Many thanks to the hundreds of you who entered the Def Comedy Jam UK Tour ticket-giveaway. The correct answer to the question below is highlighted:

Which ‘Bad Boy’ star was a regular host of the Def Comedy Jam series?

b) Martin Lawrence


The winners, who were chosen randomly from all correct entries, are listed below (and have been notified via email):

* Craig Price / Manchester: Manchester Apollo – Sept 16th

* Christian Vasquez / Birmingham: Alexandra Theatre – Sept 17th

* Christiana Ajilore/ London: Brixton Academy – Sept 20th

Congratulations to the winners! Remember to keep it locked on That Grape Juice for future competitions…

Britney's 'Circus' Due December 1st! After much speculation, Sony have confirmed that Britney Spears will indeed release new album this year. In the press release sent to media outlets this morning, including That Grape Juice, Sony confirmed the album will be called ‘Circus’ and will be preceded by first single ‘Womanizer’:

Jive/Zomba recording artist Britney Spears announces her sixth studio album, ‘Circus’, set for release December 1st. The first single from the album is titled “Womanizer” and was produced by the up-and-coming Atlanta production team The Outsyders. The album release date coincides with Spears’ birthday.

On the heels of an MTV VMA awards sweep, where Britney walked away with three Moonmen awards for “Video of the Year,” “Best Female” and “Best Pop Video” for “Piece of Me,” Jive Records is preparing her latest album, ‘Circus’, a follow-up to her critically well received album, ‘Blackout’. For her latest effort, Britney has enlisted a stellar group of established producers/writers that include Dr. Luke (who wrote and produced the album’s title track, “Circus”), Danja, Max Martin, Bloodshy & Avant and Guy Sigsworth (Madonna, Alanis Morissette, Bjork).

Britney Spears is one of the top-selling artists of the last decade,and to date, she has sold in excess of 62 million albums worldwide that include ‘Baby One More Time’ (1999), ‘Oops!…I Did It Again’ (2000), ‘Britney’ (2001), ‘In The Zone’ (2003), and ‘Blackout’ (2007), eight #1 worldwide singles and four consecutive #1 albums.

Wow. The latter part of this year is set to deliver some major releases; Beyonce, Ciara, Kanye, and now Britney. Exciting stuff.

Your thoughts?

Jennifer Hudson Gets Engaged According to People.com, Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson is engaged to boyfriend David Otunga who she’s been dating for little under a year:

Jennifer Hudson and boyfriend, David Otunga, have gotten engaged, her rep tells PEOPLE exclusively.

“I can confirm that Jennifer got engaged to her boyfriend David on Friday night in L.A.” says the rep.

Otunga, who is known as “Punk” from the reality show I Love New York 2, popped the question with a Neil Lane diamond ring on the Dreamgirls Oscar winner’s 27th birthday.

The couple, who have been dating less than a year, both hail from Chicago.

Professionally, it is a busy time for Hudson as well. Her debut solo album, Jennifer Hudson, will be in stores Sept. 30, and her next film, The Secret Life of Bees opens on Oct. 17.

No doubt, this one will raise a few eyebrows. In any case, congratulations to Jennifer and David.

Any thoughts?

The video for Leona’s 3rd UK single ‘Forgive Me’ premiered today. I must say, the clip for this Akon produced track is pleasantly surprising. Sans the gowns and big ballads Leona manages to serve up her best video yet IMO. Bright, colourful and visually engaging, this one is definitely a winner. The International star actually appeared to have been choreographed for the first time too. Good stuff.

What do you think of the video?

Rihanna Talks Money, Relationships & New LP In a recent interview with the UK’s Daily Mail newspaper, Rihanna spoke about her finances, being in the spotlight as well as shedding light on the direction of her new album. Check out extracts from the piece below:

On Her Finances

“You can’t get away from the business side. It takes over. The minute you get into the business side, it becomes you. I get business reports all the time because it’s my money. And I stay on top by living it, breathing it, thinking about it every day and every night.”

On The Paparazzi Following Her Home

“Barbados should be off-limits. It should be a getaway for me. My family lives there. It’s sacred. But these people follow me all the way to my home, all the way to the beach. It sucks. I spend most of my life in the public eye, but I don’t want to do that all the time. I don’t always want to be in front of a camera or looking my best. Sometimes, I just want to be me. But that’s hard when people wait outside my house and chase me. They follow me, they yell at me, and I can’t stop them.

On Being Overworked

I don’t want to work like a horse any more. When I first started, I didn’t know what to expect and I went with the flow. I got burned out, but I thought that’s how it was supposed to be. Even Jay looked at my schedule and thought it was crazy. I don’t ever want to hate what I do. I don’t ever want to say, ‘Ugh! Another day of this!’ I just want a gentler pace that allows me to recuperate and still love and enjoy it.”

On Relationships

It’s tough to have a relationship and be famous. And even if I’m not in a relationship, people want to match me up, or be in my private life all the time. It makes things difficult.”

“I want happiness. I want to have someone who is willing to grow with me, respect me, and I will give that back. They need to be a good person to me. That’s all.”

On Her New Album (Due Early Next Year)

I’m not going to give anything away but it’s going to be very edgy. Good Girl Gone Bad definitely spoke to a year in my life, a year of attitude. It stood for who I am – the attitude, the edge. My next album will take it up a notch. I want to keep growing. I don’t want to get stuck. I want to change.” {Source}

I’m sure the finances part was to combat the rumors of her being broke – which is all well and good. I maintain, however, that the girl still requires a little more media training as the ‘live and breathing the money’ part is easy to misinterpret as Ms. Fenty doing it all for the money – though I’m sure that’s not what she meant. Anywhoo….hurray…another Rihanna album…

Your thoughts?

Beyonce Shoots New Video Apologies for the slow go over the weekend; That Grape Juice has “A LOT” in store for you guys this week, starting from today (all will be revealed later….mwahahhahahahaha lol).
Anyway, Ms. Beyonce shot the video for one of her new singles ‘If I Were A Boy’ in New York, late last week in this cop get-up. Looks interesting…
‘If I Were A Boy’ was produced by Toby Gad, who was at the helm of Fergie’s ‘Big Girls Don’t Cry’. The song along with Bey’s other single ‘Single Ladies’ debut on October 7th…

Your thoughts?
Competition: Win Tickets To Def Comedy Jam's UK Tour (Reminder)!

As many of you know, That Grape Juice has teamed up with Live Nation UK to offer you the chance to attend the sold-out Def Comedy Jam UK tour, which will be making stops in Manchester, Birmingham and London. Click here to enter, if you’ve yet to already. Competition ends tomorrow (Sunday 14th September).

The Billboard Hot 100 All-Time Top Artists To celebrate their 50th Anniversary, Billboard have released the list of Hot 100 All-Time Top Artists. Consisting of stats and chartings from all of Billboard’s charts, the list below certainly provides many a surprise:

(more…)

Jermaine Dupri has once again given the masses an insiders look at Janet’s already-acclaimed ‘Rock Witchu Tour’, this time documenting the show’s opening night in Vancouver yesterday. Check it out:

The more footage I see of the tour, the more I’m hoping for a European leg/or set of dates. Word has it, Ms. Jackson may be hitting this side of the pond (Europe basically lol) early 2009. Watch this space…

Any thoughts?

Continuing along the promo trail for her sophomore effort ‘Sol-Angel & The Hadley Street Dreams’, Solange stopped by the Jimmy Kimmel Live show yesterday. She was interviewed and spoke on the Beyonce comparisons, ‘that’ Fox News interview and more. Peep her performance of ‘I Decided’ below:

Both the Knowles ladies definitely know how to work a stage, as Solange shows here. Great performance.

Your thoughts?

Kanye West Arrested At AirportRapper Kanye West was arrested today after a scuffle LAX airport in Los Angeles:

Kanye West has just been arrested at LAX for felony vandalism. A still photographer was trying to take pics of Kanye at the American Airlines terminal. According to our guy on the scene, Kanye allegedly confronted the photog and smashed his camera to the ground.

Our photog then began videotaping the scene when Kanye’s assistant grabbed our camera — a struggle ensued and the assistant threw the video camera to the ground, breaking it. When Kanye realized our camera guy had videotaped the incident, he rushed our guy and yelled, “Gimme that f**king tape!”

Both Kanye and his assistant have been arrested and will be booked. {Source}

My girl Necole Bitchie summed it up when saying: “Out of all days to be flipping out at an airport, this is definitely not the best one..”

…SMH…

Your thoughts?

Diva Mariah Carey took to the stage on Canadian Idol last night. Check out her performances of ‘I’m That Chick’ as well as ‘We Belong Together’ below:

Yawn. Yes this was marginally better than that Fashion Rocks performance of ‘I’m That Chick’ from earlier this week (she actually moved this time around), but I was still left short-changed. With both performances it was wildly obvious she was lip-synching 95% of the time (though ‘We Belong Together’ was decent-ish). This for a singer who is renown for her voice. I was even thinking the other day; all this talk of Mariah getting older being the reason for her voice being near-enough shot is without any ground IMO. I mean, one need not look further than vocalists such as Patti Labelle’s and co, who way into their old age can still blow as well as they could before.

Mariah already has her name etched in history for what she once was. However, my interest in what she currently is, is fast disappearing.

Anyway, in other Mariah news, she has announced that she has ditched manager Benny Medina. Instead of functioning as her manager, Medina will serve as more of a ‘creative director’ for the singer. Mariah will now be managed by her own company Maroon Entertainment. Ineresting… {Source}.

Your thoughts?

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