stuff

Amy Winehouse’s dad Mitch was left devastated last month after unsuccessfully suing two of her pals for selling some of the star’s belongings.

But now Amy’s closest friend, fellow singer Tyler James, has revealed he plans to auction off more items which were once owned by the late superstar.

Last month the High Court ordered Mitch to pay almost £1million in legal fees after he lost his case against Amy’s stylist Naomi Parry and her pal Catriona Gourlay.

Both women insist they were either given or loaned the items they sold by Rehab singer Amy, and had not stolen them — as Mitch claimed.

And Tyler told how he had been upset when his own Amy auction had to be cancelled after Mitch called in the lawyers.

Handwritten song lyrics and Amy’s red bowling shirt were among the lots he had planned to sell at auction.

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Tyler told me: “I’ve been through hell. I just couldn’t deal with it.

“Sotheby’s explained to me that due to Mitch’s lawyers contesting ownership, they couldn’t go ahead with the sale and that I needed a lawyer. I felt as if I had done something wrong.”

Tyler and Amy met at the Sylvia Young Theatre School and lived together for several years until her death from alcohol poisoning at the age of 27 in 2011.

Tyler — who appeared on The Voice UK in 2012 — now hopes to restart plans for his own auction, saying that last month’s High Court ruling “changes everything”.

He said: “I loved Amy more than anyone else in the world.

“I supported her through all the years of drug addiction, self-harm . . .  you name it. I wanted to protect her.

“We had been through so much together, and nothing can take away what we shared — not possessions.”

Of the previously cancelled auction, he said: “I don’t know why he [Mitch] stopped it. He knew how much Amy meant to me.

“Shortly after she passed away, we went to Amy’s place and there were two pillows on her bed. He gave me one of them.”

Of Naomi and Catriona’s recent court victory, Tyler added: “I don’t speak to the girls much any more, but I’m really pleased for them.

“But maybe — and this sounds selfish — I’m much more pleased for myself. I haven’t decided what to do yet, but I will be ringing Sotheby’s.”

October marks two decades since the release of Amy’s second — and most successful — album, Back To Black.

Something tells me fans will be lining up to bid on whatever treasures Tyler has.

It’s Paris fashion chic . . . 

No fashion is tutu much for Paris Hilton as she poses in this striking mini-dress from a new collection she has helped design.

The socialite has teamed up with Betsey Johnson for a new range, which is launching this week to celebrate the US designer’s 84th birthday.

This white bow dress costs $119 – around £88 – and it sounds like they had a hoot designing it.

Paris told People mag: “We had the best time brainstorming together, playing with looks at fittings, and making TikToks on set.

“She has this magnetic energy that lights up the room, and getting to create something with her has been such a dream.

“She is just as fun, original and full of personality as her clothes, and she brings so much creativity into everything she does.”

Rihanna doesn’t lack drive

Rihanna had a full-circle moment as she took her kids to the home she grew up in – but they didn’t look too impressed.

She shared photos on Instagram of herself with sons RZA and Riot, as well as daughter Rocki, outside the modest property in Barbados.

The street was originally named Westbury New Road but was renamed Rihanna Drive in 2017 – and her childhood crib is now a tourist attraction.

The Umbrella singer wrote: “One minute I feel like that kid from Westbury. The next minute I’m bringing my own kids back to ‘Rihanna Drive’. Trippy how life works!”

Julie hangs up her ‘Princess’ crown

She made two of the most famous movie musicals in Mary Poppins and The Sound Of Music, but Julie Andrews’ days on screen are definitely over.

The Surrey-born star, now aged 90, announced she has retired from her acting career, but will still pursue other creative paths.

It means she will not star in Princess Diaries 3 – currently in development – after playing Queen Clarisse Renaldi in the 2001 original and 2004 sequel opposite Anne Hathaway as Princess Mia.

Explaining how she passed up the chance, she said: “I think I’m retired, really, would be about the best description for that. The film’s team asked me all last year if I would be keen to do it.

“It was very, very hard to say no, but I did because I felt I had a wonderful ride, and this one would flourish very well and wouldn’t need Granny going in there at my age.”

Julie’s last on- screen role was in the children’s Netflix series Julie’s Greenroom.

In a separate interview, she added of Princess Diaries 3: “I’m not going to be in it. I think the story is slightly different, and I’m not quite sure how they’re dealing with that.

“But it’s too late for me to do it.”

Be a prop star at sale

Pop culture fans can bag themselves something special as Propstore is putting on one of the biggest-ever auctions of signed memorabilia.

More than 1,700 film, TV and music props will be up for grabs, including a 1997 Spice World T-shirt signed by the Spice Girls, and a Back To The Future poster signed by Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd and other cast members.

Other notable lots include a replica sword from The Bodyguard autographed by Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner, and a vinyl LP from the cult movie Labyrinth, signed by one of its stars, David Bowie.

Before the live auction, which will run from August 26 to 29, you can see the full list of lots for yourself at propstoreauction.com.

Frankie’s binge too far

Who said the world of pop music was full of boozy antics?

S Club Juniors and The Saturdays star Frankie Bridge has revealed she’s just had her first hangover – years after her music career ended.

Speaking on the Bottoms Up podcast, she admitted: “I’m not a massive drinker. I’m a massive lightweight. I actually just had my first proper hangover last week – at the age of 37.

“It was honestly the worst day of my life and I was so pathetic, I cried. I washed my hair and then I couldn’t brush it so my friend Leah had to brush my hair for me and I was like, ‘This is a new low’.”

It came on the last day of her holiday after a night drinking mojitos, but she added: “I was fine by the time I got home and went in the gym.”

Trust me Frankie, if you were still able to go to the gym, you would never want to experience my hangovers.

Blur drummer Dave Rowntree says another reunion is a “question of when rather than if”. The band last played a gig two years ago, and he said: “I seem to remember us at Heathrow, saying, ‘We’ll do that again’. That’s my take.”

Spotify fake alert

Spotify is going to start flagging AI artists so that listeners know if they are getting computer-generated rubbish.

The streaming platform said fake acts’ profiles will be labelled “AI personas” and their music will be excluded from recommendations via its algorithm.

It’s hoped the crackdown will deliver a boost to real musicians and prevent artificial acts from taking over.

Spotify said: “True artist-fan connection can only be built on a foundation of trust and authenticity.

“In music, that means listeners need to be able to trust that the artist behind the music is who they say they are.

“That’s more essential than ever in the age of generative AI.” Good for them.

Country twist for ‘rock’ star

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson showed off his vocals in Moana and its sequel, as well as in the new Disney live-action remake.

Now the hardman actor is eyeing a career as a singer – by getting into country music.

The former wrestler said: “Music has always been such an anchor for me, and very specifically in genres that I love, like traditional country music.

“We’re exploring that now. I’ve reached this point in my life and career where, honestly, when I wake up in the morning I swing my legs out of bed, and whatever the thing is that I’m doing, I wanna feel like I’m just running towards it.

“And the most gratifying things we do are when it’s for us, because we have enough pressure to deliver for so many other entities.”

Country music is on the rise, with US singer Luke Combs playing three sold-out shows at Wembley Stadium last month, while Taylor Swift went back to her country roots for her Toy Story 5 soundtrack single I Knew It, I Knew You, which topped the charts.

But Dwayne will be keen not to follow in Hollywood star Will Smith’s footsteps. Last year, he released his comeback album, Based On A True Story – but it sold just 268 physical copies in the UK in its first week.

I have faith The Rock won’t settle for that type of knockout.

Scott Lay, an attorney by training, a fierce advocate for community colleges and the author of a must-read newsletter in the state Capitol, has died at 48.

His death prompted an outpouring of grief in Sacramento, from those who knew Lay as a lobbyist to subscribers of the Nooner, Lay’s daily email roundup of political news, legislative activity, job openings and policy, all laced with insider gossip and observations.

“He was so committed to his community, whether that was his neighborhood, whether that was the community college world, whether it was a political party,” said Lisa Ortega, Lay’s sister. “He was always trying to build bridges and make the world better.”

Lay’s final newsletter was sent on Sept. 8; he was found dead at his Sacramento home on Sept. 13. The coroner has not determined a cause of death.

Born in Portland, Ore., Lay grew up in Placentia. His family frequently talked politics at the dinner table, and the extended family had lively political debates at gatherings.

Lay had severe asthma as a child, which led to frequent hospitalizations at the Children’s Hospital of Orange County. His health issues prevented him from graduating from high school, but Lay earned his GED at 17 and enrolled at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa.

That’s where in 1991 Lay met Paul Mitchell, now a Democratic redistricting expert. They were in a speech class together; Lay would sometimes show up in scrubs after volunteer shifts at the children’s hospital. They cofounded a College Democrats chapter and served in student government and on the California Student Assn. of Community Colleges together.

“Getting into student government and getting into politics gave him a mission outside of himself,” Mitchell said, noting that when they first met, Lay volunteered escorting women into abortion clinics in the face of protesters. “Having that drive made him able to overcome a lot of his earlier health problems because he just had this focus and mission.”

Lay would go onto get a law degree from UC Davis, but his experience at Orange Coast was pivotal. He started working for the Community College League of California in 1995 and became its president and CEO in 2006.

“He was really passionate about the system and the access community colleges provided,” Mitchell said. “He saw in the system his story — a kid who doesn’t graduate high school growing up to become a CEO.”

Lay started working in Sacramento at a time of great turnover in the state Capitol because of term limits. Lay was among the new young lobbyists when he met Anthony York, then a cub reporter who now works in political communications, mostly for the California Medical Assn.

York and Lay became friends, and in 2004 the pair cofounded a daily email newsletter about politics called the Roundup, a precursor of the Nooner.

“Stuff like this was popping up in Washington. There was nothing like that in Sacramento,” York said. “Scott had the technical ability to make this stuff happen. He hand-coded it.”

(Lay also used his tech skills to create a legislative tracking and a campaign contribution database.)

The other blogs and emails at the time were largely simple aggregators of news stories; the Roundup and later the Nooner had personality, gossip, observations and quips. It was Politico before Politico. That’s why Lay’s loss was being mourned by many, said York, who worked for the Los Angeles Times from 2010 to 2014.

“Through his email, he had a very specific voice and type of coverage you normally don’t get. I think it really bred a familiarity with this kind of niche audience,” York said. “It’s written about insidery stuff for insidery types with a very personal tone and touch. I think it’s reflected in the reaction to the news of his death. You can sense a real void without that voice.”

Lay’s relationships crossed party lines. Another of his close friends going back to his college days is GOP strategist Mike Madrid, who was at Moorpark College at the time Lay was at Orange Coast.

“The band of us met and we differed a lot on policies, but we fell in love like brothers, and just kind of came up through the system together,” Madrid said.

Lay put on a sunny face on social media, posting about his latest haul from the farmers market and his trips to his favorite taco stand. But he also acknowledged struggles with alcoholism, and was in failing health in recent years.

His friends say that while he was publicly forging relations with so many people through his newsletter and on social media, he began isolating himself from his personal relationships.

“He was the first of our generation to go, and to go that way, and to have him slip through our fingers is just heartbreaking,” Madrid said. “He was extremely talented, not just on policy, not just on politics, but on both. And he loved being part of the Capitol community.”

In addition to Ortega, Lay is survived by his father, Roy Lay, and his mother, Linda James.

Lay and Mehta both served on the board of directors for the nonprofit Open California.

There was a time in the beginning of Sublime’s recent revival when Jakob Nowell, the son of the band’s late singer Bradley Nowell, saw himself simply as a good son trying to help his adoptive uncles — drummer Bud Gaugh and bassist Eric Wilson — restart his dad’s iconic Long Beach trio. The goal wasn’t to take the place of his frontman father who died of an overdose in 1996. “I’ll never look at it as my band. Sublime is my dad’s band, and I’m helping out, that’s all,” he told The Times in 2024. Luckily, he was wrong.

The journey of finding his own voice through his father’s sly, shambolic poetry and reggae rock anthems, along with his determination on the road with Gaugh and Wilson through a barrage of festivals and tour dates helped him eventually step into his own as a songwriter and Gen Z rock star. It’s all been done with the mission to preserving his dad’s legacy and having fun while doing it. Now it feels as natural as the trio sitting together on the waterfront in LBC’s shoreline marina within earshot of the bellowing horn of the Queen Mary earlier this year as they were finishing the recording of “Until the Sun Explodes,” the first album under the Sublime moniker in 30 years.

Just like the band’s original recipe of shoving punk, dub reggae, hip-hop and ska into a blender, the new songs dutifully stick to the formula along with Jakob’s soulful caterwauls that sound scarily similar to his dad. But what emerges from the 21-song tracklist is the evolution of a trademark sound that gives a nod to the past while standing strong on its own, just like Jakob, despite coming to the interview on crutches while healing from a performance-related knee injury. The band members chatted with The Times about recapturing the effortless essence of their immortal beach-ready sound and looking forward to a second chance to chase an endless summer.

This interview was edited for length and clarity

It’s kind of a rare thing for all three of you guys to be in one place at the same time. What was it like working in the studio together to finish the new album?

Bud Gaugh: Magical. Things are just coming together. We showed up, Jake had an idea for another song, and he sent us a little demo and said “Hey, this is what I’ve been thinking about.” And then we get down to the studio [in San Pedro], and he’s like, “Oh yeah, so I had another idea,” and kind of changed it. We jumped in there [and by the end of our sessions, we had written] brand new songs to the list of songs that we already had.

The band’s revival has been a long time in the making. I remember when you guys had your first show together, a surprise gig a couple years ago as part of a benefit show for the Bad Brains frontman H.R. Do you feel you’ve come a long way since then?

Eric Wilson: I never thought the chemistry would be like it was with Bradley.

Jakob Nowell: Especially now that we’ve been playing together this long, the chemistry is very much there. We’re just comfortable and having fun. Jamming together is the best. We get in there to do a take for a song, and I’m always like “Let’s just do like three more!” It’s just that much fun, and that’s how it feels playing live too.

When did the idea for creating a new album come about?

Gaugh: It was pretty much just while we were playing shows, At first, the idea was that we were getting together to do this benefit for H.R. [at Teragram Ballroom in December 2023]. We went from “How’s this going to work?” and then [after the show] it was like, “Wow, this is something special. We should definitely go out and play some more shows, and get this music out there and get the opportunity to bring the music to the people in the purest form that we possibly could.” As we’re doing that, it’s like we’re seeing the reaction in the fans, and we were feeling it emotionally. We realized this is going to be bigger than we ever thought. That’s when we really decided where it was going to go.

Jakob Nowell, right, once thought Sublime was only his late father’s band; now, fronting the Long Beach trio, he’s leading a new chapter that still honors Bradley Nowell’s legacy.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

Were any of the songs on the new album mined from previously unreleased material or did you start fresh?

Nowell: There was that song we did with Stick Figure [“Feel Like That”], so I think that kind of inspired us. [We realized] “Oh s—, there really is some meat on the bone.” And then I had found some old recordings of stuff that were just like jams without even like vocals or whatever. Then it became just this thing during sound check or maybe in the middle of sets, we’d just start jamming these random progressions and stuff, and it kind of just evolved from there naturally.

The new songs that I’ve heard fit right in the vein of what people love about Sublime. What was it like putting some of those new songs in the setlist as you were building them?

Nowell: It was like magic. We were joking yesterday that sometimes we’ll play a new song for the first time just randomly and I’d see people try mouthing the lyrics and stuff and I’ll say “you’ve never even heard this before! I know you haven’t. We don’t even really know what the hell we’re saying.”

Gaugh: You frontin’! [Laughs]

Nowell: But [the new material] sounded like it was supposed to be there, so it was kind of a rad little test in a lot of ways. We almost don’t even have to think about it. That’s always going to be the guiding goal of any band trying to make fun music that’s relatable.

Wilson: What if you’re Slayer? That’s not true if you’re Slayer.

Jakob, it seems like you’ve gotten a lot more comfortable in the frontman role since joining the band. What’s it like just taking the lead, not just for the sake of your dad, but for the fans?

Nowell: Oh, dude, it’s the best. I don’t even have to think about it. We really feel like this is — we’re a band, you know?

Gaugh: It’s [Jakob’s] band too. Now it’s our band. It’s us.

Nowell: It feels like that whenever we’re hanging out, just doing stuff, or at the studio or at these shows. So, this upcoming year feels like a really rad adventure. We got all these different eras [of fans] — people who were in their 50s when [Sublime’s] first stuff dropped, who are still alive, and then their kids and their grandkids and great grandkids. Everybody finds a piece of the discography they can relate to. That’s what is most exciting. It’s not just one or two songs, people sing along to everything.

I was at Warped Tour in Long Beach last year when you guys played and —

Nowell: That was my favorite set!

To me that felt like it encapsulated what you were talking about with the multigenerational groups of fans that have enjoyed you guys and associate you with Long Beach.

Gaugh: It was like a homecoming for me. I remembered playing the Chili Cook off, you know, right over there in the same area [as Warped Tour], and it was just bringing me back 30 years. It’s so meaningful to be in our backyard playing our music again, right there. This is where it all started. It’s come full circle.

Nowell: It was like playing at a local bar in a cool way. I had this huge group of people up front, they were just talking and shouting and saying stuff, like f–ing with us and joking around. I was like “Damn this is great!”

How about you, Eric? How’d you feel playing Warped?

Wilson: [Mumbles] It was f–ing awesome.

Now that you’ve played all these festival shows, from Coachella to No Values, you’ve got your own festival going on. Can you talk a little bit about Sublime Fest and your Sublime Reef Madness Cruise and how you came up with it?

Nowell: We could put on a bunch of the bands we love, and some of our boys, like Vandals, and make it our own vibe.

Gaugh: You walk around Coachella and there’s so many different elements there. Wouldn’t it be neat if we could make like all this like a Long Beach element, a Sublime element. Looking at this thing, it’s like “Oh wow. So we can actually get some of our friends and set up like a tattoo booth, and have our idea of art and everything out there, and mix it all together — food, art, music — bringing all these different elements, and friends of ours that play music. We get to decide who’s going to share the stage with us, so it’s really neat. It’s like planning a high school party or something like that.

Nowell: The biggest backyard party ever seen.

You guys always had your own sound going on, what’s it like to see that the fans still want it?

Wilson: It took a lotta years to catch on, but it did.

Nowell: Yeah, the kids really want that, like ‘90s, Y2K kind of vibe. That was the last era of like cool authenticity and stuff. You can see it when young people make stuff to look retro … when things get so high fidelity, we’re almost losing a little element, so I think these festivals kind of seek to bring some of that back in a way that everybody can get into.

With “Until the Sun Explodes,” Sublime’s first album in three decades, Jakob Nowell, Bud Gaugh and Eric Wilson rediscover their studio chemistry, jamming new songs that feel instantly familiar onstage.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

You guys also have the timeless iconography of the Sublime sun logo. The title of the album is “Until the Sun Explodes.” Does that title have any particular meaning to you?

Nowell: It’s almost just another way of saying “forever,” like “Oh baby I’m gonna love you till the sun blows up.” That’s gonna happen in billions of years, if at all. The fact that [Sublime’s] lasted this long and has this many fans is evidence to me that we wanna be here forever. I think that’s what everybody wants for themselves.

Jake, you’ve taken steps to advance your own aspirations and music with your label, Sunburnt Records, how does that fit into where Sublime is right now?

I was inspired by the whole Skunk Records thing [Sublime’s first label], Evan Zinger with [his lifestyle brand] SRH, and just all the local brands I grew up with when I was a kid. So just trying to do a cool, chill local thing that has that vibe of putting on small shows and kind of getting to use this new notoriety to be like, man, I have so many friends in these small bands like Strange Case and Eight Ball, and other bands up and down Southern California. Let’s put on shows and sneak them on a Sunburnt Stage at [Sublime Fest] and if people really like that Sublime sound here’s a bunch of kids who are carrying the torch like Slightly Stoopid did when they started out. Mike Watt always said “start your own band!” So the more we can inspire people to do that and be some small part of that, it’s a dream come true.

Do you feel like this version of Sublime is something Brad would be proud of?

Gaugh: We all kind of brought our own element to the music orignally. So we just kind of followed that recipe. Jake’s his own person, he’s got his own influences, and we just kind of stick with that idea. Jake brings in his feelings, and Eric brings in his and we sat there and recorded this song, and then as we were recording it, we’re coming up with ideas. It’s like, “Oh wait, we should do this here, slow that down there, stop here,” it’s all a conglomeration of ideas, everyone does their part, brings in their own spices and we mix it in a pot like gumbo.