One would think that naming a band would have its challenges. Whether the name is cute, outrageous, or it has no meaning at all, it still supposed to describe the band in some way. It wasn’t any of those ways for The Town Pants. Yes that is the name of the band — The Town ...

NEW YORK (AP) — Madonna says she wasn’t asked and didn’t intend to do a tribute to Aretha Franklin at the MTV Video Music Awards. The pop star was scorched online for telling a lengthy story about Franklin on Monday’s show that had more to do with herself than the Queen of Soul, who ...

Aretha Franklin, who was born and rose to fame during the segregation era and went on to sing at the inauguration of the first black president, often used her talent, fortune and platform to inspire millions of black Americans and support the fight for racial equality. “The earth lost a lot ...

Genre blending. Ragtime. Dixieland jazz. Rock. Swing. 1920s blues. Hot jazz. Preservationist. Time traveler. Vaudevillian glamor. Theatrical. Intoxicating. Whatever you want to label it, Blair Crimmins and The Hookers are just plain fun. It’s the kind of music that instantly puts a smile ...

DARIEN CENTER — When they announced that this trip around was going to be the last, Slayer fans may have started looking for shows close to them. It was with good reason. On Aug. 3 it was the band’s final performance in western New York. Taking the stage with precision at 9:20 p.m. at ...

NEW YORK (AP) — The themes and trappings are familiar for an Ernest Hemingway narrative: Paris, wartime, talk of books and wine and the scars of battle. But the story itself has been little known beyond the scholarly community for decades: “A Room on the Garden Side,” written in 1956, ...