Category: 5. Entertainment

WWE has managed to do a great job of masking the absence of Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes as it tours through the Midwest after Clash in Paris. Monday’s latest “Raw” in Milwaukee continued to progress towards a stacked inaugural Wrestlepalooza event that has a lot to like on it, including the in-ring return of an underrated all-time great.

“Hello, my name is AJ Lee”

OK. So AJ Lee’s first promo back in a WWE ring after a decade was all one needed to see to know why she was the fan-favorite she was. This woman is magnetic, she is a natural, and man, does she have “it.”

Advertisement

Lee spoke directly to us who missed her career, introducing herself. Admittedly, her promo work may have felt extra authentic and special because that’s exactly what it was. This was April Mendez speaking from the heart, sharing her experiences and why she retired 10 years ago. She even managed to do the unfathomable and elicited a “therapy” chant after mentioning her mental health battles. It was a tremendous return to form, and I’m so curious to see how her first match goes.

Speaking of which, it wasn’t long until her enemies Becky Lynch and Seth Rollins arrived to try and reclaim Lynch’s stolen Intercontinental crown.

Lynch emerged first, wearing the most ridiculous sunglasses of all time to hide the black eye Lee gave her on “SmackDown.” She played the hypocrite role perfectly, claiming CM Punk was hiding behind his wife, as Punk said Rollins was in their previous interactions. Lynch, like Lee, said she’ll need therapy after the segment, garnering more chants. We all love some good therapy time.

Advertisement

“It works, I swear. It’s wonderful. I have some names I can give you,” Lee responded.

This whole thing culminated with Lee’s ultimatum, telling Lynch to come fight her for the belt or accept her challenge to a mixed tag team match at Wrestlepalooza. Rollins wound up agreeing to the latter for the couple after Punk snuck up on them for a near-GTS.

There we go, folks. The Lee comeback tour officially carries on, and this feels like one of the freshest returns WWE has arguably ever had.

❤️‍🩹 Reunion of the Night

The Usos are officially back together and set to take on The Vision at Wrestlepalooza. The twins kicked off “Raw” with the usual show opener promo, but thankfully, it didn’t run overly long, as they were quickly interrupted by their rivals. The segment dissolved into a brawl when LA Knight attacked Bron Breakker from behind, but that was far from the highlight.

It’s wild how much Jimmy Uso outshone his brother Jey on the mic tonight. He already demonstrated his excellence in that build to Jey’s WrestleMania match against Gunther. The dude’s delivery was just so much cleaner and natural-sounding. It probably helps that he wasn’t winded once he entered the ring, but ultimately, it makes you wonder how he performed in his world title run in an alternate universe.

Advertisement

I’m not sure I’d go so far as to say I wish that had happened instead of Jey overall, but if I had to choose between the two, I might say so.

Overall, it’s great to see The Usos back together, as they are needed in the “Raw” tag team division. However, this might not be a permanent reunion, considering they made their entrance with every bit of Jey’s theme.

Before the night ended, we even saw some friction between the brothers, as Jey (seemingly) left the arena early, asking Jimmy why he’d stick around to help Knight in his match against Bronson Reed. Jimmy even said his brother is starting to sound like Roman Reigns. If these two end up rematching, that would be a brutally misguided route to take.

😴 Goodknight

As mentioned, the opening segment set up the main event, as is the standard formula in WWE. The stunning stretch of no DQ finishes continued, but at the expense of Knight, who lost “cleanly” again. I’m unsure what WWE is doing with the “Megastar,” as his character development is moving in the right direction, but he’s now taking pins left and right — this time after being distracted by Breakker.

Advertisement

The match was fine, but all of The Vision stuff, particularly with the “Brons” is feeling so uninspired. It doesn’t help that they’re now separated from Rollins with Paul Heyman kayfabe injured.

The bigger picture angle revolved around The Usos, as they saved Knight from the expected post-match beatdown. The Vision maintained their control, beating everyone down until Knight grabbed a chair and took a spear from Jey. It very much felt like a heel turn that Jimmy wasn’t happy about, almost like WWE is trying to replicate a bit of the dynamic Adam Copeland (Edge) and Christian Cage have over in AEW. That very clear heel-face tag team who have such a deep connection that they get along and love each other regardless. That’s another interesting possible route to go down, but Knight, like Penta, needs some sort of serious change, and he deserves one more than anyone right now.

Advertisement

👍 MONDAY NIGHT MONEY 👍

1. Breakker has slowly started to morph more into a loose cannon Steiner rather than the brainless henchman he was at the start of The Vision’s angle, and it’s quite entertaining.

2. Asuka beat Nikki Bella clean with the Asuka Lock. This was a better match and performance for Bella than in her title shot against Lynch, so good on her. Asuka, however, was the real star, as she’s just so, so good as this overprotective heel. At one point, she even used Kairi Sane as a shield on the outside of the ring, which was more clever than it was a heel tactic, but it’s all good fun.

🤷 IT HAPPENED 🤷

1. AJ Styles defeated El Grande “Amerikaiser” with the Styles Clash after shenanigan interferences from Dragon Lee and another masked dude. The match was fine for what it was, but what is happening here? Who is this for at this point? That also might have been the first singles loss for the Americano character since it started with Chad Gable.

More interestingly, Styles cut a very, very interesting promo during the Netflix commercial. The timing of this feels intentional, considering all the Styles free agency reports afloat.

2. Penta needs help. After the former AEW Tag Team champion hilariously questioned Adam Pearce’s love (literally), he landed a match against Rusev and lost. Losing to Rusev is nothing to be ashamed of, and Rusev should keep winning. But Penta desperately needs some wins, and he looked like a bozo out there getting distracted by The New Day, who came out for no other reason than to try and mask a burial in the making.

Advertisement

The Penta-New Day “feud” is boring and should not continue — unless, like The Usos, The Lucha Bros reunite. We haven’t seen Rey Fenix on “SmackDown” lately, after all.

👎 RAW DEAL 👎

1. Joe Tessitore replaced Michael Cole on this “Raw,” and he seriously has to tone it down, man. I appreciate enthusiasm, but the number of times he loses his mind to oversell a move or sequence is insane. See the Styles match finish, for example.

2. To cap off the Asuka-Bella saga on this show, Rhea Ripley came to Bella’s aid backstage when tensions thickened. From that awesome, building duo of Ripley and Iyo Sky to Ripley and Bella, huh? Talk about one hell of a downgrade, as Ripley wanders aimlessly through the division after her world title matches. Naomi’s pregnancy butchered several immediate directions for some of these wrestlers. Stephanie Vaquer has yet to be seen since her Sky title match was made official.

👑 Uncrowned Gem of the Night 👑

Lyra Valkyria and Raquel Rodriguez had something to prove tonight. It’s not that I had low expectations; I simply didn’t think much of this match’s announcement. It had also been a while since we’d seen a Valkyria match, so shame on me.

Advertisement

These two are great against anyone. Put them together, and they deliver an absolute must-see banger. Rodriguez scored a big, surprising, much-needed win with a counter Tejana Bomb off the top rope. (Clean!) Roxanne Perez made a brief (typical) interference attempt, but it wasn’t a part of the finish.

This is another reminder that Rodriguez needs to go back on a singles run and get some proper respect. She’s excellent, and this makes me hope for another pairing with Valkyria at some point. In the meantime, it appears Valkyria isn’t done with Bayley, as her old frenemy delivered another great psycho vignette. Before that, Valkyria will have to face Rodriguez’s other Judgment Day half, Perez, next week.

👑 I give this show a Crown score of: 7.5/10. 👑

Prolific horror author Stephen King has unveiled his top 10 favorite movies of all time — and, naturally, he’s excluding his own adaptations from the list.

The multi-hyphenate, whose novels The Long Walk, The Running Man and It are all receiving forthcoming Hollywood projects, tweeted his list earlier today, “in no particular order.”

Unsurprisingly, his chosen projects include seminal directors — William Friedkin, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Billy Wilder and Steven Spielberg (the latter, twice) — and two entries each featuring legendary performers Humphrey Bogart, Richard Dreyfuss and Robert De Niro. The list is also largely dominated by ’70s classics (unsurprising, given King was coming of age at this time in his 20s).

King begins with Sorcerer, which was critically panned and a box office disaster — perhaps due to Star Wars becoming a runaway success just a month earlier in 1977. Since then, it has received a critical reappraisal, and been cited by some as an underrated masterpiece — including by Friedkin (The Exorcist) himself, who said it was his most personal and difficult project.

He also lists the six-time Academy Award winning The Godfather Part II and 1972’s The Getaway, which stars Steve McQueen and Ali MacGraw in a Bonnie & Clyde-esque caper. Perhaps a surprising entry for a writer known for his hair-raising works is the Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell time-loop rom-com Groundhog Day, a universally beloved staple in the genre that has inspired a wide range of subsequent repeating-day movies from Palm Springs (2020) to Happy Death Day (2017).

As any respectable cinephile, King also includes Casablanca on his list, the ever-quotable and devastatingly moving Bogart and Ingrid Bergman romantic drama set against the backdrop of World War II.

Additionally on the list are John Huston’s neo-Western The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) and Billy Wilder’s classic film noir Double Indemnity (1944). Also listed are the first-ever summer blockbuster Jaws, which just celebrated its 50th anniversary and will soon feature in an Academy Museum exhibition, and sci-fi UFO drama Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Scorsese’s Mean Streets, his first of several collaborations with De Niro, also makes the cut.

Interestingly, more than half the list features pics that have been adapted from novels (Sorcerer, Godfather, The Getaway, Sierra Madre, Jaws and Double Indemnity), with Close Encounters receiving a novelization released in conjunction with the film’s debut.

Noted in his list is the exclusion of his own top four adaptations: Misery and Stand By Me (both directed by Rob Reiner), as well as The Green Mile and The Shawshank Redemption (both helmed by Frank Darabont, who also adapted The Mist). (You’ll notice the widely lauded The Shining does not make the cut, as King infamously despised Stanley Kubrick’s take on his source material. Also, potentially surprising is Carrie‘s omission, a horror juggernaut I’d argue should be included.)

“The Conjuring: Last Rites” busted past all expectations in its debut weekend to make it lucky No. 7 of a streak of successful openings at the box office for distributor Warner Bros. Pictures.

On today’s episode of “Daily Variety” podcast, Rebecca Rubin, Variety’s box office chief, breaks down the strong showing for film No. 9 in the “Conjuring” horror franchises. With a total haul of more than $83 million, the film delivered about $20 million more at the domestic box office than was forecast. It also performed surprisingly well for a horror title on Imax screens.

“This is the seventh consecutive movie for Warner Bros. to open above $40 million,” Rubin says. “They are the first studio in history to ever achieve that consistent streak. And it’s also notable because they had a pretty rocky start to the year as well as end to 2024.” After misses with “Mickey 17” and “Alto Knights,” the studio has rebounded with “A Minecraft Movie,” “Sinners,” “Final Destination Bloodlines,” “Superman” and “Weapons.”

Warner Bros. Pictures chiefs Pamela Abdy and Michael De Luca deserve credit for putting “an emphasis on filmmaker driven, original fare — what’s been considered the riskiest kind of movie to put out,” Rubin says. “And with a movie like ‘Sinners’ or ‘Weapons,’ those were both original horror films that turned into huge sleeper hits. What they’ve done successfully is lean into directors who have really strong visions, and hoping that that’s going to be the driving factor in the marketing and getting people to come to see these movies.”

Also in the episode, Variety‘s Michael Schneider and Jazz Tangcay weigh in from backstage at the Creative Arts Emmy Awards. The two discuss the trends and read the tea leaves from the early wave of winners leading in to the Sept. 14 main event, which airs this year on CBS. Schneider, who is television editor, noted that the first wave of winners indicates a narrowing race among “Severance” and “The Pitt” on the drama side and “Hacks” and “The Studio.”

“This year, it really is all about ‘The Studio’ versus ‘Hacks.’ And then, of course, ‘Severance’ versus ‘The Pitt.’ And in the guest actor categories in both drama and comedy, it was split 50-50. ‘Severance’ one one. Then ‘The Pitt’ won one. ‘Studio’ won one. And then ‘Hacks won one. So going into the big ceremony next week, it is a race between those shows,” he said.

Tangcay, who is senior artisans editor, pointed to a poignant moment when Jessica Lee Gagné became the first woman to win an Emmy for cinematography in a one-hour program, for her work on “Severance.” Gagné also directed

“It’s crazy to think that no woman has ever won in that category until last night,” Tangcay says. “That was a beautiful moment. We spoke with her backstage and she was like, ‘This was a dream that I’ve wanted for a long time.’ “

Backstage at the Creative Arts, Shawn Hatosy, who won guest actor in a drama series for “The Pitt,” and presenter Giancarlo Esposito both spoke from the heart when asked about issues that the industry faces, from the loss of production in Los Angeles to the decline in moviegoing since the pandemic.

“I know what a set feels like in Los Angeles. I know what experienced crews, how they work, how they operate, and in many cases, the people that I’m meeting, the carpenters, I’m meeting the transportation captains, I’m meeting the makeup people, the hair people, everything,” Hatosy said. “So even more so this recognition and the fact that this show, is not a very expensive show. It it shoots right here in Los Angeles. And so I think that there’s a chance that maybe some other people that make these decisions will, see the success and find a model like it so that we can employ a lot of people in Los Angeles.”

Esposito suggested that exhibitors and studios join forces to take radical steps to reinvigorate the public’s passion for going to the multiplexes.

“Part of the solution is to look at the model in a new way, is to look at how we make film and what we charge for ticket prices in the movie theaters in a new way. We are crying about how streaming has sucked away people going to films and having a social experience together, but we’re not doing anything about it,” Esposito said. “I love that we could stream and sit home and do that. I’m taking nothing away from that. But what about offering just offering a weekend in a movie theater for the big companies who have more than one for free? Or one weekend, all movies are free to reignite people’s passion for film. Get them in the theater. Charge for the popcorn, charge for the soda. But the ticket price is free.”

(Pictured: “Severance” cinematography winner Jessica Lee Gagné at the Creative Arts Emmy Awards)

Listen to Daily Variety on iHeartPodcasts, Apple Podcasts, Variety’s YouTube Podcast channel, Amazon Music, Spotify and other podcast platforms.

LONDON — LONDON (AP) — Prince Harry will make a flying visit to his U.K.-based charities this week, leading to a flurry of speculation about whether he will meet with his father, King Charles III, for the first time in 19 months.

Amid signs of a thaw in the frigid relationship between Harry and the rest of the royal family, British media suggest that the prince’s trip to London on Monday’s third anniversary of the death of Queen Elizabeth II provides an opening for a long-overdue rapprochement between Charles, 76, and his estranged son.

Harry has had little contact with his father and elder brother, Prince William, since he and his wife, the former Meghan Markle, gave up royal duties and moved to California in 2020. The relationship became even frostier after the couple bared their grievances with Buckingham Palace in a tell-all interview with Oprah Winfrey, a Netflix series and Harry’s memoir, “Spare.”

The last time Harry and Charles met was in February 2024, when the prince flew to London after receiving news that his father had been diagnosed with cancer. Harry spent about 45 minutes with Charles before the king flew to his Sandringham country estate to recuperate from his treatment.

Harry was last in London in April, when the Court of Appeal rejected his bid to restore a police protection detail that was canceled after he stopped being a working royal. Charles was on a state visit to Italy at the time, so a meeting was impossible.

That case was itself an impediment to improved relations because it involved Harry criticizing the king’s government in the courts. But once it was over, change became possible.

Immediately after the case ended, Harry said he would “love reconciliation with my family.”

“There’s no point in continuing to fight anymore,” he told the BBC on the day the court case was resolved. “Life is precious. I don’t know how much longer my father has.”

Despite that olive branch, Harry struck a combative tone that might torpedo hopes of repairing the family breach. The prince repeatedly said that the decision to withdraw his security was made at the direction of the royal household in an effort to control him and his wife while putting their safety at risk.

“What I’m struggling to forgive, and what I will probably always struggle to forgive, is the decision that was made in 2020 that affects my every single day and that is knowingly putting me and my family in harm’s way,” Harry said.

But with the lawsuit out of the way, the mood music coming from Charles and Harry’s supporters seemed to change.

In July, the new team handling Harry and Meghan’s communications, headed by Los Angeles-based Meredith Maines, was seen on the balcony of a private members’ club in London speaking with Tobyn Andreae, the king’s press representative. The Mail on Sunday was on hand to snap a photo of what the paper called: “The secret Harry peace summit.”

Regardless of who tipped off the paper, it showed a change of tone since the meeting wouldn’t have happened if the so-called principals hadn’t given their tacit consent.

And now comes Harry’s appearance at the WellChild Awards on Monday night in London.

The event, which celebrates the bravery of seriously ill children and those who care for them, is sponsored by a charity Harry has long supported. It is a reminder that not so long ago, Harry was one of the star attractions of the royal family’s effort to reach out to younger, more diverse Britons.

“For 20 years these Awards have highlighted the courage of young people living with complex health needs and shone a light on the devoted caregivers — family and professionals — who support them every step of the way,’’ the prince said in a statement put out by the charity. “Their stories remind us of the power of compassion, connection and community.”

But it will be hard to undo the damage caused by Harry and Meghan’s allegations of insensitivity, conflict and racism within the royal household.

Harry’s explosive memoir, “Spare,” shattered the veneer of unity the royals present to the public, depicting them as scheming rivals who use a cozy relationship with the media to jockey for public favor.

It also revealed the details of private conversations, including one between the king and his sons, which was held in a graveyard in hopes of hiding it from the press.

“Please, boys,’’ Harry quotes Charles as saying. “Don’t make my final years a misery.’’

But Charles may have an incentive to let bygones be bygones.

Now approaching his 77th birthday and continuing to undergo cancer treatment, the king may want to get more time with his grandchildren, Prince Archie, 6, and Princess Lilibet, 4, who was born after her parents moved to the wealthy Southern California enclave of Montecito.

Harry put the responsibility for any rapprochement on his family.

In his interview with the BBC, Harry said he believes that you can’t have reconciliation without truth, and his lawsuit over police protection revealed the truth about his battle with the palace.

“It would be nice to have that reconciliation part now,” he said. “If they don’t want that, that’s entirely up to them.”

Stuart Craig, an Oscar-winning production designer and art director known for his work on the blockbuster Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts films as well as Gandhi, Dangerous Liaisons and Notting Hill, died on Sunday. He was 83.

Craig died after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease, fellow production designer and art director Neil Lamont shared on the British Film Designers Guild’s Facebook page.

“A true gentleman, with grace, kindness and humility,” Lamont wrote in a tribute. “Stuart was very generous with his time and advice, always taking the time to share his knowledge and support those around him. … I bet that anyone you ask, ‘which designer would you like to work with the most’ the answer 100 [percent] would be Stuart Craig, and anyone who met him will remember their encounter forever.”

Born on April 14, 1942, in Norfolk, England, Craig started working as a set designer in the film industry in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He later scored his first role as a production designer on the 1980 sci-fi thriller Saturn 3, starring Farrah Fawcett and Kirk Douglas.

The following year, he earned his first Oscar nomination for 1980’s The Elephant Man. Then in 1983, Craig took home his first Academy Award for his set design work on the 1982 biographical drama Gandhi, starring Ben Kingsley as the famous spiritual and political leader.

In addition to several more Oscar nominations throughout his career (including for the Harry Potter movies), he received two more Academy Award wins for 1988’s Dangerous Liaisons, starring Glenn Close, John Malkovich and Michelle Pfeiffer, and 1996’s The English Patient, starring Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche.

Craig was also the creative mind who brought the magical worlds of the record-breaking Harry Potter film franchise to life through his sets. He worked on 2001’s Sorcerer’s Stone, 2002’s Chamber of Secrets, 2004’s Prisoner of Azkaban, 2005’s Goblet of Fire, 2007’s Order of the Phoenix, 2009’s Half-Blood Prince, 2010’s Deathly Hallows: Part 1 and 2011’s Deathly Hallows: Part 2. He also served as the production designer for the three Fantastic Beasts spinoff movies, including 2016’s Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, 2018’s The Crimes of Grindelwald and 2022’s The Secrets of Dumbledore.

His other film credits include Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes, Cal, The Mission, Cry Freedom, Chaplin, The Secret Garden, Shadowlands, Mary Reilly, In Love and War, The Avengers, Notting Hill, Gambit and The Legend of Tarzan, among others.

Craig is survived by his wife, Patricia Stangroom, and their two children.

Justin Bieber’s Swag II adds 23 tracks to his already over-stuffed Swag project, and it’s not just the title that lacks imagination. Like its predecessor, released just two months ago, Swag II unites a buzzy team of producers and writers known for freshening up R’n’B and hands them a precisely curated Pinterest board: Dangerous-era Michael Jackson, D’Angelo’s lush arrangements, Jai Paul’s glitchy, retro-futurist sonics and the sun-bleached textures of current collaborators Mk.gee and Dijon. But with unadventurous songwriting, the result is (another) album that’s all vibe and voguish production, and very little substance.

Opener Speed Demon reheats Bieber’s “is it clocking to you” meme for the second time across both albums, albeit with a bright, funky bravado and a memorably bonkers chorus about “checking these chickens”, AKA leaving his critics in the dust. But for a song bragging about ambition, it lacks adrenaline – like many of Swag II’s safe, repetitive tracks.

Much of the album offers an interesting, textured backdrop for Bieber’s pleading croon, and then goes nowhere. Oh Man just repeats its title. Open Up Your Heart, a frosty, Phil Collins-indebted ballad, teases progression – a key change, maybe! – only for absolutely nothing to happen. Love Song has a gorgeous, screwed-up string-section and some tepid “wooo!”s, neither of which can disguise how the track never earns those thrills. Rather, words fail Bieber as he sings about wanting to write his wife a love song – “a good one”.

Everything Hallelujah suffers a similar fate, transforming a profound realisation about his faith into lyrical mundanity (“brush my teeth, hallelujah”) and musical cliche, with squeaking acoustic guitar strings serving as an easy shorthand for authenticity. Likewise Story of God, the nearly eight-minute sermon which closes the record: Bieber retells Adam and Eve (co-written by a pastor from his preferred celebrity megachurch) with generic ambient swooshes to underscore its sincerity.

Swag II is most convincing when it leans hard into pop – and all the way out the other side. Don’t Wanna has a fidgety MJ wriggle to it, with much-needed playfulness brought by UK alt singer Bakar, and the Dijon co-written Bad Honey fizzes with squirmy synths as Bieber’s both pissed off and turned on: “If you’re bad, honey, why you look so good?”

skip past newsletter promotion

after newsletter promotion

In contrast (and with Frank Ocean’s Blond on the pinboard), Moving Fast’s soft, blurry guitar and musings on a life lived too quickly has genuine pathos – as does Safe Space, dissolving into Baltimore club for a real, wind-in-your-face sense of freedom.

Taken cynically, Swag II uses a trending aesthetic and quantity over quality to pander to streaming platforms – and Bieber’s certainly not the only pop star playing that game. More generously, it’s an under-edited try-on of a more alternative sound, aided by talented collaborators watering down their own special sauce. Dijon’s album Baby is one of the year’s boldest – maximalist, crammed with ideas, fun. Swag and Swag II come nowhere close, but within these 40-plus tracks are 10 songs that would have made a genuinely surprising statement from Bieber. Instead, they’re buried beneath a heap of blandly samey songs with nothing much to say.

School Night’s back in session! The season kicks off tonight at its new Eastside home: Zebulon! You know, the live music spot in LA’s Frogtown neighborhood that you probably already frequent. School Night will feature the same carefully curated line-ups as always and it’s completely free — all you gotta do is RSVP (get on that right here). 

Keep reading to learn more about the four artists playing at tomorrow night’s premiere show. And scroll to the very end of the page for a special bonus cut.

---

Bardo – “Funky People” 

It’s right there in the title. This funky track from Bardo is a celebration of all the people who made him who he is: an LA treasure, a man transformed, and an artist fully realized. This early single off Transformation Time, his first release under Stones Throw Records as just himself, is the embodiment of the full-time solo career that perhaps he’d always envisioned (as our beloved Chicano Batman takes its extended hiatus). The message of “Funky People” is one of joyful appreciation for others. Catch Bardo live at School Night.

---

Catch the tail end of the summer breeze with this stunning single from Pearl Charles. Close your eyes and you’ll sense the California in this amber-hued track: warm sands, salty lips, summer loves that burn up quick, but you wouldn’t trade ‘em. Charles’ layered vocals sound like a perfect tan feels… deep, confident, a little bit dangerous. Citing American folk music and a sense of psychedelia as references, Pearl Charles is sure to enrapture you from the stage at Zebulon. 

---

Multi-disciplinary artist Cleo Reed makes super duper attention-grabbing, conformity-breaking country music that’s as much poetry as it is music (her full album is called CUNTRY). The video here is just what it should be, a single shot that moves around Reed in an unbroken stream as she plays and sings, encouraging total focus on lyrics containing an extended metaphor worthy of your attention and analysis. Catch it live!

---

There’s something so comforting about the wall of shoegaze fuzz that hits you in the face when this tree-fitty track from LA band Host Family hits its crescendo. Same goes for the tinkly soft touch that follows it. Get you a band that can do both. Host Family has been playing around LA since 2022, and it doesn’t take much listening to tell that they know what they’re doing. On YT,  they’re currently sub 100 followers and sub 500 views on this sunsoaked vid. We think they’re stratospheric in sound (and vision). Let’s gooooo… to watch their set  for what’s sure to be an “I was there” moment in the making. 

---

We promise a bonus, we deliver a bonus… from perhaps the most esteemed School Night alum of the series’ 16-year history. That would be none other than Billie Eilish, who rocked that hallowed stage as a teenager in 2015, when she was teetering on the edge of pop stardom. Hit play on “The Diner,” a track from her 2024 LP HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, a favorite of School Night co-founder and KCRW DJ Chris Douridas.

[Please note: Billie Eilish will NOT be performing at Zebulon tomorrow night, this entry is just a nice walk down memory lane. The rest of the artists featured above will be there.]