case in point: Beautiful, Snoop Dogg's new song with Pharell Williams (the most visible member of The Neptunes/N.E.R.D.). It's tight and sexy but it gets predictable. This quote by Sasha Frere-Jones in the Village Voice's Pazz and Jop ('Tune versus Tim, as in Timberland) issue says it all: