Brooklyn Mirage was supposed to reopen May 1, but things aren’t going as planned. In December the East Williamsburg music venue announced major renovations, hoping to fix their not-great reputation, especially after two men left separate shows there and were later found dead in the nearby creek in 2023. But the reopening weekend was canceled, and then so was the weekend after that, and the one after that. Now, the CEO of its parent company Avant Gardner is no longer with the company, according to an email sent to employees.

Two weeks ago Taylor Swift was subpoenaed to testify in her longtime friend Blake Lively’s lawsuit against Justin Baldoni, the director of her movie It Ends With Us. Lively is suing Baldoni for sexual harassment and a supposed online smear campaign waged against Lively after the harassment allegations came out. Confirming the subpoena, a rep for Swift noted that she “never set foot on the set of this movie, was not privy to its creation in any way, “and was traveling around the globe during 2023 and 2024 headlining the biggest tour in history.” She did, however, hang out with Blake Lively during the making of the movie; the photo above shows them together at the Super Bowl in February 2024.

Pop stars loving acting at the moment. Charli XCX starred in the new season of Overcompensating and the Weeknd’s new film Hurry Up Tomorrow just hit theaters. Now, Bad Bunny is joining Austin Butler and Zoë Kravitz for Darren Aronofsky’s forthcoming movie Caught Stealing.

We have a pope from Chicago, and now Finland has an envoy from a metal band. Freddy Lim is the frontman of the group Chthonic, and he was chosen by President Lai Ching-te as Taiwan’s ambassador of the Scandinavian country.

Last month, Samia’s exquisite Bloodless was our Album Of The Week. Last night (May 20) the indie singer-songwriter kicked off her tour and gave live debuts to the tracks and covered Waxatachee.

Paul Weller has announced a new covers album titled Find El Dorado. It features guests like Robert Plant and Noel Gallagher and takes on songs by Richie Havens, the Kinks, the Bee Gees, and more.

Artists like Cardi B, Randy Travis, Mary J. Blige, and the Dave Matthews Band have expressed support for the NO FAKES Act, a bill offering federal protection against unauthorized deepfakes of one’s name, image, likeness, or voice. Today, Martina McBride advocated for it before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law at a hearing.

In 2025, everything’s coming up These New Puritans. The brothers Barnett got a Charli XCX shout-out at Coachella. They got Caroline Polachek on a track. They got Alexander Skarsgård in a music video. They even got Hedi Slimane to shoot the above promo photo.

The new Smut song “Touch & Go” is rooted in indie rock history, but not like you’re thinking. Based on the title, you might think the latest Tomorrow Comes Crashing single takes influence from Touch & Go Records, a massively important label which — just like Smut — relocated to Chicago from elsewhere in the Midwest. But it’s actually inspired by “Time To Pretend,” the iconic opening track from MGMT’s debut album Oracular Spectacular. (MGMT will be the first to tell you they only recently became an indie band, but what does indie really mean anyway?)

Mama Killa is a hell of an album title, and its lead single suggests it will be a hell of an album.