SHARON JONES & THE DAP-KINGS: "Please Come Home For Christmas."

THE LEMON TWIGS play for WFUV at Rockwood Music Hall.

PARQUET COURTS play for WFUV at Rockwood Music Hall.

THE MARCUS KING BAND plays World Cafe.

THE RACONTEURS return with “Sunday Driver” and “Now That You’re Gone.”

WOODY GUTHRIE: Hear and unearthed song from 1954.

EURYTHMICS'. Dave Stewart declares "Christmas is For Lovers".

PAUL McCARTNEY was the Greatest Beatle?

THE RUNAWAYS' bassist Jackie Fox is a Jeopardy chamption.

SNAIL MAIL: Lindsey Jordan talks to SPIN about touring Europe, her plans for 2019, and more.

THE NUMBER ONES ooks at the Beatles' secular hymn "Let It Be."

ELIZA DUSHKU: I worked at CBS. I didn't want to be sexually harassed. I was fired.

ALADDIN: Entertainment Weekly has your first look. People have thoughts on Will Smith.

HELLBOY: The reboot drops a trailer online.

THE  BRADY KIDS revisit the old house.

PENNY MARSHALL Did It Her Way, Yes, Her Way.

KATE MIDDLETON & MEGHAN MARKLE: Modern women who are changing the monarchy.

BRAD PITT turned 55 with his kids at home.

AMERICA'S WEALTHIEST CELEBRITIES, according to the latest Forbes List.

A LION shows you his O-face.

A MASSIVE, 400-LB HOG weighing nearly 400 pounds was captured by a team of dogs and trappers in Palm Bay, FL.

THERE ARE 14 MANDARIN DUCKS (that we know of!) in NYC.

YOU CAN SING ME ANYTHING: A Tribute to 69 Love Songs.

RYLEY WALKER, Live in Brooklyn, Dec. 14, 2018.

AMY GRANT plays a holiday-themed Tiny Desk Concert. 

PAUL McCARTNEY plays "Get Back" with Ringo and Ronnie Wood.

RICHARD THOMPSON: Tales Of The Unexpected.

JEFF TWEEDY shares stories from his recently-released memoir and songs from his new solo album.

ED SHEERHAN tour has ended 2018 as the highest-grossing tour of the last 30 years.

THE NUMBER ONES looks at Simon & Garfunkel's classic "Bridge Over Troubled Water."

PENNY MARSHALL, who costarred as a Milwaukee brewery worker in Laverne & Shirley before becoming a director of hit movies such as Big and A League of Their Own, has died. She was 75.

PETE DAVIDSON: Lorne Michaels is getting him help. And Rep. Dan Crenshaw reached out to him.

MEGHAN MARKLE declares herself "very pregnant."

EMILY BLUNT & JOHN KRASINSKI give a rare joint interview and reveal why they've kept their careers separate, the reason they made an exception for A Quiet Place.

THE CHILLING ADVENTURES OF SABRINA gets renewed for Seasons 3 and 4.

DARK CRYSTAL: AGE OF RESISTANCE has a ginormous voice cast.

TONY'S COMPASS: How Anthony Bourdain Became the Food TV Star of a Generation.

MUTANT SHARKS have been found hiding out inside a deadly underwater volcano.

FOUR DEAD, NAKED MOLE RATS LATER, the National Zoo's colony has finally chosen its queen.

POACHER sentenced to watch Bambi. Monthly.

A 13-FT PYTHON in your bed; that's Queensland.

JON PRATT: Pate's frontman gets soulful on "Testify," with a guitar that once belonged to a member of the Wrecking Crew.

LUCY DACUS, Live at Brooklyn Steel.

PHOEBE BRIDGERS, Live at Brooklyn Steel.

JULIEN BAKER, Live at Brooklyn Steel.

KIM WILDE drunkenly warbles "Kids In America" and "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" on the subway.

JOE OSBORN, a bassist for the legendary Wrecking Crew, who played on tunes as silly as The Monkees theme and as sublime as Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” died of pancreatic cancer on Dec. 14 at 81.

THE CLASH gets two and a half hours of discussion and analysis on Political Beats with guest CJ Ciaramella of Reason magazine.

THE GUMMY AWARDS winners are announced.

THE BEST COVER SONGS of 2018, according to Cover Me.

THE NUMBER ONES looks at Shocking Blue's English-as-a-second-language pop nugget "Venus" and Sly & The Family Stone's irony-laced funk anthem "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)."

WOODY ALLEN is accused of having a hidden eight-year "affair" with 16-year-old model Babi Christina Engelhardt in 1976.

LES MOONVES will not be getting his 120MM million severance, as CBS concluded after a months-long investigation that there is, indeed, merit to numerous claims that its former CEO sexually harassed several women over the course of decades.

GEOFFREY RUSH has denied new allegations of inappropriate behavior, amid an ongoing defamation battle with an Australian newspaper that published sexual harassment claims. And here's why Yael Stone is terrified to talk about Geoffrey Rush.

MORTAL ENGINES is expected to lose at least 100MM.

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, VOL. 3 has a script, and it may be making people cry.

PRINCE HARRY will miss out on the traditional Boxing Day pheasant shoot with his brother Prince William at Sandringham to avoid upsetting his animal-loving wife Meghan.

THIS DOG loves her wheelchair cause it means she gets to play outside.

BEAGLEY FIELD: A mass of silliness.

DOG: Been Caught Stealing.

NEW JERSEY is first state to ban wild animal circus acts.

THE GAP BETWEEN HOLIDAYS really created a lull across showbiz, but:

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse tops the chart with 35.4MM. That's near the low end of projections, but we are now entering the real cash register portion of the season, so this -- and The Mule, which placed with 17.2MM -- will probably build over the week and into the weekend and ultimately turn in decently leggy performances. We had become used to a Star Wars movie coming every Christmas and blowing up the chart, so you have to go back a few years to recall what the pattern is with a normal slate of movies. Moreover, I'd bet word-of mouth about the Spider-Verse clues people in that this is a good movie for anyone, not just the kids. The Grinch shows with 11.6MM on a leggy 24 percent drop more indicative of what we should see generally through year's end. Ralph Breaks the Internet takes the fourth slot with 9.6MM; it continues to perform somewhere between Moana and Coco, but it might also be the most vulnerable to the competition coming this week.  The debut of Mortal Engines rounds out the Top Five with 7.5MM and will likely get yanked from screns quick in favor of Mary Poppins Returns on Wednesday and especially Aquaman and Bumblebee on Friday.

ARIANA GRANDE, PETE DAVIDSOON, KANYE WEST & NICKI MINAJ made a social media mess.

HARVEY WEINSTEIN & JENNIFER LAWRENCE both denied there had been any sexual relationship between them.

CYBILL SHEPHERD revealed that she too had once been propositioned by disgraced former network titan Les Moonves.

BRADGELINA's custody battle stressed the kids.

PEANUTS: New content will be under the Apple umbrella.

More tomorrow, I hope!

THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE:

...with A CHRISTMAS SHINDIG! The full episode has gone dark, but still-available clips from 1964 include The Beach Boys' "Dance, Dance, Dance," Bobby Sherman and Donna Loren singing "Keep on Searching," the Righteous Brothers doing "The Jerk" and an awesome milk commercial, Adam Faith with "Watch Your Step," and "Santa Claus Is Back In Town", Bobby Sherman with "Sleigh Ride," Donna Loren returning with a Spector-esque, but rougher "Santa Claus is Coming to Town," and The Beach Boys deliver a set including "Little Saint Nick," "Monster Mash" (yes, really) "Papa Oom Mow Mow," "Johnny B. Goode," and "We Three Kings."

KURT VILE stops by World Cafe.

THE MC50 stops by KEXP.

H.E.R. plays a Tiny Desk Concert.

ALEX CHILTON: Hear his cover of Louis Jordan's “Don’t Let The Sun Catch You Crying" and “Lonely Weekends,” both preciously unreleased.

GREG LAKE of Emerson, Lake & Palmer, with his solo hit "I Believe in Father Christmas," which (iirc) got to No.2 in the UK behind Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody."

THE ROCK & ROLL HALL OF FAME officially announced its 2019 inductees: Radiohead, Janet Jackson, Stevie Nicks, Def Leppard, The Cure, Roxy Music and the Zombies. Radiohead was underwhelmed.

KEITH RICHARDS has given up drinking: “It was time to quit.” (Note: he's talking about booze, not blood.)

THE TOP 100 LPs of 2018, according to NME.

WFMU’s Free Music Archive is saved (but won’t be run by the station anymore).

THE NUMBER ONES looks at the Jackson 5's national debut "I Want You Back," one of the greatest No. 1 singles of all time.

NOW SHOWING: This weekend's wide releases include Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse, which is currently scoring 98 percent on the ol' Tomatometer (and deservedly so -- see below); Mortal Engines, which is scoring 28 percent; and The Mule, scoring 68 percent. There's also Once Upon a Deadpool, the PG-13 version of the sequel reimagined through the frame of The Princess Bride, complete with Fred Savage; it's scoring 51 percent, but a share of the profits are going to a cancer charity here because it is mostly a way to get the franchise into the Chinese market.

SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE is quite arguably the best comic-book movie of the year, in a year we got Black Panther and Incredibles 2. It's a fun-filled visual feast that fully realizes all the dynamism a mind fills in reading comics. It's 3-D. it's 2-D, it's anime, it's Rauschenberg swinging from a skyscraper and popping you in the eyes with a mighty "THWAAK!" It's more psychedelic than Dr. Strange. Yet it's also filled with the sort of character moments that are the secret of the Marvel franchise on top of the phantasmagorical set pieces, ample comic relief, homages to the late, great Stan Lee (plus other artists) and the original Spider-trilogy directed by Sam Raimi. And yes, there's a little something something for those who stay past the end credits.

ELIZA DUSKU got a secret (until now) 9.5MM sex harassment from CBS after working on the set of Bull. And the network cluelessly gave her outtakes that contained evidence of the harassment.

KEN JEONG to host the Oscars?

JENNIFER GARNER and J.J. ABRAMS, together again (professionally).

DUCHESS MEGHAN has had enough of the rumors surrounding her and her family members.

DAX SHEPARD was quick to shut down reports he cheated on Kristen Bell with Julie Andrews' granddaughter, Kayti Edwards.

STARGIRL  has cast S.W.A.T.'s Lou Ferrigno Jr. as the Golden Age Hourman.

STAR TREK: DISCOVERY has a Season 2 trailer online.

SONDRA LOCKE, who received a supporting actress Oscar nomination in her first movie role for The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, but may be best known for Sudden Impact, died Nov. 3 at 74.

MANDARIN DUCK meets... Mandarin Dog.

HOW HOUSE CATS spread across the world.

CHRISTMAS IN THE SOUTH: There's a new animal pulling Santa's sleigh this year: "Reingators."

A PARROT has fallen in love with his owner's Amazon Alexa - but keeps using it to order shopping. (NSFW content on the page.)