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Robin Thicke found himself in hot water this week. A transcript of his deposition from his ongoing lawsuit surrounding "Blurred Lines" was released, which revealed the 37-year-old artist was not so truthful about his involvement in the making of chart-topping hit. According to the transcript, Thicke also admitted to being high on Vicodin during its recording.
On the heels of Jay Z and Beyoncé finishing up their "On the Run" tour, prominent radio personality DJ Skee reported the power couple were planning to release a joint album. Skee didn't share any firm details regarding the possible collaborative project, only stating he spoke with multiple sources who confirmed it was in the works.
Check out all that and more in What The Hell Just Happened In Music This Week?
PARTYNEXTDOOR announced plans for his own fall tour.
Date: September 15
PARTYNEXTDOOR is heading out on a brief tour that will hit most major American cities as well as Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal. Earlier this summer, PARTYNEXTDOOR dropped his long-awaited album, PARTYNEXTDOOR Two, via OVO Sound. He also spent the last few weeks opening for the “Drake vs. Lil Wayne” tour, as well. His full tour dates are below.
10/19 – Montreal, QC – Le Belmont
10/21 – Boston, MA – Middle East
10/23 – New York, NY – SOB’s
10/24 – Washington, DC – U Street Music Hall
10/26 – Houston, TX – Studio @ Warehouse Live
10/27 – Dallas, TX – Trees
10/28 – Austin, TX – The Parish
10/30 – Miami, FL – The Culture Room
11/2 – Atlanta, GA – The Loft @ Center Stage
11/4 – Chicago, IL – Subterranean
11/6 – Oakland, CA – The New Parrish
11/7 – Vancouver, BC – Fortune Sound Club
11/12 – Toronto, ON – The Virgin Mobile Mod Club
11/22 – Los Angeles, CA – The Roxy Theatre
Robin Thicke admitted he lied about writing “Blurred Lines” and was high on Vicodin during its recording.
Date: September 15
Robin Thicke's catastrophic year got even worse today. Besides the public separation from his wife and his weak, and creepy attempt to get her back on the album, Paula, which tanked in sales, he's still in a ton of legal drama over his chart-topping hit, “Blurred Lines.” The Hollywood Reporter was able to obtain a copy of the transcripts from Robin and Pharrell's preemptive lawsuit against Marvin Gaye's estate, which threatened to sue the artists over the similarities between “Blurred Lines” and Gaye's “Got to Give It Up.”
In the transcripts, Robin admits to being high on Vicodin during the making and recording of the song, and that he received wrongful credit for the song—he's listed as a songwriter ahead of Pharrell. In a previous interview with GQ, Thicke claimed that he and Pharrell came up with the song together after being inspired by “Got to Give It Up.”
Q: Were you present during the creation of 'Blurred Lines'?
Thicke: I was present. Obviously, I sang it. I had to be there.
Q: When the rhythm track was being created, were you there with Pharrell?
Thicke: To be honest, that's the only part where — I was high on vicodin and alcohol when I showed up at the studio. So my recollection is when we made the song, I thought I wanted — I — I wanted to be more involved than I actually was by the time, nine months later, it became a huge hit and I wanted credit. So I started kind of convincing myself that I was a little more part of it than I was and I — because I didn't want him — I wanted some credit for this big hit. But the reality is, is that Pharrell had the beat and he wrote almost every single part of the song.” Thicke says he was just “lucky enough to be in the room” when Williams wrote the song.
During Pharrell's portion of the deposition, he explained why he let Robin take so much credit for the single.
“This is what happens every day in our industry,” said Williams during his own deposition. “You know, people are made to look like they have much more authorship in the situation than they actually do. So that's where the embellishment comes in.”
Pharrell also says that Thicke's voice was the determining factor to hold the song together and differentiate it.
Q: In your view, what holds 'Blurred Lines' together throughout the different sections?
Williams: What holds it together?
Q: Yeah.
Williams: Robin Thicke's voice.
Q: Does the bass line and the keyboard hold the songs together through the different sections?
A: No
Q: Why not?
A: Because it's the white man singing soulfully and we, unfortunately, in this country don't get enough — we don't get to hear that as often, so we get excited by it when the mainstream gives that a shot. But there's a lot of incredibly talented white folk with really soulful vocals, so when we're able to give them a shot — and when I say 'we,' I mean like as in the public gives them a shot to be heard, then you hear the Justin Timberlakes and you hear the Christina Aguileras and you hear, you know, all of these masterful voices that have just been given, you know, an opportunity to be heard because they're doing something different.
In response to Thicke and Pharrell's statements, Gaye's family questions how much can be believed of what Thicke says based on his substantial drug and alcohol abuse.
“Thicke, for his part, now claims he made all of his statements while drunk or on drugs, none of them true, and he mentioned Marvin Gaye only to sell records,” states the counter-claimants' court papers. “He also actually testified that he is not an honest person. This complete contempt for the judicial system, and their obligations to tell the truth, can best be summed up by Thicke’s ultimate admission, while under oath, that he '[does not] give a f–k' about this litigation.” This case is currently set to go to trial on February 10, 2015. —Zach Frydenlund
Related: Robin Thicke Lied About Writing “Blurred Lines” Because He Was High and Wanted More Credit
Kanye West responded to media outlets who falsely reported on the wheelchair story.
Date: September 15
Kanye West's speaking tour/rodeo/live concert experience hit Brisbane, Australia. As he's done dozens of times around the world this past year, Kanye took a few minutes during his set to deliver his oral blog. The topic on hand in Brisbane: The media (again), and how certain outlets and media types keep on trying to drag Kanye's name through the mud. This latest trip came after a Fox News story about Kanye reportedly singling-out a wheelchair-bound fan to stand up during a song.
The headline for that Fox News story, "Kanye West tries to shame man in wheelchair into standing during Sydney concert" is what really went viral, not the details or facts within the non-story itself. Here's what happened: Kanye was performing, and he wanted everyone to stand up and clap and have an awesome time.
When he noticed that two fans weren't standing, he felt some type of way about it, and implored them to stand. Unfortunately, the fans were disabled, but Kanye couldn't really tell, so he egged them on to stand until one of the disabled fans held up a prosthetic limb—an obvious visual call for Kanye to stand down. It was a weird misunderstanding that got flipped into being judged as a heinous mistake by some media outlets. Read his full statement below.
Hey Mike, stop the piano, turn the auto tune off, turn your camera phones off. what I want you to do is just run the video that everyone's talking about where I so called scream at somebody and everything. I want you to run that right since this is such big media press news and obvious shit where you try to demonize people. It's like, "Welcome to today's news ladies and gentlemen, we got Americans getting killed on TV, kids getting killed every weekend in Chicago, we have unarmed people being killed by police officers, and we have Kanye West buying ice cream—and also that squirrel can jet ski."
You know it makes you just WANT TO reflect on the things that are a little more sensationalized than others. I want to take this platform. If I didn't have this last concert maybe I would have tweeted or something. Maybe I would have put a statement with a publicist, but I can talk directly to you, my fans, because they got this thing where they want the masses, the people who have never even heard one of my albums to somehow read a headline that reads negative and to think I'm a bad person or something. But the thing is, I'm not judging anybody, but I'm going to tell you who I am: I'm a married Christian man.
If you take someone that can go from being a rock star across the globe, pick one woman, raise a family which anyone that is here that is married or is in a relationship knows that there is enough things working against you. What I'm saying is, you've got like 12 years that we've put in positive music. How many people here ever heard one of my songs on their way to work or they heard it and it made them feel better? And in these songs that made them feel better, don't I say offensive shit here and there? Oh so wait a second, that's like my brand. I curse and I say like really offensive—wait a second—that's why when I did "Runaway" earlier I said, "I sent this bitch a picture of my dick" what did ya'll think when you heard that? It's not G rated. It's rap fucking music. It's real music. it's real expression. This is real artistry.
An artist's career doesn't happen in the cycle of one week of news an artist's career happens in a lifetime and if you're a true artist you're willing to die for what you believe in, and I don't know if you feel like this, but do you get this feeling after the 10, 11, 12 years—does it seem in anyway that I might just be a true artist? I heard it's going to the Today show, I'm not sure if I keep up with the news but if Michael Strahan is still at GMA, if it goes to The View, Whoopi Goldberg, Barbara Walters, I don't know wherever y'all send. If y'all run this—look at me for a second—and take a step back for a second and look at this: I'm a married Christian man with a family. At my concerts I make sure everybody has good of a time as possible, so all this demonizing me, it ain't going to work after awhile. Pick a new target, pick a new target cause I'm not one of these dumb ass artists that you're used to. You come at me and I'm gonna take my platform and break this shit down for real intelligent people every night so they can understand, then we get back to the music.
August Alsina spent three days in a coma after collapsing during a performance in NYC.
Date: September 15
While making a tour stop at Irving Plaza in New York City, August Alsina suddenly passed out during his set and took a fall off the stage, crashing into the barricade below. According to TMZ, August remains hospitalized in NYC and is receiving treatment for seizures. No drugs other than marijuana were found in his system, but doctors believe that August fainting was a result of dehydration and exhaustion.
The singer shared his first message since the incident, revealing that he had been in a coma for three days and had recently woken up. August is currently scheduled to hit the road with Usher for the "UR Experience" tour, though it's not yet known if that is still the plan with August's current health situation.
Related: August Alsina Collapsed On Stage During His Concert Tonight
After a year of speculation, information was released that proved Tim Dog did in fact pass away in 2013.
Date: September 16
It seems that the strange case surrounding Tim Dog's death has finally come to a close, according to NBC's Dateline. In their report, the official death certificate of the Bronx MC was presented, and it revealed that he did indeed pass away on February 14, 2013 in Atlanta, Georgia.
Questions about the validity of Tim Dog's death arose in May of 2013 when a woman, Esther Pilgrim, accused the MC of faking his death to get out of paying $32,000 that he had previously scammed her out of. She then hired a private investigator to look into his death, and when no death certificate was found, real questions were raised.
Now, according to the Deadline report, the reason that no death certificate was originally found was because it was filed in the county where Tim Dog passed away and not the county was he was a resident, thus the certificate went undetected at the time.
Dateline was able to track down the real story and track down the hospital and hospice where Tim Dog was treated before he passed away. Neither Tim Dog nor his estate could afford a funeral, so the county paid for him to be cremated. —Zach Frydenlund
Rihanna put CBS on blast for pulling her song from its Thursday Night Fooball programming.
Date: September 16
CBS recently decided to pull Rihanna from the opening intro of their Thursday Night Football program due to the ongoing Ray Rice situation, and essentially punishing her for being a victim of domestic violence. That obviously didn't sit well with RiRi, who took to her Twitter to blast the network for the entire situation, and revealed that the network wanted to run her intro for this week's game on Thursday night.
Not only did Rihanna straight up say no, but she called out the network for punishing her for this situation. The intro was set to feature Rihanna and Jay Z's song “Run This Town” and a special narration from Don Cheadle. No word yet on what the network has planned to replace the intro for the rest of the season. —Zach Frydenlund
Related: Rihanna Responds to CBS Pulling “Run This Town” From “Thursday Night Football” Intro
A report came out that claimed Jay Z and Beyoncé were working on a joint album.
Date: September 16
With the “On the Run” tour completed, are Mr. and Mrs. Carter working on their next big venture? Well, according to DJ Skee, yes, yes they are. On his newly-launched station, Dash Radio, Skee revealed that multiple sources have told him that Jay Z and Beyoncé are working on a new joint album and are looking to drop it sometime this year. No word on if this project will ever become a reality, but when you have Jay and Bey involved, anything is possible. If nothing else, the Internet will surely run wild with rumors and possible signs that the album is coming for at least the next month. —Zach Frydenlund
Related: Jay Z and Beyoncé Are Working On a Joint Album, According to DJ Skee
Kendrick Lamar revealed he would be releasing the first single from his upcoming album.
Date: September 16
As the year begins to wind down, there has been a sudden amount of buzz about the release of Kendrick Lamar's sophomore album. Kendrick has mostly been silent about the album, but some information has leaked out recently.
The news allegedly came from a private dinner that IGA and Clear Channel hosted for radio personalities. Another Twitter user came forward with an exact date for Kendrick along with other Interscope artists Gwen Stefani and Fergie. He claims that the dates were leaked from the promo site and quickly removed. Sources at Interscope have since confirmed the name of the song to be “I,” and will be released in the coming week. Though more details are not yet available, it is known that Los Angeles-based musician Rahki produced the single. —Justin Davis
Related: Kendrick Lamar's New Single Will Reportedly Be Released Next Week
