pulls

AN X Factor star has mysteriously pulled out of a major festival gig for “unforeseen” reasons.

The 30-year-old shot to fame on The X Factor in 2012 and went on to enjoy huge success as a musician.

The In It Together festival, which takes place this month in Wales, has announced that X Factor star Ella Henderson will not be appearing this year.

Taking to social media they said: “We’re very sorry to share that Ella Henderson has unfortunately been forced to cancel some of her upcoming appearances due to unforeseen circumstances, and as a result will no longer be appearing at In It Together Festival this year.

“We completely understand and support Ella’s decision, and we want to send our love and very best wishes to Ella and her entire team at this time.

“We sincerely hope to welcome Ella to In It Together in the near future.”

The statement continued: “While we know many of you will be disappointed, we’ve worked tirelessly behind the scenes at the last minute to secure a huge replacement artist and someone you absolutely do not want to miss.

“Join us on Sunday at 2PM on the Together Stage for the official reveal. Trust us… this is BIG.”

Ella found fame on the ITV talent show in 2012 aged 16 where she wowed judges with her rendition of Cher’s Believe before reaching the live finals.

But she finished in sixth place behind winner James Arthur.

Following her stint on the show, Ella went on to sign with Simon Cowell’s label Syco Music and released her first studio album, Chapter One, with the music mogul in 2014.

During her time with label, Ella scored several hits with her single Ghost, which she wrote with the American writer producer Ryan Tedder, and emotional ballad Yours.

She went on a four-year hiatus in 2015, and released her second studio album, Everything I Didn’t Say, in 2022. It became her second top 10 album in the UK.

Ella has received the Brit Billion Award, and nominations for four Brit Awards and an Ivor Novello Award.

Casey Means speaks during a Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions hearing on her nomination to be surgeon general on February 25. On Thursday, President Donald Trump pulled her nomination. File Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo

April 30 (UPI) — President Donald Trump on Thursday pulled the nomination of Casey Means for surgeon general and replaced her with Dr. Nicole Saphier.

Means, a medical doctor, is a Make America Healthy Again activist who doesn’t have an active medical license.

Saphier is a working radiologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York and a former Fox News contributor.

Trump announced the appointment on Truth Social.

“Nicole is a STAR physician who has spent her career guiding women facing breast cancer through their diagnosis and treatment while tirelessly advocating to increase early cancer detection and prevention, while at the same time working with men and women on all other forms of cancer diagnoses and treatments. She is also an INCREDIBLE COMMUNICATOR, who makes complicated health issues more easily understood by all Americans. Dr. Nicole Saphier will do great things for our Country, and help, ‘MAKE AMERICA HEALTHY AGAIN,'” the president posted.

Means’ nomination had stalled in the Senate. In February, she answered senators’ questions about vaccines, psychedelics and abortion pills.

Trump blamed Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., a physician, because he had refused to say if he would support Means.

He said, in a separate post: “Hopefully all of the Great Republican People of Louisiana, which I won, BIG, three times, will be voting Bill Cassidy OUT OF OFFICE in the upcoming Republican Primary!”

In January, Trump endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow, R-La., for the Louisiana Republican primary against Cassidy.

When reporters asked Cassidy about Trump blaming Means’ failed nomination on him, Cassidy said, “I can promise you, there are multiple people on the committee who decided to vote no,” Politico reported.

WASHINGTON — President Trump says he’s nominating Fox News Channel contributor Nicole Saphier for surgeon general after Casey Means’ path forward stalled in the Senate over questions about her experience and her stance on vaccines.

In a social media post Thursday, the Republican president said Saphier is “a STAR physician who has spent her career guiding women facing breast cancer through their diagnosis and treatment.”

Senators of both major political parties grilled Means on her vaccine stance and other health topics during a tense confirmation hearing, deepening doubts about her ability to secure the votes she needs for the role.

Earlier Thursday, Trump on social media commended Means as “a strong MAHA Warrior,” also criticizing the “intransigence and political games” from GOP Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who interrogated Means about vaccines during the hearing.

The withdrawal of Means’ nomination to be the next U.S. surgeon general is a blow to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his movement, which championed Means for the role as the country’s top doctor despite her nontraditional path in medicine and some controversial past remarks on vaccines and other health topics.

The withdrawal comes after tense exchanges between Means and lawmakers of both parties threw into question whether she could secure enough votes to advance out of the Senate health committee. Her nomination had languished since her confirmation hearing in late February, even as activists from Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again movement orchestrated a push to support her bid by surging phone calls to Republican senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, who had both indicated reservations with the pick.

In nominating Means last May, Trump sought to hire a close ally of Kennedy as the nation’s doctor. Means, a Stanford-education physician whose disillusionment with the healthcare system led to her career as an author and entrepreneur, promotes ideas popular with the MAHA movement, including that Americans are overmedicalized and that diet and lifestyle changes should be at the center of efforts to end widespread chronic disease.

KYLIE Jenner seductively pulled down her skimpy swimsuit as she cuddled her new kitty for a slew of sexy selfies.

The socialite, 28, has become a cat mom since her beloved 11-year-old Italian Greyhound, Norman, passed away last year.

And is seems that the stunning beauty mogul is enjoying the company of her new four-legged friend.

Taking to Instagram, Kylie posed up a storm in a seriously skimpy outfit, writing a caption which read: “me + my lip liner + and my kitty.”

She shared four photos to the platform, with each of the snaps being selfies of the star as she rocked a gray bathing suit.

The swimsuit was strapless and had cutout details, displaying her toned physique.

The first image saw Kylie pulling her cut-out bikini down a little while applying lip gloss in a huge mirror.

Her cleavage was on full display as she pouted up a storm and applied the lip product with her long raven locks framing her face.

The second snap saw her standing up straight while holding her adorable fluffy friend.

Posing with her kitty, Kylie pouted while lifting the kitten up to her cheek.

The third photo was of Kylie posing with her hair all over her face, and the fourth was a video of her cradling the kitty and kissing it.

“Absolutely beautiful,” swooned one fan in the comments section.

“You’re perfect” swooned another.

“That cat makes me smile,” said someone else.

Meanwhile, on Reddit, one penned: “Her body is amazing. Go Kylie go. Love what she’s wearing. The kitten is adorable.”

“Why is she pulling on her bottoms in 1?” asked someone else.

A third Reddit fan then speculated: “Hmmm she’s looking extra toned lately in the abdominal area.I think she got sum fat removed or something?”

While a fourth said: “I honestly wonder how often these girls go under the knife? They always look different.”

This comes after The U.S. Sun revealed Kylie‘s former housekeeper, claimed she was forced to clean Timothee Chalamet’s mansion without being properly paid in an explosive new lawsuit.

Angelica Vasquez also said she was belittled over her race, religion and immigration status by fellow domestic staffers.

Brothers Leo and Oliver Kremer visited karaoke spots around the globe and almost always had the same impression.

“The drinks weren’t always great, the aesthetics weren’t always so glamorous, the sound wasn’t always awesome and the lights were often generic,” says Leo, a former bassist of the band Third Eye Blind.

As devout karaoke fans, they wanted to level up the experience. So they dreamed up Mic Drop, an upscale karaoke lounge in West Hollywood that opens Thursday. It’s located inside the original Larrabee Studios, a historic 1920s building formerly owned by Carole King and her ex-husband, Gerry Goffin — and the spot where King recorded some of her biggest hits. Third Eye Blind band members Stephan Jenkins and Brad Hargreaves are investors of the new venue.

Inside the two-story, 6,300-square-foot venue with 13 private karaoke rooms and an electrifying main stage, you can feel like a rock star in front of a cheering audience. Want to check it out? Here are six things to know.

1. Take your pick between a private karaoke experience or the main stage

A unique element of Mic Drop is that it offers both private karaoke rooms and a main stage experience for those who wish to sing in front of a crowd. The 13 private rooms range from six- to 45-person capacity. Each of the karaoke rooms are named after a famous recording studio such as Electric Lady, Abbey Road, Shangri La and of course, Larrabee Studios. There is a two-hour minimum on all rentals and hourly rates depend on the room size and day of the week.

But if you’re ready to take the center stage, it’s free to sing — at least technically. All you have to do is pay a $10 fee at the door, which is essentially a token that goes toward your first drink. Then you can put your name on the list with the KJ (karaoke jockey) who keeps the crowd energized throughout the night and even hits the stage at times.

2. Thumping, high sound quality was a top priority

As someone who toured the world playing bass for Third Eye Blind, top-tier sound was a nonnegotiable for Leo. “Typically with karaoke, the sound is kind of teeny, there’s not a lot of bass and the vocal is super hot and sitting on top too much,” he says. To combat this, he and his brother teamed up with Pineapple Audio, an audio visual company based in Chicago, to design their crisp sound system. They also installed concert-grade speakers and custom subwoofers from a European audio equipment manufacturer called Celto, and bought gold-plated Sennheiser wireless microphones, which they loved so much that they had an 8-foot-tall replica made for their main room. Designed by artist Shawn HibmaCronan, the “macrophone,” as they call it, has roughly 30,000 mirror tiles. “It spins and throws incredible disco light everywhere,” says Leo.

3. A concert-level performance isn’t complete without good stage lighting and a haze machine

Each karaoke room features a disco ball and dynamic lighting that syncs up with whatever song you’re singing, which makes you feel like you are a professional performer. There’s also a haze machine hidden under the leather seats. Meanwhile, the main stage is concert-ready with additional dancing lasers and spotlights.

4. The song selection is vast, offering classics and new hits

One of the worst things that can happen when you go to karaoke is not being able to find the song you want to sing. At Mic Drop, the odds of this happening are slim to none. The venue uses a popular karaoke service called KaraFun, which has a catalog of more than 600,000 songs (and adds 400 new tracks every month), according to its website. Take your pick from country, R&B, jazz, rap, pop, love duets and more. (Two newish selections I spotted were Raye’s “Where Is my Husband” and Olivia Dean’s “Man I Need,” which both released late last year.) In the private karaoke rooms, there’s also a fun feature on Karafun called “battle mode,” which allows you and your crew of up to 20 people to compete in real time. KaraFun also has an entertaining music trivia game, which I tested out with the founders and came in second place.

5. The interiors are inspired by 1920s music lounges mixed with ‘70s disco vibes

If you took the sophisticated aesthetic of 1920s music lounges and mixed it with the vibrant and playful era of 1970s disco culture, you’d find Mic Drop.

When you walk into the lounge, the first thing you’ll see is a bright red check-in desk that resembles a performer’s dressing room with vanity lights, several mirrors and a range of wigs. “So much of karaoke is about getting into character and letting go of the day, so we had the idea to sell the wigs,” says Oliver. As you continue into the lounge, the focal point is the stage, which is adorned with zebra-printed carpet and dramatic, red velvet curtains. For seating, slide into the red velvet banquettes or plop onto a gold tiger velvet stool. Upstairs, you’ll find the intimate karaoke studios, which are decorated with red velvet walls and brass, curved doorways that echo the building’s deco arches, says Mic Drop’s interior designer, Amy Morris of the Morris Project.

6. You can order nontraditional karaoke bites as you wait for your turn to sing

While Mic Drop offers some of the food you’d typically find at a karaoke lounge such as tater tots, truffle popcorn and pizza, the venue has some surprising options as well. For example, a 57 gram caviar service (served with chips, crème fraîche and chives) and shrimp cocktail from Santa Monica Seafood. For their pizza program, the Kremer brothers teamed up with Avalou’s Italian Pizza Company, which is run by Louis Lombardi who starred in “The Sopranos.” He’s the brainchild behind my favorite dish, the Fuhgeddaboudit pizza, which is made with pastrami, pickles and mustard. It might sound repulsive, but trust me.

As for the cheeky cocktails, they are all named after famous musicians and songs such as the Pink Pony Club (a tart cherry pomegranate drink with vodka named after Chappell Roan), Green Eyes (a sake sour with kiwi and melon named after Green Day) and Megroni Thee Stallion (an elevated negroni named after Megan Thee Stallion).

The BBC has seemingly pulled episodes of Top of the Pops that featured Scott Mills from iPlayer after the corporation made the decision to dismiss the radio star last month

The BBC has seemingly pulled episodes of Top of the Pops that featured Scott Mills from iPlayer. In yet another scandal for the public broadcaster, Scott Mills, a BBC radio favourite for decades, was axed from his role in March.

The Mirror revealed that the former BBC Radio 1 and 2 DJ was questioned in 2018 over the historical allegations of serious sexual offences, but the investigation – which began in 2016 – was closed in 2019 after the CPS deemed there was insufficient evidence to bring charges.

The allegations are reported to have happened between 1997 and 2000. The Metropolitan Police told the Mirror that the teenage boy at the centre of the investigation was under 16.

For more than 40 years, Top of the Pops was the BBC’s major music programme that showcased the acts who were in the charts that week and gave a platform to some of the biggest names in the industry, with the likes of The Beatles, Spice Girls and Madonna amongst countless others all having performed on it over the years.

READ MORE: BBC bosses poised to offer Scott Mills Radio 2 replacement to rightful ‘heir’READ MORE: Scott Mills replacement hopefuls battling it out for his Radio 2 job

The programme, which ended in 2006, is still repeated regularly but now the The Sun has reported that the three episodes in which Scott, 53, served as host, have now been wiped from the corporation’s streaming service.

The episodes in question originally aired in 1999 and around that time, he welcomed the likes of Billie Piper, Mariah Carey and Westlife onto the show to perform their latest singles. The Mirror has contacted the BBC for comment.

On Wednesday April 1, The Mirror revealed that the BBC was forced to terminate Mills’ contract after receiving compelling new information. The BBC then confirmed the Mirror’s report a day after it emerged that they knew of information relating to the police investigation. They pledged that they were “doing more work to understand the detail of what was known by the BBC at this time.”

The Metropolitan Police said a man, who was in his 40s at the time of the interview in 2016, was investigated over allegations reported to have happened between 1997 and 2000. Today, BBC News reported that director general at the time, Tony Hall, was not aware of the allegations.

The investigation was dropped in 2019 after the CPS deemed there was insufficient evidence to bring charges. As first reported by the Mirror, Mills was sacked over allegations relating to his ‘personal conduct’ after the final edition of his breakfast programme aired.

Following his dismissal, Mills issued a statement via lawyers thanking his well-wishers. He said: “I wish to thank from the bottom of my heart all those who have reached out to me with kindness, my former colleagues, and my beloved listeners, who I greatly miss.”

On the police probe, he said: “The recent announcement that I am no longer contracted to the BBC has led to the publication of rumour and speculation. In response to this the Metropolitan Police has made a statement, which I confirm relates to me.

“An allegation was made against me in 2016 of a historic sexual offence, which was the subject of a police investigation in which I fully co-operated and responded to in 2018.”

He added: “Since the investigation related to an allegation that dates back nearly 30 years and the police investigation was closed seven years ago, I hope that the public and the media will understand and respect my wish not to make any further public comment on this matter.”

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