Pop

It was billed as a "shocking tell-all" and a "world exclusive," but the National Enquirer's March 26 cover story landed with a thud. TMZ, Page Six and other major players in celebrity gossip ignored the article in which a masseur claimed John Travolta offered money for sex. FOR THE RECORD: An earlier version of this article used the term "masseuse"; it should have said "masseur. " Five weeks after the issue left the checkout aisle, a DUI attorney from Pasadena put the anonymous masseur's tawdry tale in a lawsuit and it became an overnight pop culture sensation, topping Google News, trending on Twitter and meriting a segment on "Good Morning America.

AURORA, Colo. — On May 2, D'Avonte Meadows, a 6-year-old with an infectious grin and rambunctious streak, was suspended for three days from Sable Elementary in suburban Denver for crooning "[I'm] Sexy and I Know It" to a girl in lunch line. The school declared it sexual harassment and told his parents that, because D'Avonte sang the same song to the same girl before, he is a repeat offender. The news media pounced.

Often film sequels are slam dunks at the box office, a seamless continuation from where a previous hit left off. But as the new installment of the 15-year-old franchise "Men in Black" proves, getting to the big screen isn't always a cakewalk. One of the most troubled productions in recent Hollywood memory, Sony Pictures' latest movie in the Will Smith-Tommy Lee Jones sci-fi-comedy franchise encountered multiple script rewrites, a discontented star and a three-month production shutdown as writers and studio executives scrambled to fix a project that nearly fell apart . By the time it was over, the studio had run up a tab of nearly $250 million - making "Men in Black 3" one of the most expensive releases of the summer.

Robin Gibb, a singer and songwriter who joined two of his brothers in forming the Bee Gees pop group that helped define the sound of the disco era with the best-selling 1977 soundtrack to"Saturday Night Fever," has died. He was 62. Gibb died Sunday after battling cancer and while recuperating from intestinal surgery, family spokesman Doug Wright announced. This spring Gibb had been hospitalized in London with advanced colorectal cancer. He had intestinal surgery in March and, after contracting pneumonia, was unable to attend the April 10 premiere in London of "The Titanic Requiem," a classical composition he wrote with his son, Robin-John, to coincide with the 100th anniversary observance of the luxury ocean liner's sinking.

The Grammy Award-winning singer Glen Campbell announced this week that he is suffering from Alzheimer's disease. And then he said he'd be going on the road for a farewell tour. It's not unusual for a public figure to reveal a diagnosis of the insidious disease. Former President Reagan told the world of his battle with Alzheimer's in a poignant letter in 1994. Actor Charlton Heston disclosed, via a taped statement, that he was suffering from symptoms similar to those of Alzheimer's.

Pop star Andy Gibb died of natural causes--an inflammation of the heart probably caused by a virus--and not from a drug overdose or alcohol abuse, a hospital announced Friday. Gibb died at Oxford's John Ratcliffe Hospital on Thursday, five days after his 30th birthday. He entered the hospital Monday complaining of stomach pains.

Underneath the stage before February's Super Bowl halftime show, Nicki Minaj felt an emotion she hadn't experienced in quite some time. She was really, really nervous. Over the last three years, the young rapper had become one of the most charismatic and commercially successful stars in pop music, with a gum-snapping flow and acerbic guest rhymes that stole the show from vets such as Mariah Carey, Kanye West and Rihanna. Her pop-inclined solo debut, "Pink Friday," hit No. 1 and launched bestselling singles like the elastic "Super Bass.

The nine young women of Girls' Generation sauntered onto the performance stage of "Late Show With David Letterman. " Flanked by a DJ and live drummer, the South Korean pop group wore lacy black mini-dresses and thigh-high leather boots, as if they were hosting a goth cocktail party. It was a rare American network television performance from a South Korean music group. The song they performed on the January show, a slinky bit of minor-key dance-pop called "The Boys," owed an obvious debt to Kelis' catcalling hit "Milkshake.

We live in a pop age gone loco for retro and crazy for commemoration. Band reformations and reunion tours, tribute albums and box sets, anniversary festivals and live performances of classic albums: Each new year is better than the previous year for music from yesteryear. Could it be that the greatest danger to the future of our music culture is ... its past? Maybe that sounds unnecessarily apocalyptic. But the scenario I'm imagining isn't a cataclysm so much as a gradual wind-down.

While the drama "Magic City" offers the Starz network a bid for critical glory, it's also serving as a second chapter for one of its sexiest players: Willa Ford. If the name sounds familiar, it's because Ford was a pop diva in a heyday that saw chart peers including Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys. "I Wanna Be Bad," her biggest single, showcased a hard-bodied blond with some specific intentions.  But now she's all grown up, married to retired NHL player Mike Modano and stepping out with a serious role on "Magic City.

Pop-Hop Books and Print Where: 5002 York Blvd. When: grand opening: 1 p.m.-9 p.m. Sunday; storytime, 2:30 p.m.; readings, 6:30 p.m.

Like a bad love affair, they kept it a secret from their families as long as they could. Because in 2012, who can admit the thing they want more than anything in the world is to open a bookstore? Now they know. Pop-Hop Books & Print is holding its grand opening on Sunday with readings, music, printing and refreshments. Located in Highland Park on a stretch of York Boulevard that sparkles with new shops and restaurants, the store is a celebration of books as print artifact, with used literary and art books for sale and, tucked behind movable shelves, a screen-printing salon.

In 1975, Donna Summer released a pop single unlike any before it. The singer, then an unknown in the U.S., was living in Germany and working with Italian producer Giorgio Moroder and lyricist Pete Bellotte. Together they came up with a breathy, minimalist number that sounded flagrantly sexy. Summer's coos acted as musical erotica atop a simple, four-on-the-floor drum beat. "Love to Love You Baby," all 17 minutes of it, set a template that would ignite Summer's career, and a style that defined an era: disco.

What happens when an indie balladeer with a love for opera sets out to make a true pop album? Singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright decided to find out. Much to the relief of Wainwright's fan base, going pop doesn't mean dropping the piano or enlisting Skrillex to refashion his soft touch into crossover club anthems. Instead, the Canadian American artist who debuted in 1998 with vibrato-soaked ballads and later cemented his reputation with playful odes to vices like cigarettes and chocolate milk, called on one of pop's most stylish producers to helm his seventh solo album, "Out of the Game.

The nine young women of Girls' Generation sauntered onto the performance stage of "Late Show With David Letterman. " Flanked by a DJ and live drummer, the South Korean pop group wore lacy black mini-dresses and thigh-high leather boots, as if they were hosting a goth cocktail party. It was a rare American network television performance from a South Korean music group. The song they performed on the January show, a slinky bit of minor-key dance-pop called "The Boys," owed an obvious debt to Kelis' catcalling hit "Milkshake.

If your destination is Bratislava, be prepared for a few questions: Is that in Eastern Europe? (No, it's in Central Europe.) Capital of Slovenia, right? (Uh, no.) Where is that? (The last question courtesy of a Customs employee at LAX.) Until recently, my schooling on all things Bratislavan occurred during a 20-minute stop on a train traveling from Prague, Czech Republic, to Budapest, Hungary, almost a decade ago. Several travelers boarded; a few disembarked. Some of them flashed passports, suggesting that we had stopped in a different country, in a major European city about which I knew … nothing.

Homemade pop tarts? Are we crazy? Absolutely not. This isn't just another example of the locavore artisanal movement gone mad, these pastries developed by food writer Amy Scattergood are really delicious. The dough is much richer and flakier than the original — and it's made with whole wheat. You can fill it with jam or fruit preserves and it'll be really good. But what got this recipe into the top 10 was the filling of almond-flavored frangipane. Making them is a bit of a project — certainly more work than just popping them in the toaster — but the flavor more than makes it worthwhile.

Cirque du Soleil's tribute to the king of pop, " Michael Jackson: The Immortal World Tour," fuses visuals, dance and music to immerse audiences in the late pop star's creative inspirations. The show presents a fantasy-tinged take on the source of the performer's creativity as well as his love of music, dance, fairy tale and nature. Staples Center, 1111 S. Figueroa St., L.A. 8 p.m. Fri.-Sat., 4 p.m. Sun. $50-$175. staplescenter.com

Gabriel Kahane, best known as an indie singer-songwriter, was his own charismatic singer-songwriter Saturday night in the West Coast premiere of his affecting "Crane Palimpsest" at the Alex Theatre. As he does in a club, he used a microphone and wore jeans. He accompanied himself on guitar and piano. He also had the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra on hand, and he gratefully used everything at his disposal to merge pop and new music sensibilities naturally and unpretentiously. Composer-performers who write orchestral pieces for themselves as soloists can these days be anything they like.

CAIRO - When filmmaker and Egyptian democracy activist Amr Salama watched Hosni Mubarak's regime collapse in 2011, he couldn't have been more heartened. Salama had been making films for years and had found himself hamstrung by the government's censorship board. This was finally the opportunity he'd been waiting for. So shortly after the regime fell, Salama resubmitted a script that had been rejected under Mubarak - one whose story centered on tension between Cairo's majority Muslim population and its Coptic Christian minority.