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Olivia Rodrigo’s Daisy Chain Fields: A New Feminist Music Festival Takes Shape 31 August 2026 at 23:27

Olivia Rodrigo’s Daisy Chain Fields: A New Feminist Music Festival Takes Shape

31 August 2026 at 23:27

At the first Daisy Chain Fields festival, the 23-year-old pop star presented a cross-generational vision of female empowerment. (With Taco Bell activations, too.)

World news | The Guardian
Tennessee to wear Dolly Parton tribute on helmets during 2026 college football season 31 August 2026 at 23:19

Tennessee to wear Dolly Parton tribute on helmets during 2026 college football season

World news | The Guardian

By: Agencies

31 August 2026 at 23:19

Beloved singer died last week at the age of 80
Parton was born 30 miles from college campus

The Tennessee Volunteers will be honoring Dolly Parton with a helmet sticker this season, the college football team’s head coach, Josh Heupel, announced on Monday.

Parton, a Tennessee native, died last week at the age of 80 from cancer.

The Guardian
A$AP Rocky review – arena spectacular has plenty of helicopters but little sense of direction 31 August 2026 at 16:47

A$AP Rocky review – arena spectacular has plenty of helicopters but little sense of direction

The Guardian

By: Stevie Chick

31 August 2026 at 16:47

O2 Arena, London
The polymath rapper’s stage show, which also features SWAT teams and a warship, is truly bravura stuff – but you can’t help feeling this is an artist at a creative crossroads

A$AP Rocky dangles precariously from a helicopter, while beneath him black-clad SWAT officers brawl with his white-masked followers. This isn’t some cliffhanger setpiece from the rapper/actor’s latest film – it’s just how shows on his Don’t Be Dumb tour open. It’s a big production: there are further prop helicopters, including a smaller one up in the rafters from which he also raps (a reference to his single Helicopter), while the stage recreates the top deck of a naval warship, for reasons that never become clear.

The bizarre set underscores a sense of a man in career transition, unsure who he is any more. In the eight years since his last album, this survivor of homelessness and incarceration became a father, three times, with Rihanna; he’s pivoting towards movies – good ones – and co-chairs the Met Gala. His new record sought to redefine him as an artist, juggling more of his trademark pugilistic rap with ambitious stylistic experiments and unexpected collaborations (Damon Albarn! Danny Elfman!).

The Guardian
Dolly Parton laid to rest in private Nashville funeral 31 August 2026 at 19:17

Dolly Parton laid to rest in private Nashville funeral

The Guardian

By: Owen Myers

31 August 2026 at 19:17

The queen of country was interred next to her late husband in an intimate ceremony attended by close family

Dolly Parton was laid to rest in a private ceremony in Nashville on Friday, her family has confirmed.

The queen of country music, who died aged 80 on 25 August “after bravely facing a brief battle with cancer”, was interred at Woodlawn Memorial Park and Mausoleum alongside her husband of 60 years, Carl Thomas.

World news | The Guardian
Dolly Parton laid to rest in private Nashville funeral 31 August 2026 at 19:17

Dolly Parton laid to rest in private Nashville funeral

World news | The Guardian

By: Owen Myers

31 August 2026 at 19:17

The queen of country was interred next to her late husband in an intimate ceremony attended by close family

Dolly Parton was laid to rest in a private ceremony in Nashville on Friday, her family has confirmed.

The queen of country music, who died aged 80 on 25 August “after bravely facing a brief battle with cancer”, was interred at Woodlawn Memorial Park and Mausoleum alongside her husband of 60 years Carl Thomas.

The Guardian
A job that changed me: Being a theatre usher cracked open my heart to beauty 31 August 2026 at 18:00

A job that changed me: Being a theatre usher cracked open my heart to beauty

The Guardian

By: Freya Bennett

31 August 2026 at 18:00

The performances often gave me goose bumps, but I also got to observe the highs and lows of audience behaviour

Read more in this series here

I was 24, had just moved into a share house I couldn’t afford, and my job as a nanny was proving less than ideal. I’d graduated from my music degree a few years prior and was floating along, feeling a little lost.

A friend had told me to apply to become a front-of-house staff member at Australia’s busiest performing arts centre, Arts Centre Melbourne. It was a rare opportunity, as people rarely quit. To be surrounded by art again sounded like a dream.

The Guardian
Tupac Shakur murder trial: jury begins deliberations after hearing closing arguments 1 September 2026 at 00:42

Tupac Shakur murder trial: jury begins deliberations after hearing closing arguments

The Guardian

By: Gabrielle Canon and Roque Planas

1 September 2026 at 00:42

Former gang leader Duane ‘Keffe D’ Davis, 63, is accused of ordering the killing of the hip-hop star in 1996

A Las Vegas jury is now deliberating after hearing closing arguments in the trial of the South Side Compton Crips gang leader Duane “Keffe D” Davis, who is accused of ordering the murder of hip-hop legend Tupac Shakur.

Davis, 63, is accused of leading a group of men to kill Shakur in retaliation for the beating of his nephew, though not of pulling the trigger himself. Davis has pleaded not guilty.

Reuters and the Associated Press contributed reporting

The Guardian
Anthropic sued over alleged theft of ‘tens of thousands’ of songs 31 August 2026 at 15:42

Anthropic sued over alleged theft of ‘tens of thousands’ of songs

The Guardian

By: Dan Milmo Global technology editor

31 August 2026 at 15:42

AI company faces multibillion dollar lawsuit over misuse of copyrighted songs to train Claude models

All AI wants for Christmas is a vast back catalogue of songs without paying for it, according to a multibillion-dollar lawsuit against the startup behind the Claude chatbot.

Sony Music Publishing and Warner Chappell, music publishers who manage the copyright of songs on behalf of songwriters and composers, are seeking damages for alleged misuse of “tens of thousands” of copyrighted works by Anthropic.

The Guardian
Bel review – the powerful life force and haunting absence of a traumatised singer-songwriter 31 August 2026 at 11:00

Bel review – the powerful life force and haunting absence of a traumatised singer-songwriter

The Guardian

By: Phil Hoad

31 August 2026 at 11:00

Beldina Odenyo alchemised the pain of exile, loss and racism into music as Heir of the Cursed before her death in 2021, as this attentive tribute explores

Instead of an artist in a booth, a lone amplifier plays the music of singer-songwriter Beldina Odenyo for a cluster of microphones to pick up during the posthumous recording of her debut album. It is a haunting encapsulation of the absence and presence at the heart of Louise Lockwood’s documentary, which makes a commendably thorough exploration of the mental illness that led to Odenyo killing herself in November 2021, and its roots: exile, loss and racism.

Performing under the moniker Heir of the Cursed, a translation of the Tetela name of assassinated Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba, Odenyo was on the verge of bigger recognition at the end of 2021 after a successful performance at Edinburgh’s Usher Hall. But hemmed in by successive Covid lockdowns, the 31-year-old is clearly unwell in a discomfiting backstage interview. Squirming, monosyllabic, she seems to be regressing to the non-verbal state of shock in which she arrived in Dumfriesshire from Kenya as a young child.