Tag: Los Angeles

Taylor Swift made a surprise appearance at the 2022 American Music Awards in LA on Sunday to accept a trio of awards – amid her tour ticket fiasco with Ticketmaster.

Accepting her first gong for Favorite Pop Album for  Red (Taylor’s Version), the star, 32, was visibly emotional as she reflected on the win for the 2021 release – which was one of six albums she re-recorded after Scooter Braun purchased her entire music catalog out from underneath her and then sold it without her knowledge for $300million to Shamrock Holdings. 

The Anti-Hero singer, who earlier skipped the red carpet, was delighted as she picked up the first of a trio of awards on the night, saying: ‘Wow. This album is a re-recorded album, and I cannot tell you how much my rerecorded albums mean to me, but I never expected or assumed that they would mean anything to you. 

‘So I can’t thank you enough for caring about this album that I’m so proud of. I have some people who made this happen who I really want to thank.    

She added: ‘Chris Row who co-produced this album with me, hours and hours and hours in the studio recreating Red, an album I love so much. I want to thank all the artists who featured on the vault tracks, 

‘Chris Stapleton, Phoebe Bridgers. I want to thank my live touring band who played on this album, and I want to take a moment — there was a music video that I did that I was very happy about, so I want to say thank you to Sadie Sink and Dylan O’Brien, and my brilliant director Blake Lively, and Mike Teller and Kelly Teller for being in the music video. 

‘I want to thank you guys for making this a possibility for To the fans, I cannot thank you enough. This is so special. Thank you.’

Taylor, who last week revealed she was ‘p****d off’ following Ticketmaster’s botched handling of sales for her The Eras Tour, looked radiant in a glittering gold backless jumpsuit.

The Bejeweled hitmaker showed of a hint of her cleavage in the Hollywood glamor number, with her tresses styled in soft waves.

Back in 2019, Taylor called Scooter out over the sale in a social media post and claimed that he intentionally kept her in the dark while he turned a hefty profit on her hard work. 

Prior to that, in 2019 Braun had purchased Nashville-based independent record label Big Machine, first taking the rights to Taylor’s body of work and at the time, she voiced public outrage at being cut out of the deal.

Swift said the news made her ‘sad and grossed out’ because, in part, she claims Braun perpetuated ‘incessant, manipulative bullying’ against her for years.

She also released Fearless (Taylor’s Version in April 2021. Red was originally released in 2012 and Fearless in 2009.

In September 2022, entertainment executive Braun responded to the controversy, telling Wendy Williams, ‘I learned an important lesson’ from the purchase. 

He appeared to be referring to Big Machine owner Scott Borchetta, 60, when he claimed, ‘When I did that deal, I was under a very strict NDA with the gentleman who owned it, and I couldn’t tell any artist.’ 

Braun also indicated in the interview he wasn’t as realistic as he should have been when signing on the dotted line.

‘I was excited to work with every artist on the label. So when we finalized the deal, I started making phone calls to say, hey, I’m a part of this. And before I could even do that – I made four phone calls; I started to do those phone calls – all hell broke loose.’

‘So the regret I have there,’ he continued, ‘is that I made the assumption that everyone, once the deal was done, was going to have a conversation with me, see my intent, see my character and say, great, let’s be in business together. And I made that assumption with people that I didn’t know.’ 

 The New York native claimed he learned an important lesson from the controversy. ‘I can never make that assumption again. I can’t put myself in a place of, you know, arrogance to think that someone would just be willing to have a conversation and be excited to work with me.’  

Taylor also won the awards for Favorite Music Video for All Too Well: The Short Film and  Artist of the Year. She released the track and its accompanying 10-minute short film towards the end of 2021 and sparked rumors that the ‘red scarf’ she sings about was still in the possession of ex-boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal, 41.

However, she has now admitted that the garment was simply a storytelling device, with the color chosen after its parent album’s title. 

The ‘Shake It Off’ hitmaker alleges in the lyrics that she left a scarf at the house of a sister to a man she was dating and fans believe that she is alluding to the ‘Brokeback Mountain’ actor – whom she dated from October 2010 until January 2011 – and his sister Maggie.  

All Too Well originally debuted in a five-minute version on her hit 2012 album Red, but Taylor had originally written a 10-minute draft of the song with her cowriter Liz Rose, who helped her edit it down for the album.

After Taylor set about rerecording her catalogue, she finally recorded the original 10-minute version of All Too Well and included it as a bonus track on the album.

To accompany the new song, she created the nearly 15-minute short film to serve as its music video.

The film was deemed eligible for Oscar consideration in the best live action short film category, The Hollywood Reporter revealed last month.

The film appears to act out a version of Taylor’s relationship with Jake, with Sadie Sink, 20, playing the Taylor stand-in — referred to only as Her — while Dylan O’Brien plays a version of Jake, known as Him.

Taylor is also featured toward the end of the short as an older version of Sadie’s character, and she sports red hair to match.

In addition to making her directorial debut, Taylor also wrote and produced the short film.   

Accepting the award Taylor said: ‘Alright! This short film was ten years in the making, and the only reason I got to write and direct the film is because you the fans chose the song all too well. You chose it. No one at a record label chose it. You picked it. You said that is the song that matters to us, and it was just so happens that it was the song that matters the most to me. 

‘I’m very happy we all agreed on that. So the people who helped me make this, I really want to ssay this forever, Sadie Sink and Dylan O’Brien, thank you so much for trusting me as a director with your immense talent… I’m so proud of it. I’m so happy you like it too. This is so special and wonderful and — ahh, thank you. Thank you for this.’

And accepting her third award of the night, Taylor said: ‘You know, in the past few years, I have released more music than I did in the entire decade preceding that, and I really feel like that’s down to the fact that you, the fans, made it clear that you wanted to hear lots of music that I would make. 

‘You encouraged me. And so, I found that the more music I made and the more music I put out, the happier I was. The more I just kept that channel open and just kept creating, kept making things, and the more that happened, the more you guys were like, yeah, keep doing it. 

And the happier I was, so I have the fans to thank, essentially, for my happiness and — [ cheers and applause ] — And I love you more than I can say. I cannot express how unbelievable it is to me that I still get to do this and that you still care, so thank you underlined with 13 exclamation points. I don’t know what to say. I love you.’

This comes as Ticketmaster blamed a ‘staggering number of bot attacks’ for causing a tidal wave of problems for Taylor fans seeking to purchase tickets for her Eras Tour.

On November 1, Swift announced a 27-date tour across 20 U.S. cities, running from March to August next year – sparking fan chaos.

Tickets went on sale on Tuesday, but what Ticketmaster termed a ‘historically unprecedented demand’ from millions of fans saw the site crash repeatedly and the process descend into a fiasco, with her supporters furious at the soaring prices and spending hours waiting in line.

Taylor blasted Ticketmaster for the mayhem surrounding her recent ticket sale, claiming that she was ‘assured’ the company could handle the high demand ‘multiple times’ and calling it ‘excruciating’ to ‘watch mistakes happen with no recourse.’ 

Ticketmaster has cancelled the scheduled public sale of tickets for Taylor Swift’s Eras tour on Friday, citing ‘high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory.’

In a tweet, Ticketmaster said ‘Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow’s public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled.’

Now, Taylor has spoken out about the situation in a statement posted to her Instagram Stories, and she said she is just as ‘pissed off’ as everyone else is.

‘It goes without saying that I’m extremely protective of my fans,’ she began in the lengthy post. 

‘We’ve been doing this for decades together and over the years, I’ve brought so many elements of my career in house.’

Taylor went on to explain – without mentioning the company by name – that she chose to use Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan system because she thought it would ‘improve the quality of her fans’ experience,’ despite it being ‘really difficult’ for her to ‘trust an outside entity.’

‘I’ve done this SPECIFICALLY to improve the quality of my fans’ experience by doing it myself with my team, who care as much about my fans as I do,’ she continued. 

‘It’s really difficult for me to trust an outside entity with these relationships and loyalties, and excruciating for me to just watch mistakes happen with no recourse.’ 

The Cardigan songstress added that there were ‘multiple reasons why people had such a hard time trying to get tickets’ and that she’s currently ‘trying to figure out how the situation can be improved moving forward.’

‘I’m not going to make excuses for anyone because we asked them, multiple times, if they could handle this kind of demand and we were assured they could,’ she said. 

‘It’s truly amazing that 2.4 million people got tickets, but it really pisses me off that a lot of them feel like they went through several bear attacks to get them.’

She concluded her message with a note to those who weren’t able to get their hands on a ticket, writing, ‘All I can say is that my hope is to provide more opportunities for us all to get together and sing these songs.

‘Thank you for wanting to be there. You have no idea how much that means.’   

Now, after Tennessee’s attorney general Jonathan Skrmetti revealed he was launching an investigation into Ticketmaster, the site has issued a lengthy response blaming bots and fans without invite codes for causing ‘unprecedented traffic’ of 3.5billion users – four times the normal amount.

A statement read: ‘The Eras on sale made one thing clear: Taylor Swift is an unstoppable force and continues to set records. We strive to make ticket buying as easy as possible for fans, but that hasn’t been the case for many people trying to buy tickets for the Eras Tour. We want to share some information to help explain what happened.

Ticketmaster explained that fans needed to register with their system Verified Fan before the sale began, which is designed to ‘help manage high demand shows – identifying real humans and weeding out bots.’   

The statement continued: ‘Based on fan interest at registration we knew this would be big. Over 3.5 million people pre-registered for Taylor’s Verified Fan, which is the largest registration in history.  

‘The huge demand for Taylor’s tour informed the artist team’s decision to add additional dates – doubling the tour and number of tickets available so more fans could make it to shows.

‘Historically, around 40% of invited fans actually show up and buy tickets, and most purchase an average of 3 tickets. So working with the artist team, around 1.5 million people were invited to participate in the on sale for all 52 show dates, including the 47 sold by Ticketmaster.

‘The remaining 2 million Verified Fans were put on the waiting list.’

Adding the demand for Taylor ‘broke records and parts of our website’, the statement continued: ‘Historically, working with Verified Fan invite codes has worked as we’ve been able to manage the volume coming into the site to shop for tickets. 

‘However, this time the staggering number of bot attacks as well as fans who didn’t have invite codes drove unprecedented traffic on our site, resulting in 3.5 billion total system requests – 4x our previous peak.

‘Never before has a Verified Fan on sale sparked so much attention – or uninvited volume. This disrupted the predictability and reliability that is the hallmark of our Verified Fan platform.  

‘It usually takes us about an hour to sell through a stadium show, but we slowed down some sales and pushed back others to stabilize the systems. The trade off was longer wait times in queue for some fans.

‘Overall, we estimate about 15% of interactions across the site experienced issues, and that’s 15% too many, including passcode validation errors that caused fans to lose tickets they had carted.’

They added: ‘The biggest venues and artists turn to us because we have the leading ticketing technology in the world – that doesn’t mean it’s perfect, and clearly for Taylor’s on sale it wasn’t. But we’re always working to improve the ticket buying experience. Especially for high demand on sales, which continue to test new limits.

‘Even when a high demand on sale goes flawlessly from a tech perspective, many fans are left empty handed. For example: based on the volume of traffic to our site, Taylor would need to perform over 900 stadium shows (almost 20x the number of shows she is doing)…that’s a stadium show every single night for the next 2.5 years.

‘While it’s impossible for everyone to get tickets to these shows, we know we can do more to improve the experience and that’s what we’re focused on.’

The Eras Tour would sell a staggering and record-breaking 2 million tickets in just one day. 

The situation also launched an investigation into Ticketmaster from the the Justice Department, according to the New York Times.

‘The Justice Department has opened an antitrust investigation into the owner of Ticketmaster, whose sale of Taylor Swift concert tickets descended into chaos this week, said two people with knowledge of the matter,’ the outlet reported.

‘The investigation is focused on whether Live Nation Entertainment has abused its power over the multibillion-dollar live music industry.’                   

Puerto Rican rapper and singer Bad Bunny landed the most nominations at this year’s American Music Awards.

He leads fellow rapper Drake and pop superstars Beyonce and Taylor Swift on the list of contenders.

Bad Bunny received a total of eight AMA nominations and will compete for artist of the year against British singers Adele and Harry Styles and Canadian musician The Weeknd.

Drake, Beyonce and Swift also are in the running for artist of the year and received six nominations each.

The nominations are based on performances on the Billboard music charts, streaming and album sales, radio play and social media engagement. 

Winners will be determined by fan votes and announced at the ceremony at Microsoft Theater at L.A. LIVE in Los Angeles.

Bad Bunny’s other nods included favorite male pop artist, favorite music video and favorite touring artist.

The singer set a record this year for the highest-grossing tour by a Latin artist in history. His album ‘Un Verano Sin Ti’ just topped the Billboard charts for a 13th week.

If Bad Bunny wins all eight awards he is eligible for, he would tie 1980s superstars Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston for the most AMA wins in a single year.

Organizers added a category this year for favorite K-pop artist. Contenders are BTS, BLACKPINK, SEVENTEEN, Tomorrow X Together and Twice.  

First-time AMA nominees included rapper Jack Harlow, K-pop band BLACKPINK and Scandinavian DJ group Swedish House Mafia.

In country music categories, Chris Stapleton, Luke Combs and Morgan Wallen are among the nominees for favorite male country artist.

Carrie Underwood, Maren Morris and Miranda Lambert will compete for favorite female country artist. 

Pink is set to honor the late Olivia Newton–John with a musical performance at the show.

The performance in Newton–John’s memory follows her death at age 73 in August from a years-long battle with breast cancer.   

The beloved British–Australian singer and actress had a lengthy association with the award show.

She co-hosted the ceremony with Aretha Franklin and Glen Campbell in 1976, two years before her success in films spread to the US with her role in 1978’s Grease.   

Newton–John was also presented with 10 AMAs during her lengthy career.

Pink (real name: Alecia Moore) was previously announced as a performer at the AMAs, and her tribute number will be her second performance of the evening.

The hitmaker is also scheduled to give her new single Never Gonna Not Dance Again its live performance debut. 

Lionel Richie will also be honored at the ceremony, where he is set to receive the Icon Award.

Stevie Wonder will be leading the performance for his contemporary, while Charlie Puth and Ari Lennox will be joining the keyboard virtuoso for a medley of Richie’s most popular material.

The ceremony, which is being hosted by Wayne Brady, was previously announced to have performances from Carrie Underwood, Imagine Dragons, JID, and Yola, among others. 

Bebe Rexha and David Guetta will be performing their hit I’m Good (Blue), while Dove Cameron will make her debut at the show with a performance of her song Boyfriend.

The rapper GloRilla and Anitta will also be making their performance debuts at the show. 

The 2021 ceremony saw K-Pop icons BTS earn the most wins with three including top honor artist of the year as the most nominated singer Olivia Rodrigo earned new artist of the year.

The seven member South Korean pop boyband – who also earned favorite pop group or duo and favorite pop song  – was given the most coveted crystal pyramid trophy of the night as they beat out heavy hitters including Ariana Grande, Drake, Olivia Rodrigo, Taylor Swift, and The Weeknd.