Angels

IT’S FAIR to say that Robbie Williams’ iconic song Angels is the most famous of his back catalogue and always gets everyone singing.

However, the man who claims to have originally wrote the song almost 30 years ago has reignited the decades old feud this week as he gave fans the inside story in a slew of new TikTok videos.

Irish singer-songwriter Ray Heffernan has always maintained that he wrote the first version of Angels in 1996.

However, although former Take That star Robbie confirmed that he recorded a demo with Ray, he has maintained he rewrote it significantly with Guy Chambers.

The singer also bought the rights to Angels from Ray for £7,500 before it was released in 1997.

However, over the years there has been a lot of bad blood between the two men concerning the song, and this week the feud over the iconic tune was reignited.

Read more on Robbie Williams

ROB THE MENTOR

Robbie Williams mentoring Brit rock star to stop him going off the rails

PRECIOUS MEMORIES

Robbie Williams and Ayda Field share rare family snaps for son’s birthday

It came when Robbie appeared on Radio 2 to talk about his debut album, and said: “I spoke a lot about the album I wanted to make, but the one I did make was Life Through A Lens.

“My memories of making it are, it took me less than two weeks with Guy Chambers to write the whole album.

“That didn’t necessarily mean that it was going to be a success. My album came out and it sold 33,000 copies in three months and that is not what EMI expected to do.”

Continuing with his story, the singer said: “I was about to be dropped and then fortunately I dropped The Angels, didn’t I?

“And it gave me the career that I’ve got today. I’m incredibly grateful for that song.”

But it was this last comment that appeared to really annoy Ray.

Sharing a POV video, the songwriter was seen on his couch reacting in response to Robbie’s comment about Angels, as he wagged his finger at the video and tutted with disapproval.

Since then, Ray has been dropping videos on TikTok, where he has been talking about Angels and how he “signed his rights away” to the song.

He also posted a throwback video of Robbie from 1997 where the singer talked about how he “wrote Angels in a couple of hours”.

Ray captioned the short clip with: “Body language never lies.”

The Sun has reached out to representatives of Robbie Williams for comment.

The last time the pair’s Angels feud was reignited was three years ago – again following Rob’s comments about writing the song.

It came after Ray was left incensed after listening to a Gary Barlow podcast in 2023 where the subject of who wrote Angels popped up again.

Robbie told his former Take That bandmate: “I was off my head basically, the record company has spent a lot of money signing me.

“I made a big song and dance about leaving Take That and wanting to do my own thing, and I hadn’t done anything.

“I thought I’d better get down to it, figure out my voice, and whether I can actually do this … I was at my sister’s house in the garden with a pen and a paper and I thought, right then, I’d better come up with something..(so I wrote) ‘I sit and wait .”…

Robbie then reportedly branded Ray a “fantasist” in the comments section of the podcast, after the songwriter revealed he was unhappy with what had been said.

Ray told The Irish Sun at the time: “How can Robbie Williams call me a fantasist?

“I have always maintained that as a young man, I wrote a song with Robbie, that went on to become his hit song Angels and my story of how that came about has never changed.

“Robbie now says publicly that I’m a fantasist. My question is what part of this am I making up?”

Ray also previously shared with The Irish Sun a picture featuring himself, Robbie and his family on the day he says they wrote the song together.

It was during Christmas 1996 when he met the singer in Dublin’s Globe pub.

Later the same evening, Ray claims that he invited Robbie around to his mum’s place to hear a song he’d just written.

Ray recalled: “We didn’t waste any time, starting that night where I got the guitar out in my mum’s house and played him this song I had been working on.

“This picture was taken the next night day when we played this new song. Robbie loved the song so much, he booked a studio to record his own version the next day.”

A few months later, Ray found out that Robbie was going to record Angels for his next album.

“I contacted Robbie’s management and his people said they would give us an amount of money if I signed a waiver denouncing any rights I had to the song,” he told us.

Robbie later worked on the song Angels with songwriter Guy Chambers.

The song went on to become the singer’s biggest selling single to date AND one of the biggest songs of the 90s.

Speaking about selling the rights to the song, Ray said: “I accepted a deal worth £7,500 to pay me for ‘all and any creative input’ into the song.

“I have the legal documents to prove it. So I am not making this up. You could certainly call me a dreamer in life but not a fantasist. I have never lied about this story, and every part of it is true”.

Back in 2017, Robbie defended the decision to pay Ray for Angels.

“We could have gone to court, and it all would have been down to whether what way the judge wakes up that day out of bed … So I gave him some money, and he went away,” the singer said.

MILAN — After a one-hour on-ice training session and on the way to yet another interview, Isabeau Levito has one big problem on her mind.

One of the plants in the U.S. figure skater’s room has started growing mold. She needs to figure out how to wrangle it.

“That’s our task of the day,” Levito said Monday.

Nevermind that the biggest competition of her life was starting in about 24 hours.

Isabeau Levito competes during the free skating competition at the U.S. figure skating championships on Jan. 9 in St. Louis.

(Jeff Roberson / Associated Press)

Levito and the United States’ “Blade Angels” are trying to stay calm under pressure at the Olympics, where chaos has reigned at Milano Ice Skating Arena.

The United States was expected to dominate figure skating in Milan, but has yet to win a gold medal in an individual event entering Tuesday’s women’s short program. A supposed sure-fire gold medal disappeared in stunning fashion with Ilia Malinin’s eighth-place collapse. Three-time reigning world ice dance champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates settled for a “bittersweet” silver that was marred by judging controversies.

But the talent and depth on what is likely the best U.S. women’s Olympic team in decades could help end a 20-year Olympic medal drought in women’s singles skating. The last U.S. woman to stand on an Olympic podium for an individual event was Sasha Cohen in 2006. Sarah Hughes’ 2002 gold medal was the last for the United States in women’s singles.

Alysa Liu has already ended one skid. The reigning world champion was the first U.S. woman to win the world title since 2006. With blonde horizontal stripes dyed into her black hair and a piercing in her upper lip, the 20-year-old Liu is putting an alternative spin on figure skating.

Three-time national champion Amber Glenn combines power in her triple axel with emotion on the ice.

Levito, the 2024 world silver medalist, is the classic balletic skater who packs a humorous punch behind her teenage smile.

In a sport that once pitted young women against each other to fit a singular “ice princess” mold, the “Blade Angels” find their strength in their diversity.

“I really like that we’re all so different,” Levito said. “We have our own strengths and our own personalities and our own ways we want to look and appear. … We all have the same passion for the sport and have very aligned goals of wanting to do our best, and once we do that, we’re all happy, regardless of who beat who.”

NBC announcing team Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir dubbed the trio of medal contenders “the big three,” but the skaters workshopped their own nickname after nationals. They nixed “Babes of Glory” and “Powerpuff Girls” for copyright concerns. Their final choice was a mashup of “Blades of Glory” and “Charlie’s Angels.” If you like it, credit Liu.

“If people don’t like it,” Liu said, “don’t say I made it.”

Liu and Glenn have already won a gold medal in Milan, helping the United States win the team event in dramatic fashion. But with the two events spaced more than one week apart, “being in a high-pressure atmosphere for so long takes its toll,” Glenn said.

The 26-year-old has faced additional challenges on social media at the Games. She had to resolve potential copyright issues concerning her free skate music and received threats for comments she made during a news conference when asked about President Trump’s policies regarding the LGBTQ+ community. Glenn, who identifies as bisexual and pansexual, encouraged people in the queer community to “stay strong during these hard times,” refusing to avoid political conversations because “politics affect us all.”

American Amber Glenn competes during the team skate at the Winter Olympics in Milan on Feb. 8.

(Natacha Pisarenko / Associated Press)

While she said Monday she doesn’t regret the comments, she has also had to take a break from social media to focus on her remaining competitions at the Olympics.

“I’m happy to do what I do and stand for what I stand for,” Glenn said. “But it has been —”

She paused.

“Complicated.”

Not only are the Olympic Games the largest stage for many sports and a dream that begins from childhood, but the spotlight has only increased with social media in recent years, Glenn said. Amid the pressure, she tries to lean on her teammates and embody the advice of U.S. figure skating alumni who tell her simply “enjoy it.”

“Four years ago, I could never have imagined even making it here,” Glenn said. “To just be here is a privilege that I don’t take lightly, and I need to remind myself of that and to just really soak in the experience, not just the results.”

Isabeau Levito skates during the U.S. figure skating championships on Jan. 11 in St. Louis.

(Jeff Roberson / Associated Press)

To reset after the team competition, the “Angels” went with the pairs skaters — whose competition started one week after the team event wrapped — to train at a U.S. facility in Bergamo, about a 50-minute drive outside of Milan. The training sessions are longer than what’s available at the competition venue, said Levito, who only took two training sessions in Milan before Tuesday’s short program.

The last U.S. figure skater to take Olympic ice, Levito has passed her time at the Games in the Olympic village. After making the Olympic team, the New Jersey native was most excited about the village. To her, it was going to be like “a magic kingdom,” she said before the Games.

It’s lived up to every expectation. She walks by the Olympic rings every morning. She and her teammates lounged in front of the TV watching the pairs competition Sunday and Glenn ordered ramen. Levito and U.S. ice dancer Christina Carreira named the adopted plants in their shared room Christabeau and Isatina. Levito is loving the experience so much that she won’t even harp on the fact that she briefly battled food poisoning.

She felt “horrible” off the ice, but it didn’t affect her training.

“When I was skating,” Levito said, “I flipped a switch in my head.”

She’ll need to switch it again Tuesday.

PALM BEACH, Fla. — As Major League Baseball closes in on an agreement for its players to participate in the 2028 Olympics, Commissioner Rob Manfred said the controversy surrounding LA28 chief Casey Wasserman would not impact the league’s final decision.

“Our dealings are not with Casey,” Manfred said Thursday at the MLB owners’ meetings. “Our dealings are with the institution of the Olympics.”

On Wednesday, amid a stream of artists dumping Wasserman’s talent agency and a growing list of civic leaders calling on him to resign, the executive committee of the LA28 board issued a statement backing Wasserman.

In recently released emails, Wasserman was linked to Jeffrey Epstein and his associate, Ghislaine Maxwell. The board retained a law firm to investigate, the statement said, and the review did not uncover any behavior beyond what was already known: a “single interaction with Epstein” on a plane flight for a humanitarian mission and raunchy emails with Maxwell, both two decades ago, before the “deplorable crimes” of both became public.

“Based on these facts, as well as the strong leadership he has exhibited over the past ten years, Mr. Wasserman should continue to lead LA28 and deliver a safe and successful Games,” the committee statement said.

Epstein died by suicide after his indictment on sex trafficking charges in 2019. Maxwell was convicted of sex trafficking in 2021.

Manfred declined to say whether he was concerned that an association with Wasserman could be detrimental for baseball.

“I’m going to pass on that one,” Manfred said. “People much closer to that situation are better to opine on that.”

Mark Attanasio, the Los Angeles-based owner of the Milwaukee Brewers, is a member of the LA28 executive committee. Attanasio said he would let the statement speak for itself.

While baseball is not new to the Olympics, the participation of major leaguers would be. In past Olympics, MLB declined to interrupt its season so its players could travel halfway around the world, and Team USA featured minor leaguers and college players.

MLB players already travel to Los Angeles every summer, and Wasserman has pitched Manfred and MLB owners in a variety of meetings on the benefit of using major leaguers at a time the league is focused on broadening its international appeal.

“What an incredible opportunity to elevate the sport in a city where you have one of the great cathedrals of the sport,” Wasserman told The Times last year. “There is no better chance to tell the global story of baseball than from the Olympics in Los Angeles.

“They understand that. We could have another Dream Team, or two, depending on the countries. That is a vehicle to tell the story of baseball around the world, and that is really powerful.”

MLB and LA28 officials have worked out a tentative timeline under which the All-Star Game would be played in its usual mid-July spot in 2028, most likely in San Francisco, followed by a six-day, six-team Olympic baseball tournament at Dodger Stadium.

“I think people have come to appreciate that the Olympics on U.S. soil is a unique marketing opportunity for the game,” Manfred said Thursday. “We’ve got a lot of players interested in doing it, and I feel pretty good about the idea we’ll get there.”

Are the Dodgers good for baseball?

Outfielder Kyle Tucker adjusts his Dodgers cap during his introductory news conference at Dodger Stadium on Jan. 21.

(Ronaldo Bolaños/Los Angeles Times)

The Dodgers’ signing of outfielder Kyle Tucker – for $60 million per year – revived the debate over whether the big-spending, star-studded, back-to-back champions are good for baseball.

“I think great teams are always good for baseball,” Manfred said. “I think, with respect to this particular great team, it added to what we have been hearing from fans in a lot of markets for a long time about the competitiveness of the game. But great teams are always good for baseball.”

MLB officials have cited that fan concern repeatedly over the last year, prelude to an expected push for a salary cap. Manfred declined to discuss the owners’ labor strategy but said he expected negotiations on a new collective bargaining agreement to begin after Opening Day and said he would not talk about MLB proposals until they are presented to the players’ union.

The current agreement expires Dec. 1, and a lockout is widely expected.

Where can you watch the Angels?

Angels star Mike Trout celebrates after hitting a solo home run against the Houston Astros on Sept. 28 in Anaheim.

(Wally Skalij / Associated Press)

The Angels already are in spring training, and yet their fans have no idea where to watch their games on television this season.

The Angels have agreed that MLB will provide a streaming option, and a team official confirmed they are still deciding whether to let MLB sell their telecasts to cable and satellite distributors or reinvent what remains of the FanDuel Sports channel already part-owned by the team, with the Kings joining the Angels.

The Angels’ situation is not unique. Three years ago, MLB did not provide broadcast services to any team. Today, amid the collapse of the cable and satellite universe, MLB provides broadcast services to 14 of its 30 teams — 15, if the Angels go that way.

In 2028, Manfred would like to sell national streaming packages, in the hope that more bidders would mean more revenue, a particularly acute need for the teams losing revenue as guaranteed rights fees are cut or eliminated altogether. The challenge: how to convince the Dodgers and other big-market teams to sacrifice their still-lucrative local rights so MLB can sell a 30-team package.

“Ideally, I’d love to get there,” Manfred said. “I don’t need to get all the way there to accomplish most of what I am thinking about.”

On Thursday, Manfred cited one way he could get close enough: have rival owners vote to expand the number of games — for the Dodgers or anyone else — that would be classified as national rather than local.

“We can take as many games as we want from any club in a national package,” Manfred said, “with a majority vote of the clubs.”

Major League Baseball is making streaming options available for fans to watch in-market games of 20 teams, including the Dodgers, Los Angeles Angels, San Francisco Giants and San Diego Padres — a significant shift to respond to the fast-changing TV landscape.

The Angels on Tuesday announced its arrangement with the league to make its games more widely available. The club said the option — Angels.TV — would be available for purchase for $99.99 for the full season or $19.99 per month through the MLB app.

“We are excited to partner with Major League Baseball to bring Angels games to their streaming platform,” Angels President John Carpino said in a statement. “Our priority is making it as easy as possible for fans to watch Angels Baseball and MLB’s industry-leading app provides another great option to stay connected to the team.”

The league separately announced the move, which provides options for fans of other teams, through its MLB app. In-market games for the Arizona Diamondbacks, Baltimore Orioles, Cincinnati Reds, Cleveland Guardians, Colorado Rockies, Kansas City Royals, Miami Marlins, Milwaukee Brewers, Minnesota Twins, New York Mets, Philadelphia Phillies, St. Louis Cardinals, Seattle Mariners, Tampa Bay Rays and Washington Nationals will be provided through the app.

Games will still be available to traditional pay-TV subscribers.

Spectrum, owned by cable giant Charter Communications, which distributes the Dodgers’ SportsNet LA had previously made available Dodger games as a streaming option through a separate app.

On Tuesday, ESPN announced that it would become the new streaming home of MLB.TV, bringing out-of-market live games to the ESPN App and ESPN.com.

“With MLB.TV now available through ESPN, we’re taking a significant step forward in reinforcing ESPN as the home of the MLB regular season while deepening the value proposition of the ESPN Unlimited plan – giving fans even more flexibility in how and where they watch all season long,” Rosalyn Durant, Executive Vice President, ESPN Programming & Acquisitions, said in a statement.

The move comes as traditional regional sports networks struggle amid the exodus of pay-TV customers. Regional sports networks once were viewed as cash cows for teams and TV programming companies that owned them but, in recent years, at least one regional sports network owner has filed for bankruptcy. That pompted the MLB to step in to fill the gap.

The league said it also was taking over the television production of games for 14 teams, including the Padres and Arizona Diamondbacks.

Former Baltimore slugger and cancer survivor Trey Mancini is taking another shot at a major league comeback after agreeing to a minor league contract with the Angels that includes an invitation to big league spring training.

The Angels on Wednesday listed the infielder among their 27 non-roster invitees to camp in Tempe, Ariz.

The 33-year-old Mancini has batted .263 with 129 homers and 400 RBIs over parts of seven seasons, but he hasn’t played in the major leagues since 2023. He began his career by playing parts of six seasons with the Orioles, hitting a career-high 29 homers in 2019.

Mancini then missed the 2020 season after surgery to remove a malignant tumor from his colon. He made a successful return to the Orioles in 2021, and he won a World Series ring in 2022 after Baltimore traded him to the Houston Astros.

He spent part of the 2023 season with the Chicago Cubs. He has since played in the minor-league systems of the Reds, Marlins and Diamondbacks.

Mancini opted out of a minor-league deal with Arizona last July after batting .308 with 16 homers for triple-A Reno.