Music News

Nick Jonas will perform at V Festival.
The 'Jealous' hitmaker joins hip hop trio De La Soul, Pendulum and MNEK in the latest list of acts confirmed for the 20th anniversary event which is sponsored by Virgin Media and takes place across the weekend of August 22 and 23 in Hylands Park, Chelmsford and Weston Park, Staffordshire.
The 22-year-old singer confessed he felt "honoured" to have been added to the star-studded lineup, whose headliners include Calvin Harris, Kasabian, Sam Smith, Stereophonics and Ellie Goulding.
He said: "I'm honoured to join such an incredible line up at the 20th anniversary of V Festival.
"My fans have been very supportive of my new music so I'm really excited to perform for them at one of the UK's greatest festivals."
De La Soul's Kelvin Mercer is also looking forward to performing in front of one of the "craziest crowds".
He said: "Every time we perform in the UK we get the best reception, from the craziest crowds! V Festival 2015 is going to be the biggest rave of the year, so we're looking forward to being on that stage and joining the party!"
Grammy-nominated MNEK added: "This year has been a whirlwind and it's not over yet. I'm so chuffed to be part of such a brilliant line-up and can't wait to get out there."
Other acts scheduled to perform include The Script, Paloma Faith, Olly Murs, Ella Henderson, Kodaline, Nero, The Kooks, Marina & The Diamonds and George Ezra.
The music acts will play alongside a hilarious mix of comedy headliners including Russell Kane, Frankie Boyle, Shappi Khorsandi and Matt Richardson, who will all take centre stage in the Glee Club Comedy Tent across the weekend.

Mariah Carey performs all her own stunts in her music videos.
The R&B legend is famous for her elaborate promos which have seen her ride a jet ski for 1997 single 'Honey' and fight a love rival for 1999's 'Heartbreaker' among other things.
Mariah is adamant there is no camera trickery involved or stunt doubles replacing her as she likes to shoot every scene herself.
In a feature for Us Weekly magazine entitled '25 Things You Don't Know About Me', she revealed: "I do all of my own stunts in videos. The jet ski scenes, the fight scenes, all of them!"
However, one video shoot has gone wrong.
When Mariah was making the promo for the remix of '#Beautiful' - directed by her estranged husband Nick Cannon - in July 2013 when she slipped on stage while wearing a gown and heels.
The singer - who has four-year-old twins Moroccan and Monroe with Nick - insists the pain of the injury was worse than childbirth and two years later she has only just finished physiotherapy for it.
She said: "I dislocated my shoulder two years ago, and it was the worst pain I've ever experienced. I had to wear a glove for a while because it affected my hand as well. Thanks to physical therapy, I'm finally glove-free!"

Val Doonican has died at the age of 88.
The Irish singer and entertainer passed away "peacefully" at home in Buckinghamshire, South East England, his family confirmed this morning (02.07.15).
His family said in a statement: "He was a wonderful husband, father and grandfather and will be greatly missed by family, friends and his many fans."
They added that he had not been suffering from any illness with his daughter Sarah explaining his "batteries had just run out".
She told The Guardian: "Until 87, he was as fit as a flea. It was just old age, I'm afraid - the batteries ran out."
The showbiz veteran, who retired in 2009 after 60 years in the business, is survived by his wife Lynn, daughters Sarah and Fiona and grandchildren Bethany and Scott.
The singer was born Michael Valentine Doonican in Waterford, Ireland, in 1927, the youngest of eight children.
After performing with Irish quartet The Four Ramblers, he went solo and hit it big in the UK when he was booked to appear on 'Sunday Night at the Palladium' in 1963.
This led to him being offered his own programme, 'The Val Doonican Music Show', on the BBC which ran for over 20 years.
His hits included 'Walk Tall', 'What Would I Be', 'If The Whole World Stopped Loving', and 'Morning'. He also sang the theme tune for the film 'Ring of Bright Water'.

The Libertines will release their new album 'Anthems For Doomed Youth' on September 4.
The reformed band - comprised of Pete Doherty, Carl Barât, John Hassall and Gary Powell - recorded the hotly anticipated LP with producer Jake Gosling over a six-week period at Karma Sound Studios in Thailand, in April and May and it is now ready to come out.
It is the indie rockers third studio album and their first release for 11 years and the four guys decamped to the Far East to make it so Pete could continue his rehab treatment for drug addiction and stay clean.
Bass player John admits the recording process was very different from past experiences because there was little partying and the guys all missed their kids.
John, 34, said: "The album was challenging, because we've got families and being away from our kids for six weeks was hard."
The album will be preceded by single 'Gunga Din', which comes out on July 3, and the video for the single was shot in 'Walking Street' Pattaya and was directed by Roger Sargent.
To coincide with the album announcement The Libertines - who played an acclaimed secret set at Glastonbury last weekend - have also announced several festival appearances and live dates throughout the summer.
'Anthems For Doomed Youth' is available to pre-order from iTunes, Amazon and the band's official website now.

The Libertines 'Anthems For Doomed Youth' tracklisting:

'Barbarians'
'Gunga Din'
'Fame and Fortune'
'Anthem for Doomed Youth'
'Heart of the Matter'
'Belly of the Beast'
'Iceman'
'You're My Waterloo'
'Fury of Chonburi'
'The Milkman's Horse'
'Glasgow Coma Scale Blues'
'Dead For Love'

Alexa Goddard has premiered a video for her new single 'We Broke The Sky'.
The 26-year-old star co-wrote the single with Kirby Lauryen - who worked on Rihanna's 'FourFiveSeconds', as well as hits for Beyonce and Ariana Grande - and has released an accompanying clip for the summer anthem on YouTube.
The single - which will be released on August 28 - gives a taste of what fans can expect from her debut album, on which she has worked with Stargate (Beyonce, Rihanna, Ne-Yo) and 'Loyal' hitmaker Chris Brown.
The Roc Nation-signed star - who has racked up almost 50 million views on her YouTube channel - has also been working with producers and songwriters such as DJ Mustard (Big Sean, Jeremih) and Ester Dean (Katy Perry, Christina Aguilera, Mary J Blige).
Meanwhile the blonde beauty - who counts four-time Grammy Award winner Sam Smith among her fans - previously praised the people she worked with on the LP because they helped the collection come together so quickly.
Speaking about making the record in New York, she said: "We ended up leaving having recorded 12 songs in eight days! It was such a nice feeling because even though I didn't write any of them on my own, that wasn't important to me, as long as the songs felt like they came from me, and that I had some sort of involvement that was really important. With videos, as an artist, you always know what sort of things you want, like how you want to look and things like that."

Sir Mick Jagger insists The Rolling Stones have no intention of retiring and are going to keep "working".
This week the band announced 'Exhibitionism' this week, an exhibition displaying memorabilia from the legendary group's 53-year career which will include iconic stage outfits, instruments, tour posters, album artwork, photos, letters and even some rare sound archives and recordings.
Although the four Rolling Stones members - also including Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood and Charlie Watts - have decided to create this retrospective attraction, Mick is adamant they will continue to play live and work on new projects going forward.
In an interview with The Sun newspaper, the 71-year-old singer said: "Just because we're doing a retrospective doesn't mean it's all over. We're still working, still doing shows and I think we will continue to do so."
Guitarist Keith echoes his bandmate's statement and has assured fans The Stones - who are currently on their North American 'Zip Code Tour' - are "not particularly" interested in retirement.
He said: "How many times have they said that about every tour (that it's our last) since 1975?
"If anybody should be interested in when we're going to quit, it should be the Stones (themselves) and, er, they're not particularly interested in that."
Ronnie added: "This is another insight into an ongoing machine, an institution that will never stop rumbling. Another input into the travelling circus. We didn't have this museum idea with the thought of retirement."
The band also revealed they spent just as much time organising and developing the exhibition as they would planning their concerts and wanted to include as much paraphernalia and as many iconic items - such as Mick's flag cape - as they could.
Mick said: "We've been thinking about it for quite a long time, collecting things, thinking, 'Ah, this would be good,' or, 'We'd better save that.'
"We wanted it to be just right and on a large scale. The process has been like planning our touring productions."
'Exhibitionism' opens at The Saatchi Gallery in London on April 6, 2016 and will run until September 2016.

Kings of Leon have started work on their seventh album.
The rockers have been writing new songs at home for the follow-up to 2013 LP 'Mechanical Bull' and intend to have the tracks finished by the end of this year.
In an interview with SiriusXM radio show Alt Nation, drummer Nathan Followill revealed: "We've been at home writing, trying to get some new stuff going. We kind of had to put it on hold because we have festivals coming up, but we have big enough breaks in between most of them to where I think we're gonna be able to get the album written by the end of the year."
However, frontman Caleb Followill has warned fans not to expect the album to be ready for release by the close of 2015 and has joked it could be the band's difficult record.
He quipped: "Record number seven, most people take, like, what, five years to make that or something?. So we're still in the very early stages of our five-year plan for this next record."
The group have already started contemplating where they're going to lay down the tracks for the LP and at the moment they're trying to decide between their home studio in Nashville, Tennessee, where they made 'Mechanical Bull', or a 174-year-old house located opposite that they recently bought.
Speaking about the old property, Nathan - who is married to singer/songwriter Jessie Baylin - said: "It's a really rad place and I think we can do something cool with it. And you know if we go in there and it sounds like s**t, we can just go across the street."

Paul McCartney doesn't think any modern day bands can have the success that The Beatles had.
The 73-year-old singer has insisted the success of the 'Eleanor Rigby' band - made up of Paul, John Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison - was down to them writing their own material, and timing, but doesn't see it happening again with any of today's music.
Paul said: "Let's not forget, those four boys were f***ing good. You name me another group who had what The Beatles had. We all played, which is pretty hard. You don't get a lot of that these days.
"We came at the right time. We wrote some pretty good stuff, our own material. We didn't have writers. Could that happen again? I don't know. I wish people well but I have a feeling it couldn't."
Paul went on to talk about his feelings after his former bandmate John was murdered in 1980 by Mark Chapman in New York, and confessed it made the other Beatles feel like they couldn't compete with him, as it made him a "martyr".
Speaking to Esquire magazine, the 'Hey Jude' star said: "When John got shot, aside from the pure horror of it, the lingering thing was, OK, well now John's a martyr. A JFK. So what happened was, I started to get frustrated because people started to say, 'Well, he was The Beatles.'
"And post-Beatles he did more great work, but he also did a lot of not-great work. Now the fact that he's now martyred has elevated him to a James Dean, and beyond."

Nick Jonas has teased he may release a track with Ariana Grande.
The chart-topping musician has revealed the pair wrote several tracks together "a couple of years ago," suggesting they could release a duet at some point in the future.
He admitted: "We wrote a bunch of songs a couple years ago when she first started making her record.
"We wrote together then and had a great time writing.
"Maybe there's a collaboration somewhere down the road."
The 'Jealous' hitmaker is currently shooting comedy horror series 'Scream Queens' with the 22-year-old singer, but insisted they won't be belting out any tracks in the 15-part run of episodes.
He said: "This project is solely acting. None of us are singing."
Meanwhile, Nick confessed he has no plans to get back together with his brothers Joe and Kevin to reform the Jonas Brothers following their split in 2013.
He explained: "I'm happy to be doing my own thing.
"We're all kind of happy to be doing our own thing.
"We chose being a family first and not a band.
"Tough decision but it was the right thing for all of us."
The 22-year-old hunk also spoke about Safehouse Records, which he founded last month alongside former Disney star Demi Lovato and her manager Phil McIntyre.
Speaking about the venture, he told ETOnline: "We felt like it was time for us to set up our own thing and secure that we could create freely and in a safe environment."