Bon Jovi have been rocking stadiums since 1983
Bon Jovi are setting off on a worldwide tour in support of their 11th studio album, The Circle and will rock the O2 Arena in London with ten stomping gigs from 7th to 23rd June 2010.
The American band consisting of lead singer Jon Bon Jovi, guitarist Richie Sambora, keyboardist David Bryan, bassist Alec John Such and drummer Tico Torres have been around since 1983 and are world famous for their particular brand of uplifting rock and for filling stadiums for almost over two decades.
And let’s face it – if you’ve never leapt around the room singing your heart out to the band’s feelgood classics like Livin’ on a Prayer and It’s My Life, you’re probably not human.
Having produced a host of successful studio albums over the years, Bon Jovi’s latest offering, The Circle is to be released on 10th November 2009 in the US to coincide with the concert tour.
After exploring country music with their album Lost Highway in 2007, Bon Jovi have returned to the anthemic rock their fans love, mixed with more meditative tracks like Live Before You Die. The first single from the new album is We Weren’t Born to Follow – another guaranteed stadium rocker that will also become the soundtrack to the Wii game Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers.
Another of Bon Jovi’s claims to fame is that they were the first band to be officially sanctioned by the Russian government to perform in Russia thus making their own contribution to glasnost. After performing in huge worldwide tours over the years, an inspirational acoustic performance on the 1989 MTV Video Music Awards received rave reviews and led to the subsequent popularity of the unplugged movement.
No doubt Bon Jovi will be firmly plugged in at the O2. It’s also highly probable that 23,000 people will be singing along to Livin’ on a Prayer and attempting to leap around a bit too. Why not join them?
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Law Abiding Citizen - crime thriller
This crime thriller starring Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler is to be released on 27th November 2009 in the UK after a European premiere at the Cineworld Complex in Glasgow, home of Gerard Butler, on November 15th 2009.
After brilliant engineer, Clyde Shelton’s (Butler) wife and daughter are brutally murdered, Assistant DA Nick Rice (Foxx) is persuaded to agree to a 10-year plea bargain sentence for one of their killers. When the murderer winds up dead on his release, it becomes apparent that Clyde was responsible and is himself put in jail. Clyde threatens Nick that he and his family will die unless he corrects the corrupt justice system.
Nick becomes embroiled in a struggle to save his family and the entire DA office as Clyde begins to wreak a terrible vengeance from his prison cell.
Directed by F. Gary Gray from a screenplay written by Kurt Wimmer, Law Abiding Citizen is filmed in and around Philadelphia and took second place in the US in its opening weekend just behind Where the Wild Things Are. Rated certificate 18, the film contains scenes of brutal violence and torture, rape and offensive language but it’s definitely worth a trip out to the cinema if just to see the interaction between two great actors.
The Box stars Cameron Diaz
The Box, a drama mystery thriller starring Cameron Diaz and James Marsden is to be released in cinemas on 4th December 2009.
Here’s the dilemma – a suburban couple receives a mysterious wooden box containing $1 million which could belong to them at the press of a button. The catch is that pressing the button will simultaneously cause the death of a stranger somewhere in the world. The box will only be in their possession for 24 hours. What would you do? What should they do? What do they do in fact?
You’ll have to see the film to find out as The Box has as many twists and turns as the Pineapple Garden Maze. The storyline follows the moral dilemma as the couple discover things about themselves they did not know; their humanity, their capacity for good or bad and their trust in each other as they end up facing a terrible choice from which there is “No Exit” – the title of a Sartre play that is chillingly etched in the frost on the windscreen of their car. And believe us, things get curiouser and curiouser…
The Box is based on the 1970 short story, Button, Button by Richard Matheson which was adapted into an episode of The Twilight Zone. With an original soundtrack by the Canadian Band Arcade Fire and a 12A rating, director Richard Kelly says of the movie; “My hope is to make a film suspenseful and broadly commercial while still retaining my artistic sensibility.” To discover whether he achieves this or not, you’ll just have to open The Box and find out.
Star Wars - the animated series
From a galaxy far, far away… comes the Complete Season One of the animated Star Wars series to land in a shop near you on 16th November.
The four disc set contains 22 action-packed episodes with seven Director’s Cut episodes, 22 Behind-the-Scenes interviews with the director and crew, an exclusive 68-page Production Journal complete with original sketches and artist notes, plus a sneak preview of Season Two.
It sounds too good to be true and even better, The Clone Wars comes with a RRP of £39.99. It continues the adventures of the Star Wars saga. A fierce battle rages throughout the universe and in particular, on the planet of Christophsis, as the clones steadily advance on the Separatist forces, but the threat of the droid army is ever present. Anakin and Ahsoka, a young Padawan are charged with rescuing the child of Jabba the Hutt who has been kidnapped as a plot to make the Hutts join the Separatists under the evil General Grievous. The fate of the Republic lies in the hands of the heroic Jedi knights – can they rescue Jabba’s son and save the universe?
The voice cast includes Matt Lanter as Anakin Skywalker, Sir Christopher Lee as Count Dooku and Samuel L. Jackson as Mace Windu with Ashley Eckstein as Ahsoka Tano. The animation pays homage to the Japanese anime and manga and the marionette-based British series, Thunderbirds, with George Lucas specifying that he wanted a stylized look rather than a realistic one and uses long camera shots and strong lighting. This special edition is a must for Star Wars fans everywhere.
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Barclays ATP World Tour Finals Tickets
Tickets for the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals are available from Sunday 22nd November 2009 to Sunday 29th November 2009 at the O2 Arena starting from £19.50.
This is your chance to see legends like Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and British star and World No 4, Andy Murray locked in a battle to be crowned ATP World Tour Champion with the best eight singles and best eight doubles teams playing for the first time in the O2 Arena in London.
Play takes place on a hard court within the unique round-robin format whereby eight players/teams are divided into two groups of four players/teams each, with eight seeds determined by the South African Airways ATP Rankings and 209 ATP Doubles Team Rankings. The format is thereafter an elimination competition. All singles matches will be the best of three tie-break sets and doubles will be two sets and match-tie break. Tickets are available for afternoon and evening sessions starting from 12.30pm, 2.15pm, 7pm and 8.45pm with the doors into the O2 Arena scheduled to open 75 minutes before the start of play.
With prize money notching up to $5 million, this is guaranteed to be the ultimate competitive showdown. Great seats are still available so get your Barclays ATP World Finals Tickets now and make sure it’s game, set and match to you.
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Star Trek is out on DVD on 16th November
The latest Star Trek (Xl) movie is coming out on video and DVD and you can beam up a copy right now to materialise on 16th November 2009 at a RRP of £19.99 or £24.99 for two discs.
Starring Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto, the film tells the story of the young crew when Captain Kirk was but a lad on board the USS Enterprise with the creation of a new timeline. Once again an evil being threatens the whole of mankind and it remains up to the crew to rescue the world from destruction once more (or maybe this was the first time they ever did it – who knows?).
The story depicts Romulan time traveller, Nero’s quest for revenge against the Federation and Spock in particular. Full of comedy, action and intrigue the film is as full of optimism and escapism as ever and has been lovingly reinvented by director JJ Abrams. What’s more, fans may even be treated to an interactive tour of the USS Enterprise by means of an interactive hologram that works when the disk packaging is held in front of any standard computer webcam after logging in to the film’s official website.
With deep roots in the original series, the characters exist as new versions of their former selves. With Chris Pine as Kirk and Zachary Quinto as the enigmatic Spock, Zoe Saldana plays Uhura while Simon Pegg provides the comic relief as Scottie and Karl Urban is Bones. The action is intense and spectacular with an incredible opening and eye-popping effects. Widely recognised as a worthy successor to the iconic series, the Star Trek beacon has ventured boldly where no man has gone before – into the hearts of the next generation.
The Informant - a true story starring Matt Damon
The Informant is based on the true story of Mark Whitacre (played by a slightly plump Matt Damon), who became the highest ranking executive in US history to inform on the major food additive company’s price fixing tactics and it’s to be released on 20th November 2009 in the UK.
This dark comedy thriller, directed by Steven Soderbergh of Ocean’s 11, 12 and 13, documents Whitacre’s extensive undercover work at the Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) in the early 1990s in Illinois, whilst struggling with a severe bipolar disorder that eventually led him to crack under pressure and go into meltdown.
No sooner did the case go to court than Whitacre was also charged with price-fixing, wire fraud and money laundering and although he was brilliantly represented by his first attorney, James Epstein, was sent to prison for three times longer than any of the white collar criminals he had exposed. Ten years later, the former FBI supervisor of the case, Dean Paisley went public saying that Whitacre was a national hero: “Without him the biggest antitrust case we’ve ever had would not have been,” he said.
Something of a mixture between A Beautiful Mind and The Insider, The Informant is very funny, riveting and entertaining and shows off Matt Damon’s consummate acting skills to the hilt.
Paranormal Activity - dare you watch it?
Hold on to your seats and become part of the phenomenon – Paranormal Activity is to be released in the UK on 25th November. This is the movie that caused people in the US to leave the cinemas in droves after they became too frightened to stay at the initial screening.
The horror thriller was made by Oren Peli, a director with no formal film training and a budget of just $15,000 dollars. It has since become the most profitable independent film ever.
The film follows the story of Katie and Micah (played by Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat), a couple who are haunted by a demon in their new home in the middle of suburbia in San Diego, California and attempt to record the paranormal activity that is going on during the night even as they sleep. Filming is via a hand-held camera set up by Micah, in Blair Witch Project style – which brings the action a little closer to home – a little too close for some people! If you think Paranormal Activity sounds like a run of the mill ghost story you are in for a shock. Peli uses atmosphere and tension to create a slow build of sheer terror to an excruciating climax.
Paranormal Activity was first shown at the Screamfest Film Festival in the US in 2007 but languished for a while before being discovered by Jason Blum and Steven Schneider. Steven Spielberg himself took the DVD of the film home to watch overnight and returned convinced that it was haunted itself after his bedroom doors locked by themselves during the screening.
A campaign on the internet asking users to vote where the film should be shown followed – the first time a motion picture studio had used the web to virally market a film. After 1,000,000 hits were registered requesting that the film be released nationwide, it went national in the US and went on to gross $7,900,695 beating Saw Vl.
Michael Buble is performing in a series of concerts
The Canadian artist Michael Bublé has had a meteoric rise to fame since his acclaimed self-titled album in 2003 and is to perform in a series of concerts across the UK in May 2010.
He’s sold more than 20 million albums worldwide. Having earned two Grammy nominations and reached a multi-platinum status with his 2005 album It’s Time, he has made smooth swing and big band sounds trendy once more. With his third album Call Me Irresponsible being released in May 2009, Bublé is at the pinnacle of his career.
It’s a success that’s well deserved for the first seven years of his career saw Bublé struggling to take on every gig imaginable – even working as a singing Santa Claus. After Michael McSweeney saw Bublé perform at a business party, he introduced the singer to David Foster, a record executive and producer who, despite being not too sure “how to market this kind of music,” managed to release a debut album that went straight into the top 10 in Canada, the UK and South Africa and reached number one in Australia. Although he’s famed for his reworked Sinatra-ish songs, Bublé’s new album contains two self-penned tracks which have been described as some of his best work yet with the song “Haven’t met you yet” causing hearts to flutter everywhere.
Concerts are to take place in Sheffield, Glasgow, Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Birmingham and London. You may think May is a long way off but we reckon tickets for these will be like gold dust before too long.
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Echo is Leona Lewis's second studio album
Leona Lewis’s long-awaited album Echo contains a mixture of ballads and dance-floor anthems. It’s to be released on 16th November in the UK and can be pre-ordered from Amazon at £8.98 and £16.09.
Echo is available in three different formats – a standard edition, a deluxe edition with two extra tracks and a 32-page insert and as a download from iTunes to include two live performance songs taken from Leona’s first full UK show at Hackney Empire on 2nd November 2009.
This is Leona’s second studio album and in it, the former winner of the X-Factor has worked with an impressive range of musicians, including Justin Timberlake, John Shanks and Ne-Yo to produce thirteen tracks that combine upbeat, electro numbers with unashamedly romantic songs reminiscent of the heart rending Keep Bleeding. Leona herself has described the album as the creation of a “big, organic sound like an echo.”
The vocalist of OneRepublic, Ryan Tedder who wrote Happy, the lead single from the album and the track You Don’t Care, claims that Leona’s singing has been raised to a new level: “I pushed Lewis vocally more on this song than any song she’s ever done,” he says.
Art work on the album features Leona looking more and more like a sultry pop diva, wearing gold lamé and white satin gowns designed by Vivienne Westwood. Expect a more polished and confident performance than that achieved in the début album, Spirit with Can’t Breathe, Broken and Stop Crying Your Heart Out all strong contenders for future singles. The album has received three out of five stars from The Observer when the reviewer Peter Robinson wrote that “Echo hits its target.” And if the album pleases the likes of the Observer critics, there’s no doubt that Leona’s fans will be more than over the moon with it.
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